Sunday, August 8th 2010
At 5:30 (CET), there was an announcement that breakfast is starting, so we got our stuff and went to the buffet. Both of us ate a lot, although we were disappointed that there was barely any fruit left when we got there. I did find pancakes, croissants and donuts though! We arrived in the harbor at 6:30 - just had enough time to eat and brush our teeth. We got off the ferry, and got on a bus heading for the central station of Stockholm. The bus driver talked funny: he gave a little welcoming speech to all the passengers and the way he said "Welcome. Bye bye" made a lot of people (including myself) laugh. I don't know if that's just the way Swedes speak English, or if it's just that bus driver, but it was amusing.
We got to the central station around 7:15, and tried to find an info-desk, where we could ask whether or not we need to exchange our ticket (purchased in Finland) for a different one. Turns out there is no info-desk, or at least we didn't find one. There was just a lobby where they sell tickets, but that opened at 8:00 on Sundays, so we found some free seats and waited. We managed to spend most of the Swedish crowns that we had in the kiosk. When Pinky was at the kiosk, an old lady was going to sit down in her seat and I spoke Finnish to her, and when she replied in Swedish I realized we're not in Kansas anymore.
At 8:00 the ticket booth opened, but there was such a rush of people that we decided not to bother and just boarded our train hoping that our tickets are valid the way they are. And they were. The train was scheduled to arrive in Copenhagen at 13:30, but it was late (as trains in Sweden tend to be). The scenery didn't differ much from Finland, although there were more horses and cows out in the fields :) The bridge connecting Sweden and Denmark was pretty cool, although the view would've been better if it hadn't been so cloudy. When we were getting ready to get off the train, we met more weird people: some guy asked us if we're American, and said that the way we use the word "like" is very American. I don't know if I should be offended.
The weather in Copenhagen was quite bad. It was very gray and gloomy, and rained a little. We left our luggage at the train station security lockers, and then headed for the S-tog platform. We were supposed to go to Hellerup, which is where Experimentarium is located. We were promised free entry through some connections :P The S-tog stopped at a stop before Hellerup, and it turned out that it wasn't going any further because of construction work, so we'd have to take a bus the rest of the way. We got there in the end, and followed the road signs to Experimentarium. It was raining quite heavily at that point and we had to walk for at least 20 minutes. It was pretty easy to find though and we did get in for free. There were a lot of kids everywhere (it was Sunday, after all). We went to the Brain exhibition first, and didn't really understand much of it, so we moved on to the activity section, which was self-explanatory and fun.
We then went upstairs and ate at the cafeteria. We both had pasta salad and a brownie, which were tasty and affordable. Then we started exploring the upstairs, which was the most fun - we should've gone there right from the start. The section with the bubbles was definitely my favorite. I tried making a bubble around myself and got to my waist til it popped. We also blew large bubbles, roughly the size of our heads, which was pretty damn cool.
Then there were other fun activities - standing in front of a green screen with different backgrounds, making power by biking, and so on, and so forth. We could've easily spent the whole day there, but the place closed at 17:00, so we only got like an hour and a half. We met up with Pinky's friend Mia, and she drove us back to the main train station, where we picked up our luggage. Mia then drove us to her place, and their friend Majken was waiting for us outside. The four of us ate a traditional Danish dinner, prepared by Mia - ox meat with a wine sauce with mushrooms, hasselback potatoes and tomato salad. The food was delicious. The meat was medium rare and with the wine sauce it was incredible. The potatoes were slightly salty and spicy, and amazing. And the salad was awesome too: mozzarella, tomatoes, cherry tomatoes and onions with balsamico dressing. I wish I could eat like that more often. Hands down the best meal of the trip.
After dinner we took a walk around the lake, which was very pretty in the darkness. Before going to sleep, Mia took our map and circled all the buildings and landmarks in Copenhagen that we should see. We also weighed our rinkkas: mine was 11 kg and Pinky's was 12 kg. They sure felt heavier...
-Brain
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