Does size really matter?

Last Saturday we made a family trip to IKEA, it was one of our smoothest journeys yet. We got to the first bus right on time without having to run, we didn't have to wait long for the train and the second bus showed up right as we stepped up to bus stop. We didn't have to look up directions before we left and we recognized which stop we need to get off at. Shannon and I congratulated each other on how much our travel skills are improving. The trip there took about 40min, not too bad for such a major outing.

On a side note, we really like going to IKEA because they have a childcare place, so Shannon and I can drop the kids of for an hour and have a little date - at least we would have if they hadn't kept calling us to come because our kids needed something.

Our reason for going was to get cross bar slates for the bunk bed (I don't really know what the thing I am trying to describe is called, it is the boards that hold the mattress up as seen here). Of course we ended up getting way more than we had intended but did not realize until after we checked out and were trying to fit everything in our backpacks. The trip home was only slightly more awkward. The biggest disapointmet came when we got home and realized that I had bought the wrong size boards for the bed and was going to have to take them back and exchange them.

Instead of taking the buses and train again I decided to try and strap it on Shannon's bike and ride there; this worked out really well. The biggest surprise was that it only took me 15 min to get to IKEA on a bike, hauling a heavy load, on a windy day. This of course makes sense since we only live 3 miles from IKEA.

I tell this experience as an example of how much our perspective of distance has changed since moving to Denmark. When I go to work we talk about my commute to the city, when in reality we live closer to my work now than we did living in Hyrum and driving to Logan.

Denmark is really small. My theory is that "they" have intentially designed the transportation system so that it takes a long time to get places and that way you feel like it's bigger than it really is.

I created the map below (it might not be completely accurate but it is pretty close). Utah is 5 times larger than Denmark (Utah = 84,899 sq mi, Denmark = 16,641 sq mi). Yet Denmark has more than double the number of people (Population: Denmark =5,671,050  Utah =2,817,222). Crazy how distince is really just a matter of perspective.

Green is Utah, Red is Denmark

Interesting fact (by fact I mean something people have told me and I choose to repeat without verifying): Despite being so small Denmark has more coast line than India, the seventh biggest country in the world.