Somewhere between Vox & Hunter S. Thompson
I was excited to see some of Norway’s legendary mountains! Unfortunately, Freyr (the Norse god of good weather) was otherwise occupied during my visit. During our entire stay in Trysil, the landscape was covered in a thick fog and a cold, driving rain. It was perfect weather to cuddle up with a good book in a mountain cabin… but we had other plans.
As you know, today we’re in NORWAY, which is a new country for this blog! Unlike its Scandinavian peers, Norway is actually not part of the European Union, although it is a member of the Schengen area. Oslo is far and away the largest city in Norway, with a metro area population of 1.5 million people, although Oslo proper has less than half that number. For context, the next largest city in Norway by metro area is Bergen with about 460k people. And Norway overall has a population of 5.52 million people. That’s less than half the population of London, and is more than 7x smaller than the population of the Tokyo metro area. Not a big place, even by Nordic standards. But it’s definitely a beautiful place.
Here are a few fun-facts about Oslo…
While it might seem like just some quirky hippie commune, Freetown Christiania is actually a self-proclaimed micro-nation within Denmark that operates by its own set of rules. It’s got its own flag (shown here), and the approximately 1,000 people who live within its borders apparently do not think of themselves as being Danish, but rather, as “Christianites.”
But let’s go back to the beginning of this improbable story. I think context is key here in order for this to make any sense.
Copenhagen is an interesting example of how the center of gravity for contemporary, social life is often not in the historic city center. I think this is true in varying degrees in many cities across Europe, but what I understand from speaking with my Danish friends over here, is that this phenomenon is particularly decisive in Copenhagen. If you move to Copenhagen, most people will tell you that the best place to live is not Indre By, but other neighborhoods that are a bit further afield, a bit less dense, a bit less historic, and a lot less photogenic.
Today we’re going to focus on two such neighborhoods, which have a reputation for the being the “cool / trendy” areas in Copenhagen: Frederiksberg and Nørrebro.
Copenhagen (or, in Danish, København) is the capital city of Denmark. It is also the most populous city, with a metro area population of 2.1 million people, which is almost double the population of its next largest city, Aarhus. If you’ve never taken a moment to observe the geography of Copenhagen, you can do so on the map below; it’s actually pretty interesting. It sits on an island in the North Sea called Zealand—which is home to a whopping 40% of Denmark’s population!—right between Sweden and the peninsula that forms mainland Denmark. This stretch of water is known at the Danish straits, and it separates the North Sea from the Baltic Sea. Thusly, it is quite a consequential water way for trade with Poland, Finland, the Baltics, and Russia.
Camden Town is a vibrant little area in north London that is famous for—among other things—its rich history with London’s musical lore. This area has long been associated with London’s punk scene, and indeed you’ll still see some people walking around this area sporting 2-foot high mohawks and all kinds of punk stylings that strike one as being almost performatively contrarian. Camden had deep ties to the early punk movement in Britain, with bands like The Clash, The Sex Pistols, and The Ramones famously frequenting this area. Apparently the photo on the cover of The Clash’s debut album (the real ones will know) was shot here in Camden. Later on, bands like Joy Division and The Cure would play here frequently, but Camden’s most recent contribution musical lore was none other than Amy Winehouse. She actually lived here, and as such, this neighborhood’s already-crowded mural scene is now infused with her likeness.
Maasai Mara—which is often locally referred to as simply, “The Mara”—is the name of a giant nature preserve in southwest Kenya. Its namesake, the Mara River, runs through it, and the word “Maasai” refers to the original tribal inhabitants of this area, who can still be found here today.
Well, as far as I know, the only difference between Maasai Mara and the Serengeti is the border between Kenya and Tanzania. The Mara is the Kenyan side, while the Serengeti is the Tanzanian side. Looking at the map, it might be tempting to think that Maasai Mara is the lesser of the two experiences because it’s so much smaller than the Serengeti, but—while I have not personally experienced both—I’m told this is not the case.
We only saw a couple of Lions at Lake Nakuru, but in Maasai Mara, we’re going to see a LOT of them. Here we saw a male and female lion relaxing in the shade of a big tree. We sat here for quite a while just admiring them. These really are massive cats. But if you watch they way they behave, they really are just cats—the same as the cute little ones we have living in our houses.
The safari continued. The further we drove, the more incredible it became. There were just so many animals out here. I think I saw more animals here than I had in the past decade of my life in aggregate. These environments are truly just bursting with life! Is this what planet earth was like before humans ruined everything?
There was some rain that came through in the middle of our visit, so I got to see the light chance a good deal throughout this photo shoot. I look at these photos and I can almost hear the gentle sound of rain on the tea fields.
It was the British who introduced tea to Kenya in 1903. And, apparently the place where it was introduced was right here in Limuru! Today the majority of tea in Kenya is grown in the Kenyan Highlands, mostly on the upper slopes of the Great Rift Valley. As I understand it, a good proportion of it is concentrated on the slopes of Mt. Kenya. So, Limuru is definitely the easiest area of tea fields to access from Nairobi.
Clocking in at the projected 12th largest city in the world by 2100 (a title that is today held by Lagos, Nigeria), Nairobi is the capital city of Kenya, and by far its largest population center. The most common languages spoken here are Swahili, and then English (Kenya is a former British colony). This pretty much covers “mainstream” Kenya, but like most nations on this vast continent, there are a LOT more languages being spoken here in addition to these main 2. In fact, there are a total of 68 languages spoken in Kenya!
