On the second day of the Copenhagen itinerary, the weather was average. A bit of rain, a bit of wind, the sun barely came out - in other words, typical European winter weather. One good thing about traveling in Europe in winter, though, is that because it 'rains,' the cold is less severe. Of course, in that moment right after the rain falls and dries up completely, the weather gets extremely chilly, but apart from that - that is, while it's raining, and during the day and in winter - the rain doesn't dry up but rather 'liquefies' and gives off a considerable amount of heat, so I thought it was fine.
The first place I went on the second day was a cathedral. Denmark is a 'Protestant' country. So there's no Catholic church. There are mostly forms of Lutheranism or Calvinism. If I had to name the cathedral's characteristic, it's a 'white'-centered cleanness. That is, the cathedrals of Germany, France, Spain, and Belgium that I'd passed through before all tended to show a facet of the ornate cathedral. The splendor of stained glass and other ornate decorations.. but here it wasn't like that. Not just here - the cathedral I went to in Stockholm and the cathedral I went to in Helsinki all had 'cleanness' as their basis. To the extent that it felt somewhat plain, even.
I'm not sure if you can see the 'window' visible in the center of the ceiling. That's a glass window, and light comes in through there. I've always liked buildings with that kind of composition. Devices that use sunlight as natural light to make the lighting better, I mean. Let me listen for a moment to the music I heard there... I went in by chance, but they happened to be playing music inside. Organ sounds have a really mysterious charm, and the organ sound that day was really nice too..
I figured this person was probably the accompaniment supervisor of this cathedral, but I never even thought of asking; I just simply enjoyed the sound..
The next place I went was a market. The concept of the Northern Europe trip was 'markets,' 'libraries,' and 'everyday life.' There's a reason I set the concept this way. Usually people think of a Europe trip as roughly 'tourism' and come back having spent the trip going to various places and eating delicious food. But I didn't want to do that. Above all, I wanted to make a slightly meaningful trip. Honestly, just going to play around is more comfortable to do when you're older. By then it'll be comfortable to travel with a guide accompanying you and listening to explanations flowing along.. but the trip I wanted to take while young was a 'learning trip.' And I thought the foundation of that learning trip lies in everyday life. Just look at this market right here... it's different.
An 8,000-won hot dog, said to be a hot dog that won an award at a world hot dog festival; because it's a hot dog served in a baguette the bread is hard, but apart from that there are many good points. The taste was good, and above all the conscience of the boss.. what on earth is the kind of thoughtfulness of giving an extra piece of bread because today's bread is small.. To have this kind of experience in Korea you'd have to go to an old traditional market, but here, even in such a sophisticated-looking market, the thoughtfulness of giving an extra piece of bread.. Eating a hot dog outside was expensive but nice. This kind of generosity should probably be seen as part of civic consciousness... I wonder how on earth the positive mindset and ease felt in everyday life are cultivated. Aren't these embodied behaviors that appeared from what they saw and learned piling up since childhood..
As you can see, on the second day it was raining like this in the morning. The building visible on the right is Building 1, and on the left is Building 2. Inside there are various shops. The shops are arranged as in the photo two above. A nice place, a Copenhagen I want to go back to - somehow it felt good that the start of Northern Europe was Copenhagen. I walked around those streets wearing the boots I have at home, and I wonder when I'll get to walk around again. It'll be quite a while before I travel again.
This is a photo taken before going into Christiania. Christiania is a concept of a free city within Copenhagen, holding the status of an autonomous district. You can't take photos inside, so I couldn't leave any photos; well, inside there was the smell of drugs and all sorts of an unusual atmosphere.. I think that was the first time I'd been to such a strange neighborhood.. Still, I suppose there are people who'd like it if they went...
A photo near the Copenhagen riverside, taken as the weather started to clear up a bit..
A street photo; if you look carefully, you can see there's a bike lane on the left. Copenhagen's bike lanes really are the world's strongest - with the advantage of flat terrain plus civic consciousness, there are an enormous number of people who 'bike-commute.' I almost got hit while standing in the bike lane.... I'll have to be careful next time. And next time I want to rent a bike and ride around Copenhagen. In winter it was too cold so I couldn't bring myself to do it..
From this photo on are photos of a park called Superklein. It's a project-type park. This park is quite long and large in size, and it corresponds to a case of converting a former residential area into a park form. As you can tell from looking, it's a park with sensible design. For detailed information, if you type superklein into Google it'll come up.. To put it simply, it's a representative case of reviving a dead space.
The Royal Danish Library. It's commonly called the Black Diamond. I didn't take photos of the interior. It's a really cool library. Much cooler than Korea's National Library.. lol The bikes you can see on the left, those bikes are most likely the bikes of people using the library. Maybe it's because I saw everyone parking their bikes and going into the library.. Inside there were an enormous number of people studying...
Around the time I came to the Black Diamond the weather had cleared up a bit, so I took a photo facing the other side. The thought of what a strange city this is - Paris has almost nothing but 'classical' buildings. Over 99 percent are classical buildings, but Copenhagen wasn't like that. You can see an appropriate harmony. You can see a design that considered a minimum 'building height.' The strange-shaped 'skyline' with just one thing towering up is hard to find here. All similar building heights.. in cases where a building is a bit tall, it's usually a church spire, and apart from that everything is similar. A feeling of considering the cityscape - a developed country is a developed country.
And so the wrap-up of the second day ends; for the third day there should be a few photos I took on the way to Stockholm. Noting that Copenhagen was the most beautiful city among the Northern European cities, I move on to the next city's piece.
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