So. Copenhagen.
I have no urge to see The Little Mermaid, or Den lille Havfrue as the locals would say, sounding exactly like they have an ice-cube on their tongue and thereby managing to ignore several of the consonants which, personally, I find helpful. If knowing how a Danish person sounds is absurdly high on your wish list, please go straight to the freezer compartment of your fridge, lodge a cube in your gob and say ‘Crocodile Dundee’. Trust me, you’re sounding Danish. This is not an insult. Indeed, I’ve become quite partial to the glottled sounds of the local lingo. It would seem the Scandinavians and the Eastern Europeans divvied up all the vowels and consonants a long, long time ago, the former to the former, the latter to the latter. As long as they’re hppy.
I was referring, of course, to that overly famous sculpture that sits on a rock in the Copenhagen harbour. It is based on the famous Hans Christian Andersen fairy tale, about a mermaid who wants an immortal soul. Yeh yeh. You thought she wanted the prince. He was a means to an end, people. Wake up and smell the oysters. In the story she swallows a nasty potion to give her feet and they bleed and hurt like hell but she’s a determined little mermaid. Nonetheless it all goes fins up and she dies and turns into foam. And then into an air sprite. Why wouldn’t you want to turn that into a sculpture? The moral of the story being…if you’re good at swimming, stick to that. Isn’t it? The statue was commissioned in 1909 by one Carl Jacobsen, who’s dad founded the Carlsberg brewing company. Carl says he was inspired by a ballet based on the tale. I say he was inspired by a pint based on his dad’s efforts. And the sculptor, Edward Eriksen, used his wife as the model. The conversation went something like this:
“Honey, I need you to model for me.”
“I suppose I’m nude again?”
“…yeh… But you’re a mermaid!”
“A mermaid?”
“Carl asked me a couple of nights ago.”
“At poker?”
“…yeh… It’s a commission!”
“Exactly how much did you lose?”
“A commission, honey!”
“Why a mermaid?”
“It’s the one out of that Andersen book. ”
“So you think I have big feet?”
“What? No!”
“They’re not that big.”
“I never said they were.”
“You’ve never liked them.”
“I love your feet.”
“You never spend any time…you know…down there.”
The conversation halted. And then…
“It’s a commission!”
The marriage remained intact and the sculpture now lies just off-shore in the Danish capital.
And aren’t they proud of Hans up here? So they should be. A ripper bed-time read for the kiddies and nothing morally confusing at all. You can’t move without going along an HCA road or street or highway. There are HCA cafes and restaurants and parks. There’s an Hans Christian Andersen ride at the Tivoli Gardens park too. It’s not exactly a rollercoaster, although there’s a concept that should be explored. “168 mind-altering tales in 56 body-shattering seconds!!! You’ll scream for a happy ending!!! Queue here!!! (Riders must be tall enough to have forgotten the stories.) ”
After Copenhagen (a quick detour so I can tell you a fairy’s tale: Leonardo da Brazilian; he was over 30, no fins and there was a happy ending) we moved on to Odense. Hans was born in Odense so of course there’s a museum here to celebrate that. Another piece of HCA historica I am intensely keen to disregard. I do learn, despite efforts to remain ignorant, that he meets Charles Dickens at some party and then visits him in England ten years later. In Charles’ daughter’s diary, she writes: "He was a bony bore, and stayed on and on." Hans, bless him, had a ball, and never understood why Chuck forever continued to ignore his letters.
But let us leave behind the Danes and the Hans and the mermaids. Denmark is done. Let us return to London. Herein lies another tale. Not so much Dickensian as Melrose Place..ian. A tale of three men. Newman you know. But let me introduce my own Big, with a nod to Sex and the City, although I give him this name for reasons physical. And I’m not referring to his feet. Because I’m talking about his penis. The Third Man, for all its Viennese overtones, shall just be referred to as The Third Man. I liked Newman and now Newman likes me. But now I’m not so sure I like Newman. Big is good fun and made it very clear he wants to start dating when I was last in London for a couple of days. The Third Man is straight and not mine to have but I’m contemplating becoming Special Guest Star Heather Locklear and saying things like “I always get what I want!” whilst curling a lip and raising an eyebrow. I haven’t had a crush like this since high school. If it follows the rules of series television and the playground, it shall end either embarrassingly or really embarrassingly or with a small bomb in an apartment building put there by a mad woman who thinks she’s her own sister and totally jealous of herself! …or something. Oh how I loved that show.
So. Will I have a happy ending? I’m good at being in musicals and getting drunk and flirting at an Olympic level. Should I stick to that? Should I want more? Should I be hankering after an immortal soul or a prince or even a semi-detached mortgage? The answers are sitting in a boat, far out at sea. I can only hope they drift closer to my shore at some point and that I’m standing near the right bollard when the tide brings them in. Or should I buy some flippers…?
Hasta Manana ’til we meet again. Or as they say in Denmark: Aa aaa I e ee aai.
