A second attempt

Well, we'll be heading back to the airport again tomorrow lunchtime for a new attempt to spend a little time in the UK (so there is unlikely to be much from me until mid next week). This time we're flying with SAS to Heathrow. I don't care that it means having to get the coach from there to Gatwick to visit my family if I can avoid flying with that 'other' airline whenever I can.

Added bonus: my other half has not experienced the joys of travelling on the M25 motorway before, so that will be a new delight for him...

"A bit more exotic"

Glamour model Jordan and husband Peter Andre have named their newborn daughter Princess Tiáamii after their mothers (Thea and Amy). The accent on the first 'a' is apparently to make the name " a bit more exotic" and the double i to make it "different" - well, they're right there...

The Sun newspaper in the UK has very kindly provided a tool (at the bottom of the page) to help you decide on your own child's name using the same principles. So, what names can we expect to see on the children of the future...?

Home, sweet home - part 2

One of my main aims this rainy Sunday is to finish off the painting that I started yesterday and finish tidying up the apartment a bit more so that I can set up some valuations with estate agents - exciting, but scary too. (Maybe that is why I'm sitting here at the computer, writing about it rather than actually doing the painting...?)


Anyhoo, mortgage provider Realkredit Danmark offers a quick online valuation guide on its website (Danish only, I'm afraid). It seems to be a very quick-and-dirty calculation, as all you need to put in is the postcode, the attractiveness of the property's location in the area, the size in square metres, number of toilets, type of heating, building year, year of any major renovation and the condition of the year. Press the button and, hey-presto, it comes up with a figure for you.

As I say, a very quick-and-dirty calculation, but as a guide it seems okay, given the price of similar places to mine on the market now. But let's see what the estate agents say...

Great minds think alike

likemind is a concept that developed after Noah Brier wrote an entry on his site saying how he would be interested in meeting other bloggers living in or visiting NYC in person. The reply he received from Piers Fawkes led to them starting a coffee meet-up for like-minded people once a month; and so likemind was born.

The concept really seems to have taken off; in just a year it has developed into coffee morning held in 32 cities across the continents. Among them are Copenhagen, Stockholm and Malmö. So if you're in either of the first two (unfortunately, the Malmö meeting is cancelled this month) or, of course, in any of the other 29 host cities, and you like what you see on the website, why not check it out tomorrow.

(I cannot say how the coffee meets are as, I'm sorry to say, they are held at precisely the time that I really cannot sneak out of work...)

Strange things seen in Copenhagen, no.1

After living here in Copenhagen for just over six years now, there are some things that no longer seem strange to me, but which I found very puzzling when I first arrived. One of these was the many people in the city (well-dressed as well as not) who will wander up to a rubbish bin in the street and poke around in it, looking for empty bottles.

Denmark uses a system of deposits on glass and plastic bottles and cans to encourage recycling. After you have finished your drink you can take the container back to the supermarket, put it into a 'reverse vending machine' and you get a voucher that you can use in that store.

These means that as well as people rooting around in bins in the street, there are often queues in the supermarkets at the weekends (especially after big holidays like Christmas and New Year) of people returning crate after crate of their Carlsberg bottles. (Actually the picture in that link is rather civilised compared with the reality of the machine jamming when it thinks you're putting in the bottles too fast, or of realising just too late that the can still had some dregs left in it, as they trickle down your arm and seep into your sleeve.)

On the whole, I think the system is a great idea - recycling without really thinking about it, and it brings the added amusement of watching visitors' faces when they see that guy delve into the bin for a prized Tuborg can.

Airline moan

Yes, another one, I'm afraid... Today I checked with my credit card company only to find that the airline who cancelled our flight have not refunded all of the money that we paid for the flights. No, instead they have kept hold of Dkr 140 (about €20) as a handling fee.

I know this is a small amount of money really and that they are probably within their rights to keep this "handling fee", but, oh, it makes me mad - just the principle that they are the ones in the wrong and then they fail to give us all the money back.

Well, it has made me decide once and for all that I will boycott that particular airline, even though they are the only one to fly from Copenhagen and Stockholm to the London airport that suits me best. My decision will not make an iota of difference to their revenues, but it gives me pleasure to imagine if everyone on that flight (and all flights that they have previously cancelled) did the same [evil smirk].

There is Nothing Wrong in This Whole Wide World

I stumbled upon this today - truly beautiful...

Where is everybody?

It must have been the same last year and perhaps I think this each summer, but where is everybody? Walking through the city at 19.30 on a Saturday evening there was no one around.

Every July the majority of smaller shops close for much of the month for their summer holidays, but this year it seems that even more people have deserted the capital. Perhaps it has something to do with the bad summer weather that Scandinavia has experienced these past few weeks, or maybe it really is like this each year and I just forget. But whatever the cause, the city seems empty.

- - - - - - -

Just after I started writing this, the power went out in this area and stayed out for a couple of hours. It was then that you could really notice how little noise we actually make ourselves - the place was silent in the semi-darkness. The majority of the noise that we generate seems to come from tvs, stereos, radios and other electrical equipment. Without the use of these it was eerily silent here...

...but enough of the moaning

Despite the cancellation of our trip to the UK, we were still able to make a holiday of our time off work and spent three days in Budapest, which is a truly beautiful and fascinating city.

This was my second visit to the city in only about six or seven weeks but that did not matter as there was more than enough to do, including trying out some great Hungarian wines, visiting the Gellért baths and fitting in a little time for shopping.

A little annoyed...

I'm trying to resist venting my spleen about problems with a certain Scandinavian airline (whose name is another word for the British currency), but let me just say that I am less than happy as we were booked on a flight with them last Saturday evening and arrived at Copenhagen airport only to be told very rudely that we could not check in as our flight was cancelled and had to stand in a queue for the ticket office. After two hours in said queue, we were handed a photocopy of the contact page from the company's website and were asked to leave the airport, with no explanation given for why the flight was cancelled and nothing offered in the way of help to those who had travelled from elsewhere in Denmark, from Sweden or who were heading home to the UK. When I called the number on the page, I was told that the first flight that they could offer us was Thursday (not much use when our return flight was booked for Friday evening).

Unfortunately, all the other airlines were fully booked until Wednesday, so we had to cancel our holiday as well as the belated birthday celebration that I was due to have there. I know that this is always a risk with travelling on a low-cost carrier but an apology of some form would have made it somewhat less of a bitter pill to swallow - rather than being treated as an inconvenience.

Luckily, we were able to grab a last-minute flight to Budapest (thank you, Wizz Air!) four hours before it left and had a great few days there. And we will be attempting our UK trip again in a couple of weeks - on SAS this time.

What's that they say about telling one person after a good experience, but 10 after a bad one...?

Daylight robbery?

After taking the decision to move up to Stockholm, I signed up with Hemnet to receive emails whenever a new apartment was put on the market in the city. Now is the quiet period of the year and the emails are averaging 2 emails with one or two apartments a week rather than daily with up to 20 as was the case earlier in the year.

But of this morning’s two newly available apartments, one really caught my eye as the price tag seemed a little steep. When I clicked on the link I found that it was actually even steeper than I had first thought – the price is fixed at Skr 10,300,000m (around €1,125,000m) but the apartment is only 128 square metres. So, despite only having one bedroom (two if you converted the dining room), the place is on the market at Skr 80,469 (around €8,785) per square metre! Given that most apartments in that part of town are already on the market for a not-inconsiderable Skr 40,000-50,000 per square metre, you can understand my surprise.

Book review – Modern-Day Vikings

I recently finished reading Modern-Day Vikings: A Practical Guide to Interacting with the Swedes by Christina Johansson Robinowitz and Lisa Werner Carr. The book provides a brief history of the country and sets out to explain Swedish social democracy (‘cradle to the grave’ system) and cultural concepts such as lagom and jantelagen.

The book is aimed mainly at people moving to and doing business in Sweden from the USA, so perhaps they would see the cultural differences as more extreme than someone from elsewhere in Europe. Nonetheless, it seems to be a very useful guide that offers some insight into the country and its culture.

For me, reading it was a positive experience too after all the depressing statistics I had seen in previous weeks, as it suggested that maybe things will not be as complicated as I have made them to be in my head: my protection mechanism of always thinking through what the worst case scenario could be, so there is always upside – I guess I am a ‘glass is half empty’ girl then…

Back to the book: in one way I cannot say how useful the book actually is until I come to rely on what it is told me and put it to practical use next year but it was an interesting read. I would recommend it anyway, just for its descriptions of lagom and jantelagen – two rather complicated concepts for those who have not grown up in Scandinavia – and of the Swedish social system and culture.

Pink Prank Project

How much fun is this?!