Today Queen Margrethe II turned 70 years old! And the Danes love their queen so this was no minor celebration. At noon the Queen was scheduled to come out onto her balcony at Amalienborg Palace and wave to all of her adoring countrymen and women. So my Danish class set out at about 11:30 to go see the queen. The palace was absolutely packed but we somehow magically found a perfect spot and I was about 50 meters away from the queen! She came out and waved and the crowd went crazy. Thousands of Danish flags were being proudly waved and everyone was trying to get a picture of the Queen. This proved to be a difficult task though because every picture I took seemed to be of a Danish flag and not of the Queen... 
Then the Queen's husband joined her on the balcony and he was soon followed by her two sons and their families. After they became tired of waving they made their way back inside and the Danish people started chanting something to the effect of "We won't leave unless you come out again!" And sure enough she came out two more times and gave the Danish people what they wanted. Then she got into her carriage and drove through the streets of Copenhagen on her way to her birthday brunch at the town hall (Radhuspladsen). I once again got to wave at Queen Margrethe but this time I was so close I could have given her a high five if I wanted to.The whole day was filled with excitement and everyone seemed to celebrate in their own little way. Most stores had signs in the windows or were at least flying flags. My Human Health and Disease teacher brought us all pastries and the nice man working at the kiosk where I bought some coffee gave me a discount since it was the Queen's birthday and I was an American trying to speak Danish. Even the city buses were decked out with Danish flags. So it was a very exciting day for Danes and wannabe Danes alike and a very fun piece of Danish culture that I'm glad I got to experience.
More Pictures:
Marmor Kirken (And a massive crowd a people I navigated through to get a front row spot to see the Queen)
A random band that we accidentally stumbled across
Happy Birthday!
Some Queen's Guards
The Queen in her carriage
No comments:
Post a Comment