Anyways, this past weekend was (for the most part) phenomenal. At one point (about three beers into my brewery tour and tasting and, admittedly, a little bit tipsy) I looked over to one of my friends from my Economic Theories of Globalization class, raised my glass, and proclaimed "touche DIS!" I'm still not quite sure what I meant by that, but I think it mostly regarded me being pleased with the overall study tour experience of the weekend.
Let's recap: On Thursday morning, Ingrid woke up at the first fart of the lark (for those of you who aren't my dad, that's REALLY early) to drive me into the train station at Hillerød. I took the train down to Nørreport and was on a bus heading toward Jutland at 7:45 that morning (surprisingly right on schedule). We first travelled to Århus to visit an art museum and get the cultural aspect of the weekend off to a start. The museum (ARoS) was wonderful, although we didn't have quite enough time to visit all of the nooks and crannies of it. A couple of highlights (pictures will be on facebook and linked here soon, I promise) were "The Nine Spaces," a collection of dark, creepy rooms that were an exhibition of art created using mainly light and sound; a 20 foot tall lifelike figurine of a Gollum-esque young boy; and Andy Warhol's Marilyn Monroe. We also got lunch at a little buffet on the main drag of Århus before getting back on the bus to head to our first academic stop of the trip.
And that stop was at Suzlon. Suzlon is a windmill company that is based in India and has a research center in Denmark to mainly snipe the expertise of jaded ex-Vestas employees. Between Suzlon itself and its sister company REpower, it comprises the third largest windmill producer in the world. We were given a presentation regarding green energy in general, wind energy in particular, and Suzlon's independent strategy to grow and continue to corner the green energy market. An interesting fact that I didn't know before the visit is that wind energy cannot be stored, and thus it is inefficient to power more than about 20% of a grid using it. In fact, there are times (mostly during the wee-night hours) that Denmark sends its extra wind energy to Germany and Sweden free of charge because there is too much of it being produced in Denmark for the overnight demand.
After the visit at Suzlon, we drove to Herning and checked into our Danhostel for the evening. I thought about renting the movie "Hostel" for the night, but decided that that might be a bad idea. Anyways, the hostel fed us, and then we walked about 2 miles into town to find a couple of bars to spend a few hours before bed.
The next morning we were up early to travel to Bang & Olufsen, a high end electronics store in denial about its gradual economic decline. To give you an idea of the attitude at B&O, they claim that their competition is less with Sony and Panasonic and more with Gucci and Lexus. We did have a decent presentation to get the morning started, where they explained what it's like to be the producer of a purely luxury good and danced around the questions we asked regarding substitutions away from luxury goods resulting from the current economic climate. We then had a dreadfully boring tour of their factory that lasted about an hour too long. I seriously wondered how many aluminium rods I could be shown before grabbing one and bashing myself over the head with it. After that was over, we moved on to the demos. These were cool. Say what you want about the prospect of spending thousands (or even hundreds of thousands) of dollars on Audio/Video equipment, but their products were nice. The first demo was that of their high end sound system (that can only be found in Audis, Aston Martins, and Mercedes). You have never heard music in a car sound that amazing (and you probably never will). They then showed us a $300,000 room completely decked out with a B&O soundsystem, television, a 100" projection screen, and smart-light technology. We watched some concert footage, and it was absolutely unreal. With the surround sound, you could honestly convince yourself that you were at the concert, except our seats were better than any that were actually there. I have pictures from in there too, but I'm not sure how well they came out.
After the B&O visit, we travelled about an hour north to Dare Adventure Center to play paintball. I thought that it was tuition money well spent, and we all had a great time. We played for about three hours (and I have the welts to prove it) in a forest and cityscape before departing for our hostel in Aalborg. It took about another hour to get there, and by the time we arrived, the ladies were definitely ready to be off of the same bus as some of us, admittedly very sweaty, gents. We had about 30 minutes to pass the 23 of us through 5 showers, but with a show of true efficiency (every economist's dream), we were able to get everybody cleaned off before dinner.
Dinner was at the local Bryghus (Brewhouse). A microbrewery was kind enough to welcome two DIS groups at the same time, giving about 60 of us tours, and a very fun tasting. The New Ale was one of the most delicious brews I have ever had the pleasure of drinking, and the three others that I demoed were almost equally as delicious. They also served us a very large, very delicious dinner of ribs and potatoes before unleashing us on the poor, unsuspecting town of Aalborg.
That night, we partied like crazy. We started at a little bar called Robin that had very cheap drinks, but almost no atmosphere. A friend and I were accosted by three of the biggest, foulest, meanest Danish women that I have yet encountered, who were more then willing to voice their displeasure with our inability to speak their language. Need I remind them that a) we are trying to learn it, and b) there are only 5 million of them that speak it. They left shortly thereafter and we didn't encounter them for the rest of the evening.
After Robin, four of us went to scope out potential party sites for the evening's festivities. We happened upon a location called The Hollywood Bar that, despite a very good dance-floor, a live DJ, and cheap drinks, was dead. We literally quintupled their clientelle when the four of us walked in. Spotting a win-win opportunity in the making, we approached the bartender and told him that, in exchange for a round of drinks, we could have 30 of our American friends in his bar within half-an-hour. At first he was very skeptacle and wasn't really having it, but we eventually convinced him that we could come through on our end of the deal. He agreed, and we got to work. We walked up and down the street locating the rest of the DIS students scattered amongst the bar and convinced a good deal of them to join us at The Hollywood Bar after they finished their current round. It took almost 30 minutes, but we got a solid party started from scratch (that lasted well into the night and eventually included a mix of Danes and DIS students) and got our free drinks to boot! The operation was certainly a success!
I rolled back to the hostel at about 2 the next morning, surprisingly sober and remarkably with-it. I did, however, crash very hard as soon as my head touched my pillow. That ended the best day in Denmark I've had thus far!
Saturday was pretty much a throwaway day. In the morning I regretted surprisingly few of the decisions I had made the night before and felt more or less fine. Except for the nasty cold that I'd caught from somebody (my guess is either Kristian or somebody on the bus on the way to Jutland...there's no way to be certain). I still have the sniffles as I stand in the DIS basement computer room writing this, but I'm definitely on the upswing. Saturday started with a tour of the Utzon Center (Jørn Utzon was the Danish architect who designed the Sydney Opera House). I was not particularly impressed. The architecture of the center (which was designed by him) was disappointingly bland, and the tour was led by an intolerably cheery woman who I wouldn't have been able to stand had I been completely healthy and had had a full night's rest. After the longest hour of my life, we got back on the bus and headed to our lunch location, a Danish Kro ( a hotel in the woods). It was the most traditional Danish meal we had the entire trip, and included a lot of tasty Danish fish dishes and some leverpostej (liver patte). After the meal, we played a speed round of mini-golf and got on the bus to head back to Zealand (the Island that København is on). A very quiet five hours later we rolled back into Frue Plads (where the whole journey had started) and I hustled to catch the next train home from Nørreport.
Sunday was when I was the sickest, and I spent most of the day napping, watching a movie with the equally sick Jakob, and doing a little bit of homework. This morning I was feeling much better (at least well enough to venture into the city for class) and am ready to attack another week.
In summary, it was an awesome Study Tour, and I am really excited for my trip to Belgium and Germany in October!
That's all for now. Pictures will be up on facebook later this week.
After the visit at Suzlon, we drove to Herning and checked into our Danhostel for the evening. I thought about renting the movie "Hostel" for the night, but decided that that might be a bad idea. Anyways, the hostel fed us, and then we walked about 2 miles into town to find a couple of bars to spend a few hours before bed.
The next morning we were up early to travel to Bang & Olufsen, a high end electronics store in denial about its gradual economic decline. To give you an idea of the attitude at B&O, they claim that their competition is less with Sony and Panasonic and more with Gucci and Lexus. We did have a decent presentation to get the morning started, where they explained what it's like to be the producer of a purely luxury good and danced around the questions we asked regarding substitutions away from luxury goods resulting from the current economic climate. We then had a dreadfully boring tour of their factory that lasted about an hour too long. I seriously wondered how many aluminium rods I could be shown before grabbing one and bashing myself over the head with it. After that was over, we moved on to the demos. These were cool. Say what you want about the prospect of spending thousands (or even hundreds of thousands) of dollars on Audio/Video equipment, but their products were nice. The first demo was that of their high end sound system (that can only be found in Audis, Aston Martins, and Mercedes). You have never heard music in a car sound that amazing (and you probably never will). They then showed us a $300,000 room completely decked out with a B&O soundsystem, television, a 100" projection screen, and smart-light technology. We watched some concert footage, and it was absolutely unreal. With the surround sound, you could honestly convince yourself that you were at the concert, except our seats were better than any that were actually there. I have pictures from in there too, but I'm not sure how well they came out.
After the B&O visit, we travelled about an hour north to Dare Adventure Center to play paintball. I thought that it was tuition money well spent, and we all had a great time. We played for about three hours (and I have the welts to prove it) in a forest and cityscape before departing for our hostel in Aalborg. It took about another hour to get there, and by the time we arrived, the ladies were definitely ready to be off of the same bus as some of us, admittedly very sweaty, gents. We had about 30 minutes to pass the 23 of us through 5 showers, but with a show of true efficiency (every economist's dream), we were able to get everybody cleaned off before dinner.
Dinner was at the local Bryghus (Brewhouse). A microbrewery was kind enough to welcome two DIS groups at the same time, giving about 60 of us tours, and a very fun tasting. The New Ale was one of the most delicious brews I have ever had the pleasure of drinking, and the three others that I demoed were almost equally as delicious. They also served us a very large, very delicious dinner of ribs and potatoes before unleashing us on the poor, unsuspecting town of Aalborg.
That night, we partied like crazy. We started at a little bar called Robin that had very cheap drinks, but almost no atmosphere. A friend and I were accosted by three of the biggest, foulest, meanest Danish women that I have yet encountered, who were more then willing to voice their displeasure with our inability to speak their language. Need I remind them that a) we are trying to learn it, and b) there are only 5 million of them that speak it. They left shortly thereafter and we didn't encounter them for the rest of the evening.
After Robin, four of us went to scope out potential party sites for the evening's festivities. We happened upon a location called The Hollywood Bar that, despite a very good dance-floor, a live DJ, and cheap drinks, was dead. We literally quintupled their clientelle when the four of us walked in. Spotting a win-win opportunity in the making, we approached the bartender and told him that, in exchange for a round of drinks, we could have 30 of our American friends in his bar within half-an-hour. At first he was very skeptacle and wasn't really having it, but we eventually convinced him that we could come through on our end of the deal. He agreed, and we got to work. We walked up and down the street locating the rest of the DIS students scattered amongst the bar and convinced a good deal of them to join us at The Hollywood Bar after they finished their current round. It took almost 30 minutes, but we got a solid party started from scratch (that lasted well into the night and eventually included a mix of Danes and DIS students) and got our free drinks to boot! The operation was certainly a success!
I rolled back to the hostel at about 2 the next morning, surprisingly sober and remarkably with-it. I did, however, crash very hard as soon as my head touched my pillow. That ended the best day in Denmark I've had thus far!
Saturday was pretty much a throwaway day. In the morning I regretted surprisingly few of the decisions I had made the night before and felt more or less fine. Except for the nasty cold that I'd caught from somebody (my guess is either Kristian or somebody on the bus on the way to Jutland...there's no way to be certain). I still have the sniffles as I stand in the DIS basement computer room writing this, but I'm definitely on the upswing. Saturday started with a tour of the Utzon Center (Jørn Utzon was the Danish architect who designed the Sydney Opera House). I was not particularly impressed. The architecture of the center (which was designed by him) was disappointingly bland, and the tour was led by an intolerably cheery woman who I wouldn't have been able to stand had I been completely healthy and had had a full night's rest. After the longest hour of my life, we got back on the bus and headed to our lunch location, a Danish Kro ( a hotel in the woods). It was the most traditional Danish meal we had the entire trip, and included a lot of tasty Danish fish dishes and some leverpostej (liver patte). After the meal, we played a speed round of mini-golf and got on the bus to head back to Zealand (the Island that København is on). A very quiet five hours later we rolled back into Frue Plads (where the whole journey had started) and I hustled to catch the next train home from Nørreport.
Sunday was when I was the sickest, and I spent most of the day napping, watching a movie with the equally sick Jakob, and doing a little bit of homework. This morning I was feeling much better (at least well enough to venture into the city for class) and am ready to attack another week.
In summary, it was an awesome Study Tour, and I am really excited for my trip to Belgium and Germany in October!
That's all for now. Pictures will be up on facebook later this week.
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