I found a new favorite sport, Handball! Basically I love it :] For those of you who don't know handball you should, its kind of a cross between basketball and a bit of soccer. Each team has a goal, very small, that is defended by a goalie, and they toss around this midget version of a soccer ball back and forth between their players and try to score. They can only take so many steps before needing to bounce it or pass it, and when they can plow through the defense they try to throw the ball in the goal. So basically scoring takes a lot of jumping, body contorting and quite a lot of funny face making. My host family and I watch in often in the evenings, it is also becoming one of the only times I can really understand what my host family is saying when they speak in Danish, Nej Nej Nej!
This weekend their 15 yr old son Daniel came home from his efterskole, which a traditional Danish version of a boarding school where the students are only there for a year and they are all in 9th or 10th grade. Daniel had just been on a week long ski trip in Norway with his school and they gave the students a 3 day weekend to spend with family. So Thomas went to get him around 7:30, on the way back they stopped to get some breakfast to bring home, an assortment of breads, rolls and donuts, have I mentioned how much I love Denmark :] Then we went to a mall type thing in Birkerod, where Benedicte and Daniel showed me around while their parents did the grocery shopping. Thomas and Christina come out of the grocery store to meet up with us and they tell me about this foreign substance that the bought for me, want to know what it was? Peanut butter! They don't eat it here, Christina has never even tried it before, and apparently it is nearly impossible to find. I guess I still have a lot to learn about Danish food.
My host family made home made pizza for dinner! Again, I love Denmark. Sunday morning I went to my host family's church with them, boy was that an experience. In the hour's long service I understood all of two words, but hey at least I understood something! I think Benedicte and Daniel enjoyed snickering at the confused look plastered on my face. I am definitely going back though, it was an interesting experience and i'm not ready to call it quits yet!
We had a little gathering of the host families who live in the area at our house Sunday afternoon, I met 3 new girls who live around and got to hang out again with 2 girls that I had met before who live pretty close. We all had a pretty good time and ate homemade cinnamon rolls, oh how I am being spoiled :]
I woke up this morning to the most amazing view from the kitchen window...a snow covered yard! I have been hoping it would snow just one time while i'm here and I got my wish!
Well thats all for now folks, more to come later!
Wednesday, January 26, 2011
Thursday, January 20, 2011
Surviving my first days!
Well I feel like my first 4 days so far have been a whirlwind of activity and walking, my legs hurt! Its been hard to find time to breathe with everything that we've been doing, but I know it will make my stay here easier. My flight getting her was long, but I ended up meeting 6 other DIS people at the Amsterdam airport so I made some friends!
I am staying with my host family and they are wonderful, my host mom is a great cook. Kristen, you will be happy about this, they make me eat vegetables! I have had some sort of salad thing with dinner every night! My host sister is adorable, we joke a lot together, ahh the international language of laughter :] My host family is very musical, in fact they are all singing around the piano as I write!
I live about an hours commute by public transit away from DIS, sometimes an hour and a half if I am coming home later in the evening. Figuring out public transit is not hard, but when you get dropped into it, its pretty intimidating. I take a bus and then a train to get to school and have about twenty minutes of walking mixed in there, so I am getting my exercise! I have already experienced my first public transit malfunction also lol, yesterday the trains were having electrical problems so I was late for orientation.
Navigating your way through a big city is insane! I feel like such a tourist with my nose in my map 24/7, but I have met a lot friendly Danes who try and help me while I completely mispronounce the names of their streets. I have been lost more times than I can count with friends, we keep finding these great stores that we can never find again because we were lost when we found them. I think I like being lost in Copenhagen, it is fun to see this new place and just wonder down a street because you feel like it. We had a scavenger hunt on the first day of orientation so we could learn about local stores and fun places to go. Yesterday we had fun version of scavenger hunt and history lesson. We had to find our way to these marked locations around Copenhagen, where DIS faculty were waiting for us to tell us some history of that place. I was 30 feet away from a Danish Princess's front door!
I had my first day of class today, so basically it was a day of me being lost and in the wrong classroom or mispronouncing danish words and I loved it! I did end up dropping a class, because it was not what I was thinking it would be and I knew I would struggle too much to justify spending the time on it. I still have 4 classes that look very exciting, so this semester looks magnificent at the moment!
Well I think I am going to do some reading now for my environmental history class, so I shall write another day!
I am staying with my host family and they are wonderful, my host mom is a great cook. Kristen, you will be happy about this, they make me eat vegetables! I have had some sort of salad thing with dinner every night! My host sister is adorable, we joke a lot together, ahh the international language of laughter :] My host family is very musical, in fact they are all singing around the piano as I write!
I live about an hours commute by public transit away from DIS, sometimes an hour and a half if I am coming home later in the evening. Figuring out public transit is not hard, but when you get dropped into it, its pretty intimidating. I take a bus and then a train to get to school and have about twenty minutes of walking mixed in there, so I am getting my exercise! I have already experienced my first public transit malfunction also lol, yesterday the trains were having electrical problems so I was late for orientation.
Navigating your way through a big city is insane! I feel like such a tourist with my nose in my map 24/7, but I have met a lot friendly Danes who try and help me while I completely mispronounce the names of their streets. I have been lost more times than I can count with friends, we keep finding these great stores that we can never find again because we were lost when we found them. I think I like being lost in Copenhagen, it is fun to see this new place and just wonder down a street because you feel like it. We had a scavenger hunt on the first day of orientation so we could learn about local stores and fun places to go. Yesterday we had fun version of scavenger hunt and history lesson. We had to find our way to these marked locations around Copenhagen, where DIS faculty were waiting for us to tell us some history of that place. I was 30 feet away from a Danish Princess's front door!
I had my first day of class today, so basically it was a day of me being lost and in the wrong classroom or mispronouncing danish words and I loved it! I did end up dropping a class, because it was not what I was thinking it would be and I knew I would struggle too much to justify spending the time on it. I still have 4 classes that look very exciting, so this semester looks magnificent at the moment!
Well I think I am going to do some reading now for my environmental history class, so I shall write another day!
Wednesday, January 12, 2011
Just days till I leave!
Okay so this is my first ever blog post!
I leave in like 2 and a half days, so naturally I haven't really started packing and I am freaking out just a little, but everything will get done, probably at like 5 in the morning the day I leave, but it will get done!
I heard from my host family, basically they are awesome! They are a family of 4, mom, dad, son and daughter. Their son, Daniel, is in a boarding school so I won't see him too much, but their daughter, Benedicte, will be there, she is 12 and adorable! Benedicte and my host dad, Thomas, made me a little video giving me a tour of their home, it was so sweet! And I've been told that my host mom, Christina, makes delicious food so i'm really excited :]
I'm so anxious and excited to get there and meet everyone, it still feels surreal to me, probably because I haven't packed yet, I guess it will feel more real when I finally get to the airport Saturday morning.
Well I had better go do some laundry now!
Adios!
I leave in like 2 and a half days, so naturally I haven't really started packing and I am freaking out just a little, but everything will get done, probably at like 5 in the morning the day I leave, but it will get done!
I heard from my host family, basically they are awesome! They are a family of 4, mom, dad, son and daughter. Their son, Daniel, is in a boarding school so I won't see him too much, but their daughter, Benedicte, will be there, she is 12 and adorable! Benedicte and my host dad, Thomas, made me a little video giving me a tour of their home, it was so sweet! And I've been told that my host mom, Christina, makes delicious food so i'm really excited :]
I'm so anxious and excited to get there and meet everyone, it still feels surreal to me, probably because I haven't packed yet, I guess it will feel more real when I finally get to the airport Saturday morning.
Well I had better go do some laundry now!
Adios!
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