our year in Denmark
It’s hard for me to get footage of this, because he just won’t speak Danish to me. (”You don’t understand Danish Mummy”). I know he will lose it quickly once we’re home and not using it anymore so I really wanted to get some footage of it.
On Sunday Hugo turned five! We celebrated by going to Billund, to Legoland and Lalandia. We were also very happy to have Aunty Livvy visiting from Australia as well. We had a great time, and acquired yet another massive assortment of lego.
On Monday Hugo took cupcakes to børnehave to share with his friends. It is probably not surprising that I used a Betty Crocker packet mix to make the cupcakes (I’m using the excuse that we got home late-ish on Sunday night from Billund, but the truth is I was too scared to try to work out the ingredients in Danish). I even used Betty Crocker icing mix. One of Hugo’s teachers said they were the best cupcakes he’d ever had, but I think the real reason for this is that the cakes here aren’t very much like cake in Australia. (And of course I didn’t disillusion him about the packet mix).
All in all it was a birthday to remember!
September seems to be circus month in Copenhagen, there have been a few different circuses advertised around our suburb lately. I can’t even remember the last time I heard of a circus in Australia …
Recently, while we were in Spain over Summer, we saw a circus tent and had wanted to go while we were there but unfortunately they didn’t have a show on the night we wanted to go so since then, we decided that if we could find a circus in Copenhagen, Hugo could go. Sure enough, within weeks posters started appearing everywhere advertising the BEST! circus in Denmark, Denmark’s PREMIER! circus, the NUMBER ONE! circus … (these are all different circuses!).
Cirkus Dannebrog* set up it’s big top just outside the post office here in Østerbro last week, and purely by virtue of it’s closeness, Hugo went to their show this weekend. He loved the clowns (and understood their crazy antics, even though it was all in Danish), the performing dogs, the horses … but the highlight (well, for me at least) was that he got to RIDE AN ELEPHANT.
Like I said, I’m not aware of any circuses in Australia, but even if they’re out there I’m pretty sure (public liability being the issue that it is in Australia) that riding an elephant is NOT part of the show. He was all very down to earth and serious about it. No, he wasn’t scared at all.
* Dannebrog, just by way of interest, is the name given to the Danish flag (literally, Danish cloth). The flag is used for all occasions here, particularly birthdays. When we first arrived, I thought there were an awful lot of national holidays because nearly every week I’d see Danish flags everywhere, but it just turned out to be different birthday celebrations.
Hugo’s børnehave held their sommerfest (summer party) this evening. Everyone brought different dishes so there was lots of yummy food (among his classmates, Indian, South American, Japanese, and of course Danish), and lots of games to play. They had decorated the school with balloons and fairy lights, and all the kids were so excited.
Sophie, who wishes she could stay with Hugo every time we take him to school, was also extremely excited about going to the party. She even put on party clothes (not a small achievement, as getting her to agree to ANY clothes at the moment can be fraught with danger).
While Hugo had a good time playing the different games, Sophie’s favourite place was the disco room. She’s a total groover, she’ll dance to anything!
a bike. Of course.
Hugo has ridden to preschool a couple of days this week. Considering his generally cautious nature he does quite well, he is learning Left and Right and so far hasn’t accidently careered off the path into the lake. (Concerned grandparents, please don’t fear, I walk closely behind him, he knows where the brakes are, and we don’t ride on roads, just the footpaths and the pedestrian/bike paths around the lake).
Danish is a really, really difficult language to learn. The pronunciation isn’t intuitive, and almost everyone in Denmark over the age of seven knows how to speak English (luckily for me!) so as soon as it’s obvious that your Danish is ‘not so good’ - an understatement! - they will automatically use English. My ‘functional’ (and I use that term very loosely) Danish consists of “Hej” (Hello), “Hej hej” (goodbye), “undskyld” (excuse me/sorry - I use this a LOT) and “tak!” (Thanks!).
Hugo goes to a Danish preschool, so all the teachers speak English as well as Danish but all the children speak Danish (so of course most of the day is done in Danish). He has been picking up words here and there. Last week he asked for a “vegemite smørbrød” and as I went to the kitchen he called out “that’s a sandwich, Mum!” … although I should have realise he meant the Danish open sandwich because he was quite offended when I brought him a “proper” sandwich, and not just vegemite on bread. When I arrived to pick him up from preschool one afternoon, all the children were playing in the playground and Hugo was babbling a very Danish-sounding babble (the same way babies, when they start to make speech sounds, babble in English).
Sophie’s English is exploding - we’re in that awkward stage where she is saying so many new words and phrases that I can’t keep up, and although she knows what she’s saying I can’t always understand what she means so it can be frustrating for both of us. But it’s really exciting as well as she starts to use longer phrases and her ever increasing vocabulary. (And she does have a few Danish words as well).
I am learning about Danish traditions through Hugo’s børnehave activities. The preschool is on Easter break now, so yesterday (the last day of the term) they had a ‘formal’ lunch together, which is how many Danes celebrate at Easter. Each student brought food to share, and they dressed up in their nice clothing. They also had a short Easter service at the church next to the preschool (I think it’s a Lutheran church) and each child put a daffodil onto a wooden cross.
Daffodils (according to wikipedia) are traditional table decorations at Easter lunch.
Carnival, or Fastelavn, is celebrated seven weeks before Easter and has something to do with cats in barrels, yummy treats and beating up the people you like … or something. Read the wikipedia entry here for a better description!
I guess one of the traditions is also dressing up as all the children (and the teachers too, it was FANTASTIC!) dressed up today (Fastelavn is on Sunday).
Hugo chose his own costume … it was a hard decision between Spider Man and a policeman.
Actually, this highlighted for me, one of the things I find difficult here. Everyone over the age of seven speaks English, but everything is written in Danish. There have been written notices on the board at preschool and I knew that it was something to do with Carnival but I had to ask one of the teachers what it said … everything is written in Danish, and I can generally work out some of what it’s saying (and a bit more, if I can use an online translator) but I still miss the detail. It actually makes me feel a bit stupid - which I’m not, really. I do get sick of having to ask, every time. And don’t get me started on official forms!
Hugo’s first day at preschool … he has been so keen to go (I think, far more than I can remember him being in Australia - I don’t know if that’s because he doesn’t have to walk here, hehe).
The preschool director suggested that I stay with him today so he wasn’t too upset - as it was, he basically didn’t notice that I was there from the time we arrived, so Sophia and I came home for lunch and went back a couple of hours later to collect him. He was playing outside in the sandpit and didn’t want to leave.
He doesn’t seem to mind too much that the other children speak Danish, and his room teacher was great with translating, and talking to him in English. I think he’ll pick Danish up quickly (and then I will use him to translate for me ;)). His teacher said he had a great time laughing with all the other children at lunch time, and he’s very keen to go back again tomorrow!
Copyright © 2010 Copenhagen … don’t they make icecream? All rights reserved. Theme by Laptop Geek.