Winter in Denmark is unforgiving. Days are short, shorter than the shortest days in D.C., and the few hours of daylight are bleak and overcast – you can go weeks without seeing the sun. In Copenhagen, Danes are courteous, but not always friendly. There’s a rhythm to the city, patterns that have been established through years of habit, and attempting to integrate into that rhythm as a newcomer is difficult at best. I arrived with my thin red jacket and knit purple hat, eager to explore the city, and quickly found that my enthusiasm and colorful outfit betrayed me as an American in the sea of suavity and sleek black coats. I’ve since switched to a long navy pinstripe coat and have been going hatless unless the wind is particularly brutal, in which case I wrap my scarf around my head and hope for the best.
Surviving the winter means finding pockets of warmth, searching for moments and people and places that provide relief from the darkness and finding solace in them, even if just for a moment. The Danes call this hygge (pronounced hyoo-guh), which essentially means maximizing the coziness of indoor spaces as a way of bringing peace and comfort. Hyggelig spaces typically consist of warm lighting coming from candles or small lamps, comfortable seating, and a certain je ne sais quoi that simply can’t be faked.
In my search for solace from the cold, I came across La Fontaine, a jazz bar merely ten minutes from my apartment. My first visit to La Fontaine was a story I’m sure many of us are familiar with: while out with a friend, I heard word from another friend that she had found this jazz bar and it was so cool and we would love it there and we just had to join her.
As we (somewhat reluctantly) trekked across the city, I felt myself losing steam. It was getting late, and the night felt especially dark, and the biting wind was slowly chipping away at my two-beer buzz. By the time we arrived at the bar, I had made a promise to myself that I would stay for twenty minutes max, maybe thirty if I was feeling courageous. We stepped inside and I immediately knew I was going to break my promise.
The room was packed, with chairs crammed in haphazard formations around tables and people standing shoulder-to-shoulder against the back wall. Framed black-and-white photographs covered the textured red walls, illuminated by soft red fairy lights strung along the windowsills. We had walked in during a lively saxophone solo, and the brassy notes rang brightly against the low murmur of conversation. I could barely see the band through the tangle of people, but when I craned my neck just right I could make out the guitarist’s fingers deftly plucking the strings and the gleam of the bass shining mahogany in the light. I found a comfortable spot against the wall and listened, letting the music and faint chatter lull me into a bit of a stupor. I stayed that way for hours, listening and watching the snow fall silently against the foggy windowpane and thinking that maybe here, in this tiny bar by the river, I’d found solace.
I’ve returned to La Fontaine many times since then, and each time I’ve felt the same peace and comfort I did that very first night. I’m not sure what it is about La Fontaine that makes me feel so content. Maybe it’s the warmth of the air, maybe it’s the familiar scent of cigarette smoke, maybe it’s the feeling of sharing a moment with a roomful of strangers. I don’t know, and I’ve decided not to investigate. It is what it is and that’s enough. If you’re ever in Copenhagen in the heart of winter, feeling lost and alone, check out La Fontaine – maybe it’ll give you the same comfort it gave me. Winter in Denmark is still unforgiving, but pockets of warmth exist if you know where to find them.
