Hunting in Denmark

I didn’t grow up hunting, but I did go rabbit hunting with my Uncle once, and I carried the rabbit back proudly. Since moving to Haida Gwaii hunting has become something I do, I enjoy the time outdoor and appreciate the clean, local meat. I find myself missing it and so when I was invited to go hunting in Denmark I was excited and could hardly wait. I looked forward to spending time on hunting grounds and seeing how it was done here.

At home I hunt deer with a rifle and that’s about it. Here we used shotguns and were hunting for anything we saw; hare, ducks, pheasants, deer, you name it (though I didn’t shoot the little song birds that Jesse pointed out all day, ‘Shoot that one Dad’). Going hunting once with one group of hunters hardly makes me an expert on hunting in Denmark (just as hunting deer on Haida Gwaii doesn’t make me an expert on hunting in Canada) but the two experiences were quite different. The hunting party met at a farmhouse on the island of Funen (Fyn) about 1.5 hours drive from where we live. On the drive we were told about the ‘fines’ that result from failing to follow certain procedures; we shook hands with everyone and removed our hats when we were supposed to. Nice to know there are rules and rituals to the hunt, Jesse especially liked the one about kissing the ass of the first duck you shoot and was disappointed that I didn’t get a duck. 

New for me was hunting with dogs, I tried to imagine Ruby as a hunting dog but the only image I could conjure was the sight of Ruby fading into the distance as she chased our prey into the forest. There were 8 of us with guns and we were positioned around an area when the dogs were sent to do their work. I got one shot at a bird but missed it (so did another guy so it’s okay), the one duck we got would never have been seen if not for the dogs work, and though I volunteered Jesse to swim out and get any ducks that landed in the water the dogs did that too.

What will stay with me from the day was eating lunch in the barn, an old brick barn. We sat around a table with the elder seated in the middle; you could sense the deference he had earned with age. This man has been hunting on this farm for 50 years, he is 80, and he was the only one to shoot anything all day. Lunch was one of my focuses when I shared about our day when I got home, Jesse wondered what was so great about sitting in an old barn and why I made special mention of the 80 year old man, but when he remembers this day I think he will remember what it felt like around the table, just as I remember sitting around tables in my youth and knowing who the most important people were, the ones without whom we could not be there.

Oh Canada

Last week a student revealed to me that he thought Canada was a part of the United States. I felt in turns shocked, confused, hurt, indignant; this is precisely the kind of thing that is supposed to make us Canadians angry. I explained all this to the student but then found myself unable to think of all the good reasons why being from Canada is preferential to being from the States. My minds eye was clouded by oil and I could not see.

Living away from Canada has made me think about our fair country from a different perspective. I am no longer a Canadian amongst Canadians; I am now a Canadian abroad. I can take jokes about moose, maple syrup, and hockey, but I am finding it increasingly difficult to praise Canada when every time I look for Canadian news I am confronted by the realities of Canadian resource extraction and it's related environmental record (that and Rob Ford). People think of Canada as being one of the last great nature preserves and yet the truth of how we treat what we are so fortunate to have leaves me lost for words in conversation with a teenaged Dane.

Language Again

I think it must be time to write another reflection on Danish language acquisition; it is a frequent topic around here. Understanding what is being said is getting better, context provides most of the information, but still it is so satisfying to understand. Last week I had another conversation with students about my (lack of) learning the Danish language. Present was the Brazilian exchange student with whom I have been able to sympathize. He takes classes so he is further along than I am but he too feels like he is not progressing as much as he would like. He tells about exchange students in Brazil and how they are functional in Portuguese within four months of having lived there. He and I both feel like the high level of English has a lot to do with our lack of progress, if we try to speak Danish to anybody, or struggle to understand, people just switch to English.

This led me to share about a soccer parent from England who has been in Denmark for many years (12?). A few weeks ago I heard a conversation he was having with Gus’s coach, the parent spoke in English and the coach in Danish, and they understood each other without any problems. I thought that this must be a unique situation but as I shared this story a student who has a Danish father and a mother from the Philippines told us that her mother speaks to her in English and she replies in Danish. We also know a family with a Canadian mother who has learned Danish, so it is possible, though she tells us that co-workers still ask her to say certain things because they like to listen to how she says them.

One way we might learn more is by watching more Danish television, but when English is an option and it’s the end of the day, well it is hard to force yourself to choose otherwise. Recently an old favourite, the British comedy show “Absolutely Fabulous” is back on the air with new episodes, who could choose anything else? We know that Danish television has produced some shows that are very popular (The Killing) and so too do the people at “AbFab”; I’m not sure that the clip provided by the link could possibly be as funny to anyone else as it has been for us, but you should watch it anyways, I can’t tell you how many times I have.  

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u4sPy-02NjI

3 in 1

This week I wrote a few entries and then wondered why I would share them, followed by another ‘why share anything’ phase where I wasn’t sure that people spending their time reading my blog was my fault or theirs, and then conversations on the week-end helped me to realize how much writing the blog is helping me make sense of everything, and that my purpose is a higher one, that my true purpose is not to share the everyday minutiae of my year in Denmark but to be an ambassador for writing as a means to make sense of it all.

Mall Jammin’

Sundays start with indoor training for Jesse and Gus, it starts at 8:00 in the morning and we are there for two hours, not the best time slot but it extends the soccer/ religion relationship in my mind (soccer was Dad’s religion, Mom took me to church). As I did when I was a child I go reluctantly and amuse myself by looking around at people, at one point I get up for communion with the parents and players (parents vs. kids), and by the end of it I am anxious to leave and get on with my day. 

After lunch we went for a walk and as we often do on Sundays without plans we found ourselves at the Outlet Mall (the only one of its kind in Denmark). The draw of malls and downtown shopping areas is undeniable; consumerism is a true force to be reckoned with. I don’t like shopping, I like the mall less than downtown areas, but we haven’t done this in a long time and I’m okay with it, there is no beach within walking or biking distance, and it is good to get out amongst the people. I don’t often buy anything, when you pack for a year there are inevitable packing errors so I make the occasional purchase, but mostly it is just strolling and observing, noticing how shopping culture is insidious; ‘hey that’s a nice sweater, I could use a nice sweater’, ‘I like those shoes and they are such a good price’, etc. The downsides of consumer cultural are numerous and have been written about extensively elsewhere and by better writers, but the one I find myself thinking about is the throw away nature of much of what is offered, clothes that will last a season or two, few items that will become generational hand-me-downs like that sweater of my Dad’s I used to wear in high school, or the coat that was my grandfather’s.

My favourite stores are still the second hand ones and the latest addition to my wardrobe is from one of these, a cardigan that’s pretty thin, I probably won’t be handing it down to my kids (Gus said it was a girls sweater so he won’t mind), but at least it is getting a second chance with me.

The Times They Have Changed

When I was in high school (already it sounds like an Ole’ Man Seifert column) we played football with quarters when we should have been working, the literary types might read, some might look at magazine pictures, or just harass their fellow students. When I enter classrooms today most students are fixed to a screen playing games, facebooking, or watching youtube. I’m not going to complain about it in the classic teacher, ‘they aren’t using their time well’ way, but rather I will simply state that it isn’t fair.

When I was in school and bored out of my mind I did not have the option of playing a game, or sending messages on my laptop, pretending I was taking notes. Yes I could doodle on my paper, or write notes and risk discovery, but killing zombies was never an option. So what did I do? When I think back through the years and recall the ways that I amused myself I find two memories stand out: a game played with a friend involving the floor and our mouths, and imagining escape on the roof outside the windows.

In grade 6 the girl across the aisle from me was as bored as I was and we quickly devised ways to amuse ourselves, the most memorable for me was the ‘smile and you have to kiss the floor’ game. If my memories of grade 6 are accurate I spent half my time trying not to smile and the other half pretending to pick something up off the floor in an attempt to get close enough to kiss it. In high school the game involved less action and more imagination. Outside the window was a lower section of the school building and through the window we could see the roof. Escape plans became a part of class, and the one that stands the test of time is the helicopter plan, simple yet dramatic, bound to make us legends: ‘They climbed out the window, into the helicopter, and then they were gone.’  

Musical

We recently attended the school musical, “Hotel Hallelujah” and I am still marveling at the time and commitment students put into the production to make it what it is. I guess I had certain preconceived notions about what a production at this level would be like, and I was off the mark. I had expected to be sitting on a chair on the gym floor, but they had transformed the gym into a theater, it was no longer a gym. The stage set was professional (the sagging cardboard props of my imagination absent), the sound involved sophisticated equipment, and the lights were first class. What seems to be sticking as most impressive is the number and variety of performers; there were musicians, dancers, actors, singing actors, and if you add that to the workers who set up the stage, the lights, the sound, you are looking at a big group of dedicated students. I went away from the show wondering how any of the students involved had managed to do any schoolwork over the past month. The rehearsal time to get to where they were… and none of this is for credit?

It all made me think of something Gus commented on recently, Gus has noticed that people are really into stuff here.