Travels in det Mørke Jylland- Part 2

Right. Carrying on...
   After we left the folkehøjskole we went straight to prison.
   No, really. The main point this field trip was to provide us with varied experiences of the unique aspects of Danish culture. This was why we got to spend time at the folkehøjskole. Well, another very unusual and notable Danish institution is the open prison. These are prisons with no gates and very minimal security. And we got to visit one.

I'm afraid this is one of the only pictures that you're going to get. We weren't really allowed to take pictures in the prison itself. This is the road that leads to the prison. I think the weather really helped the ambience, don't you?








   When we arrived we were met by a woman who turned out to be the warden and a young-ish guy in a sweatshirt who turned out to be one of the inmates. They talked to us for a bit about how exactly open prisons work. The basic idea is that, rather than merely punishing criminals, prisons should focus on helping to reform the inmates and prepare them for re-entering society. The sentence times are relatively short (compared to those in the US) and the primary punishment is the removal of freedom which, the inmate assured us, was punishment enough. The inmates are allowed to leave the prison once every three weeks and, apparently, most of them come back. They cook for themselves (which means they get access to, you know, knives and stuff) and are allowed computers if they have a good reason for needing one. The inmate who we were talking with, for instance, was using his computer to take online business classes. The inmates are generally put to work doing various menial jobs at the prison in order to keep them busy. But, as I mentioned, there are no fences. There are some security guards, but apart from that... well, the name "open prison" really explains itself.
   After this discussion we got a brief tour of the prison, which involved us driving through the prison complex in the bus, and then going inside one of the...er... dormitories, I guess would be the word? The complex was fairly large, with several dormitories and a church and some sports facilities. The dormitories themselves weren't particularly nice and the rooms were very small and the hallways smelled of cigarette smoke, but for a prison it probably was quite posh. The walls inside were painted a cheerful shade of blue, and there was a foosball table. Not bad at all.

One of the prison dormitories. Not bad, eh?











    Anyway, after the tour we got some time to ask the warden and the inmate more questions, and then we left prison. On bail, of course. By the way, we found out that the inmate we were talking with was there for financial crimes (embezzlement, specifically, I think - thank you, Terry Pratchett, for teaching me that word) but it turns out that he was framed. The warden actually said so. I'm not ashamed to admit that I was a little disappointed about that. I mean, we get to meet a criminal, but he didn't actually do anything wrong? What a gyp.

    Then we went to lunch at a very nice restaurant with a buffet and, more importantly, a nice collection of Scandinavian flags out front.

I'm a bit of a flag enthusiast, in case you didn't know. This is, from left to right, Norway, Iceland, Finland and, way on the end, Sweden.
The Danish flag is off screen, on an extra tall, extra special flagpole. I would show you a picture, but you all know what the Danish flag looks like, right?

Oh, what the heck. Here it is.












    After lunch we went to the Vejen Kunst Museum in the town of Vejen, where we saw some very cool sculptures by the artist Niels Hansen Jacobsen and some different very cool sculptures by the artist Eva Steen Christiensen. The ones by Jacobsen are the ones that look like actual sculptures and are slightly creepy, and the ones by Christiensen are the ones that are strange and artsy and occasionally seem to involve cutting bits out of carpets.

 

This is very possibly the coolest fountain on the planet. That's a troll in the middle, in case you didn't notice. A TROLL.

Did I mention the troll?

This statue is called "Death and the Mother" and it's based on the story of the same name by Hans Christian Andersen.

And this is "The Shadow", also based on a story by Hans Christian Andersen.

I think I'm going to stop here for now, but I will end with a very exciting picture.

              There it is. My first Danish danish. I had it for dessert that night, after we left the museum, and it was really good. And those gummies on top were, I'm pretty sure, the best gummies I have ever eaten. They had more flavor than our bland, weak Amurrican gummies.

    Anyway, that's all for now. Happy Valentines Day, and all that.

   Hej hej!