Happy New Year 2018/19 from Nuuk

Spending New Years in another country is always an exciting experience. And this year in Greenland was no different! I've only spent New Years in one other country besides Denmark; Ireland, where I celebrated New Years 2015/16 with my friend Bethann. Dublin was an interesting experience with a complete lack of fireworks, which I'm not used to. Greenland was the opposite - it was firework heaven!

I was so lucky to have my family (minus my older brother) here in Nuuk to bring in the New Year with me and my roomie Charlotte. After watching the traditional speech from our Queen, we spent all day cooking and getting ready for the evening, which was absolutely perfect. Great food, great company and lots and lots of fireworks and traditions!

The first firework display started at 8 PM, when Denmark waved goodbye to 2018 and hello to 2019! In Greenland, they celebrate that as well because of its connections to Denmark (Greenland is officially an autonomous constituent country of the Kingdom of Denmark). I was shocked to see how many fireworks went off at that time - I mean, it wasn't even anywhere near midnight! As we stood and watched the beautiful display, my thoughts drifted to Denmark and all of my friends there, wondering how they were celebrating at that very moment.

But I was still in the past, four hours behind them, so I still had plenty of partying (and eating) left to do before midnight! 9 PM came and it was time for the Faroese/Icelandic New Year celebrations! The firework display was nowhere near as big this time, and it became evident that all Faroese and Icelandic people in Nuuk live in Qinngorput, as we could only see fireworks from that area!

The next few hours were spent eating a blue carrot cake (gotta try new things sometimes, right?), playing games and teaching Charlotte about the "strange" Danish New Years traditions.

When it was getting closer to midnight, the six of us all stood on the sofas, counted down from ten to midnight and then jumped into the new year of 2019!

Then it was time to rush and get our warm outerwear on, so we could get outside to watch the biggest and most impressive firework display of our lives. Never in my life have I seen so many fireworks at once. Despite my general dislike towards fireworks, it was incredible to see. 2019 was welcomed in the best way possible in my beautiful city of Nuuk, with thousands of fireworks above my family, Charlotte and I!