Glædelig Jul og godt Nytår alle sammen!! (Merry Christmas and Happy New Year everyone)
So I thought I should probably tell everyone that I am indeed still alive and fill everyone in on the phenomenon that is Danish Christmas! Woooooo!
For starters, Danish Christmas is designed to have you eat so much that you don't need to eat again for another month, it is both disgusting an delightful all at the same time. For example, in the traditional Danish Julefrokost (Christmas Lunch), there are 6 courses, with about 15 minutes in between, which is just enough time for your stomach to make room for the next course. The first course includes the lovely Danish rye bread (of course), pickled and smoked fish (my favorite is the smoked salmon), fried white fish, remolade, and eggs. Yummy. The second course include bread, again, cold cuts, eggs, butter, cucumber, and liver patte (disgusting). After that you get a course of potatoes, cabbage, duck, fleskinstein (pork with a crisp finish), and "brown sauce". Then, after a short break that is filled with singing, dancing, and drinking, you have the cheese course, which is filled with many different types of cheese, crackers, and bread. This course is followed by a long break because the next round requires a very roomy stomach. This 5th course is called risalamande, which is a Danish dessert consisting of rice pudding with almonds, covered by a warm cherry sauce. But, there is a catch, in the whole batch of risalamande, there is hidden one whole almond, and the person who finds the almond wins a prize. Sometimes you get a kind winner, who pops the almond out upon discovery and stops you from overstuffing yourself, but other times you get a little devil of a winner who hides it until all of the pudding is gone and everyone is moaning because of their over full stomachs. From this you have a couple of hours playing games, exchanging gifts and causing all kinds of trouble before the coffee and cake is served, with the intent to sober everyone up enough to head on home.
So as you can see, the need to eat is destroyed and you are ready to hibernate for the month of January.
Another interesting thing about Danish Christmas is their gift exchange game which is just too long to spell and kinda looks like a keyboard crashed into a wall. Imagine pronouncing such a mess, here's a hint, you can't, not even the Danes can. This game is played by rolling dice, in hopes that you land a six. So, everyone sits at a table, and there can be multiple dice rounding the table. For every six, you collect a present and set it in front of you. Once all of the presents are taken, the stealing round begins. For this round, a timer is set and every time you roll a six, you can steal from one of the other players. By the end, everyone secretly hates each other for stealing their gifts and the amount of gifts ranging from person to person is big. After the stealing round, everyone unwraps their gifts and laughs at the hilarity that is inside. One time I got a CPR training mask, another time I got a couple of bars of soap and some chocolate.
The last Danish I will tell you about takes place on Christmas Eve. On Christmas Eve, the whole family dresses up and has a dinner resembling the Julefrokost. After dinner you have some lovely dancing and singing around the Christmas tree, with the last song requiring everyone to run crazily around the house. After dancing and singing, it is present opening time. It was strange opening presents the night before Christmas, I mean Santa must get pretty annoyed having to deliver presents a day early to just one country of only 5 million people, but like a good mystical fairytale man, he follows through. While all of this is going on, there are about 50 candles lit, along with a fire, so by the time presents are done, you are exhausted from lack of oxygen due to the fire hazard that is the house.
So, as you can see, Danish Christmas is insane and overwhelming, I love it don't get me wrong, but it is definitely not something for the weak hearted. This New Year, I will be celebrating in the great white north that is Norway. I will freeze, but I will have fun adding another country to my belt and acting like the proper snow bunny that I am (kinda, not really). Here's a fun fact about the Danes, they literally jump off of furniture when the clock strikes twelve. Nope no kissing or banging pots and pans, but jumping. Off of furniture. Screaming like some kind of Viking warrior. I swear, these people are almost as crazy as I am.
Well, that's all for now kids. I'll talk to you'll again when I am back from Norway and safe inside Danish boarders.
Vi ses!
Becca
