I flew from Denver to Frankfurt non-stop, and non-sleep, starting Sunday, January 11, and ending up in Germany about lunchtime January 12. I estimate my total REM time aboard the two-deck jumbo to have been no more than two hours total. Credit goes to the (Indian?) family with two toddlers in the row behind mine. Ah, what a true test of patience and good manners!
Blearily navigating my way through Customs, and explaining the presence of my alarm clock and flashlight to German security, I caught my connecting flight into Copenhagen (I like the look of "København" better, personally) without any hassle. I had to get on a bus that shuttled a load of us Denmark-bound passengers out onto the tarmac, where our plane waited, and we climbed the set of rolling stairs to board. The briskness of the foggy German Monday was refreshing after the hot and cramped plane-ride.
The plane arrived on time in a clear-skyed Copenhagen. As I disembarked, I thought about the service I've received while flying throughout my life, and I've concluded Scandinavian Airlines (SAS) provides the best. These people are very polite, observant, and seem to have unshakable cheer and uncrackable patience. Lufthansa (my carrier from Denver to Frankfurt) comes in a close second.
After picking up my checked bag I made my way into the airport's main building to find the train ticket office. The Copenhagen airport is very beautiful, full of glass and color and winding, swirling designs in everything from staircases to chairs. There are reclining armchairs lining some of the concourse walls for the weary traveler to rest in between or after flights, a feature my jet-lagged body sorely wished to enjoy, but declined in favor of getting to my final destination with all haste.
I found the train ticket booth and bought a ride to Roskilde, the city where I am living (for now), and where Risø, Denmark's National Sustainable Energy Laboratory, is located. I am glad nearly every Dane speaks or understands English, for while I can read it in fair fashion, I cannot pronounce it correct enough to be useful, yet. I made it to the correct platform, looking for "Roskilde" on the view screen and boarded. I thought I would be fine all the way to Roskilde, but it turned out the train first stopped in Copenhagen Train Station. Here it stopped and everyone who did not want to go right back to the airport had to get off and transfer. By the time I found someone to ask, I had two minutes and had to be two platforms over. I think I looked like an overburdened Sherpa with my bags slung across my back and front, running up one escalator and (carefully) running down the other one, getting onto the right train connection 30 seconds before departure. Phew! A good thing too as the next one would come an hour later. The station is very nice, but I was anxious to get to Roskilde before it got too late.
Upon arrival in the mid-island town, I grabbed some cash and a cab to the home of Anne and Klaus Hauch, about 1 mile from the train station. They are a very nice, young couple, with a 9 month-old son, Jacob. This little tot is real easy to like. He has to touch and eat everything within reach, and he stares curiously at any new object (i.e. me), but he's also very pleasant and he loves his Lego bricks! I'm staying with them till January 16, and then I'll move into the Risø-DTU Guest House. My new home will be closer to work, but I'll have to cook for myself and I won't get to learn as much about Danish culture and family life, so I'm a bit sad be leaving so soon. Free meals and lodging is great!
I had not originally intended to spend any time with a Danish family, but when there was a scheduling mix-up with the Guest House people, I found myself homeless in Denmark for four days and nights. My boss, Mogens Mogensen, put me in touch with Anne, a post-doc researcher at Risø, and she agreed to put me up in a guest room for the week--very nice of her indeed. I have learned a lot from them about Danish customs, history, and language. I'm still real rubbish when it comes to remembering pronunciations (a real hindrance is that, like most native speakers, the Danish don't enunciate very well), but I'm getting there.
So far at this house, I've accompanied Anne on a grocery run, using bicycles (I rode Klaus') and towing the food home in a small trailer bin attached to my seat by a bar, running behind me on wheels. Klaus' birthday was today (January 13), and I heard, though I cannot remember, the Danish version of "Happy Birthday." Klaus' parents are visiting today also, having driven the 130 km from the city of Odense (say: 'Ooln-suh' while swallowing the 'l' a bit). They speak very little English, but are happy to trade expressions and learn new ones. Klaus is quite a cook, and we've had several great meals. When they don't know the English word for a vegetable, food, dish, etc..., they look it up in their Dansk-Engelsk dictionary and tell me. I've never had 'jordskok' before, but it's called 'Jerusalem artichoke' in English, looks somewhat like a mushroom, and has the consistency of a radish, though it tastes like a potato. Yes, very good food! In our dinner conversations we've been over Danish driving laws, what Americans eat on New Year's Eve (Klaus' father thought maybe we all ate 'Big Macs'), Danish history, food, a bit of politics, and all sorts of descriptions about the Rocky Mountains, Denver, and Colorado. Klaus works as a math teacher at a university that trains teachers, so we talked about the Danish education system and its comparison to those in America. Jacob is perpetually either at the dinner table or playing on a toy-filled blanket next to it. He cannot yet walk or talk, but he scoots himself between our legs, tries to eat our toes (or slippers), and often grabs the attention of one or more of us. Cute kid.
Ø Ø Ø Ø Ø
I went into work with Anne today. We rode the bicycles the 6 km (~4 miles) to Risø. Even though we left at 7:45 am, it was still predawn. At least, I think so, for I never saw the sky today. Fog and low-hanging clouds was the forecast and it held. I don't mind, really, the countryside is still quite beautiful and the town is very nice. Bike paths are built like separate, miniature highways running along the car roads. Except for the small side streets, every roadway has them. In town, cyclists even have their own set of traffic lights to obey at intersections. While it had rained during the night, the air was merely damp on our way up to Risø. It felt about as cold as a Colorado winter, and I'm glad I came plenty prepared for winter weather. Anne tells me ice and snow are rare; mostly it's wet, windy, and dim during Denmark winters. I've been told the worst part of the cold season has passed, and the days are about seven hours long now.
We arrived at Risø around 8:15 and I got my guest badge. I'll soon have a more permanent ID with a picture, and access will be easier. Anne showed me around some of the facilities (I'd been given much the same tour when I visited back in August 08), and I met some of the other 'early birds' (it's typical to arrive around 9am). Mogens was already there though, and we talked briefly about my initial duties here at Risø, i.e. getting safety and liability paperwork, lab tours, my office set up, a network password, and so on.
The rest of the day was occupied with a workshop on hydrocarbon fuels. This event consisted of nine half-hour presentations by scientists and PhD students working at Risø, all within the Fuel Cells and Solid State Chemistry department. We heard about hydrocarbon and hydrogen fuel production, systems integration, economic considerations, modeling, electrochemistry, and materials research. Much of it directly related to my work here, so I kept fairly good notes throughout the day. As with everything Risø-DTU is involve in, sustainability is a major factor, from basic design to system and market integration. This idea gets a lot of attention in Demark, coming out in mandates from their government, initiatives in companies (e.g. Vestas, DONG Energy, Haldor Topsoe), and all over academia. If you, Dear Reader, are not informed, Risø was originally founded by Physicist Niels Bohr in 1958, as a nuclear power research facility. It has long since shifted track to renewable and sustainable energy technologies, and the fuel cells division (where I am) is only a small part. Researchers here also work on fusion, wind, biomass, and solar, among others. So, yes, sustainability and renewability are two buzz words going around everywhere.
The talks were spread out by several coffee breaks (the Danish are religious about this custom) and a catered lunch in the cafeteria. The food was much the same as the fare I ate back in August, at Fulgsøcentret, and I made acquaintances over bites of fish and bread with several other people in the workshop group. Most of us are Danish, though there is another American, Chris, whom I met last time, a few Asian-looking fellows, and an Indian man named Shital. In all we numbered about 20 or so, I didn't count.
Tomorrow I will go with Anne in a Risø-rented car to DTU (Technical University of Denmark, the academic institution financially and legally linked to the government lab Risø). Many of the people from today's workshop will be there. The occasion is a two-day conference on renewable energy, and there will be more intensive and longer presentations on solar, wind, biomass, and energy storage. People are coming from around the world to attend and talk. A woman from NREL is scheduled to speak about the Colorado lab's wind program. I may attend that one. The schedule is largely a free-for-all in the reservation department, so I guess it's just "show up and listen."
That's enough for one day! I'll write more soon, so take care Dear Reader.
Afsked og godnat! (meaning farewell and goodnight. I had typed it as 'Afskend' back in August, but I was wrong, so, AFSKED!)
We arrived at Risø around 8:15 and I got my guest badge. I'll soon have a more permanent ID with a picture, and access will be easier. Anne showed me around some of the facilities (I'd been given much the same tour when I visited back in August 08), and I met some of the other 'early birds' (it's typical to arrive around 9am). Mogens was already there though, and we talked briefly about my initial duties here at Risø, i.e. getting safety and liability paperwork, lab tours, my office set up, a network password, and so on.
The rest of the day was occupied with a workshop on hydrocarbon fuels. This event consisted of nine half-hour presentations by scientists and PhD students working at Risø, all within the Fuel Cells and Solid State Chemistry department. We heard about hydrocarbon and hydrogen fuel production, systems integration, economic considerations, modeling, electrochemistry, and materials research. Much of it directly related to my work here, so I kept fairly good notes throughout the day. As with everything Risø-DTU is involve in, sustainability is a major factor, from basic design to system and market integration. This idea gets a lot of attention in Demark, coming out in mandates from their government, initiatives in companies (e.g. Vestas, DONG Energy, Haldor Topsoe), and all over academia. If you, Dear Reader, are not informed, Risø was originally founded by Physicist Niels Bohr in 1958, as a nuclear power research facility. It has long since shifted track to renewable and sustainable energy technologies, and the fuel cells division (where I am) is only a small part. Researchers here also work on fusion, wind, biomass, and solar, among others. So, yes, sustainability and renewability are two buzz words going around everywhere.
The talks were spread out by several coffee breaks (the Danish are religious about this custom) and a catered lunch in the cafeteria. The food was much the same as the fare I ate back in August, at Fulgsøcentret, and I made acquaintances over bites of fish and bread with several other people in the workshop group. Most of us are Danish, though there is another American, Chris, whom I met last time, a few Asian-looking fellows, and an Indian man named Shital. In all we numbered about 20 or so, I didn't count.
Tomorrow I will go with Anne in a Risø-rented car to DTU (Technical University of Denmark, the academic institution financially and legally linked to the government lab Risø). Many of the people from today's workshop will be there. The occasion is a two-day conference on renewable energy, and there will be more intensive and longer presentations on solar, wind, biomass, and energy storage. People are coming from around the world to attend and talk. A woman from NREL is scheduled to speak about the Colorado lab's wind program. I may attend that one. The schedule is largely a free-for-all in the reservation department, so I guess it's just "show up and listen."
That's enough for one day! I'll write more soon, so take care Dear Reader.
Afsked og godnat! (meaning farewell and goodnight. I had typed it as 'Afskend' back in August, but I was wrong, so, AFSKED!)
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