Late summer 2019. I was back in Copenhagen, Denmark — one final time.
Even writing that sentence hurts a little. Emotional soundtrack playing in the background, naturally. But jokes aside, this was it. After the most adventurous summer of my life, crossing Europe one last time, I returned to the city that had been my home for four years. Only for a couple of weeks. Just long enough to say goodbye.
Goodbye to friends. Goodbye to routines. Goodbye to a country that had shaped me far more than I ever expected.
The old pavilion by the castle lake at Frederiksborg Castle, Hillerød
Denmark is often described as cold — its people reserved, distant, hard to befriend. I found that to be mostly myth. What I encountered instead were warm, straightforward, quietly kind people who opened doors for a foreigner trying to find his footing. As I packed my final bags and counted down the days to my flight to Canada, I realized something painful and beautiful at the same time:
My farewells had begun long before August.
The Last Ride North
In truth, the goodbye started in early June. That’s when I took my final cycling trip north to Hillerød — a route I had ridden many times before, but one that felt different this time. The sun was high, gifting Denmark one of those rare, perfect summer days when everything feels briefly aligned.
Just a satyr splashing in the fountain
The ride began in Amager, cutting through Copenhagen’s city centre and past the familiar lakes of Brønshøj. Then came the long stretch along the forests hugging the lakes near Farum — another place I once called home — before the rolling hills of North Zealand took over. Small towns passed quietly. Forests closed in again. And finally, Hillerød.
Frederiksborg Castle, Hillerød
Jesper and I walked around the castle grounds as we had done before, talking about life, work, and whatever lay ahead. We wished each other the best — sincerely, without ceremony. I sometimes wonder if he stayed there, if he settled down, started a family like so many of my friends did, while I kept drifting across borders and oceans.
That ride felt like closing a circle.
Copenhell: Noise, Sweat, and Catharsis
Early summer held another goodbye I hadn’t yet written about.
After Wacken Open Air in 2018, 2019 brought something closer to home: Copenhell, Denmark’s largest metal festival — and its 10-year anniversary. A very different experience this time. No tent. No mud. I cycled in and out daily from my apartment in Amager, the festival grounds conveniently close.
Copenhell 2019 festival grounds
Two concerts stood above all others.
Slipknot
Slipknot was chaos in its purest form.
I forced my way to roughly the tenth row before the show began. The black curtain loomed above us, the band’s name stamped across it. Distorted noise filled the air — the intro track 515 from Iowa. The crowd screamed, compressed, surged. Then the drums hit.
I will never forget that insane intro to this concert
The curtain didn’t fall — it twisted upward violently, like it was being sucked into a vacuum, revealing the band already blasting at full force. The crowd exploded. I felt an insane pressure as bodies crushed forward. For a moment I thought I might lose my phone — or my breath. Then it clicked.
Slipknot it all of it’s glory, with big Mick Thomson in the center — Corey Taylor and Shawn Crahan flanking him
I was at a Slipknot concert. So I shoved back, found space, and gave in completely — screaming, jumping, laughing like my teenage self had been waiting years for this moment. Somehow, through the chaos, I ended up even closer to the stage.
Later, during Duality, I crowd-surfed for the first time in my life. Absolutely wild. Unforgettable.
Dimmu Borgir
Dimmu Borgir was something else entirely.
I claimed a front-row spot early and waited patiently, barely drinking so I wouldn’t lose my place. Worth every second. The atmosphere was darker, ritualistic, less primal but more intense in its own way.
Shagrath posing with the ram head in his ritualistic robes
During one of my favorite songs, I let out a loud long war cry — something that still makes me laugh when I think about it. I was finally seeing one of my all-time favorite bands, these legendary Norwegian musicians I’d admired for years.
Galder and Silenoz shredding hard during their concert
As the crowd dispersed afterward, I lingered near the stage. One of the crew walked by and handed me a guitar pick. A real Dimmu Borgir pick. I still cherish it to this day.
Winds of Change
On the final night, The Scorpions took the stage.
That’s when I met up with my old friend Lasse — drunk, hoarse, and gloriously exhausted. We sat on a small hill overlooking the massive crowd as the opening whistles of Winds of Change began.
The Danish flag shown proudly during the Scorpions concert
We whistled along. Then sang — badly, loudly, sincerely.
Candles lit up across the crowd as darkness fell. My voice was nearly gone. So was his. That moment — the song, the crowd, my friend beside me — felt like the perfect, unspoken farewell.
One Last Dinner
By August, it was time for quieter goodbyes.
My roommates and I planned one final group dinner with our computer scientist friends, and I suggested Folkehuset Absalon. I’d been introduced to the former church years earlier — repurposed into a community space filled with shared meals, conversations, and long wooden tables.
Every evening at six, strangers and acquaintances alike gathered for communal dinner — delicious, home-style food served family-style. Affordable, warm, human. It felt right.
The Machine and friends after our last dinner together in Copenhagen
Sitting there one last time, sharing food and stories, I realized how deeply Denmark had taught me the value of community — not loud or forced, but quietly present if you chose to participate.
What Denmark Taught Me
When I arrived in Denmark years earlier, my only real goal was to leave Romania.
To escape. To prove myself. To breathe.
I believe I did that. During my Master’s at Copenhagen University, I started behind my peers and ended up exceeding expectations. I learned discipline, independence, resilience. I even began dreaming of academia. But I also learned something harder: effort alone isn’t always enough.
One last evening stroll along the streets of Copenhagen
Financial instability followed me for years. Career opportunities came slowly. As much as I loved Denmark, there was no future for me there along my chosen path. So my thinking changed.
Idealism gave way to pragmatism. Stability, income, and long-term opportunity began to matter more than prestige. That shift shaped my decision to choose Canada over Switzerland, industry over academia, practicality over purity. It shaped my growing interest in investing, markets, and long-term independence.
The Next Chapter
If my Danish saga was about escape — about searching for an idealized happiness — then my Canadian saga would be about ambition.
The day I embarked on the next big adventure of my life
With my final bags packed and every goodbye said, I boarded the transatlantic flight that carried me away from Europe and toward an entire new chapter filled with its own radical ups and downs.
As my Danish Saga came to a close, my Canadian chapter was about to begin.
It was around early May, 2019. I was nearing the final stages of my two PhD applications — one in Canada, the other in Switzerland. By then it was clear: my time in Denmark was coming to an end. Nothing lasts forever, after all.
Soon enough, I would have to make a choice between the two opportunities. The Canadian PhD already felt like a done deal — the contract was practically ready for my signature. The Swiss path, however, required one last step: traveling to Zurich to meet the ETH team in person and leave a strong impression.
The Canadian option
The Canadian project was funded by Metal Earth in Sudbury, Ontario, but the primary supervisor — and thus the position — was based at the Université du Québec à Chicoutimi (UQAC).
At first, only the “Université du Québec” part registered with me, and I mistakenly thought it meant I’d be moving to Quebec City. I still laugh when I think back to those early days, googling images of the city and imagining what a beautiful place it would be to live for the next four years.
This is where I thought the University of Quebec was
It was only later in the process that I realized the truth: the Université du Québec system was split into several subdivisions scattered across the province. None of them were actually in Quebec City. UQAC turned out to be in Chicoutimi, a smaller northern town along the Saguenay Fjord. Not quite as grand as Quebec City, but still charming enough in photos.
This was actually where the UQAC was located
One clear downside: Chicoutimi is in the heartland of French-speaking Canada. The courses I would need to take were all in French — a language I hadn’t touched since some basic lessons in middle school. Thankfully, the PhD research itself could be done in English, but the expectation was that I’d learn French along the way.
Weighing the Two Options
Even though the Swiss PhD wasn’t a done deal yet, I began weighing the two options early.
From an academic and research perspective, ETH was the clear winner. It was world-renowned, offered unparalleled networking opportunities, and operated with a much larger budget. The project itself — a study of pegmatites in Colorado, USA — was fascinating (and ironically, quite relevant to what I would end up doing in later years). Best of all, everything would be in hassle-free English.
The Canadian PhD, however, was more industry-oriented. Its focus was on intrusion-related gold systems, knowledge directly valuable to mining and exploration careers. And honestly, I wasn’t sure I wanted a purely academic future. Research was fun, yes, but the uncertainty of postdoc cycles and the slim odds of landing a professorship were discouraging. My ideal academic path might have been a government research position in Europe — but those jobs were rare and fiercely competitive.
Fiery sunset views from my apartment room in Copenhagen
If I was willing to sacrifice a little on the “prestige factor” during the PhD years, Canada offered something ETH couldn’t: a strong chance of a stable career afterwards. Opportunities in North America were simply far more abundant. Plus, I had family in Alberta. Even if not close to Chicoutimi, the thought of finally living in the same country after decades apart carried its own weight.
Still, ETH had a unique pull. With a PhD from Zurich, maybe — just maybe — I’d have the credentials to crack into those coveted European research positions too.
I wasn’t ready to decide. Not yet.
All Expenses Paid
Julien, the supervisor for the ETH Zurich PhD project, explained that the two finalists would be invited separately to campus. The task: meet staff and students, and deliver an open presentation of our Master’s thesis. All expenses paid.
By that point, the Canadian PhD was basically secured, so I felt unusually relaxed. I wasn’t yet certain which offer I would ultimately choose, but I wanted to take the Swiss process all the way. And so, I found myself flying to Zurich for the first time in my life, on my way to visit one of the most prestigious universities in the world.
Zurich, Switzerland. May of 2019
I was booked into a cozy hotel in the city center, just a short walk from campus, for two nights. The weather was overcast and a little drizzly, but I made time to wander Zurich’s streets and take in the sights. Not much preparation was needed for my presentation — I had spent months after graduation working on a scientific paper based on my thesis with my former supervisor in Copenhagen, so the material was second nature. And best of all, there was no stress. I had a safety net.
ETH Zurich
For those unfamiliar with it, ETH consistently ranks among the very top universities worldwide. With cutting-edge facilities, near-limitless funding, and some of the brightest minds on the planet, it’s an institution that sets the gold standard. In Geology, the gap was staggering: ETH ranked #1 globally. My Canadian option, UQAC, showed up somewhere in the deep hundreds.
Zurich University, main entrance
The welcome in Zurich reflected that prestige. When I arrived on campus, I met Julien and soon it was time for my presentation. Professors and researchers filed into the room. Under different circumstances, I might have been a bundle of nerves — but with Canada as a sure backup, I felt calm, almost professorial myself.
I delivered my talk with confidence, even channeling some of the pedagogical style of one of my favorite KU professors, Tod Waight. The session went beautifully. A handful of questions followed, which I answered with clarity — and when I didn’t have a precise answer, we dove into back-and-forth discussions as if I were already a peer in their academic circle.
It felt incredible.
University vibes
After my presentation, Julien introduced me to several professors and students from the geology department. The students then gave me a tour of the campus. Everything was state of the art. I could feel, even in their tone, that the expectations here were sky-high — but none of them would have had it any other way. The environment at ETH seemed perfect for this kind of work.
Walking around Zurich
One of the last students I met turned out to be Romanian — a fellow geologist from Iași. He described his first year as a nightmarishly steep learning curve, necessary to catch up to ETH’s academic standards. It sounded eerily familiar to my first semester at Copenhagen University. But he emphasized that he wouldn’t trade the experience for anything and that he wanted to stay in Switzerland long-term.
And yet — this was where a flaw in the Swiss system revealed itself. Despite welcoming top-tier students from around the world, Switzerland didn’t seem to want them to remain afterwards. In fact, even Swiss graduates themselves couldn’t apply for postdocs at ETH after completing their PhD there.
The dim evening sunrays on Liebfrauenkirche
This was a serious concern for me. I wasn’t just choosing the next four years of my life. I was trying to choose what would be best for the long term.
Torn Between Two Paths
I spent the rest of the day mingling with students and wandering the vast campus, soaking in the splendor of what could be. All the while, my mind kept circling back to the decision that weighed on me.
Streets of Zurich on a slow Sunday afternoon
Friends and family I had consulted agreed with my pragmatic view: Canada seemed like the safer choice. More industry ties, more opportunities, and a long-term career path. But after the warm welcome at ETH — the people, the prestige, the sheer weight of being there — I couldn’t stop asking myself: How could anyone say no to all of this?
Water fountain in Platzspitz along the Limat river
Maybe those thoughts slipped into my subconscious, subtly influencing how I carried myself for the rest of the visit. Later that afternoon, Julien invited me for a beer in town. Although I had mentioned alternatives before, it was during that conversation that I opened up more fully about my hesitation. Maybe too much. Looking back, I think he picked up on my uncertainty about ETH.
Zurich train station
Still, the evening ended on a warm note. By then, our conversation felt less like supervisor-to-candidate and more like a friendly outing.
No Going Back
A week later, fate made the decision for me. Julien wrote, regretfully, that ETH had chosen the other candidate.
I wasn’t disappointed. By that point, I had already leaned toward Canada. In fact, I felt relieved — spared from having to say no to such a prestigious offer. I wrote back warmly, thanking him for the opportunity and expressing hope that our paths might cross again in the future.
Back in Copenhagen
Now there was no going back. Canada was my path forward. The only question was: had I truly made the right choice? Only time would tell.
Regardless of what lay ahead, I knew one thing for sure: my last summer in Europe had begun. My final months in Copenhagen were awash in waves of nostalgia and emotion. Denmark had given me so much — friends, experiences, growth. A whole chapter of my life was closing, and a new saga was about to begin.
The Final Summer
This summer wouldn’t be spent quietly, however. Months earlier, I had promised myself and my Greek friends that if things worked out for me, I’d go visit Greece. This went back to my comical discovery that I might be up to 5% Greek — enough for me to start proudly declaring myself a descendant of Odysseus, forever searching not for my birthplace, but for that elusive place that would one day truly feel like home. So I wasted no time planning a two-week solo adventure across Greece.
Lighthouse off the shores of Copenhagen
And there was more. I couldn’t miss EUGEN that year — the gathering that had indirectly led me to this opportunity in the first place. Plus, one of my best friends, Eddy, had recently moved to Lausanne, Switzerland. This was my last chance to see him before leaving Europe.
In the end, the summer of 2019 turned out to be one of the most adventurous and joyful times of my life — travel, friendship, laughter, and discovery. A legendary summer to mark an equally legendary year. One that I’ll rave about forever.
Last selfie in Copenhagen before the big summer extravaganza
Sweden, Ireland, Canada, Switzerland — each of them had dangled a possible future before me. Some were set aside early, others carried me further along the road, but they all left me wondering about the lives I might have lived. And then there was Denmark, at the center of it all. The country that had been my home for over four years. A place I wasn’t leaving behind lightly. Yet I was at peace with my choice. The time had come to move on. Perhaps that is my destiny — like a descendant of Odysseus, or as I like to call myself Odyssian, forever searching for that elusive place I can finally call home.
April 2019 — A year and a half had passed since completing my Master’s degree in Geology at Copenhagen University, and still no job in sight. I had applied locally and abroad, sent out countless CVs, and heard nothing but silence. Near the end of my patience, I was ready to give up on geology altogether and follow the path so many of my classmates had taken: switching into IT. Then, in the span of just one week, everything changed — five job offers arrived after eighteen months of nothing.
This was one of the great crossroads of my life: the moment that closed my chapter in Denmark and opened the next big phase of my journey.
A Few Weeks Earlier
It was just another ordinary day, the kind that usually gets lost in memory. Late March, 2019. Then, on Facebook, something unusual caught my eye: a post in the EUGEN (European Geoscience Network) group.
Just an ordinary spring day in Copenhagen, 2019
Remember EUGEN? The student-run network that organized annual summer geology camps? After the great time I’d had at EUGEN Austria the year before, I had joined their Facebook group. And half a year later, that decision proved unexpectedly valuable.
A fellow “Eugeneer,” Adrien — someone I’d never met — shared an opportunity: his supervisor in Quebec, Canada was looking for PhD candidates. I thought, why not? It was worth a shot, though I didn’t expect much after so many applications that had gone nowhere.
The imposing Grundtvigs Kirke in Bispebjerg, Copenhagen
To my surprise, just a few days later I heard back. Professor Lucie Mathieu was not only interested but eager to set up an interview. The conversation went very well, but questions remained: tuition fees, grant coverage, and whether the stipend would be enough to live on. It wasn’t a done deal yet — but it was the most promising lead I’d had in months.
Exploring Every Possibility
As I continued to look into the tuition situation in Quebec, I never stopped pursuing other paths. If there was one thing I had learned since graduating, it was that nothing was certain until the deal was signed. Among those other paths were two more PhD applications — one in Dublin, Ireland, and one at ETH Zurich in Switzerland. I also stayed in touch with my former supervisor from my 2018 internship at GEUS, hoping that one day, if a lab-tech role opened, he might have me in mind.
The sea of uncertainty was finally narrowing
None of this was new. I had been applying since 2017, endlessly sending CVs into the void. The only fresh tactic I tried came after a job-seeking course suggested I reach out directly on LinkedIn. Late that March, I gave it a shot, writing to an executive at Boliden, the Swedish mining company, to ask about summer fieldwork.
The Week Everything Changed
Up until mid-March 2019 — until that Canadian PhD interview — I had not received so much as a single interview invitation. Then, suddenly, everything flipped.
The financial uncertainties in Quebec were resolved: tuition would be minimal, and the PhD stipend more than enough to cover living costs. Professor Julien Allaz at ETH invited me first to a Skype call and then to Zurich for the final stage of selection, expenses paid. Tonny Thomsen from GEUS reached out with a one-year lab technician offer. Peter Svensson from Boliden called me to offer a summer job in Sweden after my speculative LinkedIn message. Even the Dublin professor wrote to express interest — though by then, overwhelmed with concrete options, I politely declined.
Cherry blossom at Bispebjerg Kirkegård
It was absolutely surreal. After nearly two years of silence, within a single week in April, everything was happening at once. I was ecstatic, but also frustrated and confused. Why now? Why all at once, after so long?
That week remains one of the most surreal of my life — the week I went from feeling invisible to standing at a crossroads of extraordinary opportunities. I knew whichever path I chose would shape not only the next few years, but the course of my life. And I wasn’t going to make that choice lightly.
Choices… So Many Choices
So many choices indeed. I had to pause and collect my thoughts. The spring days were warm and golden that year, and I spent as much time as I could cycling through the city streets. In the back of my mind I knew it would likely be my last spring in Denmark.
A melancholic visit to Amager beach park
The lab-tech position at GEUS was a solid opportunity, but it was only a one-year contract — hardly the stable future I was searching for. The Swedish mining job was tempting too: a real foot in the door of the exploration industry. Yet, it was only a summer contract, nothing permanent.
I couldn’t help reflecting on how much I would miss this place. Copenhagen had become my city — the city that gave me my first real chance to prove myself. And prove myself I did. My new apartment, right in the heart of town, felt like home again, especially living with two close friends. The sunsets from my window were spectacular and the apartment vibe was top. Well… except for that time when our ceiling sprung a leak and the landlord’s “solution” was to jam in a couple of metal rods and suspend two buckets in the middle of our living room. Still, the laughter, the company, and those views made it one of my happiest homes.
Newly built modern building. Great job guys! 6/10 – IGN
But choices had to be made. The path forward was narrowing. It would come down to one of the two PhD offers: Switzerland or Canada. Not an easy choice by any stretch.
January 2019—I was still living in Farum, Denmark—still unemployed, and feeling the mounting pressure to find a job. Any job, at that point. I was even ready to give up on my career as a geologist. Despite all the studying, all the effort, and even an internship, nothing concrete had come of it. The frustration was real. But nothing lasts forever, right? Not the good times—but not the bad ones either.
A rare snowy Nyhavn
As a last resort, just to avoid moving back to Romania, I started considering a move to Hungary later that year. A fresh start: new country, new career, new opportunities. Hopefully. Maybe.
Then came an unexpected turning point.
Nostalgia Comes Knocking
Half way through January, I went to see the movie Glass with two of my friends, Venko and Abdalla. As we left the cinema chatting about the film, the conversation drifted—first to life, then to housing. Not abroad. Within Denmark. I admitted how tired I was of Farum. It felt like ever since I moved there, I’d left the best parts of my Danish life behind in Copenhagen. I missed the city. I missed the memories.
Exploring The Citadel during my early days in Copenhagen
Coincidentally, both Venko and Abdalla were also thinking about moving out of their apartments. That’s when I threw out a suggestion—half joke, half serious: “What if we moved in together?”
It made sense. Renting a larger apartment for several people was often easier—and cheaper—than finding a one- or two-bedroom place alone. The idea stuck. Before long, we were actively looking, even attending open houses. I only had one request: to take the smaller room, and pay a little less. They both had full-time jobs, while I was still unemployed. Our financial situations were very different, and I wanted to be fair.
The Apartment That Lit a Spark
We visited an apartment in a newly built complex in Amager, on Faste Batteri Vej. The area still had that “fresh construction” feel—unfinished corners in the courtyard, patches of gravel where grass would eventually grow—but the apartment itself? It was lit.
Three bedrooms, a spacious living room with an open kitchen, and even a balcony. Best of all, one of the bedrooms was slightly smaller, but it had large floor-to-ceiling windows that flooded the space with light. I loved it instantly. The rent, when split three ways, wasn’t bad at all. Even though I’d be paying less than my friends due to my financial situation, it was still going to be more expensive than what I was paying in Farum. But honestly, it felt worth it.
Walks along the canals in Copenhagen
At that point in my life, I desperately needed a morale boost. Moving back to Copenhagen and living with close friends felt like exactly the right call. After thinking it over for a few days, we all agreed: We’d take it.
The move
The move could honestly be a story all on its own. We were three guys—none of us with a car, and I don’t think any of us even had an active driver’s license—trying to move into one apartment, all on the same day, from three different directions. To make things even more chaotic, we had plans to pick up various pieces of second-hand furniture along the way.
To bring some order to the madness, we called in our friend Bogdan—our unofficial strategist and logistics master. The plan was simple-ish: Bogdan would rent a large van, pick up Venko first, then come grab me and all my stuff from Farum in the afternoon. From there, we’d spend the evening and night picking up furniture, grabbing Abdalla, and collecting a second-hand couch and TV. We would move in that very night.
One last look at my room in Farum
The day arrived. My luggage and few pieces of furniture were packed and ready to go. The guys showed up a little behind schedule, but we loaded everything quickly. I vividly remember watching a beautiful sunset as we drove toward Copenhagen.
I was leaving Farum behind for good—and it felt symbolic. The stagnant, sour winds were finally shifting. Something new was beginning. A rebirth.
By the time we’d picked up Abdalla and loaded everyone’s belongings, it was already nighttime. The van was getting full, and we started to worry. How were we going to haul beds, tables, and a huge couch up several flights of stairs? The elevator in the building was tiny—it clearly wasn’t going to cut it.
The Couch: A Battle of Willpower
Ah yes, the couch.
It was big. Which was perfect for our spacious new living room—but a total nightmare to carry. To make matters worse, it couldn’t be disassembled. Still, we bought it. We’d figure it out somehow.
And figure it out we did—through sheer Balkan willpower, brute force, and a lot of swearing. We pushed, pulled, and wrestled that massive thing up a tight, winding staircase—floor by floor—until we finally reached the top (I believe it was the 5’th) floor. By the end, we were drenched in sweat and completely exhausted. It was around 3 a.m., but we had pulled off the unimaginable: moved three people, furniture and all, across greater Copenhagen, in less than a day.
The night of the big move in. Couch successfully in place and all.
We capped off the night with a celebratory meal at a nearby Chinese fast-food spot that was open all night. Sitting there, utterly wiped out but smiling, it was clear this would be the beginning of a beautiful new chapter.
Finally back in Copenhagen
After two years away from my favorite city, I was finally back in Copenhagen. This time, I was living in a fairly central neighborhood, which meant I could once again enjoy all the familiar places I used to frequent as a student—and, more importantly, spend more time with friends.
Not long after moving in, my flat mates and I began inviting friends over. Some evenings were for food and drinks, others were guitar jam sessions. It felt like life was finally falling back into place. Even if my career situation hadn’t improved yet, I felt more grounded, more at home.
Bogdan impressing us with his skills during one of our guitar jam sessions
But being back also meant new bureaucracy. Because I’d moved municipalities, I had to register with the local Copenhagen job center. That’s when they enrolled me in a mandatory six-week job search course—standard procedure for anyone newly unemployed in the city. The ironic part? I wasn’t new to unemployment. I had already been out of work for well over a year. But apparently, in the eyes of the system, I was “new” to being unemployed here—so off to class I went.
As absurd as it seemed at the time, that course ended up being one of the best unexpected turns in my life. Not because it helped me land a job, but because I met some truly unforgettable people—specifically a couple of hilarious Greeks who would end up leaving a real mark on my journey.
Greek Blood Runs Through Our Veins
Not long before this, I had taken one of those at-home DNA tests. Pure curiosity. My family has a pretty complex and scattered history, with a lot of missing pieces and unanswered questions. I just wanted to know more.
Spring was in the air in Copenhagen once more
The results were mostly what I expected: a strong Balkan, Central, and Eastern European mix. But two things stood out. One was a notable percentage of Ashkenazi Jewish ancestry. The other—more surprising to me—was a small spark of Greek heritage. Just about 5%.
That 5% fascinated me the most. Maybe because, in the months before, I’d already been drawing a kind of poetic parallel between my own journey and that of Odysseus—leaving behind my country of birth, wandering in search of a home, navigating obstacles, always hoping for a happy resolution. The idea that there might be a literal Greek connection hidden in my blood somehow made the metaphor feel more real.
Team Greece
It was right around this time that I met Makis and Anestis—two over-educated, unemployed Greeks who were stuck in the same job search course as me. From the first conversation, things escalated quickly: we went from casual small talk to deep dives into politics, philosophy, and history like it was nothing.
We became fast friends. It started as a joke—I called ourselves Odysseus, Achilles, and Agamemnon—but soon we were actually hanging out outside of class. One day, poor Makis had a full-on meltdown after spending hours arguing with a call center agent from DR (Danish Broadcasting). What started as a bad day turned into one of the funniest, most memorable rants I’ve ever witnessed. It lasted the whole day. Poor man had to eat a couple of cheap, shitty Frikadeller because the “DR mafia” had stolen his money. We laughed until our stomachs hurt.
Agamemnon, Achilles and Odysseus enjoying a BBQ
That late winter and early spring were filled with moments like that—serious conversations, endless jokes, and a bond that made the bleakness of unemployment more bearable.
It also sparked something deeper in me: a genuine curiosity to one day visit Greece, explore the culture, and connect—however loosely—to that little 5% of me. Not just to understand my heritage better, but to honor the strange and wonderful twists of fate that brought me to that job center classroom, and to the friends I met there.
Perhaps it was the move, or the change of the season, but I could almost feel the winds of change beginning to stir—gently carrying the scent of opportunity and better days. Life, as it turns out, was already setting the stage for an unexpected turn.
During late November, 2017, while I was routinely scrolling through my Facebook feed, a random ad post caught my eye. It was from DFDS, a Danish international shipping and logistics company, and read something like “The cheapest ferry ride ever”, roundtrip from Copenhagen to Oslo.
With a raised eyebrow, and high skepticism I decided to check it out on their website and, it was indeed legit. Copenhagen to Oslo, round trip on selected dates within the next couple of weeks for 2 DKK… I repeat, TWO KRONER… That’s less than a dollar!
Full moon spontaneity
This was one of those rare opportunities for a spontaneous adventure that I couldn’t pass up. However, I hoped to get at least one of my friends on board to go with. This wasn’t the easiest thing to do as most of my friends were working at the time and couldn’t, or wouldn’t just want to suddenly take time off. Having recently graduated, I had the “luxury” of still being unemployed. Luckily, there was at least one other person I could think of in a similar boat.
None other than Eddy, my Nigerian colleague and close friend from KU who had also recently graduated and was job-searching. I quickly reached out to him with a proposal to take a break from the mundane and to join me on the cheapest ferry ride ever.
Setting sail
Within a week or so, Eddy and I were ready to embark on our dirt cheap journey to Norway. The ferry departs daily at 16:40 from Copenhagen and arrives in Oslo the next morning at around 10:00. It stays in port until around the same time in the afternoon before returning to Copenhagen. To keep to the theme of cheapest trip ever, both of us made sure to pack enough sandwiches to last us through the outbound journey.
Nordhavn, Copenhagen, before departure
Once on board, we left our things in our cabin in the bowels of the ship and rushed up and out onto the deck to enjoy the view; and what a view it was… Since it was around early December, it was already nightfall by the time we were supposed to leave. Copenhagen’s lights glimmered and shined against the fading hues of the late sunset, their reflections dancing over the dark, rippling waters.
Not long after, the ship began to slowly drift away from the shore. As we floated away, the bay of Nordhavn offered some excellent photo opportunities that I couldn’t pass up. The downside was that the chilly wind and ship’s movements made it hard to get a clean shot since my camera didn’t have stabilizer.
Eddy and I, ready to set sail
After leaving Copenhagen behind, we returned to our rooms to warm up and rest. This was my first time traveling on a big ship and I was curious if and how the rocking motion would affect me. For the first hours of the trip we could barely feel any movement. Eddy fell asleep and I sat in my bed reading and doom-scrolling through my phone.
The Kattegat sea
A couple of hours into our trip, the rocking had begun. It was very subtle at first, especially while laying in bed, but I noticed that I’d constantly have to reposition myself as I kept sliding off the bed. The novelty of this excited me and I immediately got up to go topside.
Old photos of ferry ships of the DFDS fleet on display
We had now left the calm waters of the Øresund strait and were sailing into the much more turbulent Kattegat sea. As I walked towards the deck, the rocking was way more prevalent. It wasn’t bad by any means, but it felt and looked as if everyone on the ship was a bit drunk. Once I got out, I was instantly hit by rushing cold winds and water droplets from the waves smashing into the side of the hull.
It felt bad enough that I didn’t want to get anywhere near the handrails. Instead, I kept close to the walls and enjoyed the raw elements battering our ship in the night from a safe distance. I was also pleasantly relieved that I didn’t feel any motion sickness. In fact the entire night trip was quite pleasant and I think all that rocking even helped put me to sleep faster.
Arriving in Oslo
When we got up the next morning, we finished our sandwiches and rushed back up onto the deck to be greeted by the sights of the Oslofjord.
Sailing through the Oslofjord
Sailing past residential and industrial buildings scattered across the surrounding hills, our ship slowly but surely made its way along the fjord and into the port of Oslo. As we turned to dock, one building in particular stuck out with its bold, modern, angular shape. Namely the Oslo Opera House, situated in Oslo harbor.
Oslo Opera House looking like an iceberg
After disembarking, Eddy and I wandered off into the busy streets of the city for a day of sightseeing.
Oslo
Arriving in Oslo feels like stepping into a city that balances its rich past with a crisp, modern energy. The Norwegian capital, founded over a thousand years ago during the Viking Age, has grown from a medieval trading post into a vibrant waterfront city. Walking along the harbor at Aker Brygge, you can see sleek new buildings standing beside old wooden piers, where merchant ships once unloaded goods from across Europe.
Oslo harbor from the ship’s deck
Heading inland, we followed the wide, clean streets past the striking Oslo City Hall, a huge red-brick building famous for hosting the Nobel Peace Prize ceremony. Its twin towers loom above the harbor, decorated with murals and carvings that tell stories of Norway’s seafaring and working-class roots. From there, the city begins to open up.
Oslo City Hall (Rådhus)
Crossing into the city center, we passed through the People’s Theater (Folketeateret), an art deco building that once hosted grand operas and plays, and today holds concerts and modern performances under its stately old signage.
Folketeatret, also home to a weird sculpture of Kate Moss in a yoga position, among other things
As we continued along some of the side streets, we came across this amusing giraffe mural on one of the buildings, its long neck and goofy-looking face resembling ET the extraterrestrial.
ET the giraffe
After about an hour of strolling through the streets, we arrived at the The Royal Palace (Det kongelige slott), located at the end of Karl Johans gate, the main boulevard of the city. Built between 1824 and 1848, the palace is the official residence of the Norwegian monarch.
Ain’t nothing like being back in Norway!
Standing as a historic landmark, the royal residence was originally built for King Charles III John, the first king of Norway after the country gained independence from Denmark.
Jul i Vinterland
Heading back from The Royal Palace, we passed by the central part of the University of Oslo’s historic campus and the Norwegian parliament building. It was around noon, so we were on the lookout for a cheap place to grab a bite. Not something easy to find in the center of Oslo.
University of Oslo building in the city center
As we strolled along Karl Johans gate, we came across “Jul i Vinterland”, Oslo’s largest and most iconic Christmas market. Located in Spikersuppa, a city square between the National Theatre and the Royal Palace, the enchanting market transforms the heart of the city into a festive wonderland each winter.
Oslo’s Christmas market
At the center of the market was an open-air ice skating rink, free for all to enjoy. Surrounded by twinkling lights and festive music, it provided a perfect setting for skating enthusiasts and families alike. Various amusement rides dotted the square, including a 40-meter-high Ferris wheel providing panoramic views of the city.
Food and drink stalls at Jul i Vinterland
All across the square bustling stalls offered a variety of gifts, clothing, toys, and culinary delights. We couldn’t pass up the chance to enjoy a cup of gløgg (mulled wine) while we were there.
Nothing like a cup of gløgg on a cold December day
As we stood there in the cool outdoors enjoying our hot beverage, the first snowflakes of the season started coming down, marking the start of winter. Even if it barely lasted a few minutes, it was just such a perfectly hygge moment… Being back in Norway and enjoying a hot drink in a festive atmosphere with one of my dearest friends while witnessing the first snowfall of the end of 2017.
Oslo harbor and heading back home
After leaving the market, we found a reasonably priced place to have a quick lunch and then made our way back to the harbor. We strolled around there for another hour, or two until it was time to head back to the ferry.
The Diver (Dykkaren) located along the harbor promenade
This was now my third time visiting Norway and thus far each of my visits had these memorable “feel good” moments that I will never forget. Be it the peaceful solitude of the lonely mountain high above the fjords in Borgund, the vivid sunset reddening the sky in Jostedalsbreen National Park, or the first snowfall at Oslo’s cozy Christmas market.
There was definitely something special about this country for me. Something that kept calling me back. Whether this would lead to a more permanent move there in the future was anyone’s guess. For the moment, it was time to head back home to Denmark.
Adios Oslo. Until next time!
That night on the ferry, Eddy and I decided to dine out on the ship. Even if a bit pricey, after this incredibly cheap little holiday we felt we deserved a little indulging. Plus, this was my way poor-man’s way of paying back DFDS for this awesome opportunity that basically cost nothing.
A delicious steak and beer dinner on the ferry
While enjoying our steaks and fancy beers, I kept thinking of if and when will the day come that an experience like dining out on a ship won’t feel like indulging in a once in a lifetime financial expense. Will there ever be a time when I can just enjoy things without constantly looking at the costs? Maybe… Hopefully.
Hoisting up the Danish flag. We’re coming home!
The next morning, while we were back sailing in the calm Øresund strait towards Copenhagen, I was out on the deck looking out at the horizon, wondering what the future holds. Even with all the ups and downs of life, and constant financial difficulties, as long as the good stories and adventures kept flowing, life was pretty darn good and worthwhile.
After returning from my holiday in Norway, I fell back into my work-study routine for the rest of 2016. Apart from the occasional bike trips to Bakken, or hang outs with my friends from university, the last months were fairly uneventful. It was soon time to close a triumphant year of success and adventure.
Svanemøllen beach near where I lived in my first year in Copenhagen
Work and study were intense through this period. I didn’t have any more courses, but I began thoroughly working on the samples collected in Iceland. Whenever I wasn’t working in the labs, I tried to read through one of the numerous scientific articles my supervisor had sent me. Apart from that, I had my part-time job and Danish language classes to fill my time. Whenever I’d manage to get a free day during the week, I’d try to hang out with friends. I remember being amused at one of my Danish friends, Irene, calling me a machine because it seemed like I wasn’t ever taking any breaks.
I was busier than ever and it felt great. It felt so rewarding! Having purpose, earning money, building my life and having more friends than ever.
The housing crisis is back
As busy as I had become, I had completely forgotten the unwritten terms of my then living arrangement. If you recall, I had moved in with one of my friends in early summer. However, the deal was supposed to be short term, while I find my own place. I was still looking, but not as hard as I should have. With everything else happening, looking for a new place had fallen to the bottom of my priority list. That’s until, Lasse gave me a wake-up call in November, which then really took me off guard.
The autumn streets of Frederiksberg, Copenhagen
I tried to figure out if there was an issue I could fix with him so that I could stay more, but the man simply wanted to go back to living alone. Which was completely understandable. Although I jokingly kept poking him for years later about that time he wanted to “kick me out on the streets”. Hehe… It wasn’t anything like that, of course (If you’re reading this Lasse, you know I love ya, buddy!). In any case, the pressure was on to find a new place to live. Not an easy feat in Copenhagen.
Farum
After quickly exhausting all possibilities in Copenhagen due to unavailability and pricing, I had to settle on moving out of the city. As long as I could live close to an S-train station, I could easily get in and out of the city. I ended up panic-agreeing to a basement apartment in a house to the west of Copenhagen. The price was a bit steep for me, but I was going to have a fairly large area to myself.
Incoming train towards Farum at Østerport station, Copenhagen
No written contract, just a trust-based payment. However, on second inspection, I found quite a few things that were off putting, like no toilet seat, very poor lighting throughout the day, dirty surroundings and a moldy smell. Oh and did I mention NO TOILET SEAT? That one really bothered me. But I had already sent those people my two month deposit.
Just as I was getting ready to move in, a much better offer had fallen into my lap through a friend of a friend from Romania. At the risk of losing my deposit, a substantial amount, I decided to cancel the first offer and go with the second. Thus, I ended up moving to Farum, a small town to the north of Copenhagen.
One of the regular visitors on our balcony in Farum
I had a nice clean room with a balcony and was sharing the lower part of an apartment with a neat and friendly Romanian guy. As for the other offer, well… I never saw my deposit again. Still worth it.
Holiday season
With the holiday season around the corner, I was planning to gift my mom a trip to Copenhagen so we could be together for Christmas. I wanted her to experience arriving in Denmark the same way I had, so a Norwegian Airlines flight from Budapest was the best option. I had also found a decently priced room in the WakeUpCopenhagen hotel, right in the city center. All she had to do was get herself to Budapest a couple of days before Christmas.
At the Little Mermaid statue with my mom
It was around that time that I had bought my second bike. A new one, fresh from the store. It was a simple city bike, but without all the quirks of “Shame“. So from that point on, Shame became the tourist bike I would lend out to anyone visiting me. Sometimes it was also the backup bike whenever my main one had a flat tire. Shame would never disappoint, despite it’s shameful name!
Checking out the Christmas decoration around central Copenhagen
My mom was fairly quickly impressed with her experience, having appropriately flown on the “Hans Christian Andersen” plane from Norwegian Airlines. Old Andersen being one of her favorite authors growing up. She also enjoyed cycling, so Copenhagen’s extensive cycling culture was ideal for her.
Touring the city
During her few days there, I basically wanted to show her around as many places as I could. I would head back to Farum each evening and then take a train to Copenhagen the next morning. By the time I would arrive she would have had time to go through her morning routine, and then we’d have the entire day to cycle around.
Rosenborg castle in The King’s Garden
We toured the Copenhagen Citadel, Amelienborg, Frederik’s Church, The King’s Garden and of course Nyhavn. I gave her a tour of my university campus as well. On another day we cycled all the way to my sanctuary at Charlottenlund beach. I probably also took her around Østerbro to show her where I used to live. It was basically a tour of my life for the past year and a half.
Hans Christian Andersen statue in The King’s Garden
She enjoyed it very much. She also developed an odd love and fascination for canons, which were plentiful around the old city fortifications. Even to this day she gets excited whenever she sees an old canon or artillery piece displayed in a park.
We caught the changing of the guards at Amelienborg
We spent Christmas night in the hotel room. I was hoping to be able to go out for a nice dinner somewhere, but all restaurants were of course closed. The only thing I found open was my favorite Turkish kebab place. So we ended up ordering a pizza from there. A Christmas pizza!
It’s Turkish Christmas pizza time! With some fine wine and decorations
On our last night, we visited Tivoli Gardens. Tivoli is basically an amusement park and my mom wasn’t really big on rides, or anything like that, but she was taken away by the decorations. She was snapping photos left and right at every little corner. Suffice to say, she had fallen in love with Denmark by this point.
A happy mom at Tivoli Gardens
Considering that my mom raves about that Copenhagen Christmas holiday to this day, I would say it was a resounding success.
New Years Eve
After Christmas had passed and my mom left, I went back to my work routine. I had to work on the 31’st of December too, which lasted well into the night. I didn’t make any plans, so at around 10 pm when I was done, I messaged my friends to see if anyone was available to grab a few a drinks in the city for New Years Eve. One of my friends, Carlos, replied.
We met up soon enough and bought some extra strong Carlsberg Elephant beers. I’m not going to go into details, but we ended up having a pretty wild night on the streets of Copenhagen. We even made it to the Town Hall square for the fireworks just in the nick of time!
Those Carlsberg Elephants hit hard!
The next morning I woke up at Carlos’ place with a pounding headache and an adequate hangover. It was an appropriate way to close a triumphant year of success and adventure. One of my best years to date!
It was now June 2016 and summer was upon us in Denmark. My financial crisis was over and I had settled into my new routine, balancing study and work. We were nearing the end of the semester and the onset of summer break. I was happy to take a break from courses and begin focusing on my ambitious one-year thesis project on Iceland. However, this period also triggered a new crisis for me. A housing crisis…
The problem…
In one of my first posts about life in Denmark, I mentioned how difficult it could be to find an affordable place to stay in Copenhagen, especially as a foreign student. The Housing Foundation was a relatively easy, albeit pricey, solution for first-year students. But their contracts would only cover the first year of study, and mine was nearing its end.
I got my two legs to stand on, but now I lost my upper body – Uh oh! – Sculpture from The Glyptotek, Copenhagen
I began looking for other potential dorms, and housing portals a couple of months before the deadline, but this was already way too late. Waiting lists for some of the dorms in Copenhagen had people on them going back over a year. It was absurd!
I was getting tired of the never ending crisis, but it was time to “fight” once more, so head first right into the storm!
I searched through some of the major housing/rental websites too. There were seldom any studio apartments available. If I ever found one, the price would be too steep. Flat sharing was more common and affordable, but even that was hard to come by as demand exceeded supply.
Last, but not least I made sure to spread the word amongst my friends in hopes that they knew someone looking for a flat mate. Luckily I had no shortage of friends. I was also quickly making more friends in Danish language classes. However, it seemed like everyone was looking for a new place to stay…
At least I found the horse – south Amager, Denmark
Cycling and exploring
Potential homelessness aside, things were good. Whenever I had free time and decent weather, I’d get back on my bike and go explore new parts of Copenhagen and its surroundingas. In this regard, I had found a like-minded friend in Danish class: Marios from Greece. On one of our cycling trips we south of Copenhagen to explore the island of Amager.
Cycling along Sluseløbet in west Amager
Amager was a blend of the urban, ultra-modern south-side of the city of Copenhagen bordered by cow and horse filled pastures. A comically stark change back then. Not sure if it’s still the same today. Further south there were a few quiet towns, nice beaches and Copenhagen international airport (Kastrup). All of this within reasonable cycling distance.
Somewhere in Kalvebod Fælled, close to Kastrup airport in south Amager
Dyrehaven
On another occasion we cycled north-east of the capital, to Dyrehaven (Deer park). This was one of my favorite places to go outside of the city. The northeastern coastline leading to the park was gorgeous, especially on a sunny day. At the entrance of the 11 km2 park was Bakken, the worlds oldest working amusement park.
Horseback riding in Dyrehaven, very common across Denmark actually
Dyrehaven was crisscrossed by a web of trails all converging around the center of the park at the royal hunting lodge. On the wide trails we’d zig zag around trekkers, cyclers and the occasional horse carriage. The narrow forest trails were less crowded and way more fun for cycling.
Racing across the park
Across the wide park we’d often encounter groups of deer roaming around the ponds and forests. Every now and again we’d reach the fenced edge, reminding us that we were in a man-made park and not in the wild. For me, this was the one sad thing about Denmark. It’s so extensively developed that there’s barely any patches of wilderness left. At least on the eastern part of the country where I lived and traveled.
It was always a side quest to find the deer whenever I’d visit Dyrehaven
The crisis is over! for now…
Towards the end of June I found myself having a drink with some of my fellow student at the Geobar. I still hadn’t found a place to stay and I was supposed to move out of my dorm within a week. As I sat there complaining and being all mopey, my drunk friend Lasse says out of the blue: “Well why don’t you come live with me, buddy?”. He tells me the price he’s paying and considering the location and size of the place, it was crazy cheap! The explanation was that his uncle owned the place. It was too good to be true.
There’s my shocked expression when Lasse invited me to be his flat mate out of nowhere – The Glyptotek, Copenhagen
I thought he was surely joking; but no he wasn’t… Then I thought he was just saying that because he had one too many drinks at the time… yet, the next day when I brought it up again he was still onboard with the idea. Just like that, my crisis was solved. Well, at least for the time being. We agreed that I’d still be searching for another place while I’d be living with him. Something that would kind of slip my mind after a few months as I became more comfortable there.
Big DONG sticking out in Amager, Denmark
His setup wasn’t really meant for long-term squatters, but I made the best of it. We got ahold of mattress, threw it on the floor in his study room and voila! Home sweet home. Well, sort of. Hey, it worked for the time and by splitting his already low rent, I was saving some good money too!
Another crisis averted, could I actually relax for a change, or was the next one right around the corner?
A travel-packed summer
After settling all of my problems in the first half of 2016, I was ready for a fun, travel-packed summer.
During July, I took a few days to hop over to Germany and see my mom who was visiting our relatives in Wuppertal. All I recall from that trip was visiting this funny park with some quirky modern art and décor. Another thing I recall was that at that time I was already planning to bring my mom over to Denmark for Christmas, so I was building up the hype for that.
Being eaten by a puffy German house – Wuppertal, Germany
Other than Germany, I had two big trips coming up. A two-week field work in Iceland for my Masters thesis and a glorious return to Norway, to visit my good friend Daniel, who had recently moved to Trondheim. It was truly going to be an epic summer. One of my fondest to date!
By the end of April, 2016, my roommate Nao’s student exchange period was over. He was going back to Japan and I was soon to get a new roommate. After his departure, one of the days I come back from university to find a small crew of cleaners on the job, making sure our room was in top shape for the new arrival. Just before I entered my room, I overheard them talking in Hungarian, so I greeted them in Hungarian and we started chatting. After some small talk, I was quick to inquire if their company was hiring students for part-time work. One of the guys, Gyuri recommends I write to his former employer, Inger, who owns a cleaning company, as she’ll usually hire people for part-time work.
The light at the end of the tunnel
I wasted no time and sent an email to Inger that afternoon. I wrote that I was a friend of Gyuri and I was desperately in need of work and looking to prove myself. The next morning I received a reply. She states that they had issues with Gyuri in the past due to recreational drug use and had fired him. So based on this she was very reluctant on hiring any of his “friends”… My man Gyuri had almost gotten me hired and fired at the same time.
The moment you realize the light at the end of the tunnel is a train coming your way
I immediately wrote back to Inger explaining that I had actually only met Gyuri and that he was kind enough to offer me her contact. I threw in some apologies, regrets and a pinch of desperate groveling. Shortly after, she replied that she will give me a chance and called me in for the formal interview.
Finally! After half a year of job searching and job applications I scored something! All thanks to a chance encounter with a couple of Hungarian cleaners in my student dorm.
A quirky job
The interview was smooth and casual. At the start, they gave me a few temporary cleaning gigs as a replacement for some of their regular staff. My first job was a late-night cleaning adventure at a high-end executive employment office. The client was very picky about their spotless cleanliness so I was asked to take extra care. I took my time and spent an extra hour overtime without asking for extra pay, just to make sure everything was perfect.
The fancy executive office next to Amelieborg, where I started my part-time work
My supervisor, Irina was very pleased and tentatively asked me if I could possibly help her with another gig that night. By this time it was past midnight, but I didn’t care. I was up for a late night cleaning extravaganza. We then drove over to this famous Danish sexologist’s office. Irina was telling me how their regular cleaner there was a shy Muslim fellow who was covering his eyes while cleaning for months because of the lewd paintings and sculptures on display all over the place. It was certainly the oddest office I’ve tended to, but luckily we only had to do a basic floor cleaning and trash tiding. No touching the displays and… toys…
The big contract
After a couple of weeks doing these replacement jobs, the cleaning company gave me my big stable contract. I was going to be their main cleaning guy tending to VICE media‘s Copenhagen office.
The beautiful old downtown building housing VICE media’s office on the top floors
It was a huge office space. This was great for me as this one contract perfectly covered the amount of hours I needed per week to be eligible for the SU-grant. Two week-days of 3.5 hours in the evenings and one 8 hour day on the weekend. This was a good stable schedule that I could work with. I would also have Danish language classes on the same weekdays, Mondays and Wednesdays.
Thus began my busy student schedule for the rest of 2016, where during the week I’d have two full days of courses in the morning, Danish classes in the afternoon and work in the evening. In between I’d have my recovery days with just courses and studying and then my working weekend, with potentially one day off to relax and recharge.
A rainy May day at Amelieborg
It was a lot of work, but I felt like I had all the energy in the world. Then when the money from the job and SU-grant started coming in… I felt like a king! I could actually afford things now!
A long time desire
With my financial burden lifted, I rushed to fulfill one of my desires ever since I had moved to Copenhagen: getting a gym subscription.
For years, even before moving to Denmark, I had been trying to get into shape by exercising at home. But I looked forward to the day I could afford to go to a gym and have access to all the crazy machinery and contraptions. This desire only escalated when I moved and noticed there was a big FitnessDK gym (now SATS) next to my dorm in Østerbro.
Railway overpass to Østerbro
Flashback
Sometime during November of 2015, FitnessDK was offering a 1-day for free deal and I convinced my friend Eddy to join me for a few hours of physical exercise. He was mostly interested in improving his cycling stamina, while I wanted to test everything out and do a hardcore full body workout. I treated this like I would any other freebie deal: Need to take full advantage! So I spent almost 3 hours working out every muscle to the limit… this when I had never been to a gym before, nor had I ever been the sporty type.
My whole body was numb after the workout. That night I woke up with severe muscle soreness and my arms folded up like little T-rex hands. The muscles were so tensed up that I couldn’t stretch my arms out. Everything hurt so much that I didn’t leave my room for the next couple of days. I could barely even lift a cup of water without my arm shaking like crazy. Lesson learned…
One of my old gyms in central Copenhagen
When I finally got my gym subscription, I was going to do it the proper way. Slow and consistent. I cycled through a few YouTube fitness channels over the next months until I landed on AthleanX, who I follow to this day. After all these years of continuing this hobby, I can happily say that I’m in the best shape I’ve ever been in and won’t be stopping my gym routine anytime soon!
The first month of 2016 passed by quickly with reports and exams. As bad as my financial situation was, I had to brush that to the side for now. My focus was fully on university work. It payed off too. I received good results on my exams. In fact, to my shock, I had even scored close to the top grade in my geochemistry class.
Changing of the royal guard at Amalienborg
Meanwhile we had to sign up for our optional courses in the upcoming semester. One of the options was a field course with my future thesis supervisor Paul Martin. Participants would travel a week to Gran Canaria in the Canary Islands and work on volcanic flows. Most of the trip would be covered by the University. Even with my money issues, this was a no-brainer for me.
On the other hand, there was another fascinating field course that would entail a trip to the USA. However, this would be more costly to the students. As much as I would have loved to sign up, I had to pass. One field course was good enough.
Sanctuary
February started off with a post-exam break. I was back on my job-search duties. I kept on asking around for opportunities and sending out swarms of emails. At one point my strategy became that with every rejection I got, I’d send out another three job applications. It was a number’s game, I thought. Something had to give at some point.
Copenhagen’s winters were generally rainy and grey, but occasionally we’d get a thin blanked of snow
Otherwise I regularly went out on my cycling trips, exploring the city and its outskirts. This was my way of recharging mentally. Just me, my thoughts and my music. I ended up finding this lovely strip of coastline around Charlottenlund, just north of Copenhagen. It had a wide-open beach park and a motte with rusty old cannons pointing towards Sweeden. This place became my sanctuary. My favorite daytime, or nighttime retreat to relax and clear my mind.
My sanctuary: Charlottenlund beach park during fall
Other times I would venture in other new directions within and out of the city. Every time seeking to explore a new place. Mostly parks, or nice neighborhoods. I would have loved to visit some of the castles, or museums, but most of these cost money. So with my tight budget, I had to settle for just the outside views for now.
The winds of change
Sometime around February, Paul Martin called me in for a meeting regarding the Argentina project. He had some bad news. He couldn’t go through with the project that year due to a mix-up at the financial department. As it turned out, he wouldn’t have the necessary funds. He was incredibly regretful and apologetic. Then almost immediately, he offered me another project if I were interested.
Specifically, a fully funded research project for one Master’s thesis, with two-weeks field work together with him in Iceland. I was blown away. I actually had to make an effort to hide my excitement in light of the unfortunate news about the Argentina project. But this? Iceland? Fully funded? One huge financial burden gone and I get to go to freaking Iceland!? Holy shit this was amazing! I immediately accepted and with a huge grin on my face we shook hands.
My financial problems weren’t gone yet, but this was at least one less burden to deal with. A step in the right direction. I could feel the winds of misfortune slowly shifting away.
A rare snowy day in Copenhagen, Denmark
Apart from my routine, the rest of February involved preparations and an increasing anticipation for the upcoming field trip to Gran Canaria in early March.
A taste of the good life
We departed Copenhagen late in the afternoon and by the time we reached Gran Canaria it was already night time. This was my first time going to a subtropical destination, so I wasn’t sure what to expect. I mean we all see places like this in pictures and movies, but it’s always quite a bit different experiencing them first hand.
I didn’t get to see much during landing, as it was mostly just a lot of darkness suddenly followed by the glimmering lights of the airport below. Then we entered the terminal, got our luggage and made our way to the basement parking to pick up our rented cars.
Night time view from our hotel room balcony in Gran Canaria
The realization of where I was only started sinking in once we drove out the airport. Warmly lit highways with palm trees stretching along the roads. Luxurious resorts with inviting swimming pools all around. Then our own resort hotel, with elegant rooms and balconies overlooking the gorgeous valley below and the Atlantic Ocean in the distance. Later still, the food… Oh that magnificent food! Each day a different themed buffet diner…
On the surface I was acting all calm and collected. However, on the inside I was so giddy at everything around me! Up until that point, I was never one to really yearn for tropical paradises, but… now I was experiencing one and it was AMAZING!
Day time view from our hotel room balcony in Gran Canaria
I was getting a small taste of the good life. A hypothetical life where financial worries are a part of the past. A life where I could actually afford to enjoy places like Gran Canaria on my own dime. A seed had been planet in my mind. A desire that would later turn into a grand ambition and would once more reshape the course of my life in the years to come.
For now though, I was there. Enjoying the moment and looking forward to the rest of our days in Gran Canaria.
A few years before my decision to move to Denmark, during what I would call my years of stagnation, I had a strange dream. This was perhaps a year, or so after I had graduated from University in Romania. The plans I had fell apart and I was caught in a loop of waiting on other people’s promises. Waiting for some miracle opportunity to fall into my lap.
It was at this point that I had a dream where I seemingly met up with a divine figure. It had no visible face in the dream, just a human-like outline radiating light. In the dream I acted as if this was some great old buddy of mine from past times. I told the figure that things had been quite dull and bleak for a while, and then asked when will things pick up again? The figure then replied “2015”. Then the dream just faded away. I had had all sorts of fascinating, insightful and strange dreams before. But never did I get a response like that to a legitimate question. I didn’t dwell on it too much, but it did leave me with a renewed sense of hope that things will work themselves out.
Waking up to a winter morning in the Danish countryside
I certainly didn’t plan on things going the way they did, but 2015 did indeed end up being the year that changed everything for me. It was toward the end of 2015 that I recalled that old dream. Mostly because a few months before I had another interesting one. In this one I was climbing a steep hill at night in a dark forest. It wasn’t just me alone, there were a bunch of people around me all trying to climb up this hill. It was hard and I kept sliding back constantly. Finally, a tall, smiling, short gray-haired blue eyed man extended his hand and helped me reach the top. It felt like a nice wholesome dream and I didn’t think much more of it at the time.
Knowledge shock
Before I started my studies at KU, I had to choose my specialization. The University offered four options for Geoscientists. I was debating between two of these. One was a sedimentary rock specialization, which was focused towards the oil and gas branch of geology. The other one was is igneous rocks and geochemical processes. This would somewhat touch upon economic geology and the mining industry, but was mostly a purely research oriented path. I thought back to how much I enjoyed the igneous classes from my Bachelors days. Sedimentary I always found a bit dull, but I wanted to keep my options open for practical reasons. I ended up choosing the igneous specialization, but also signed up for the sedimentary classes for my optional courses.
Nordhavn (North port), Copenhagen, seen from somewhere up the north coast
It was the most practical decision. I would give both specs a chance in my first semester and then decide which one I will focus on later. Regarding the igneous specialization, the one thing that I somehow glossed over was the “Geochemistry” part of the title. I was terrible at geochemistry. Not only that, but I severely lacked any good basic chemistry foundation. The result of too many different teachers replacing each other in middle school and high school.
At the start of my first geochem-heavy course called “Core to crust”, my huge knowledge-gap was immediately obvious. I recall our first professor, Robert Frei, stared off the course by quickly scribbling down an equation on the board and just causally stating “Well, everyone knows the decay equation, so…” and he keeps on going. I took a look at this never seen before scribble and my immediate reaction was , “Woah woah woah! What’s “e”? Euler’s number. The mathematical constant “e” obviously. Everyone knows that, right? Yeah… “Right”.
A steep learning curve
The first three weeks of courses at KU were brutal. I was trying to understand. I was listening and focusing during classes more than ever before. But some of the stuff just seemed so advanced to me that it was impossible to understand. My head felt two sizes too big after each geochemistry class. The sedimentary classes on the other hand were way easier to grasp and follow. Yet as frustrating as the geochem class was, it kept challenging and intriguing me. The topics were fascinating and kept me engaged.
A rainy Østerbrogade in Coepnhagen, Denmark
It wasn’t until we had to work in groups and make a presentation based on a scientific article that I finally started getting it. After all my Danish colleagues formed their groups and picked their topics, the two foreigners, Nigel and myself teamed up to take the scraps. I don’t recall the exact topic of the article we got, but I know it took us two solid afternoons to chew through the material. Re-reading paragraphs dozens of times to try to understand what the heck the author is saying. Deciphering scientific sentences word for word at times. Then there were all these “alien” elements that I never heard of. Like Yb… Huh, Yb? Ybbibidium? What? How about Tb? Teletubium? Ugh…
We did our best to present what we learned. A big part of it just felt like the author arguing for some things while acknowledging that it could be this way, or that way, or another way. It turned out to be a great presentation. This was what our professor was trying to show us. How so many of these processes are still not well understood. Yet how researchers keep pushing to find different ingenious, indirect ways to make sense of what we can’t see, or directly measure. It was fine to not understand everything. You just had to continue persevering, asking questions and researching. There were never any wrong questions. Maybe just wrong answers.
Enter the smiling, gray-haired, blue-eyed man
One month in, I was feeling a lot more comfortable in classes. The geochemistry class had won me over. I was now keen on sticking with the igneous rock specialization. The next step was to find an Master’s thesis project and I didn’t want to waste any time. I asked my friend Jasper about any ideas of whom I could talk to. I told him I’d love to work on volcanoes and magmatic processes. He then told me a professor Paul-Martin Holm, who had a project in the Cape Verde islands. Incidentally he was going to present the second part of our geochem class, so I’d have the chance to meet him soon.
Somewhere on a farm in Ballerup, Denmark during winter 2015
There were a few rumors’ coming from some of my Danish colleagues that Paul Martin was this mean professor. That he was very demanding and harsh during exams. The class starts and in enters this smiling, kind looking, tall, gray-haired, blue-eyed Danish man. I didn’t think of it at the time, but in hindsight, he looked eerily similar to the man extending his helping hand in my hill-climbing dream.
The moment we took a break, I walked up to him and introduced myself. I mentioned that I had heard of a potential Cape Verde project he has and that I would be interested. He replied that sadly he already has another student for that project. However, he had this other geochemistry project in Argentina that would require a Master’s student if I’m interested.
Wow… Argentina?! Heck yeah I was interested! But the geochemistry part again… I told Paul Martin I had a severely week geochemistry background and wasn’t sure if it was wise to sign up for a geochem focused project. His reply was “But you can learn!”. Nobody could have given me a better answer in that moment. I felt challenged in the best way possible. I was given a golden opportunity here and it was time to show what I could do!
Just one little problem…
The Argentina project sounded incredible, but there was one little problem for me. It wasn’t entirely covered by Paul’s research funds, so the students would have to pay a portion of the expenses. This was highly problematic given my dubious financial standing at the time. Well, I still had time to find a better paying job, I thought. So, I accepted. This was around mid-October.
Fast-forward to December and how “well” my job-search was going. Add to that the SU-grant rejection and you can now imagine that I wasn’t in the most cheerful of holiday spirits.
A gloomy winter holiday
I had no plans for the school break. I was just sulking in temporary defeat.
At the same time an old high school friend from Romania, Vlad, was living and working on a farm in Ballerup, Denmark. He invited me over for Christmas dinner with him and the farm-owners. So I went over to pay him a visit. We ate and drank, talked and laughed. His employers were very nice people. They even gave me a gift. The topic of a job came up too. They weren’t really hiring, but I also couldn’t exactly take on a full-time farm-job half an hour away from Copenhagen either.
A Danish Christmas dinner prepared by my high school friend, master chef Vlad
Vlad was a good friend. A great friend. He did what he could in his old way to cheer me up. I felt bad for bringing down the mood, but I told him too that it was just a really shitty period for me. As always, I had to dredge through this on my own.
Despite the struggles, it was a wholesome end to a life-changing year
By the time December 31’st had rolled up, I felt I had enough time to recharge mentally. I spontaneously went out with a group of dorm-mates to have a few drinks in the chaotic streets of Copenhagen on New Years Eve. I hyped myself up and prepared for the next year. Determined to fix my financial issues, prove that I could stand on my own two feet and then succeed in my challenging academic pursuits!
On January 1’st 2016, I received the following email from David, the website owner I was writing for:
My last line of income was cut. I burst out into hysteric laughter.
