Week 8 Växjö Update & Pictures from Weekend in Copenhagen

Hello to everyone back home. I just wanted to share our wonderful side trip. This weekend we went to Copenhagen, Denmark. We left Växjö by train early on Friday morning. The train ride was only about 3 hours long and there were no train changes. We got back about 10pm Sunday night. It was a weekend of sheer fun. Mariah went on her first boat ride, while we toured the city by canals. We saw museums, castles, churches, lots of people, and lots of other things. I won’t go into everything now, because I am going to try to post as many pictures as possible. Remember that you can click on the pictures to make them full size! I hope you all enjoy them.. Jens Olsens Verdensur

The 1955 mechanical astonomical clock that shows several different times and calendars. .

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Horse and Rider statues are all over the town of Copenhagen. They represent the great leaders of Copenhagen's past.

Harbour & Canal tours.

The tours go through the beautiful Danish Capital. Mariah loved the boat ride. We also video taped the 1 hour tour. .

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The fish bride as this statue is called pays tribute to the heritage to the fishing history of Copenhagen.

Dinner the first night...The waitress took this picture. We ate American! at the Hard Rock Cafe. We couldn't pass up the chance for a good ol'fashion cheeseburger.

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The Marble Church By far this has to be one of my all time favorite old churches. The entire church is done in white marble except for a few areas. The dome is hand painted marble. The dome is divided into 12 sections. Each section is painted for one of the 12 Apostles. I couldn't take too many pictures inside due to restrictions. On the outside in the church yard surrounding the building are marble statues of different people from the bible, including Jesus, Moses, and Paul. .

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In this picture of the Amalienborg Palace, you can also see the Marble Church in the background. This palace is the winter residence of the Danish Royal Family. In consist of four identical buildings in the shape of a diamond. At each building there are palace guards. We did get to witness and tape the changing of the guards on Saturday. Infront of the palace not in the picture is a large fountain and then the waterfront of the main canal into Copenhagen. .

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The royal library.

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. Christiansborg Palace. This palace has been destroyed 4 times. The stone entrance posts and the stone bridge leading over the canal into the palace courtyard are all there is left of the original Christiansborg Palace.

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Copenhagen is home to the famous Hans Christian Anderson. The "small" white house in the center is where he grew up and supposelly wrote The Little Mermaid. In the harbour is the statue of the Little Mermaid. The statue's head has been sawed off atleast 4 times. Each time the police treat the case like an actual murder.

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This last group of pictures are from the NY Calsberg Glyptotek Museum. This is a world class museum of art located in central Copenhagen. The museum main emphasis is on the art and culture of Ancient Egypt, Greece, Rome, 19th century Denmark, and 19th century France. This was Mariah's first museum. I didn't think that she would want to see all the statues and paintings. However, she loved it. She was fascinated with the museum and wanted to go in all of them in Copenhagen, but we didn't have time. The gardens outside the back of the museum were just as interesting. The corners of the building wore adorn with huge stone statues of Angels. Then in the garden there were many other statues including the Gremlin that Mariah had to pose with....

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Inside the building there was a side room that only had 3 statues. The center of the room, the focal point, was a stone statue of Jesus Christ. To his left was a statue of Death and the maiden. To his right was a gorgeous statue of one of Jesus's parables....

Can you guess which one??

You will have to email me if you can't figure it out....I am sure you all know this bible story, its one of my favorites.

This last picture of a building is one I don't remember. I know it is in the town center but I don't know what it is. Finally, Mariah was missing her stuff animal friends that she left behind in Jacksonville. So, we found a Build-A-Bear workshop in Copenhagen. She now has a new pink and white playmate.

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We are both going good. My main classes start on Monday. We didn’t do much this week other than on Thursday I represented ECU at the International fair to promote study abroad. We miss you all and send our love. We will be home in 76 days!!!