Først uge i København!

So I can’t believe it but it’s Wednesday, which means I have been in this crazy place for about a week and a half! It has certainly flown by, but at the same time, it feels like I have been here forever. YOW.

If you just want to know how I am doing generally, the answer is FINT, or fine/well in Danish. (Let’s multiply this answer times ten actually.) I am having a blast getting to know the city, its people, my host family, other chicas in the program, etc! The weather has been insanely perfect as well. Don’t you guys worry about me.

The Danes are so cool

Love Scandinavia love

Marry me someone?

I’m really loving the list thing, because it helps me to organize my thoughts, and hopefully it makes these entries easier to read for you. Sooo, here are some of my current reflections slash updates, organized by topic:

1) General bits of wisdom/insights I have come across during the first week

• Two very famous Danes are Hans Christian Andersen and the band Aqua (who I have now seen in concert, feel free to ask me about this :) )
• Danish and Swedish are written pretty similarly but pronounced VERY differently, giving me an advantage in reading, and greatly hindering my speaking.
• Danes are beautiful. Just see my family for proof.
• Copenhagen is freakin’ expensive! I bought a slice of chocolate cake yesterday for roughly $8, and I am thrilled to come across a glass of beer or a cup of coffee for $5.
• My program, DIS, has at the very least, 3 girls for every boy. Whoaa
• In the words of Jens Lekman, "It's like someone spilled a beer, all over the atmosphere." Beer is very popular, is drunk regularly and in public, and is preferred over cocktails due to the exorbitant taxes on hard liquor.
  

2) My birthday! (Mig fødselsdag!)

August 24^th, the glorious day of my birth, always falls around the beginning of school for me. Freshman year at Rice, it was the Friday of O-Week (thank you Excaliber for the wonderful memories), a very exciting time for me. There is something magical about the beginning of school in general, when everything is new – school supplies, goals, professors – and your outlook on the future is likely to be optimistic and fresh. At least this is my experience. Concerning my birthday, though, I was not expecting anything spectacular for 2009, as it happened to fall one day after arrival day for my program, in a country where I do not know 99% of the people. The age of 20 isn’t particularly epic, either. Besides, I had celebrated with my family in Sweden a little early.

But I was wrong. My low expectations were greatly exceeded, starting at 6:30 am when the five members of my new family woke me up singing in Danish. They had presents for me and everything! See below.

Decorations for my room, clothing, and other practical things!

It was really a surprise. I guess my host sisters, who friended me on Facebook in advance, had seen that my birthday was on the 24^th. Apparently in the host family orientation, they were told to celebrate their exchange student’s birthday properly and in accordance with the Danish culture, if it so happened to be in the fall semester. Which mine obviously did.

After a full day of orientation activities and exploring central Copenhagen (which included getting lost and seeking directions from beautiful Danish men), my family organized part dos of my birthday celebration, which involved a trip to Tivoli, one of Copenhagen’s most prized attractions. It is an amusement park, concert venue, outdoor park, historical site and restaurant hub all in one. I rode a few rides with my sisters, one of which focused on Hans Christian Andersen, a native of Denmark. We had fantastic Japanese food and Coldstone ice cream afterwards! Who knew!

A building at Tivoli with Danish flags flying.

A lake in the middle of Tivoli with restaurants and historical looking houses on the outside.

The outside of Tivoli at night!

In summary, I had a wonderful birthday :)

3) My new family… :D

My sisters and I at Tivoli! What beautiful posture I have.

Here is my family and I being goofy at Tivoli... haha! It is a picture of a picture, btw, so sorry if it is not so clear!

There are three girls – Rikke (which is pronounced more like “Reggae”), Pernille, and Nanna, who are 19, 15, and 10, respectively. Mom and Dad are Jens and Marianne. Rikke has graduated high school and is working at a hotel, while Pernille and Nanna are still in school and do gymnastics three times a week after school. To sum up my family, I would say that they are all very active, talkative, beautiful, and easygoing. Pernille is especially eager to practice her English, because next year she will be spending a year as an exchange student in the US.

My family lives in a house in the town of Solrød Strand, which is about 40 km (23 miles) south of Copenhagen, and involves a commute of about 1 hour, door to door. Students in my program with other living arrangements, though, have a similar commute, ranging from half an hour (that’s about the shortest I’ve heard) to 1 ½ hours. I first bike 5-7 minutes to the train station, take the train into the city for about 30 minutes, and walk to school for about 10 minutes. It’s not so bad, and I find the train system to be very reliable and peaceful to ride. You wouldn’t believe how SILENT the train is in the morning until you rode it yourself.

Here is the strand part of the town I live in!

4) My first school field trip for Danish… to see fudbol!

FC Copenhagen vs. Brondby - apparently the biggest club rivals in Copenhagen!

Megan and I eating fabulous French hot dogs

YUM!

5) Wonderful Copenhagen (this adjective precedes the city name on many brochures, maps, and signs… although I’m not exactly sure why yet)

Dear Copenhagen,

Please eat my money

Fill me with Danish goodness

Already in love

Check out the number of bikes that have passed this sign - 12,824 by around 6 in the evening!

Enough said. There are a ridiculous amount of people who bike here.

Nyhavn! One of the most famous streets in Copenhagen.

We bought purses at 70% off... what now

Beer!! Completely acceptable to drink at 2 in the afternoon.

6) My classes/the studying component of study abroad

Here are the classes I am taking and my thoughts on the first couple of classes:

Psychology of Happiness – love the teacher, love the reading. I’m excited to be taking a class on positive psychology, and to be critical about this newly developing field. I’m also pumped to be heading to Scotland with my class the first week of October!

Danish Language and Culture I – yay! Already learning a lot. We have some other cool field trips coming up in and around Copenhagen.

Holocaust and Genocide – the reading has been interesting thus far, and we will be heading to Hamburg, Germany in a couple of weeks. My teacher has a really thick Scandinavian accent, smokes a lot, and isn’t afraid to express his cynicism. Love it.

Developmental Neuropsychology – I can already tell that I will learn a lot in this class, and hopefully it will help me narrow down my desired area of specialty in psychology, which could very well be neuropsych. There is a total of 1 boy in this class, haha.

My first day of school in front of the DIS building!

Ok... I'm out. I apologize if this was super general - more stories next time, I promise. <3>