Aarhus, Denmark, with a cold

I am in Aarhus, Denmark, for the fall (until Dec. 17), on sabbatical from the University of Texas. I am teaching a grad class on global media and the media and information institute here. My wife Sandy is a visiting research at the Nordic Institute. I am likely to be home most of the day with a cold so a good time to starting blogging.

Sandy wrote a good quasi blog email to introduce the town. So I am going to start with that. This is now Sandy speaking:

I had fun pulling up some pix from the Web that sorta give an idea of what it's like here. The weather is getting a bit colder (there's a definite nip in the air and it is windy) but the leaves are still green and on the trees, and the grass is still plenty green and keeping the lawnmowers busy. Most of these pictures are summer pictures, so it's just a little different now.

The town we're in, Aarhus (or Århus), has been a city for over a thousand years, so it has some very old parts.

There is a medieval cathedral, above left.

and tons of old buildings, like the one at left.



and a wonderful downtown, centered around the old river:

(this is on the riverbank though you don't see it)

What's funny is that the river was underground when I visited here as a student in the 1970's. When I was here I stayed in this youth hostel in the woods



which still looks exactly the same as it did then. It's about twenty minutes walk from our apartment





[there are three of 'em and this isn't ours, but we're on the ground floor of one of them]which is right across from the University buildings where I get a guest office (so cool!)


The city is full of greenbelt parks which basically consist of undeveloped primeval forests with paths in them, like where the youth hostel is and this one, where we went hiking last weekend:



These roses are growing everywhere, in all different colors. They had them in Finland too (we were there for a few weeks in the beginning of August) and I convinced Joe to eat the hips and he even liked them. It's funny to find out that they are native to Asia:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rugosa_Rose

I planted some on the side of our house in Michigan back in the eighties to remind me of Scandinavia, and it makes me wonder how the bushes are doing now. I hope the new owners didn't pull them out.

What are the people like?

They all look just like this:

http://www.librarising.com/astrology/celebs/viggomortensen.html

Ha. But it's true, lots of them do. I point them out (discreetly) to Joe when we're out in the town. "Look, there's another manifestation of the Viggo genes."

I thought I could find some neat pictures of Danes in a crowd, but nothing good came up.
Today's Danes are a mixed bunch, too, more than they used to be. It's the new Europe. Lots of folks from other places are here getting educations and working and such, and their kids are growing up Danish. Joe and I took the wrong bus last night -- it didn't go home, but out to a distant suburb and back. Lots of teenagers on it of every color and dress style you can imagine, including African kids with Islamic headscarves, and some very stylish Asian girls. What was funny was that there was a lady in the seat in front of us about our age that we figured had to be a teacher, because as the various kids got on and off the bus she greeted every single one and had stuff to say to them that made them laugh.