monday.

Our weekend trip to Copenhagen went really well. K. had booked a hotel very close to the venue and we honestly only walked, like, five minutes to get there which was a big stressor off our shoulders. The hotel itself was super nice and was located in an old town house type of building and kept in an old-fashioned style with 19th century painting-replicas on the walls and such. The restaurant was excellent and the room was beautiful. I haven't slept as well as I did in that bed for years, not kidding you. It was soooooo good.

The performance was amazing. I am still not sold on the sets and costumes, although some of them are okay-ish, I guess, but mostly it felt like a whole cast of eye sores running around in really colourful clothes where the eye couldn't really find rest in anything. The lighting would have been extremely effectful if the colour scheme of the rest had been more demure. I missed the look of the black/white La Sylphide greatly that night.

However, the dancing, storytelling and acting of this performance was through the roof. Completely other level. Especially the first act, oh wow. I loved Stephanie's sylph, she was flimsical and airy and light, very alluring and paired with Alexander Bozinoff's James, I just bought the whole story of his downfall 200 percent. He was a very conflicted and devoted James, devoted to Effy (or trying to be, at least), devoted to his own dreams (the sylph) and devoted to doing what was right, by himself and by his community. In the end, he picks himself and that becomes the end of him. It was amazingly clear and well told.

What really won me over for this cast, though, was Christina Michanek as Madge!! OMG, she was amazing. I completely loved her. She was old and young and magical and a force of nature and strong and ugly and beautiful, all at the same time. Never have I seen a better Madge. She was spectacular. Along with a very strong Effy in Camilla Ruelykke (who, fun note, was actually Effy in the very first production I saw of La Sylphide on stage twelve years ago as well, she has grown so much into the role), this cast was completely on point with everything.

I loved it.

La Sylphide was shown alongside a short Balanchine work called Scotch Symphony and I liked parts of it. Holly danced the lead and she was completely in her A game. So well danced by her. I also really liked the solo Scotch girl danced by Tara Schaufuss, her part was my favourite part. But all in all, it wasn't the best Balanchine I've seen and the ballet itself felt a bit... fragmented. Somehow. Good fun while watching it, not something I'll remember for very long afterwards, except maybe specific moments.



Being back in Copenhagen was lovely, but stressful. Neither K. nor I are strong travellers and walking about with luggage and such is just always a hassle that takes more of our energy than it gives us back. Besides the hotel which was nice, we didn't get to see much. We did a very brief visit to the Glyptoteque, because there were so many people there and I simply couldn't stand it in my head. Ugh. But we did see the familiar sights and that was nice. Then, we got lunch. Lots of walking around, waiting around, then ballet and sleep. Probably not how most people would spend a weekend in CPH, but we do what we must.

I did enjoy myself and I hope we can do just a few more of these kinds of trips in the future.

Not this season, though. Besides La Sylphide there isn't anything I really want to see. Next season, then!



What did happen when we were on our way back by train was that I suddenly, for the first time in almost a week, had a raging urge to work on my Napoli project again, so although I was dead tired once we got off the train and got back to our place, I actually managed to get started on the next scene and today, after a good night's sleep, I even managed to finish it! It's one of the longest scenes in the entire fic and I really like it, I think. I need to read it over again, start to finish, but it ended exactly where I wanted it to and leads onwards seamlessly.

I only need one minor scene now to finish this chapter and then, there's only one more chapter left along with the epilogue and then, I'll be done. I hope to have first drift finished in a couple of week's time.

Still loving the process of working on this very much. Which is a relief, because most of last week, I was done with it.