DENMARK CONNECTIONS

Our American family had a wonderful year getting to know our first citizen of Denmark. Mette came to spend the 9th grade year with us as a foreign exchange student. During that year, her friends and family also visited us. Trips were taken to the beach, to the great Smoky Mountains, and to Disney World.

In the summer of 1997, the two of us visited our Danish family. We have never had such a good time. We became closer friends with them. There were many surprises: the beauty of the country, the cleanliness of the country and the towns and cities, the 50% tax rate, mandatory 5 weeks of vacation for all citizens, the satisfaction with nationalized health care and education, the government collection of a variable percentage of personal income for the Church, and the very happy faces everywhere. We expected a sea-faring people and found thousands of small farms and farming villages, grain fields ripening all over the countryside.

Mette and family helped us: tour København (Copenhagen), Tivoli at night; walking the Nyhavn area of the city in the day, seeing the wall her dad built between the US and Russian embassies, ice-cream at the harbor, see the government Christiansborg Palace, see the Queen's residence of Amelienborg Palace, and see old churches...especially Garnisons Kirke which her dad renovated, tour and stay in Greve Strand, take a trip to a beach view of Møns Klint, go to the glass factory, visit a glass maker artist in the country near Møn, visit Christinia, ride the ferry to Årrhus, tour and stay in Årrhus with a day in Den Gamle By, tour Skagen, climb the giant sand dunes, and tour Odense. Our favorite bread was grovbirkes; our favorite hundt was Spotty.

Our visit was two wonderful weeks which we will never forget! Mangetak!! We plan another visit for a special Danish future family event.

In April of 2000, Mette and her Mom and Dad visited us for 10 days at our home in South Carolina. We went to the Great Smokey Mountains, the ocean beaches, and Charleston. We got up at 4:30 a.m. and went to what may well have been the largest outdoor sunrise Easter Sunday service in North America at Williams-Brice stadium, Columbia, S. C.

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[last modified 13 July 1998; 2nd update, 18 June 2000]