Winter in Denmark

Decided to write this entry after much thought. Coz I've not been visiting new places in the past 2 weekends... but the scenery & weather has changed drastically in Copenhagen. Yup! imagine my surprise when last Sun, i woke up, open the blinds and realised that the scenery outside was white! yeah.... just a short span of about 8hrs, it snowed... and covered everywhere in white. it was a pretty sight to me. Coz i went home around 12 the night before after visiting my colleague. we went to Copenhagen to check out the christmas decorations and also the christmas markets.

white snow everywhere outside my apartment

I must say, copenhagen looked different with all the festive lights. We wanted to go into Tivoli. Coz i checked that Tivoli has a great christmas market... and the deco inside is really wonderful and mesmerizing. but we did not enter.... coz there was a huge queue. by the way, its not cheap to enter Tivoli... every adult has to pay 100 DKK just to enter. If u want to take the rides, u got to pay somemore.

CPH city hall... looks a little scary in the red lightings

Tivoli with the lights

Anyway, Francesca and her son and me just strolled down Støget. and we saw christmas lightings, markets etc. and lots of people doing christmas shopping. 

The start of Støget with the christmas deco

hundreds of candles being lighted up for a cancer awareness event

a christmas market in CPH

And yesterday, I visited Malmö for the 2nd time. I must say, this time i visited Malmö, the town definitely look much nicer. coz there was no fog! and the sun came out... but it was still cold. but the town really looked nice. I went to Malmö with my 3 other friends. Its been sometime since we went out together... it was nice to meet up and go out together and catch up. =D

Malmö

people with their dogs. and some of the dogs are really very unique dogs.

that's me on the bridge leading to the town center of Malmö. My friend captured this while i was going to take a picture of the scenery

that's 4 of us on the bridge

these friends of mine, unlike my Italian friend, do not bring lunch when we go out. So, we ate at a restaurant that was serving pizza. i must say the pizza was good... really good.... italian pizza. =D
After lunch was walking around and checking out the shops on the different things they were selling. most shops were selling christmasy things.... and clothes. some were cheap but most are expensive. I saw numerous nice things... but these days when i want to buy something i will always think properly if i seriously need them. if not i would just place the items back onto the shelves. hmmm.... even clothes... hahaha.... i will always think if i really need them otherwise i wouldn't buy. these days, the only places that i will purchase and have to visit on a weekly basis is the supermarkets! hahaha.... coz i need the supplies to cook my dinner + lunch. =P

group photo in the town square

ice sculpture

the shopping streets decked out with christmas deco

but I must say that Malmö is nice. at the town square, they even have lights strung into the design of reindeer and bears, penguins and igloos. really nice. my friends and i had quite a great time in Malmö. 

me & the huge lighted reindeer

more lightings behind me

Malmö at night

And today? i was holed up in my apartment... i did not get out. coz it was snowing pretty heavily the whole day.... and the winds were really strong. so i cooked korean tofu stew for dinner to keep myself warm. it was my 1st try with korean stew. and it turned out pretty good. i'll be having the same thing for lunch tomorrow!

yup! that's it for the time being. guess the next time i'll be writing will most probably be sometime end of this month or in jan. =D
Merry X'mas everyone & a Happy New Year! =D

1st country out of Denmark: Sweden. Visited Malmö

I've been a little busy the past few weeks since my last entry. With the ongoing twice a week Danish classes and my research project was a little tied up with things. But weekends I will spend like either the  sat or the sun, going out. However, the places that I visited in 3 weekends, were the same places that I've been to. But these 'again' trips are with my colleague, Francesca.

Yup! Finally I've stepped out of Denmark! and its to the nearest country, Sweden. on the 17th Nov, I visited Malmö. This is the most southern most city in Sweden and its also the 3rd largest occupied city in Sweden. In fact this trip to Malmö was not really planned. Coz that weekend, I had decided to stay home to revise my Danish lessons as on Mon I would be having a mid-term test. But my colleague, Francesca, called me on fri and asked me if I would like to join her and her in-laws to visit Malmö. Of course I said yes! hahaha.... coz its exciting to step out of Denmark and visit a new place. So we arranged to meet at 9am in Lyngby station.

Sat finally came and I met Francesca's in-laws (father, mother & sister) for the 1st time. They are all very nice people. We took the train to Københaven Central station and from there we take the Regional train to Malmö. Altogether, it took us about 1hr to get from Lyngby to Malmö (minus the waiting time for trains).

Malmö train station

I must say Malmö is rather similar to Copenhagen. The architectural of the buildings are somewhat similar to that in Denmark. I mean the historical buildings. I went to the tourist information center with Francesca's sister-in-law, Caterina. We got the map of Malmö and also the places of interest. Caterina was interested to see the Malmö castle, so we decided to walk there then to the town center and hopefully if we got time we'll visit the chocolate factory.

The weather in Malmö today is not the best weather. Coz it was foggy and cold (hiaz... by now I've gotten use to the fact that the weather in Scandinevia is always chilling cold). While walking to the castle, we saw a very interesting house. See below for yourselves.

House in the water

Yup! the house was partially submerged in the water! I'e got no idea what happen to the house or was that done purposely. hahaha....Strolling through the park, we finally saw the Malmö castle. ermmm.... I must say, the castle was really ugly! hahaha... i mean i've been awed by the few castles I saw in Denmark, so when i saw this, i was really disappointed. Anyway the Malmö castle has been converted to the Malmö museum.

River in the park that leads to the Malmö castle

That's Francesca and her son and me

Malmö castle

So we decided to head to the town center. Caterina wanted to buy some souvenirs. and she was telling me that all the things in Copenhagen were so expensive. She could not get anything within her budget. I told her, yeah, things in Copenhagen are relatively more expensive than in other countries. But she managed to get a couple of mugs bearing the Malmö words on it. 

Shopping district of Malmö

We had our lunch at a Burger King outlet. We had wanted to eat our sandwiches in a cafe, but seems like outside food was not allowed. I had brought my sandwiches with me, however, Francesca's mother-in-law had also made a sandwich for me! I couldn't believe it! hahaha.... the sandwich comprise of bread that she made herself and salami. Yup! Italians like to eat Salami. After our lunch, we did some shopping. I did window shopping, but Francesca and her in-laws really bought stuffs. 

Streets in Malmö

City hall of Malmö

Some interesting statues in Malmö city center

A stall selling fruits and veggies in the town center square

Took this photo coz the name of the restaurant caught my attention. hahaha... yeah a very unique name for the restaurant. =P

Malmö in the evening

After much shopping its back to Copenhagen. Francesca and her in-laws invited me to her place for dinner. I was a little embarrassed. Coz its like Francesca had cooked for me a few times now... and I've never cooked for offer her anything. Just helped her with her English only. Anyway, its not easy to decline Italians when they invited you. So i went to Francesca's place and her mother-in-law cooked. Wow! I must say the food was good! Her father-in-law offered me wine which he brought from Italy. The reason why the food tasted so good was because, all the ingredients were brought from Italy. and things like the tomato sauce/puree, olive oil etc. were prepared by themselves. 
I'm really not joking. the olive oil that was used in the cooking was produced by the olives grown in their garden! yup! so its really amazing! And I'll be going to Italy to join them for Christmas celebration this Dec! Yup! so I'll have lots more opportunities to taste the fantastic cooking of Francesca's mother-in-law. Can't wait for Christmas to come! =D