Welcome back Stickman/Bizarre, I hope you will stay around and I also hope some of our long lost comrades, SNAFU to mention just one, will join me at the bar tonight.

For today is truly a very special day.

Gentlemen,

Sometimes I wonder if the main attraction about royalty isn't really about as long as they're not one's own, but just visiting, lending some splendour, pomp and sense of extraordinary occasion to our lives.

That way you won't have to be subjected by the members of the press on a daily basis, about the royalties. Pardon me gentlemen, I fear the recent media coverage of a newly born princess in this country has left me rather fatigued, as journalists of the weekly glossy magazines insisted on the father making the mandatory gesture to the cameras with his hands indicating "the size of the fish".

Quite a different matter in times of national crisis or war, where a monarch did make quite an impact.

I'm thinking of our own King Christian X who rode the streets of Copenhagen on his horse during the occupation years 40 - 45, and how the news of a newly born by the crown heir Frederik and his wife Ingrid energized and gave hope to the entire population of a happy ending after all, to the 5 "forbannede" (i.e. damned) years, and a continuation of some sorts; The baby was our present day Queen.

Today is May 5th, a very important day in history as Danes during the war years listened in secrecy to BBC world radio on shortwave to catch news of the war that was had not been vetted by the Nazi propaganda machine before being aired. To learn of "greetings to Auntie Hilda from all the friends on her birthday "; signalling a drop of arms and ammunitions to the resistance the following night.

On the evening of May 4th, the signature tune of the BBC, 3 dots as in the morse signal for V, started as usual and the speaker came on in Danish language;

"This is London, this is London, .... etc."

What made the broadcast very special on that particular day was the message at 20.36 that German forces in Holland, Nothwestern Germany and Denmark had surrendered to General Montgomery. It was the message of freedom " Frihedsbudskabet ".

Although born after the war, the message still sends shivers through my spine and I invite you to listen to it with me.

However our friendly Isle of Bornholm, "The Sunshine Island" as we call it, part of the Kingdom but geographically located within the Soviet sphere of interest was occupied by the Soviets for almost another year, following the German Commandants refusal to surrender to the Soviets. He had already surrenderd to the Western Allies as part of the forces capitulating to Montgomery, and the hard tried islanders had to endure bombings on their cities from the air by the Soviet Airforce, even after the Liberation.

Tonight candlelights will be lit in many a window in this country, to express thankfulness and respect in the memory of the fallen.