Tag Archives: vacation

Impressions of Sonderborg

Now and then people email us with questions about Sonderborg. We are happy to answer (to the best of our abilities). Sometimes we can turn our answers in to blog posts, so feel free to send us your questions.

Ed Yandek from Ohio, US was heading to Sonderborg for a conference and his wife came along. They spent a week in town and we had an email correspondence before their trip. After they got back to Ohio Ed sent us his impressions and thoughts.

Hi, Michael—
We have been back in Cleveland now for one week but are still having very fond memories of our visit to Sonderborg. We had a nice room at the Comwell overlooking the water and that was also the meeting site, so it was very convenient to walking all over town. We found the people very friendly, especially when I would ask questions, such as why all the young people had nautical looking caps– found out it was for graduation, and then we saw them running all over the city celebrating. Weather was really fine as we came prepared with jackets and umbrellas. We had mostly lovely weather that week, except for the very wet evening of the bonfires. The Castle museum was amazing and we learned a lot about the history of that region. We also went to the mill museum and the military museum across the bridge. It was a nice walk. It made some of the old history lessons I had many years ago seem more real, since Americans really are not very knowledgeable about the Danish-Prussian issues of that period. After a week there we can see why it is a popular town for visitors. I think it would make a nice staging point to explore the larger area with a car some time. I assume there is a local rental place in the city somewhere?

 

We had only been to Copenhagen before and liked it a lot, but find we are more and more liking smaller towns like Sonderborg when we visit in Europe.

 

One thing that surprised me was how prosperous everything and every one appeared yet I would say that from an American point of view the cost of living is pretty high. Mainly it seems due to the tax structure. But, I suppose this is part of the social history and wanting to elevate the standard of living for everyone. It does seem to be successful, at least for a country such as Denmark…

 

Anyhow, we enjoyed your country and town immensely and I want to thank you again for your tips, which were all very helpful.

 

Kind regards–
Ed

 

The email is published with Ed’s approval. If you have travelled to Sonderborg we would love to hear your story or see your pictures.

Guest blog: The 7 Prophets

This post was written by Anette Linnea who went on holiday in Sønderborg with her son. Anette is a busy blogger and traveller. Go to her blog and read (in Danish) her blog posts from their visit:

She also wrote a great post about a sculpture named The 7 Prophets by Zeng Chenggang that she was kind to let us translate it for this blog.

Sønderborg 2013 – De syv profeter

The summer holiday also included a visit to Sønderborg. Here we are by a statue next to the university, Alsion.

The statue is placed with its back to the university and front towards Als Sound, where sailors have the nicest view of the statue. It will stay there only till September – too bad that it is moving away again – I think this is the perfect spot for it.

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Let’s take them in sequence – first we have Socrates.

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Confucius (I believe)

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Laozi (I believe)

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Buddha

The round stone in the background represents Muhammad – who we know can not be not be depicted – instead he is present without being shown. Clever.

I didn’t realise this when I took the picture, which is why two prophets got in the same shot 😉

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Jesus

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Karl Marx – I’m not sure he would be happy to be called a prophet 😉

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It was a good thing we could scan QR codes, otherwise we would have missed out on important information:

Infomation about the sculpture

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This is when we realised the low rock with a footprint that you can step into and become one of the great thinkers.

The role was done with great concentration by the youngest 😉

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“Bird pooping on prophet”

Even the birds appreciated the statue 😉

Just before we got on the train the last day we had to stop by the 7 prophets to give them a farewell.

Anette from the blog Linneas Univers blogs about creative works, geocaching, travels and a lot more.

Thought on Holidays

We are back to Sonderborg after a brief break for a holiday. While relaxing in the warmer climate further south, my thoughts turned to holidays and how different environments can affect the vacations you take.

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From my experience in Malta, the most common vacations are city visits. When asking friends and families where they have been on holiday this year, cities like Rome, London, Paris and Prague abound. In fact, the UK and Italy remain the most popular destinations for Maltese people year on year.

Looking at Danish people, however, their answer is typically quite different. I hear Mallorca, Malaga, Crete, Canary Islands repeatedly. In Malta these types of holidays are typically considered lazy holiday destinations for young people whose idea of a great holiday is one they spend drunk (if at all). It is sometimes considered a lazy holiday choice, so imagine my surprise when these were the destinations continually mentioned by people of all ages, and especially for families. I was even more flabbergasted when they continuously told me that they have been to that same resort/location for the last X amount of years.

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It was only when an aunt of Michael’s reply to ‘Why are you going AGAIN to Crete rather than, say, Malta this year?’ was countered back by: ‘I looked at the weather forecast and there is a much lower chance of rain in October in Crete than Malta’ that it finally clicked (yes – I might be a bit slow sometimes).

As Maltese people we do not need to travel to enjoy the beach, so we consider it a bit lazy to ‘waste’ your holiday going to beaches and relaxing there. So we go elsewhere where we can appreciate the culture, the nature, and (often) the shopping experience. However, capitalising on sun is what Danes aim for.

I always saw holiday choice from my cultural point of view. I guess I should learn to be less judgemental right?;)