So it Begins

Well, I'm here. I'm extremely jet-lagged and my head feels like it's stuffed with cotton, but I'll try to be somewhat coherent.
 We (me and my entourage, consisting of my mom and a family friend) arrived this morning at 7:30AM local time and 1:30 AM according to my body clock, so that wasn't fun. I had been hoping to catch a glimpse of the city from the air, but not only did we arrive before sunrise, but it was so foggy that I literally couldn't see anything out the window until about a minute before we landed.
Picture time!

Here we have my introduction to Denmark.









   We went through the airport very quickly, mostly because we didn't have to go through security. At least, not that I noticed. They just stamped our passports and let us go.
   At the airport we met up with a Danish friend of the family friend we had brought with us, and he drove us around Copenhagen and showed us the sights. The sun was up at this point but the fog still clung to everything. On top of that it was cloudy and drizzly. The ambiance was quite nice, actually. I managed to get a few pictures.

Did I mention the fog?

 


   This is the little mermaid from the story by Hans Christian Andersen. Who, in case you didn't know, was Danish. She sits out on a rock at the edge of the harbor and gets gawked at by tourists.

  


This is the home of the Danish royal family. Hopefully I'll have better pictures for you later. They have very minimal security and, as you can see, people are allowed to drive up and take pictures. There are uniformed guards in huge black hats who are stationed at the entrances, but I wasn't able to get a good picture of one. That will be my goal for this semester.

 

Copenhagen literally means "trading harbor" and so there are boats everywhere, parked in the harbor and along the canals. Most of the canals, and part of the harbor, are frozen at the moment.

Here are some house boats.

I'm not quite sure what's up with this boat.








    After the tour we checked into our hotel and then walked around the city a bit. I almost fell asleep while standing up at least twice. The rest of the day was a bit of a blur, and now I need to go to bed. Good night!