Oslo: The Land of Peace makers

History is full of contradictions. Consider this. The middle east is home to not one but three of the world's main religions , each of them espousing the cause of peace in the world but now it is one of the most chaotic regions in the world. On the other hand Scandinavia was home to some of the most barbaric tribes in the world who looted and plundered the civilized world. But look at it now, each country is a beacon for human rights and stands for peaceful existence! If Scandinavia is the abode of peace then surely Norway and indeed its capital city Oslo has a prime place. Oslo in fact is the place where the Nobel peace price is adjudged and given and can rightfully claim to be the city of peace makers. Oslo then was my next stop.

October 17, 2009, Saturday

The bus screeched to a halt at the Oslo Bus terminal as the driver excitedly gesticulated that we had reached our destination. It was five-thirty in the morning and it was terribly cold outside. I quickly rushed indoors into the warm clinch of the terminal. It must have been near to day break i thought but outside it looked the Sun would take a bit longer. And finally the Sun came out slowly at eight as if even he too was wary of the cold he was stepping into.

With the arrival of morning we started our way to explore the city. As we stepped outside the bus terminal what surprised us were two enormous sky scrapers that leapt to the sky. They were the twin towers of the SAS Raddison hotel. They were mighty tall by European standards and showed that Oslo unlike Copenhagen and Berlin will offer more modern buildings.The tourist information center was just outside the central station and it was housed in a beautiful tall structure which was truly unique. As we exited it armed with city maps we felt the adrenaline rush that usually accompanies such trips.


First stop on the trip was at the Oslo Opera. Operas are such an important part of any European city, every city here seems to have one. The Oslo opera was a newly built white edifice with sharp lines marking the edges. the design was nothing i had seen before as it instantly caught the gaze of the viewer. The backwater on whose shore it stood glistened with its shadow. Then we headed to the Oslo cathedral which stood at the start of the main street in Oslo called the 'Karl Johans Gate'. The cathedral true to its Scandinavian roots had a magnificent very tall spire which leapt into the air and stood head and shoulders above the nearby buildings. It reminded one of the medieval times where it was prohibited by law to build buildings taller than churches and cathedral which is the reason why most European cities are 'flat'.


Then we started to walk down the Karl Johans gate and entered the heart of the city. Europe through its Streets is simply fascinating.Streets in Europe not only serve a utilitarian purpose, they are canvases on which layer upon layer of history and culture are painted. Hence any city in Europe has a main street which represents its distinct History. Be it the famed Champs Elysee in Paris or the Stroget in Copenhagen or the Karl Johans Gate , they tell the story of their cities if only you are patient enough to listen.

As i walked down the street numerous facets of the city came into view. Modern coffee shops sat side by side to ancient markets, Shopping districts selling the most expensive goods abutted grand churches. A little further down the road we came across the Oslo parliament building. It was a pretty strange place to have a parliament i thought as it was right in center of the main shopping district. The building itself was magnificent as its stone edifice represented the power it embodied within. Adjacent to the Parliament was the famous Grand hotel which is famous as the place where all Nobel peace prize laureates lodge when they are in the city to collect their prize. A wave from its famed balcony is more or less a ritual performed by every winner they say. Come December and we will see President Obama atop that balcony!

Further down the street you have the beautiful Norwegian national theatre which hosted and continues to host some of the greatest plays ever written. Opposite to it stood a neo-classical building with beautiful carvings of Greek mythology. it turned out to be the Oslo University whose sprawling campus lay behind the building. Its a oft repeated theme in Europe , all buildings of culture and knowledge tend to have Greek architecture. Greek still represents high-art and knowledge it seems.


The Karl Johans gate finally ended at the footsteps of the beautiful Norwegian Royal palace. The Palace was not unlike the other palaces i had seen but seemed to look a bit smaller compared to the others. However what it lost out in stature it more than made up in ambiance. It was housed in a most magnificent green expanse that sprawled to all sides. What more this Garden was the address of most of the foreign embassies in Oslo. The trees in the garden cast a golden shade on us as their leaves had turned golden due to the coming of autumn.

Although Alfred Nobel was Swedish, at the time of his death Norway and Sweden were still united. As he bequeathed his wealth in the form of the Nobel prize they continued to be held simultaneously in Stockholm and in Oslo. While Stockholm gave out all the prizes the very important peace prize was given out by Oslo as Norway was considered to be more impartial than Sweden. This is one of the main reasons Oslo and indeed Norway has come to be regarded as an important place which houses the legacy of peace. This legacy of peace is further propagated by Norway by convening important peace treaties and mediating as an interlocutor in conflict ridden countries of the world such as Sri Lanka. Nobel's legacy as well as the supreme efforts put in by Norway in the way of peace has given Norway the right to be called the land of peace makers.

The Nobel Peace center is one of the most visited sites in Oslo and we headed their next. The center is quite new as it was inaugurated in 2008 and it is housed in a former railway station. The White colored building is apt for the setting as it welcomes visitors with open arms. The ground floor was dedicated to this year's winner Barack Obama. It had a host of interactive media which covered his upbringing , his speeches and other important milestones in his life. The exhibition was titled 'From King to Obama' and as the title suggests the exhibition looked at Obama as the logical conclusion of what Martin Luther King started four decades ago. However the exhibition could still not convince me that Obama deserved the peace prize. The decision has come in for much criticism and rightly so however we should not go overboard and ridicule the institution of the Nobel peace prize as the world of ours is in need of strong and honest institutions and the Nobel peace prize could be one of them.



The second floor of the peace center was dedicated to last year's winner Martti Ahtisaari. The top most floor was the one that caught my attention. It was a dark room with small portraits of past Nobel prize winners suspended on electronic poles. Each portrait gave information of the awardee and his or her achievements and the year of their winning it. The whole setting had a blessed aura to it as i felt i was standing in a place of pilgrimage with saints all around.

As we exited the Nobel Peace center, the twin towers of the City town hall with its distinct clock came into view. It was no ordinary town hall, it is the venue for the Nobel peace prize distribution ceremony. The building was beautifully constructed and it overlooked the harbour and seemed to welcome visitors from far of lands. Numerous Nobel awardees must have been in that building i thought.

As we exited Nobel's land we took the cruise and went to the island Bygdoy which houses most of the city's museums. The Fram museum was our first stop there as it featured a ship used by intrepid adventurers who tried to reach the South and North poles. One such traveller was a Norwegian Amundsen who was the first man to reach the South pole. Norwegians are proud of their prowess of the seas and are especially proud of their ancestors - the Vikings - who travelled far of lands using their ships and were trend setters for the rest of Europe. A special museum called the 'Viking Museum' is dedicated to them which contains some really old viking ships , one of them from the tenth century which were probably the first of their king built anywhere in Europe.

Last stop on our tour was the single biggest attraction of Oslo - the Vigeland Sculpture park. This eponymous park was named after Gustav Vigeland contains more than 200 statues representing the various stages of human life. Here the sculptures illustrate aspects of human daily life like joy, sorrow, anger etc and human relationships as seen by the sculptures. A 50 feet tall monolith of 121 human figures is the center piece of the park which in the setting sun looked truly beautiful and one almost got into a philosophical mode looking at it.

With the setting of the sun we had finished our tour of Oslo. A small city with big ideals and an attitude to match those ideals. As often with other tours I take back not something material for the material thing fades off like the dew on a sunny morning. Instead i take back things of the mind that will remain long after the sun has set.

Copenhagen: Between two Europes

Copenhagen has a unique distinction among European cities. It sits at the gateway of what essentially are two Europes - Scandinavian Europe and Continental Europe - and it inherits a bit of both. Indeed Copenhagen can be described as the most Scandinavian of all Continental cities and the most Continental of all Scandinavian cities! It was to this great city of synthesis that I headed to next on my EuroTrip.

October 3, 2009, Saturday

The Chill of the October night pierced the skin like a needle. I looked at the watch, it read, 2.30 AM. We were at the main bus terminal at Gothenburg. A familiar feeling of excitement had gripped me. As I boarded the bus the warmness inside was soothing.The bus was on its way and the journey was underway. The journey went off pretty well as the bus cut through the pretty Swedish countryside cloaked in the light glow of the moonlight. Soon we were passing through quaint little towns and finally made it to the Oresund bridge which connects Sweden and Denmark.

The bus pulled up at the central bus stand in Copenhagen early in the morning. However the rain which is a constant companion of any traveler in Europe had followed us much to our displeasure, at leaset the forecast in the afternoon was better i consoled myself. Undeterred by the pouring rain we went through to the nearby Grand Central station. The station looked more continental in nature and was very well organized so as to help travelers. Right from the tourist information desks to Forex counters to Eat outs , everything was arranged to make the visitors feel welcomed.

As we headed out of the station, i realised that the train station in spite of all the modernity inside had a really old-fashioned elegant look to it from the outside which was really pleasing to the eyes, a welcome break from all the modern glass and concrete structures we see around most of the time. It was by far the prettiest railway station i had ever seen. Outside the Grand central station the magnificent obelisk of the Liberty memorial greeted us to the city. How far the obelisk has traveled i thought to myself remembering that it was basically an Egyptian work of art commissioned by the great Pharaohs more than two thousand years ago which was later imitated by European artists around various cities. So much has it been replicated here in Europe that people consider it to be an invention of European art.


From the outset it appeared that the color Red was the theme of the city as most of the old and beautiful buildings had a distinct motif of red exterior and green spiraling roofs. this motif was repeated with subtle variations across the city much to the amazement of the visitors.

Copenhagen is one of the big walking cities of Europe or indeed the world. The city is big,however that does not discourage you from walking as each street and bend has something in store for you. So we set out on our foot through the heart of the city. First we approached the famed Town hall square called Radhuspladsen which is famous for the various gatherings like concerts/protest that happen in the city. In fact it looked it was recovering from a concert the previous night as the stage there looked fresh. Beside the town hall was the spectacular statue of the 'Lure blowers'. The Lure is a distinctly Scandinavian musical instrument which is a cross between a trumpet and a horn. The statue consisted of two Lure blowers playing the instrument in unison. Strangely the statues lacked symmetry as one of the statues seemed to be 'squeezed' beside the other. The reason for this is that initially there was just one blower before another was added for company a few years later!

As we trudged through the heart of the city we entered the main political district - rather it was an island which was formed by a beautiful canal. The island contained the Christianborg Palace which was a former royal palace now converted to house the danish parliament. A parliament housed inside a royal palace - It was symbolic of the constitutional monarchy type of political system existing in Denmark i thought. However as is associated with Parliaments around the world this did not have any strict security squadrons around and was fairly open to the general public. Of course this is the safe and assured first world after all.

Then we headed to the Danish National museum adjacent to the parliament building. In true traditions of European cities Copenhagen too had a wonderful museum. It housed artifacts belonging to every possible theme, right from stone age to bronze age to the middle ages to the modern age. And they were all arranged very meticulously. As we came out from the museum the rain seemed to have taken a break and given us a well needed respite.

Next we started on the trail of the royal area of Copenhagen. We started by going to the Amalienborg Palace which is the winter home of the danish royal family. In fact it was not just one palace but four of them. Each arranged so as to form a rhombus whose one tip pointed to the Royal Opera across the harbor and the opposite end pointed to the very beautiful Marmorkirken or the Marble Church. The setting was reminiscent of the St.Peters square at the Vatican which has a huge central square with the St Peter's cathedral at the top. The Amalienborg palace was guarded by stoic looking danish royal guards again reminding one of the royal Swiss guards at the Vatican. They were really serious looking and too serious for our liking as one of them even refused to pose for our camera!

It was noon now and it was time for the famous change of guard at the Palace as the current guards were replaced by the guards from the neighboring Rosenborg Castle. This is a routine event here but has attracted the tourists very much, so that its become sort of a marque event in the city. As we saw the change of guard one was amazed by the discipline of the guards on the one hand and the rampant symbolism that still existed in constitutional monarchies like Denmark. The guards i don't think serve any practical purpose but still they are persisted in deference to tradition.

One of the Palaces is converted to a royal museum and we went in to be awed by the richness of the danish royalty. Also striking was the reverence the danish people had for their royalty. This was in marked contrast to say England where the royal family is the butt of jokes. But here there were souvenirs being created out of the royals.

Next we headed to the Marmorkirken which looked absolutely stunning. The inspiration of Vatican's St. Peter's church was everywhere. Right from the huge dome at the top to the statuettes of saints on the parapets to the white marble construction. The dome was magnificent from the inside too as it looked as if it stood without any support and carried paintings of various biblical events. The calmness inside was a bit eeire compared to the hustle outside.


Following the royal line we headed to the stunning Rosenborg Castle which was housed in the equally stunning Rosenborg Garden. The garden was beautifully laid out dotted by beautiful trees all around. The garden it seemed competed with the palace for attracting visitors. The palace itself looked very elegant with a red exterior and tall spires. It was also attractive for a different reason too - it contained the danish crown jewels. As we went through the methodically arranged royal rooms we were again impressed by the wealth of the danish royalty. However it also raised a question as to how any person could attain this wealth by just winning the lottery of birth when other more talented persons could just gaze at them as commoners. So crumbles the royal cookie i guess.

As we exited the Rosenborg castle we were left with a tough decision to make. Either to continue with exploring the rest of the city's minor attractions or go onto see the stunning Kronborg Castle at Helsingør (or Elsinore in English) 50 KM away from the city. The castle was also called 'Hamlet's Castle' as it was immortalized by Shakespeare's Hamlet who set his tragic prince and his story in the castle. For a Shakespeare buff like me it was a chance not to be missed. But can we make the far-off distance to make the 4PM entrance deadline at the castle. As Hamlet would have said - To go or not to go that was the question!

Finally we decided to take the chance and headed our way to Hamlet's Elsinore. Thanks to the brilliant danish train system we were there at the Castle before it closed for the day. The Castle they say is amongst the best in Europe with a distinctly Post-renaissance architecture. It was placed at the edge of baltic sea resembling a fortress intimidating any opposing army that set eyes on it. As we approached the Castle we felt the real magnitude of it. The stormy weather on the outside was an apt setting for this great castle as it gave an almost mysthical feel to the whole place. The castle was surrounded by a moat which in itself was amazing to behold. Of course such a spectacular castle needed an equally spectacular moat!

As we crossed the moat i realised what an expedition filled with danger it must have been for opposing soldiers to cross the moat, the very moat we were just breezing through at the moment. As we entered the premises of the castle we proceeded to enter it through a beautifully carved gateway with couple of exquisitely carved statues. Once inside we soon headed to the central courtyard.

The Central courtyard brought back memories of Shakespeare's Hamlet. My first memory of the play was a movie i saw in grainy black and white in the early 90s. I still remember the scene at the beginning of the movie when King Hamlet's ghost arrives to meet the young Prince Hamlet. The scene is so vividly etched in memory that i can almost see it happening in front of my eyes. I could not believe that i am at the very legendary place where Hamlet was set. A look at the courtyard set me thinking if the famous climactic sword fighting scene was set here. It must have been i thought to myself, feeling a sense of numbness that one feels when one is face to face with History. As if in a trance i was transported into the middle ages, into the world of the tragic Prince Hamlet. Alas the trance had to end as our time to depart rushed upon us. As we returned to the city the memories of Elsinore rode with us and it will be sometime before i part from it.

Back in the city it was time to catch a much needed dinner and then we started a stroll through the longest pedestrian shopping area in Europe - Strøget. The street gave a distinctly Continental - more specifically Italian feel. The winding car free alleys punctuated by beautiful buildings and squares , the mingling of streets into streets as if like the merging of small brooks everything gave a feeling as if one was in Rome or Florence. The street was essentially a shopping area and was lined on both sides by all kinds of shops, it even had a small area for musicians to show their musical skills.

Strøget starts at the main town hall square and cuts through the centre of the city finally ending at another big square called the Kongens Nytorv (The Kings New Square). As we exited into Kongons Nytorv we were surprised to find a street exhibition underway. This exhibition with the theme '100 places to see before they disappear' displayed a set of 100 of the most amazing photographs ever taken from around the world. It also included a couple from India too. We jumped from one amazing photo to another like school kids as we took in the myriad pictures laid out. Suddenly we realised that we had a bus to catch. Hurriedly we made our way back to where we started - to the central bus stand - and sat in our return bus.

As I looked outside from my bus at the city outside that sat between the two Europes it made me really happy that i was privileged enough to visit such a unique city. As the bus chugged along I closed my eyes to relive the memories of a wonderful day which will last for a long time.