Barcelona – Day 2

Well at 2am this morning I finally got into my hotel room. What a fiddle yesterday was, but today more than made up for it. I woke at about 9:30 without any idea what time it was, seeing as my room has no windows. By 10am I was mixing with the tourists in the centre of the city, trying to navigate my way to the Picasso museum.

Unfortunately, it seemed as though every other foreigner in the city was heading to the same place. The narrow streets were overcrowded and when I eventually got to the museum entrance, the queue was 200 deep at least. Sack that – let’s go for a wonder.

So I did, and stumbled across some old blokes playing boules in a park. They all seemed rather chirpy and clearly at ease with the world. What stuck me though was how smartly dressed they all were. Ironed shirts and pullovers, one guy even in a suit. Clearly today was the bi-weekly Barcelona pensioners’ boules tournament. What a way to spend the day.

I quickly realised my mistake of forgetting sunglasses for this trip. Copenhagen now is pretty damn chilly, but certainly not Barcelona in October; thought it isn’t unbearably hot. I passed two guys – pale, blonde, fat and most obviously Danish – walking through the city with shorts on. They were screaming ‘tourists’.

After a visit to a museum of 20th Century Russian art – grossly out of place but interesting all the same – I clambered the big hill in Barcelona to the Olympic Stadium, which housed the 1992 Olympic athletics events. The picture here shows the typical bowl like any other stadium. However, what is most interesting is the outside, and in fact the whole shell of the stadium itself. Most unlike the ‘modern’ stadiums with huge steel structures and glass panelling, Barcelona’s Olympic Stadium is built with stone to form a classical Greco-Roman style, with turrets and gateways and open social areas. It is completely opposite to the Nou Camp, which I will now get on to.

Oh my good giddy aunt! I have just come back from one of those life experiences you will never forget: this was on a par with the first kiss, the first ‘time’, and yes… even the first verruca. Sitting in a press conference in the deep heart of the Nou Camp, before heading off to pitch side for one-to-one interviews. Sitting in the dug out is one thing, but having a sneak peek into FC Copenhagen’s dressing room is something else. It was enormous. In fact, it was almost too big. You could lose half a squad in that place.

I had a chance to sit at the back of the dug out and reflect on where I was. I appreciate it a lot, and of course realise what a privilege it is to be here. As my fellow reporter Torkil deduced, there are 4,600 FCK fans who would kill to have been where I was today.

A great day in Barcelona. Now let’s just hope for a 3-0 thrashing tomorrow.

Barcelona – Day 1

This post shouldn’t really be called ‘Barcelona’, as it’s 20:23 and I’m still not in bloody Spain. France, you pathetic moaning bunch of lazy individuals… I will get back to you later.

I am currently sat in the wonderfully modern Charles De Gaulle Airport, Paris. It has taken me fourteen long hours to get here, after I woke up at 6am full of excitement for the few days ahead. A bitter Copenhagen air cracked my face as I walked through the governmental grounds to the train station, clad in my new suit and shoes so shiny I accidentally caught a glimpse up an old woman’s knickerbockers from their polished reflection while queuing for my train ticket.

Of course, I didn’t actually… she was wearing trousers.

A four-hour train journey up to Gothenburg went as swimmingly as… well let’s just say it went swimmingly. I arrived at the internationally renowned Landvetter Airport, Sweden. And what an airport it is too; I should know: I spent five hours in the damn thing.

‘But Joe, why spend so long in an airport, and yet wake up at 6am? Why not have a lie in and be refreshed for your journey across Europe?’ Well, why indeed. (Excuse me at this point while I clear up the spleen that has just vented all over my keyboard)

I’ll say this nice and clear: those miserable, whingeing, adolescent, ungrateful, work-shy, quivering-bottom-lipped, floppy haired, greasy haired, cigarette devouring, begrudge-thy-neighbour, useless French tossers. How dare you delay my flight for three hours while you ponce around with your banners and mottos as though it’s your right. I’ve been so stressed out today hoping I can catch my connecting flight – both with Air France – that my hair line has receded so far back I doubt I will have to shave my shoulders ever again.

So, roughly forty minutes ago I was waiting to depart the plane, when the lovely stewardess on the tannoy explained there weren’t enough staff to trawl the stairs over to connect with the plane door. Ten minutes later and one solitary, surly looking bloke moped over and attached the stairs. I bolted out and looked around – we’d parked in what looked like an aeroplane graveyard: hundreds of them, with no buildings. So, five minutes later and we all clamber onto a shuttle bus, ten minutes after that and I fall into a man on his mobile as I try to squeeze past the garlic muncher and out of the bus.

By this point I’m knackered, hungry, sweating heavily and stressed out. I quickly gamble into the terminal and greedily devour the departures board: Barcelona, 20:20 – now delayed, 22:00.

All that stress for nowt. All that running for nowt. And, if you can see by this picture, if you wish to complain like the poor man here, you will get nowt in reply. So, thanks France. I realise how unashamedly inappropriate I have been in mentioning a whole cheese board of criticisms; but if you’re going to strike, I think I may be justified with the other stereotypes I have mentioned.

Ah, only 75 minutes to go now. I wonder if they sell berets, or cheap red plonk anywhere…

Shower Skills

The most amazing thing has just happened in the shower. No, I have not found a third nipple or uncovered a way of washing my hair without leaving half a bee hive in the plug hole, instead, I have become witness to shower skills.

Now, you may be thinking ‘oh, shower skills? what is this absurd paradigm?’ Well, to put it simply, shower skills is something every bloke on this planet will try at least once. It’s the art of catching the soap on your foot as you drop it – ladies, I know what you’re thinking: ‘what the fu-?’

It may sound absolutely ridiculous, but the sense of achievement when you successfully ‘catch the soap’ (not a euphemism in the slightest) is one of utter euphoria.

Let me just explain the reasoning behind it. There’s nothing more annoying (well, there is a lot of things more annoying but it’s just an expression I suppose), than having a shower in a cubicle without a soap rack. Where do you put the shampoo and soap and that needlessly smelly Lynx stuff? The answer is sadly on the floor, which can lead to slippage from accidental stepping and serious bending activities.

I have a shower like this. By catching the soap on your foot, you have control of it until you need it again – it can’t run off anywhere – while there’s no need to bend over and risk pushing your arse against the cold side of the shower cubicle: always a shock.

Now we have delineated the reasoning behind such an activity, it would be useful to explain the method. Having lavishly soaped oneself, the drop to the foot is important. Adding extra velocity by throwing will not help your cause. You have to lightly drop vertically, above the foot. The foot itself must be raised, with the toes bent outwards to provide a soap-sized nest.

You are now ready to catch your soap – guys stay with me, this is as tedious as trying to explain the offside rule, I know. As the soap reaches the intended raised foot – and at this point I must stress not to raise both feet at the same time, by making sure you’ve selected the appropriate foot before commencing the operation – you should begin to lower the foot in relation to the soap (but ever so slightly slower). This provides a cushion for the dropping object. The result: the soap should nestle nicely in the newly configured indent of the foot about one inch from ground level.

I know this may sound easy, but it isn’t. It takes years of practice, and even then a full soap catch is very rare to come by. I’m writing this now because this is the first time I’ve managed it in over for weeks, and therefore comes as an event for me on a Monday without lectures, social life, or any vague sense of wellbeing whatsoever.

New Bike

I’ve been here seven weeks. Approximately six weeks and five days ago, I told myself I must buy a bike. Fitness, time reduction and financial scruples were all factors in my determination to purchase a magical two-wheeled transporter. Well, yesterday, I finally bought one. I’m quick to act.

This is the stallion here. Just look at it. Set me back a wee bit, but no doubt it’s worth it. I could have got a decrepit old horsebox for £30 if I’d wanted, but decided to invest big. The reason: I want to enjoy cycling and actually get out of the city with it. I can’t quite do this on a 1970s knackered city bike with a flimsy wicker basket strapped to the front.

Today I took the new beast out for a spin. Initial results are quite positive. As you can see from the picture it’s quite a hunch-mobile, but I’m used to it. The wheels (brand new thank you Josefine) are pretty solid though. Cobbled roads and high pavements are a real pain in the arse. And may I add to take that literally; my lower pelvis is so sore I feel like those piles have returned.

So the positives: it’s fast, reasonably light and will do the job on long excursions. And now we can get to those lovely negatives:

- The seat: Harder than a 30-minute boiled egg, it’s so high I feel like a de-livered Prometheus chained to his rock, unable to hop off. In fact, I’m pretty sure the point nearly poked my own liver at one point during disembarking.

- The brakes: Needs quite a squeeze to penetrate any sort of life out of them, but generally OK. The confusing thing is their positioning: vertical rather than horizontal. I keep flapping wildly at thin air in vain attempts to slow down for fast-moving pensioners.

- The handlebars: They look pretty damn cool, and are amazing for straights. However, a bit narrow: in fact, any vigorous uphill climb that requires arm assistance usually results in slalom-style wobbling.

- The gears: Oh my word they’re situated on the diagonal crossbeam. Who the hell put them there? When I try to change gear it looks like I’m scratching my testicles. I still haven’t figured out how to use them properly (the gears, not my testicles) – they remind me of Top Gear’s infamous ‘flappy panelled gearboxs’ (again, the gears).

Now, of course it seems like I’m whining a bit… and maybe I am. But to be honest I’m chuffed to bits with the little beauty. In fact, I was so delighted with my purchase, that I decided a tad of supermarket shopping would be adequate reward.

120DKK later, and a full backpack, I was cycling back to my flat from the supermarket with a loaf of bread in a shopping bag, dangling off my right handlebar. I took to quick left turn onto some cobbles near Christianshavn tube station, which of course altered my centre of gravity somewhat. The bag swung into my front wheel, and as you can see wrapped itself lovingly round my tyre and breaks.

Because my front breaks were now rendered inactive, I couldn’t stop immediately. After ten yards little light brown fluff started flying from a hole newly carved in the bag. My loaf of bread was being sprayed all over the road.

When I finally stopped and checked out the damage I just had to take some photos. Luckily no one was around to confirm my utter embarrassment, which otherwise would be non-existent seeing as I definitely wasn’t wearing a helmet, sun glasses and reflective bicycle clips at the time.




Well with the loaf now pretty much ruined, I had no qualms with shoving it into my already crammed bag. The damage, as you can see, doesn’t look too bad. But I know that when it comes to me settling down to a lovely breakfast of marmite on toast in four days time, the taste of grit and oil may very well upset my morning.

False Tourism

Imagine peering west up the Champs-Elysees from the Louvre, and instead of resting your eyes on the magnificent Arc de Triomphe, your view settles on that crappy motorway junction behind it. Or, rounding the corner of Rome’s Forum to greet the Colloseum, only to satiate your viewing pleasure with the world’s largest roundabout. I dare say you’d be pretty peeved, maybe even a little miffed, if these landmarks in European tourism were suddenly taken away from you.

Well, this has happened in Copenhagen. The Little Mermaid, although certainly not as famous as the Eiffel Tower, Athens’ Acropolis or the Big Dipper at Blackpool, is Denmark’s jewel in the crown for tourists. Well… apart from the royal crown jewels obviously. Millions of tourists every year come to Copenhagen, and on each neatly organised to-do list are the bullet points:

- Royal Palace
- Christiania
- Little Mermaid

Now, you can’t exactly shift a palace that has stood for centuries in the middle of the city, nor can you remove an entire area of the capital. However, what it seems you CAN do is bonk off a small statue to the highest bidder.

That’s right, Copenhagen’s beloved mermaid is currently living it up in Shanghai; holidaying for eight months as the centrepiece for the Danish contribution of a world exhibition or something like that… the slapper.

How dare she piss off and leave us here in rainy Denmark all alone. It smacks of utter cheek that someone can pawn off the statue. What makes things worse however, is that the Danes have hardly realised she’s gone.

This is the current scene at the site of the Mermaid’s rock. As you can see, the scene is picturesque, a view overlooking the opposite harbour, while Copenhagen’s famous castile lurks just out of shot. What a beautiful vie- wait… hang on a minute, what’s that youtube video on that enormous projector screen doing there, blocking out the view? What, is that a live feed to the Mermaid 5,000 miles away? Quick Beryl get the camera, you’ve got to take this!

And yet, even though the Mermaid isn’t there, just on the left you can see people selling Little Mermaid figurines. About £5.50 each if you’re interested: postcards £1.50. Figurines, to commemorate that wonderful afternoon when you stared at a screen watching other people staring at the very same thing you travelled all this bloody way to stare at.

Why not just Google Image it?

The sheer cheek to sell these things overlooking the naked crime scene is remarkable, what’s more amazing is that – of course – people buy them in their droves.

I’m thinking of setting up a tourist’s trinket stall myself actually: small-scale figurines of the Yorkshire Dales’ most fascinating dry stone wall designs.

Speed Dating – Danish Style

Last week I was sat in an editorial meeting for the University of Copenhagen’s newspaper. We were discussing ideas about the theme of our next issue, ‘finding love in Denmark’. Targeted primarily to international students as an English speaking paper, I suggested – jokingly – that speed dating would be a great way of finding Danish love. Our editor wrote the idea on the white board.

Shit…

So, four days later I found myself booking a slot in the 18-26 category of Copenhagen’s main speed dating company. The premise: write an article about how to meet the Danes. What better way is there to get to know the Copenhagen youth of today than talking to random girls for 6 whole minutes each?

I haven’t written the article yet. To be honest I’m stumped on my ‘angle’ towards it. However, I am of course loyal to my blog, and so have documented the action of the evening below… enjoy.

5:30
Get home from uni and quickly put the water on boil. Cook a filling but relatively boring meal of rice, eggs, veg and sausages (less washing up for all concerned) and scoff it in front of the laptop, trying to figure out where the ‘venue’ is for the adventure to follow.

6:00
Quick shower to get rid of that old book smell I must have picked up in the English library earlier in the day. Rummage through cupboard looking for something to wear.

6:15
Shirt: the only one not crumpled in a heap will have to do. It was once ironed – long ago – but has now taken up the ‘flat because I’ve been squashed into a bag with 20kg of other clothes for a flight to Denmark’ kind of look.

6:30
Find a bottle of aftershave in my left running shoe. So THAT’S where I put it for protection during the flight.

6:45
Walk out the door, get down the stairs and onto the street outside.

6:46
Forget my map and wallet, turn round, enter my building, go up the stairs, into my room, pick up my map, wallet and… oh yes my phone, and walk out again.

7:00
Enter the bar of doom.

It’s quite a scary thing walking into a bar, knowing you’re about to be judged by a load of strangers. Of course they’re in the same boat, but you forget about that once you’re in. The ‘dating’ would be held upstairs, away from the main restaurant where NORMAL people were happily chomping away at their meals. A woman looked at me and noticed my little name badge on the breast pocket of my shirt: I turned away quickly.

The actual speed dating was not bad at all to be perfectly honest. I was petrified at the start, but soon you get into a rhythm. I think, being from England, I may have had an advantage over the other guys – not that I was playing survival of the fittest in my mind or anything. It’s simply that I have at least some different things to talk about.

The worst thing was the first introduction, where I felt compelled to apologise every time for not being able to speak Danish. I know three sentences, maybe four, and that’s it:

1) “Jeg hedder Joe”
To be honest this is practically a redundant statement, as my nametag proves beyond explanation what I’m called.

2) “Jeg kommer fra England”
Great, this is probably assumed by the bewildered lady in front of me by the fact that my first sentence lacked all the sophistication and pronunciation of a real Dane.

3) “Jeg kan ikke tale dansk”
You don’t say…

So, with these killer sentences primed neatly in my arsenal, I set forth into the world of speed dating.

And what an odd wilderness it is. The women get to stay put on their own table, while the blokes are whistled round the room, chasing the next lady like a randy Restoration fop.

We all had cards, so that after each date we could write down the other half’s name, a description for oneself to keep, and tick either ‘ja’ or n’ej’ in the box provided. I appreciate this may all seem boring and obvious, especially to you experienced daters, but I must say holding a really interesting and nice chat with someone for six minutes, only to tick the ‘nej’ box after you’ve moved on, basically gives you that sense of power not yielded in other forms of social interaction. One can be very two-faced, and get away with it.

I would like to have said that in the end I felt a bit of a Richard Gere, swimming through the ladies with a beat in my step and a glint in my eye. But no, maybe more like Bottom, as Titania seduces him to all the confidence in the word, while the audience look on in pitying bemusement.

New Phone

Ah with new places and new friends comes a new mobile phone. This is my utterly stunning ‘Nokia e5d7something’ that I bought two days ago. As you can see it’s a pretty hunky piece of machinery. Sixteen and a half of its twenty buttons work to perfection, the colour screen offers a rainbow of… colour, and the sheer weight of it means you know when it’s in your pocket.

Because my current phone is an ignorant sod that doesn’t accept Danish sim cards, I was obliged to get this stunner in order to control my luxurious credit spending on cool ringtones, saucy pictures and late night chat lines.

I bought it from a run-down second hand shop. It looked quite good behind the definitely-not-secure security cabinet. The guy gave me the phone (well I say gave, he winched it up from the case with a heavy-duty crane and gently lowered it into my hands, to which I buckled under the weight but kept my footing) and rattled off a general spec. Colour screen, Bluetooth and a voice recorder that has a one-minute memory capacity. I knew I was looking at the dog’s bollocks.

What clinched the deal for me was that it had a camera. There’s something reassuring about having a camera in your pocket, just in case a fat woman gets scared by a pigeon and you’re on hand to shoot the after effects.

However, as you can see from this photo, there is no camera. What I thought was a lensed portal to the endless frivolity of the photographic world was actually a small hole, so you can thread a piece of string through the top of the phone.

I’ve just about recovered from the sheer disgruntlement of the situation. Below is the fact file for this majestic model, just in case you’re tempted yourselves:




The Nokia Brick

Colour: Faded silver, for that rustic look.

Weight: Heavy, the cheap man’s bludgeoning tool of the 21st century.

Size: Let’s face it girls, with this in my pocket, I’m pleased to see everyone.

Buttons: Chunky and certainly 3-dimensional, could poke an eye out.

Battery: Long life, but of course heats up to magma levels when on charge.

Infra Red: Probably, but will never be tried out.

Bluetooth: Lack of memory and camera means it is redundant.

Charger: Typical Nokia, will break in three months.