Christmas Time

Yesterday it was the first of December. To be honest I’ve been counting down until that day for weeks now and I was really excited when it finally arrived. Sadly I was sick yesterday, I still am by the way, and I was being dragged around in a town named Tønder near Germany. We saw heaps of Christmas stuff, fake Santa Clauses and it was cold, so it really felt like Christmas was near. Anyway that was actually something random, what I really wanted to talk about is the Danish Christmas. Nothing beats a good, old, Danish Christmas - Danes know how to cook, how to “hygge” (look that work up if you want to understand) and we know how to make a cheerful atmosphere even though you get a dictionary from grandmother.  Therefore I’ll start talking about one of the things I love the most about Christmas: The Danish TV-Calendar. Every year in Denmark at least two different TV-shows are shown on the television, made for children especially. Of course there’re more, often some for the “elders”, which often are shown later than the others. Anyway this year Danish television has decided to finally show my favourite TV-Calendar show of all time: Christmas in Valhalla (in Danish Jul I Valhal). A TV-Calendar is of course like a normal calendar, it has 24 episodes, each around 30 mins, and it’s shown every night until Christmas Eve where the epic ending finally comes. Christmas in Valhalla is about the Nordic Gods for example Thor, Loki, Odin, Heimdall, Sif, Tyr and so on. Yes, you might recognize some of the names from the films Thor and The Avengers. The story is not only about the Gods having trouble with Loki, but they need help from the main characters, two ordinary children who really dislike each other because they’re very different. Oh and did I forget to add that they sing also? (Here’s Loki’s epic song, in Danish of course… The subs are Norwegian).  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MU_FmphZ4xA (I couldn't get it here as a video, I'm sorry).

Risengrød

Okay, enough about that, the next thing is our food! Lots of people put on weight during Christmas and we Danes sure do too! We eat gingerbread biscuits, risalamande, duck, turkey, havergrynskugler and candy and lots and lots of other great stuff. Again look up the words if you want to know what it looks like. Here’s a picture of our ride pudding by the way. (No I haven’t had it yet, so I had to steal a picture from Google).

But there’s something I love way beyond and more than those things I just told you about, dear reader. I actually mentioned the word quickly and I’ll now do it again: “Hygge”. This word can’t be translated into English even though my old English teacher used to say it meant “cozy” I refuse to believe that’s a proper translation. “Hygge” can describe everything - a person, animals, rooms, atmospheres and stuff. Everything can be described with this word and Danes know exactly how to make any situation, like Christmas, “hyggelig”. Yes it’s a big Christmas cliché but the best thing about Christmas is to be together with your family, I do believe that, and I’m that lucky that I celebrate Christmas four days in a row - and that’s all for now!