Gotta love Danish politics.. They spend MONTHS (I don’t even want to know how much money has been spent on that) discussing whether or not to forbid burka’s, only to find out there’s only three (3!) persons wearing them in Denmark

So, in Holland we celebrate Sint Maarten by kids going around town with lanterns, singing songs at doors, collecting candy (I wonder if this is actually related to trick-or-treat). How lanterns and candy are related to a bishop sharing his coat, I cannot tell.

In Denmark they eat duck the night before St Morten’s day. The reason for this, is because St Martin didn’t want to become bishop and hid in a stable filled with geese, where the geese betrayed him with their honking. That’s why they eat duck! Logical eh?

Yeah, it’s a bit far out.. But I like both candy and duck, so I won’t complain.

I can only conclude with: A cada cerdo le llega su San Martín!

Right… so my bike (11 y/o) is really falling apart right now. The chain is skipping on the gears, so I can’t really put any pressure on it, which leads to annoying situations at traffic lights, and even more dangerously in front of cars.

As I can’t afford a new bike right now (mostly because of half-year-under-the-table-part-of-rent) I am looking for ways of transforming a KitchenAid mixer into a way of transport. Any ideas?

Gebyr is the Danish word for money-making-scheme-in-the-cultural-sector, aka service/adminstration fee. I can perfectly understand when you buy a ticket in advance through a third party with your credit card that you have to pay a bit for that service. But, when you’re buying a ticket psyically at the cinema, with a voucher, how can they charge you 5 dkk extra? Is it for printing that ticket? Why wouldn’t that be included in the total amount? Another example was a dance performance. I went in, did not reserve in advance (because I knew there would be enough tickets), paid in cash, and still got charged 15 dkk in gebyr. Seriously this must be a price fixing of the cultural sector cartel. Neelie Smit-Kroes, I call on you to look into this mafia!

For a while I’ve been supporting several businesses over the world through kiva.org. Sometimes you get some feedback, and I thought it would be funny to share this one:

“…As you know, your generosity helped Selina obtain a loan of $275 in February. Selina used to run a phone accessories store in the Ubungo bus terminal area of Dar es Salaam. However due to her business not making expected levels of profit and embezzlement of money by a former employee, Selina is no longer in the phone accessories business. She now runs two businesses in parallel. She is a seller of traditional African cloth in her neighborhood and also sells chicks and hens for a profit….”

So for all you web 2.0 mobile companies on the fringe of bankruptcy, you can always switch to selling chickens! I wonder if Morten Lund ever considered going into chickens..

Let’s get this straight once and forever. There are Vikings and Wikings, and you should not mix them up. Vikings are the fellows with the funny helms that went about raping and pillaging. You know, the hardcore kind of guys. These folks in general came from Norway.

Then, there’s Wikings. Those are the Danish wannabe-vikings. These people were just farmers and fishers who liked to dress up.

And then, the Swedes.. They talk funny and brought you IKEA.

Yes, I did do extensive field studies to support this theory.

Sorry, dutch only.

Sommige spam is best leuk. Ik houd persoonlijk erg van de Nigeriaanse 419 scams hoewel die niet zoveel meer langskomen. De laatste tijd zijn het ‘eenzame oost-europese meisjes’. Vandaag kreeg ik deze bijvoorbeeld:

“Hoi. Mijn naam is Natalia. Ik eenzame meisje zonder schadelijke gewoonten. ik 29 jaar. Ik zoek een man van 32 jaar voor ernstige relaties. mijn e-mail het gemakkelijker voor mij. Ik kan sturen brief en de foto elkaar. Natalia”

In the category of Danish Oddities, I bring you Chokoladepålæg. Somehow they thought it was really efficient to make thin layers of chocolate to put on your bread. I think it’s just really an excuse to put an extra thick layer of butter on your bread to make the broken layers stick instead of falling off. Did I also mention that butter almost always is salty here?

For anyone who sees me this week: I did NOT try to slice my wrist, I was just hanging a lamp. And succeeded too!

…eventually

Aha.. now I found out why people Google for leek massage. There actually is a town called Leek in Staffordshire, UK, and apparently someone there is in need of a massage.

The only question left is, why do people searching for leek massage end up here?

I guess I just made it worse…