Back in the day, British tabloids constantly compared the Duchess of Cambridge to Denmark’s Crown Princess Mary. I think they did that to embiggen Kate, because Kate is younger and perhaps there was the presumption that Kate would outshine CP Mary and become a really big deal. Years passed and while Kate is definitely more “famous” than Mary, Mary seems like she’s better at her job and like she actually enjoys being royal.
Like most of the European royals, CP Mary has spent the summer slowly going back to work in the new pandemic reality. Last week, she was appointed the new president of the World Wildlife Foundation and to celebrate the appointment, CP Marry went to an aquarium to release 50 sea rays into the wild. Unfortunately, upon her arrival at the aquarium, as she walked up to greet various aquarium officials, she shook hands with people. She apologized afterwards:
Crown Princess Mary of Denmark is apologizing for her “mistake.” The 48-year-old royal visited the Grenaa sea aquarium on Wednesday, marking her first royal engagement since the summer holidays.
Upon her arrival, Mary shook hands with one of her hosts for the day, going against the Danish National Board of Health guidelines amid the COVID-19 outbreak. The following day, Princess Mary expressed her regret on Instagram.
“On land, at sea and in the air — we have to get used to wearing a mask. It is important that we all follow the health authorities’ recommendations together,” she captioned two photos of herself wearing face masks, translated from Danish. “Yesterday I was in Grenaa for my first official visit after the summer holidays. At sea and in the air it went fine, but on land I made a mistake and I unfortunately shook hands. It reminded me how important it is that we help each other live up to the recommendations. Stay safe and take care of each other.”
Back in March, health officials around the world told people to stop shaking hands. In April, Dr. Fauci even said that even when all of this is over, people should stop shaking hands permanently. But people have still been shaking hands or fist-bumping or what have you. I imagine it’s an easy mistake though, especially for public figures who are used to glad-handing constantly. I appreciate that CP Mary apologized and raised the handshake issue again, because I’m sure people have forgotten. Also: I hope everybody has permanently stopped touching their faces too.
Photos courtesy of Instagram, Avalon Red, Getty.
The comparison between CP Mary and Kate is laughable. They both were commoners who married into royalty, but Mary runs circles around Kate in work ethic and even fashion. Kate couldn’t outrun Mary on her best day and Mary’s worst day. The Danish people took to Mary because she has shown huge dedication to them, not because she dresses up in clothes that match the Danish flag and grins like a loon jacked up on coffee. I really am looking forward to Mary’s future Queendom.
And Mary was a foreign commoner too so she had a much harder acclimation. She had to learn a language and yet still does a better job…
There is a really adorable video out there (on youtube) where Mary presented some award to a musician in front of a huge audience. This was back when she was still a newlywed and was deeply entrenched in learning to speak fluent Danish. She was speaking English to the audience and then midsentence switched over to Danish. She caught herself, stopped, and said, “I just switched over to Danish…it is the first year outside of Denmark.” Prince Frederik just sat there laughing in the audience while everyone applauded her. It was a really cute moment.
Mary also had a successful career before marrying.
Although Mary was compared to the amazing Alexandra in the beginning a lot.
I find Alexandra to be a very interesting woman. It’s kind of nice seeing the way she still gets on so well with Joachim and seems to be on very friendly terms with Princess Marie. All of the Danes make for some good gossip and good fashion-watching. I wish we saw more on them here!
There has been some drama lately. Joachim and Marie gave an interview recently to a Danish tabloid (the crummiest one) – complaining about the criticism he received from taking his public allowance with him to France without asking Parliament (which he is required to do), then insinuating that they were being exiled. It was really messy and kinda hypocritical considering that Marie had said “one must complain” when asked about Harry and Meghan. Then he had a stroke, so the public criticism has gone away.
Generally, the DRF isn’t publicly messy (I have no idea if they are privately messy but I doubt it – that seemed to be the previous generation though I can understand that the Queen’s uncle was unhappy with him and his son not becoming king, there was some resentment there, particularly against Queen Ingrid). Still, Margrethe II is very good at queening – and she’s very entertaining to watch (she participates in documentaries), Mary is doing a lot of good work and her husband has always had an easy-going (if dorky) image.
Alex was such a breath of fresh air – and the public took to her immediately. She outshone everyone but that was OK. Her post-royal life have been somewhat messy. She re-married – a younger, handsome man who turned out to be a lying cheater who also made a mess of her finances. She’s on good terms with her ex-husband and his new wife though.
What I know of Alexandra is that it seems she was/is very sophisticated and intelligent. I have heard that part of the demise of her marriage to Joachim was that he could not hold her intellectually. But of course I also heard he cheated on her a lot too, so who knows. I personally think she’s beautiful and fascinating, and so much more interesting than Marie.
Around the time of their divorce there were rumours about his sexuality (not in the press, just what people talked about). There were also insinuations that the reason for the divorce was infidelity on her part. Whatever. I actually don’t think that there was a big drama behind the divorce but rather that they weren’t that compatible – and I think it was VERY hard for Alexandra to be based on his estate in the south of Denmark. She was from Hong Kong – compared to that metropolis Copenhagen is a small city. However, she didn’t even live in this relatively small city but in a tiny hamlet. Møgeltønder where he former estate is located is beautiful and idyllic – but it is literally a one-street hamlet. It is tiny. Imagine coming from Hong Kong to this? It was a slow life out of the way of everything – even with the engagements she did for the DRF.
Alex is still very beautiful at 50. Their oldest son has inherited his father’s height and his mother’s looks – and he has dabbled a bit in modelling.
Not really successful. She had jobs, which is more than Kate had, but there was a media campaign to exaggerate her achievements. Here in Aus she was pretty ordinary.
In Italy we usually say hello to people by hugging and kisses on the cheeks and personally I have been having a very hard time breaking the habit. More than once I’ve had to catch myself at the last moment and just wave or something, so I get Mary. That being said top CEO wishes she was half as good as the crown princess of Denmark. Mary has raised 4 kids, been an active member of the danish royal family and had to learn danish. Kate could never.
It’s a mistake, but it happened for her in front of cameras and public, it happens. It happened to me as well a couple weeks ago, I was having dinner (with a good distance) with 2 friends. When my friend’s boyfriend arrived I stood up to kiss him on the cheeks and we only realized after what we did lol (and I say this as someone who usually hates kissing people on the cheeks)
Here to agree with the comments above! Would love to see more coverage of Crown Princess Mary on the site she’s so much more interesting than the top CEO
She was the keynote speaker at Copenhagen Pride last week.
Yes, I agree. CP Mary seems like a really interesting woman. I’d love to see more coverage of her here.
She’s my favorite royal.
And yes, it sucks that she shook hands, but I think it is an old habit that is hard to break. And her apology seemed sincere.
She made a mistake – but what’s important is that she turned it into a teachable moment, a reminder for us all to be vigilant because it is hard to break habits like these.
North Italy here. Lombardia to be exact. The epicenter of the pandemic. I had people grab me and hug and kiss me and… I wrote my will just in case. Some habits will be hard to change.
Also went on vacation to my home country. There people were playing this game called “spot the foreigners-wearing masks”. NOBODY was wearing one and in the stores the workers kept their masks on their chin leaving nose and mouth exposed.
Shaking hands is the least of the problems trust me.