1st May : Labour Day

To bring a good commencement to this joyous occassion and a brand new start of the month, I woke up pleasantly surprised by the overnight blossoming of my white lillies! Now, isn't that a good sign that things will turn out fine the least you expect it. These lillies were given to me by Huiling and Alvin because I was feeling kinda blue recently. I really wuna thank god for these two pals here with me. Sometimes, it's always nice to have your friends from Singapore who will definitely take care of you in a foreign land.

Thinking that it was labour day, I expected the streets to be empty while everyone was slacking and taking a day off. I mean, after all, Aarhus went without buses for a couple of weeks due to strikes. I wouldn't be at all surprised if everything was dead. It definitely had to take a Dane to prove me wrong.
Pernille (above) decided to take me for a bicycle ride to show me how the people in Aarhus were spending this public holiday. While cycling past town, I saw little red flags pinned against the windows of a main public building and the Danish long triangular flag hoisted and flapping in the clear blue skies. This was only the beginning of the excitement.

Red flags hung outside to commemorate Labour's Day.

We finally arrived at our destination. The beach along the stretch heading towards Moesgård was crowded with so many danish people. There were live rock band concerts, make shift stores hung with banners expressing its wide array of passive opinions ranging from anti-war sentiments to No/Yes to EU and those in which represented the right and left wings. Nothing too forceful, but all in the name of light awareness. Old and young people gathered together clanging their beer bottles and exchanged well wishes. It seems to me that the Danes always had a perfectly good excuse to guzzle down beers into their stomachs at 5pm in the afternoon. The sun was also shinning and people begin taking off their jackets and baked themselves on the grass.

Live band concert. Acutely hoarsely sung.

Time to 'hygge'

Political representatives of aarhus.

Though I didn't linger there for too long, the overall 'danish' experience was indeed a lively and impressionable one. I enjoyed myself tremendously, Pernille. Looking foward to discover more of Denmark with you!

More photos here