FEEL IT ALL AROUND from Northern Lights on Vimeo.

Feature Photo: D’Arcy Norman
Video: Feel It All Around
Travelers: Chase Heavener, Jovanna Sayan, Matt Staker, Chris Heavener
Music: Washed Out, “Feel It All Around”
Produced by: Fiction

Photos: author

I’ve lived in Copenhagen long enough to know punctuality is the cardinal rule of Danish etiquette, and yet my day somehow still goes like this:

Eight(ish) :

Waking up early in Copenhagen is surprisingly complicated. Today, with one foot planted in the Scandinavian winter, sunrise is just before eight and hidden behind the patter of rain. My husband tries to roust me before leaving for work, but even then, with the casual work-life balance here, he’s barely out the door by nine.

After pillaging our carbohydrate stash for breakfast – dark bread called rugbrød and real butter – I dash down the four flights from our walk-up and head for the gym. Between October and March, we get, at best, six to eight hours of grayish daylight, so cycling, the gym and running at leafy Fælledparken keep the winter D’s – vitamin D deficiency, depression and drinking – at bay.

Ten(ish)

And… I’m late. Today it’s for coffee with a Danish friend at the Royal Library café downtown, so after the gym I hurry through the corner market where a tiny Egyptian stocks hummus, flatbread and veggies. Normally he practices his English on me – we’ve gotten up to “Have a nice day!” – but I’m trying to avoid an impending punctuality disaster, so I snack fast, clean up and choose the bus over biking downtown.

There’s a rumor here that bus drivers worsen exponentially through the winter, and today’s ride is proof. The driver plays chicken with cyclists and cars while out the window, crumbling yellow buildings and green copper spires punctuate the gloomy sky.

Noon(ish)

Finally at the café, I sip a ten dollar latte and chat about babies and maternity leave (one year, fully paid – just one of the many social services supported by high Danish taxes). Outside, the reflection of the library’s streamlined façade in the Øresund is an interesting juxtaposition with the 17th century apartment buildings across the water.

It’s easy to hate on the Danish winter (and I do, often), but the weather can also be a catalyst to see new parts of the city, like the library, or old parts through a new lens.

Three(ish)

After coffee, I make a quick trip to the supermarket, ignoring the ridiculous prices while loading my basket – the only way to stay sane while shopping. After, I poke around local boutiques until a random Dane pops out of a chocolate shop and offers me a piece of candy.

I’m so shocked at a gregarious (while sober) Dane popping out of anywhere, I accept without a second thought. That’s a fun part of living here; at first the Danes seem very reserved, but then little surprises make me remember how friendly and funny they are just under the surface. It’s also great not to have to worry about the whole candy/strangers issue.

The city is so safe mothers leave babies in prams on the sidewalk while shopping or eating in cafés. So, munching on my chocolate, I set off down the crowded sidewalk towards home and am rewarded with another treat: the setting sun peeking out of the clouds in a patch of ethereal blue. Less than an hour later, it’s night.

Dark.

My husband arrives home at eight to find me wrapped in a blanket, writing, reading email and planning our next trip. We light a few candles, lounge on the couch and snack on smoked salmon. The Danes call this hygge: the art of cozying up with your significant other (or friends and family) to ward off winter, while outside, the night settles over the city like a blanket. The dark, at least, is punctual.

Community Connection

If you like peeking into a day in the life of an expat, check out A Day in the life of An Expat in Oaxaca, Mexico, A Day in the life of A Writer in Zagreb, Croatia and A Day in the Life of An Au Pair in Breukelen, The Netherlands.

Feature Photo: hojusaram Photos: author

In Busan, South Korea, I head to dinner near Jagalchi Fish Market, the city’s famous seafront area. During the day, the neighborhood is filled with middle aged women sporting short permed hair, rubber dishwashing gloves, rain boots, waders, and sharp knives, skinning and gutting seafood by the moundful. Block after block of stalls showcase creatures from the ocean swimming in tanks, laid out on ice, and piled carelessly on the sidewalk.

The specialty in the neighborhood’s restaurants is hoetjip, Korean-style sashimi. Like most meals in Korea, hoetjip is accompanied by a dozen or more small side dishes, called panchan. Inevitably, the panchan will include plates of the ubiquitous sweet and sour pickled radish, fiery kimchi, spicy gochujang sauce, and sliced raw garlic to add even more potentcy. There are also piles of lettuce greens and shiso leaves for wrapping around bites of meat.

I enthusiastically start in on some of the more familiar panchan like fried seafood pancake, steamed prawns in the shell, and sauteed squid. A cluster of side dishes causes my chopsticks to pause midair. I don’t recognize any of the food, but that’s not what stops me. Part of appreciating food is presentation and on these plates, presentation fails. The chunks of whatever sea creature these are are so downright ugly no garnish could improve the scene.

One plate holds a pile of sea pineapple or sea squirt (meongge), beautiful when alive, with yellow fading into to red across it’s spiky spherical shell like a tropical sunset. Shelled, its butter-colored flesh has a complex flavor combining sour, fruity, and briny, with a dominant off-putting metallic taste that doesn’t merit repeating.

Next, I pluck up a piece of what I later learn is the regrettably named sea penis (gaebul). The name is also unfortunately accurate: when alive, the creature looks like a dismembered, pneumatically-propelled alien phallus. The shape also reminds me of sausage making; at the moment the filling is pushed into the stretchy casing. Dead – for the meat is dead, I poke it to make sure – the sea penis is deflated and small, looking like a flayed worm, shiny and pink like a tongue. Its crunchy and chewy texture is surprisingly pleasant.

My chopsticks finally aim towards the last untried morsels, a substance that can be generously described as resembling chunks of slug. Its glossy, soft flesh is a mottled mix of khaki green, deep brown, mustard yellow, and blue-gray, combined to make a surface both artful and repulsive.

If I saw this beast in my kitchen at home, I’d wonder how it had oozed its way inside from the backyard. But, I’m determined to try anything once, especially if it’s already on the table in front of me. With a deep breath and a deeper sigh, I pick up one of the smaller chunks.

And it moves.

More specifically it contracts, tightening up and getting smaller, tenser, and harder. I instantly drop the meat, snatch back my chopsticks, and wait to see if it will do anything else, like scream. A few seconds later, the glutenous blob relaxes, returning to a more puddle-like, flaccid state.

Being prone to occasional acts of immaturity, I begin to poke the different pieces on the plate, making each piece repeatedly contract and relax. If I do this enough, maybe the creatures will die or creep away. In my gut, I’m hoping for the latter. No such luck however, the blobs stay put.

I’m convinced these are pieces of a recently sliced up larger creature, its nerves firing in an unconscious parody of life, no different than a recently beheaded chicken running around a farmyard There’s no one to ask. None of the staff speak English, and the only other customers in the restaurant are a large party of raucously drunk Korean businessmen.

Once again, I grab a piece of mystery seafood. It predictably tenses up as I drag it through the gochujang sauce, which could make shoe leather taste phenomenal. I pop the piece into my mouth and try to chew, except the creature’s flesh is unyielding to my teeth.

I surreptitiously extract the misbehaving nosh from my mouth. As I stare down the difficult remains of food, I devise a new strategy. After I put another piece in my mouth, I leave it on my tongue, waiting for it to relax, just like it did on the plate.
As I feel the tension leaving the morsel, I attack quickly and chew remorselessly. There’s the brief flavor of ocean before I swallow my first living creature. Afterward, all I can think is, “Where’s my soju?”

Feature Photo: Robert Thompson Photo: prakhar

We’d taken refuge from the soggy Bogota afternoon in the hostel’s dank kitchen, where we sat drinking coffee and swapping tales. As this was only my third trip out of the country, I sat quietly, listening to the boys one-up each other. No one could beat the Swede in zip-off pants.

He sat smugly, like a guru, doling out morsels of his tales in titillating tidbits. He’d dyed his hair brown, donned dark contacts, and backpacked through Iran, Iraq, Pakistan. He’d ridden buses rarely, walked mostly, and had almost been killed (purportedly) by an anti-American lynch mob. Sparks of awe and admiration flew from the enthralled eyes of other travelers.

One of the boys in his rapt audience turned to me, suddenly aware of my presence. He quizzed me on my basics: where was I from, how long was I traveling, did I speak Spanish. “What’s your itinerary?” was his final question. I bit my lip as he looked me over, sizing me up for what I was: an early-twenties American girl, not terribly well-traveled, with a mediocre accent and a minimal vocabulary. I recited my basic plan: Bogota, Medellin, Cartegena, Santa Marta and La Ciudad Perdida.

“Hmph,” he snorted. “Typical.” And with that, he turned his attention back to the blond god before him.

Photo: julien_harneis

Fast forward several years and a couple thousand miles to a recent afternoon rattling down the uneven pavement of Interstate 880, blasting NPR. I’d just caught the beginning of a story on France’s proposal to charge tourists for rescues from risky spots while abroad. The hotly debated bill came about several months ago, prompted by a much-publicized rescue of French citizens who were captured by Somali pirates while pleasure-yachting around the Indian Ocean.

Reportedly, public outrage at the travelers’ perceived irresponsibility was intense enough to inspire a bill that would require tourists rescued from dangerous situations abroad to repay rescue costs (aid workers and journalists excluded). A coordinating author from Lonely Planet was on hand to discuss the proposal and its implications, a discussion that centered around issues of travel safety, and real versus perceived dangers abroad.

Here’s something most independent travelers, including myself, rarely check before going abroad: the Department of State’s current travel warnings. When you grow up amid a culture of fear-mongering, it’s easy to get desensitized.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, you think, the world’s sooo dangerous and I’ll get kidnapped and killed the moment I leave the US. Nomadic Matt has cited fear as a principal factor preventing Americans from traveling abroad, and Brave New Traveler takes a good look at both sides of the fear argument to analyze why so few Americans go overseas.

Photo: royandsusan

Yet once certain travelers step outside the country and see the rest of the world isn’t the depraved war zone it’s often portrayed to be, they get cocky. And brazen. And sometimes stupid.

Take that to the extreme: extreme tourism. I haven’t heard this term in awhile, but it was tossed around the hostel table in Bogota that afternoon. It refers to a type of off-the-beaten-path thrill-seeking travel that prides itself on brushes with danger. Real danger. As in, I’m-gonna-walk-through-Baghdad-just-to-prove-I-can danger. Implicit in this type of travel, I would argue, are entitlement and bragging rights.

Which begs the question: should risk-taking travelers enjoy the luxury of being rescued, at the expense of their countrymen? The French don’t seem to think so. Nor do the Germans. The United States—well, we don’t really need to worry about it, since so few of us travel to begin with. Reportedly vague and insufficient, the French bill also opens the door to a lot of loaded issues—namely, who decides what countries and regions are dangerous, and whether travelers are behaving recklessly?

I’ve been to three gasp-evoking places often deemed too dangerous for travelers (let alone a solo white girl): Caracas, Mexico City, the entire country of Colombia. I didn’t go to any of these places because they were considered dangerous, but despite them being considered dangerous.

Photo: author

One I ended up in circumstantially, but the other two I sought out—I’d heard too many good things from other travelers. I did my research. Street sense and good luck got me through unscathed. But there’s certainly people who would have regarded my traveling in these places as reckless, stupid and asking for trouble.

I remember thinking Colombia was a lot like Oakland. Which isn’t true: armed military don’t roll through city streets, and you can’t smoke cigarettes inside shopping malls (not even Eastmont). But both places have a sort of infamy to them, a danger that either lures or deters.

As in Oakland, many parts of Colombia feel totally safe; as in Oakland, other parts of Colombia continue to feed the unsafe reputation. To stay safe in Colombia, I did everything I already do in Oakland: don’t go out at night alone, stick to main streets in safe neighborhoods, don’t ride buses at night, check my back like a motherfuck.

The Swedish guy in the Colombian hostel reminded of suburban kids that move into Oakland warehouses. They proudly tell you they live in the Lower Bottoms, Murder Dubs, Dirty 30s, Ghost Town.

“The thugs aren’t that bad, really,” they tell you. Then, knowingly, as though they’re imparting some great gem of karmic street ethics upon you—”If you don’t bother them, they don’t bother you.”

Then they mugged/assaulted/held at gunpoint, and they leave, go back to their suburbs bruised and bitter and hating the town they so recklessly glamorized.

There’s a certain romance with violence and danger that people who have no real experience with violence and danger have. It’s exciting, enlivening, visceral and real. It’s the wild-eyed rapture of Futurists (which for all of their sexism, fascism and idiocy still created some good art). It’s as easy to write off as the uninformed fear that keeps some folks away from Oakland, away from traveling, cocooned in familiarity.

But neither side is right, neither view complete. They’re just two sides of the same coin—exoticizing someone else’s world, treating it as the Other, instead of attempting (however falteringly) to meet it, understand it and experience it as it is. Can I claim to have traveled so honorably? Not really. But I can claim to have tried.

Which could all be an elaborate rationalization for why the rules don’t apply to me—why I haven’t gotten into any real trouble while traveling, and why I would surely be rescued in the event of any dire incidents. And not expected to pay for it. (Because, after all, I’m not French.) But I suspect the truth lays somewhere muddled between all this, between embassies and travelers, the frightened and the intrepid, the streets of East Oakland, the seas of Somalia and hostel kitchen tables around the world.

Feature and article photos: author Photo: thms.nl

7:15am:

Wake up. Huddle under the covers as long as possible. Hear the DeBruijn family downstairs getting ready for the day. Senseo coffee is brewing and dull light stretches through the windows. Throw on jeans and black sweater from the day before.

Mr. and Mrs. DeBruijn depart for work, leaving me and their two kids, Lotje (7) and Meno (4), to get ready for the school day. A ritual commences: snack pack, lemonade, shoes, scarves, jackets, gloves, hats. We each get our own bikes out of the garage.

8am:

Drop off Lotje and Meno at preschool and primary school. Greet neighbors with “Goedemorgen!” Make my breakfast of bread and eggs. Catch up on e-mail to friends and family back in North Carolina. Shower and straighten the kitchen, living room, and kids’ rooms.

9:30am:

Practice piano. Today: scales, Schumann’s “Aufschwung” from Fantasiestücke, Bach “Prelude and Fugue in C# Minor”, from Well-Tempered Clavier, Book I.

Possession of a piano was an important criterion in selecting an au pair family. When I return to the US I will resume my piano performance degree. Mrs. DeMaat, the next door neighbor, waves through the window; she’s told me she loves hearing Bach.

12pm:

Pick the kids up from school for their lunch break. Prepare fresh bread, butter, and hagelslag (chocolate sprinkles), a typical lunch. We eat and converse in mangled Dutch and English.

1pm:

Lotje, Meno, and I ride our bikes back to school. I head to the market to buy groceries for dinner. Tonight I’ll cook shoarma (shawarma). I buy meat, pita bread, lettuce, cucumber, and toum (garlic sauce). The cashier, an older woman, smiles silently as we load my cloth bag. She knows my Dutch ends after “I’m doing well, thanks.”

1:30pm:

I drop off the groceries and pedal ten minutes north to see Magda. She makes more money working as an au pair than she would back in Poland with her Masters in psychology. We drink tea and discuss philosophy and boyfriends.

2:30pm:

Pick the kids up from school. Take them to swimming lessons or back home. In the warmer months we take snacks and blankets to the backyard. More often the coldness keeps us inside and we draw or play games. The kids aren’t allowed to watch tv. I help Lotje with her piano practice and think it would be so much easier to help if I spoke better Dutch.

4:30pm:

Mrs. DeBruijn returns home and I return to my attic bedroom to catch the latter half of Oprah, a connection to the US. The sun sets and the darkness inspires reflection.

5:30pm:

I cook shoarma for the family, although Mr. DeBruijn is rarely home in time for dinner. I converse with the mom in English about her day. The kids talk to the mother in rapid Dutch.

6:30pm:

Salad plates from dinner are left for Mr. DeBruijn to clean. I bundle up and head to teach a voice lesson to a teenage girl nearby. She speaks fluent English and wants to learn songs from American Idol. We talk about more than voice as she confides the career dreams her mother disapproves of.

7:30pm:

After our lesson I stop by the village pub to meet Magda and other au pairs. We drink a Dommelsch pilsener, commiserating about our days. I am the only American, the only au pair choosing to work in the Netherlands for enrichment versus necessity. This makes me feel guilty and grateful.

9:30pm:

Bike home. The night is mysterious and soft. Burning firewood scents the air. I reflect on tomorrow as the wind cuffs my face. I wonder if the kids are asleep and how parents do what they do. Even my part-time parenting demands energy and patience.

10:30 pm:

I wave goodnight to Mr. and Mrs. DeBruijn downstairs. The attic feels comfortable, almost like home. Elliott Smith plays on my ipod and I journal in my moleskine. The day is done.