hello, I was told that theres an anarchist state in copenhagen, I think its called Los Cristianos or Cristiana. Could someone please fill me in on this and its history if possible. ill be visiting it with a few friends in August and id like to find out its history before seeing what i hope will be a very interesting place. in encyclopedias it doesent even get a mention, do people try to cover up its existance? and if so, why?
Anyway thanks for your time
duncan
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a little piece of Amsterdam
a large piece of freedom
a lot of pot
The place was originally a Danish army base that a bunch of
squatters took over in the 1970s. Rather than deal with
chasing them out, the Copenhagen municipal government just
let them have it. The place originally started as a hippee
commune but it's deteriorated considerably sense then.
It's literally sex, drugs and rock and roll there. Just
don't take a camera - the locals are less than fond of them.
Hello!
I was to Cristiania 1991, a very different place...
It┤s like Vagrant said a lot of sex, drugs and rock and
roll...
Don┤t take a camera inside the gate, the locals really hate
cameras...
I had my camera with me, eventhough I was warned about
taking pictures.
A local guy saw me taking a few pictures just inside the
gate, he got furious.
He grabbed my camera and tried to run away with it.
A friend of mine grabbed him and they argued for a while.
The guy took only my film but gave me back my camera...
So, don┤t even consider taking pictures of the area !
i lived in DK in 90-91 and used to go all the time. last i
heard it was busted or something - a friend of mine in malmo
sweden told me so there may be some truth to the issue.
i hope for your sake that it is still there - not only is
the wee-weed good, but there are some interesting cafes
there and it certainly is the most international spot in all
of DK. true, don't take a camera. the above posts seem to
have a tone of a bad vibe there (i am totally reading into
this above posters and do forgive me if i am incorrect), but
i never found any bad vibes from anyone there; everyone was
very happy.
to get there, i think you need to take the number 8 bus from
the main train station.
maybe it isn't gone though - my brain has a fuzzy
recollection of finding something on the web about
crisitania (spelling!) it was however mostly in danish. try
seeing if it is a link from something like the high times
webpage, or i think i even just threw it into a search
engine like www.askjeeves.com or something. make sure ya
get the spelling right first:)
it is totally worth checking out.
The area was originally built as barracks for the army of
King Christian the fourth,absolutist monarch of Denmark in
the 17th century. In April,1970, While the government was
debating what they should do with the area (and it makes
up almost a quarter of downtown Copenhagen) a group of political
activists and homeless people (before a law was introduced
which decrees,as a basic right, that every citizen was entitled
to housing, even if the state must pay for your hotel.)walked
in and took over the base. Since then a number of political
idealists as well as outright crooks have lived side by side.
It is commonly referred to as the "Free State of Christiana".
You'll find a number of small service centers (restaurants,
cycle repair shops,etc) as well as some pretty hard core
elements but the Danish state has maintained a pretty much of
a "hands off" policy since a) they know where the crooks
are b) where are you going to house all these people when
you got to by law c) the state will have to pay for their
lodging.
If you are from the US, I heard a piece on NPR awhile ago on
it. I'm not sure what program it was, but probably just the
regular news, so you might want to try to check it out that
way.