The Copenhagen Report

by: Timothy Anderson (timothyanderson2005@gmail.com)

Upon discovering that Transglobal Underground, one of the (many, many) favourite bands of The Copenhagen Report, was coming to Copenhagen for a show on Nov. 13, we got in touch with Tim Whelan, the band's leader, keyboard and guitar player, to find out in advance of the show about what they've been up to lately. But if you've never heard Transglobal Underground, it's a chance to check out their full-throttle live performance, which never disappoints...



It's great to see the band showing up in Denmark (and Sweden) for a few shows. You could say the shows from the current tour have been pretty scattered around - how does the band decide where to tour these days?

Most of the time we've been playing where the album has been released.....and it hasn't been released in Scandinavia so we haven't played there for 2 years up till the current invitation to play with Valravn.

Late Sunday afternoon (around 18.oo), Sankt Hans Torv. Spring is in the air.

by: Tim Anderson (timothyanderson2005@gmail.com)



I am well aware that I have a habit of complaining about Sunday in Copenhagen. I know I'm not the only one in Copenhagen to feel this way, though certainly not all would agree with my views.

I'm also aware that sometimes these Sundays in Denmark are not always that bad.

And in saying this, I know those who know me may wonder if I have been struck on the head by a hard object recently. I haven't.

Perhaps the fact that we have experienced a rare and rewarding one-two punch of unseasonably pleasant Sundays in Copenhagen the past two weekends has contributed to these rare feeling of (mild and surely passing) contrition. That, and a recent comment I received this past week in connection to an article I wrote almost two years ago complaining about Sundays in Copenhagen (And thou shalt not shop on Sunday...) This article, I would suggest, basically holds true two years later - and the theme I have returned to more than once since then.

Here's the comment in question to which I'm referring:

"I spent a college semester in Copenhagen in the mid 80's and stayed with a host family. In the evenings after dinner, we'd all sit around in the living room; the mom doing cross-stitching, the dad watching TV, the teenage kids perhaps reading. On Sundays usually there'd be friends visiting or we'd bake or something. All this I remember very fondly. However, I totally understand that for a younger working person or a couple, it can be very frustrating to not be able to go out and get your shopping or chores done."

It's a fair comment, one describing a scene that surely could have occurred almost anywhere, not only Copenhagen.

Reading this comment today, I had to laugh a bit, since at this moment (Sunday) the sweet scent of a cake baking in the oven is wafting from our kitchen, while just last night - in a scene that would likely have left the writer of the above comment with a warm fuzzy feeling - we were sitting at Elisabeth's sister's place (in the countryside) after her two little nieces had gone to bed, watching the Danish classic television series Matador.

Matador portrays life in Denmark from 1929-1946. It was was originally created and broadcast over 24 episodes from 1978 to 1982 - and has been re-broadcast each week over the past months.

While some might scoff at the fairly one-dimensional view of Danish society Matador portrays (looking from the 'top' of society down, you could say), personally I would say it's a moot point, since this was the whole point of the series. And as a whole, the Matador series is a showcase of brilliant writing (not to mention filming and acting) that stands the test of time. So it's quite fun to watch. And so it remains Denmark's most popular television series ever, apparently.

These two, Matador and this comment that I quoted above, seem to me to fit nicely together. Both paint a picture portraying a supposed ideal of Danish society. Portraits that resonate since, on occasion, they accurately match the sorts of images that tend to get stirred up when people look back fondly upon times past spent with their families or (in the case of Matador) times as they imagine them once to have been.

So, as I started by saying, the past two Sundays haven't been all that bad. A sunny and fresh Sunday last weekend, and an even sunnier and almost warm one this week. I could almost forget I was in Denmark.

Perhaps the most amusing part of Sunday of one week ago was the fact the events of our day on that day (and over the entire weekend for that matter) completely contrasted the weekend events in Copenhagen being covered on the news (these being the 'riots' and such, in connection with the closing of Ungdomshuset - read more about the news coverage of what went on here, the peaceful demonstrations and what it was all about here, a nice eye-witness commentary on the 'riots' here, and or watch an amusing video of a couple of the demonstrators getting arrested here). No rioting for us - our Sunday was a peaceful spent wandering around the waterfront areas of the city, and such.

More amusing still, going back a full two weeks, it was the weather that defined the news stories during that week (lots and lots of snow), yet a week later with the supposedly action packed Ungdomshuset events in full swing and receiving full news coverage, it was actually the weather (rather than the events around the city being covered by the news) that defined our weekend.

Then today, another sunny Sunday, we were up early in the morning (two little nieces, you see) and eating a brunch basically worthy of the title 'countryside brunch', after which we ran around in the mud of the back garden of Elisabeth’s sister's place for a while (the nieces controlling the agenda again). All of which was naturally an amusing sunny diversion for us as Copenhagen apartment dwellers.




the muddy part of Sunday (in the Danish countryside)...

However - and best of all - by the end of the day we were back in the heart of Copenhagen in our Istedgade apartment. A quiet Copenhagen Sunday evening ahead of us - but one that would feature no television, no knitting and not even a newspaper to read (we've only got the Internet, naturally...).

So have times changed over the past decades in Denmark? Maybe just a little bit.

by Tim Anderson (timothyanderson2005@gmail.com)

I have been complaining to anyone who will listen for several years now (which usually means my girlfriend) about Denmark’s ridiculously antiquated Sunday shopping laws (‘lukkelovn’ in Danish). These laws are based on the most utterly nonsensical logic imaginable. The arguments for allowing shops to finally open on Sundays and later on weeknights are painfully obvious and compelling – yet they haven’t sunk in.

Outside of downtown Copenhagen, nearly all shops in Denmark close by two (!!) in the afternoon on Saturdays and six in the evening on Monday to Friday. Yes, this means that for the average working person in Denmark there is at best an hour after work on weekdays and five hours on Saturday at best for shopping – if one is willing and able to sacrifice the rare chance to sleep in on Saturday.

On the few Sundays each year when shops are allowed to open, the streets are buzzing with activity. Then there are the unbelievable weekly Sunday queues at the few grocery stores that can open on Sunday. To say there is a pent up demand for this kind of shopping flexibility could not be more dramatically underscored. Still, the government refuses to cede to the overwhelming evidence before it’s eyes.

In fact, with these ridiculously limited hours, getting out of the house on Saturday mornings to run around in a frenzy alongside the thousands of others facing these identical time constraints is the only real option most people have. The realities of life mean a certain amount of time is required each week for buying stuff, and there is only limited amount of time to buy it. The most grievously frustrating aspect of this state of affairs is that shortened shopping hours produce the polar opposite effects they are intended to.

Instead of leaving more time for the sort of loving, warm, fuzzy relationships the government has historically imagined are nurtured by closing shops early, people are forced to rush around hurriedly when they could most use a bit of time to relax – the day after a long work week. Under such time pressures, their worst sides often emerge: tempers become short, frustrations boil and resentment that previously didn’t exist appears – and all for the wrong reasons. Worse still, even when everybody agrees they would rather be doing something else, they are often forced by the necessity of their needs to go shopping nonetheless.

One wonders where exactly the benefits are in this perverse system of enforced madness?

It is an entirely unpleasant experience to run around trying to buy all those things that are best shopped for at a leisurely pace (clothes, furniture and so on) over a few inadequate hours. To imagine these pressures do not have unpleasant side-effects is outright delusional - they create some of the worst tensions that families and relationships are ritually forced to endure in Denmark.

Consider that the divorce rate in Denmark is currently running around 50% - and has been increasing for decades. While there are many factors behind this, what is certain is families have many demands placed on them, and they clearly do not always succeed in coping with them. It beggars belief to imagine that these short shopping hours make things any easier.

With an extra day of shopping on Sunday and longer weekday shopping hours, individuals and families could be flexible about how and when they wanted to spend time with their loved ones – some of which would include more leisurely shopping. Saturday may be the perfect day for a walk in the park, or a visit to a museum, or to simply spend time with the kids or a boyfriend or girlfriend doing whatever they would like to do. Currently, when one need new shoes, a new jacket and so on, for whatever reason, these become the overriding Saturday priorities – it is the only time to buy the stuff, so all else must wait. Even if these ‘other activities’ being put off are precisely the ones family relations could benefit most from. It is so patently obvious it should really not need to be said.

There are countless other points to be made. The fact that Danish ideal weather conditions for having ‘a family day’ are not always co-ordinated with Sundays is a significant point. While shopping can be done in most weather conditions, a walk in the park is most appealing on sunny days – which could be Saturday! Visitors to Copenhagen from around Denmark and tourists from other countries are a small but significant portion of the Copenhagen economy – these people can only walk around on Sundays with money to spend but nothing to buy. So forget the weather, forget the visitors, and forget flexibility - Saturday is designated ‘shopping day’ by the rationally-impaired Danish government. So it must be.

So here I sit on this Sunday typing this frustrated little rant – I’ve already been out for a pleasantly leisurely walk earlier with my girlfriend, the only real choice we had anyway. I’m home enjoying some of that lovely government-imposed family time. My girlfriend and I both agree it would be great to go shopping today for the new chair for the living room we have been intending to buy for ages now. What better day than Sunday to be able to leisurely visit a few furniture shops until we found what it was we were after? In fact, perhaps along the way we could stop at a cafe and have some lunch together…hmmm, this sounds suspiciously like the sort of quality-time together Sunday closings were supposed to facilitate in the first place? Funny that…

To continue to hold up the antiquated logic of Sunday closings benefiting society is simply unreasoned nonsense. Shopping hours in Denmark as they stand currently are a significant drag on a more smoothly functioning society. It is a shame, yet things could be so easily changed. And it can’t happen soon enough, if you ask me.