Home Sweet Copes

Hi all!! Turns out I'm horrible at blogging, since I haven't written in so long!

Since I have so much to cover, here are some highlights since the last time I've written...

September 19th... (practically a month ago, whoops!)

DIS bought everyone enrolled in Danish class a ticket to the F.C. København and Brøndby game! My first real soccer game!

Laura, Natasha and I at the FCK game!

The fans are crazy! The FCK fans were cheering the ENTIRE game. And they all cheered and danced in unison. ( http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WWr1DaexOpg&feature=related ). Not my video, but this is one of the cheers! And this is their big song they always play/sing ( http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Caq3ou1MW7E ). The Brøndby fans, on the other hand, were absolutely insane. They started off making fires in the stands, which escalated to lighting flares, which they then threw on the field. Riots broke out, drawing many police and security and fights went down.

As the riot is breaking out...

This would never fly in the states, so I was so shocked how much this escalated. Basically... the fans are pretty darn rowdy. FCK kept it classy though! AND they won, 2-0.

Tuesdays are our "weekday weekend" since we "don't" have classes on Wednesday. Wednesdays are designated for field studies, so we travel locally to places relevant to different classes. Every Tuesday, we hang out on our common room, aka the Great Dane. New favorite place to go in Copes is the Scottish Pub. (Why are all these places named after other locations?). They always have live music and is a guaranteed good time! And I'm slowly mastering how to get home from the city center via bus. The night buses are slowly becoming easier to figure out and I know street names a little bit now, so I can do some experimenting!

Hanna and I sporting our European outfits and our wine juice boxes in the Great Dane on cafe night.

September 22nd... I'm taking a Copes History class, which is basically an architecture class. Not that easy or fun to study, but it's cool (nerdy, I know) to know all this history and information about Copes. Carsten, our professor, says we're going to know more than 95% of all Danish people after taking this class. Well anyway, we had to go on a second scavenger hunt finding different Renaissance/Baroque style buildings we were assigned. This was a lottt of walking around. Luckily, we walked by a bakery on St. Pœder's Stœde, and Wednesdays are their day they make fresh cinnamon rolls. So we got a PMA (positive mental attitude) boost with hot cinnamon rolls to eat as we walked around!

September 23rd... Thursday means practicum day!! We went on a field trip to Frilandmuseet with the kids. It's an outside museum of old Scandinavian houses. It was two of the kid's Moms, one of our teachers, and me... so I was essentially the second teacher. At the end of the day, they bought everyone ice cream... I can't complain :). Out of all the houses to go in and out of, the kids favorite part was a board that they could walk across two "hills" right by the entrance. Haha, I love them. During lunch, I tried one of the kid's liver paste sandwich... not as nasty as it sounds actually. The kids always ask me questions, which I'm slowly understanding a few words! When we got back, one of the helpers was in our class and it was her birthday. She brought these traditional Danish desserts in, which is a chocolate covered marshmallow fluff with coconut sprinkled on the outside and a little wafer covered in the chocolate on the bottom. So we sang the birthday song to her! Then I went straight to my visiting family's house for dinner, which Taylor (the american staying with them) made for us. Anna made pumpkin pie with a meringue on the top for dessert!

September 25th... Aliza and I went to a cafe called the Living Room, right by DIS, to get work done. In the bottom level, there are all these couches and tables with candles everywhere that make it really hyggelig.... Danish for saying it's cozy and homey. They use this phrase really frequently. At a lot of cafes, they have Go Postcards, that are weird/random postcards and they're free! We discovered these today! Later, Hanna and I went over to Kim's kollegium in Nørrobro. Nørrobro is the part of København next to Østebro, where I live. She made us french toast! Yummy! Then we went to Barcelona Bar (yay, Barc 010!) and successfully found our way home with the buses... Notice a pattern? I find traveling anywhere one of my big successes of any day!

Made mashed potatoes that Sunday... SO good.

September 28th... Class from 8:30 to 4:10, but my Neuro teacher couldn't come, so after our "exam", we got to go early! And exam is in quotations because it was 25% of our grade, but we got a study guide of 60 questions, in which she picked 30 to ask us... not complaining! Pretty great! We got home and I decided to make applesauce! Then Tåsingegade (the apartment place I live) went bowling in Copes. I won :) Three times! When did I learn how to bowl?

Laura and I at the bowling alley in Copes!

September 29th... Field study with Copes class in the morning. Saw old Navy houses built when the Navy became a more permanent part of Copes. I never realized how close this was to me... only a five minute bike ride! Then we walked to the Citadel, which is right by the houses. You could still see where all the old bastioned walls were, like we'd been talking about in class! Really cool! Then we went to Amalienborg Palace, the royal palace. We got a tour of the palace where the Queen hosts events and parties!! We finished the tour right at the time that they do changing of the guard. We had to exit out the back door, or they might shoot at us?! That's what the guide said...seriously, or jokingly? Haha.

October 1st... Gert (Jimber's Dad) was in town for the night, so we went out to dinner right next to City Hall Square. We took him to Scottish Pub, and I now have a Carlsberg cup from there :)

Yay for Gert being in Copes!

October 2nd... We had plans to do a lot of things... Shopping, visiting the Fredericksberg Castle... Instead, I felt accomplished from Laura and Aliza making lunch and recycling my cans... You get money for recycling in Copes! People are always walking around taking cans out of the garbage... but hey, you get money for it. Then I made the best applesauce... Seems to be what I do in my free time. We are leaving for Long Study Tours tomorrow!!

October 3rd... Everybody left for long study tours over this weekend and we left today. All DIS students went with their base course. I left with my Children with Special Needs class to Tallin, Estonia... About an hour and a half flight. Our class is 28 girls and two guys, with two female leaders... so a whollleeee lot of estrogen up in there. We got there by evening time and went to a place called Olde Hansa, which has food, dress and everythinggggggg like it was way back when in Estonia.

Very cozy and hyggelig.

There were lots of interesting things... barley, tongue... tongue was gross.

Nina, Aliza and I at Olde Hansa!

But they're house drink is Honey beer, which was amazing! Tallin is such a cool city in the fact that all of the old medieval walls are still up and they are what stand between new and old Tallin. It's really neat because once you walk inside the walls, you are in a totally different, old, romantic town. I love it!

The walls surrounding the old town!

There are these stands all over Tallin that hand out free roasted spiced almonds. It's to entice you to buy them, but I enjoy getting the free almonds :)

The almonds were so good!

October 4th... We kicked off the day going to a special needs school in Tallin. Then we went on a guided walking tour of Tallin, getting to see the whole inner city. We walked all the way to the top of the town and had such an awesome view!

What an awesome view of Tallin!

After, we went to a second school for behavioral special needs. Then we had free time to explore the town. I bought a hand woven hat from an Estonian woman at the sweater mart! After dinner, we went to this Hyggelig chocolate cafe with the most amazing desserts. It was a white chocolate cheesecake with white chocolate on top, jam under it and a cinnamon crust... so heavenly.

The most fantastic dessert!

We tried to find warm, spiced wine, but all the places were closed!

October 5th... We went to the Hellen School for the Deaf and Blind in the morning for our first visit. After wandering around Tallin for a while, we packed up for our cruise ship from Tallin to Stockholm! The ship was HUGE, but was rocking miserably.

Our ship on the right!

Everyone was really feeling a little rough from it. One of our tour leaders is getting married next week, so we had a bachelorette party for her on the cruise! When we were doing Karaoke, this Estonian man picked My Heart Will Go On... aka my favorite song when I was in third grade. Needless to say, I turned it into a duet.

Karaoke on the cruise!

October 6th... We were all more than pleased to get off the cruise in the morning. We got to our hotel and realized that we all got JUNIOR SUITES. DIS hooked us up, they were so nice. We visited an Autism Center in Stockholm. Instead of using a bus like we did in Tallin, we had a 72 hour transportation pass we used. Later that night, we went to the Opera to see Figuero's wedding. There was the weirdest stuff going on in this opera. None of us could stay awake, but while I was awake, I saw a guy molesting a girl in the first act and a threesome in the second act. There was some real weird stuff going on. Plus, it was Italian with Swedish subtitles, so not too easy to follow.

Our nosebleed seats at the Opera.

October 7th... We went to the Stella Nova School in the morning. As we got close to the school, we see these kids waving American flags and cheering.

The sign they made for us within five minutes of taking this picture!

Once we were sitting, three little boys brought in coffee cups, coffee, tea, and cookies. They wrote our name on a piece of paper and handed out each cup to us individually.

This was just too precious!

Then five little girls came in and belly danced and after, four boys break danced to Boom Boom Pow. It was so adorable!

I couldn't stop smiling! So adorable!

They had made us welcome signs that were hung on the door. Then we got to walk around and hang out with all the kids. When I was walking through the first room in the school, the teacher tells me "she wants to hold your hand" and one of the little girls lifts up her hand to me and we walk around. It was so cute. We wandered all over the school and then played catch for almost 30 minutes. Then we went to a cafe and had hot chocolate and chocolate cake and apple tart while we listened to a speaker. After, we had dinner and ate REAL Swedish meatballs and mashed potatoes. We went out after and creepy old Swedish men bought us drinks. Then I sang a lovely rendition of Love the Way You Lie with my Swedish friends.

October 8th... Nina, Aliza and I wandered around Stockholm in the morning... visited the Royal Palace and took pictures with the guard!

In front of Royal Palace!

The guard looks the least serious out of the three of us!

I am collecting post cards from every place I go visit! A little reminder of the places I've been! We met up with our class and had this awesome salmon for lunch right before we left for the airport. Our flight got us back in later that night to Copes, and I had to pack right away for Paris! I went to bed at 12 and had to wake back up at 3 to get ready and leave for the airport. Five minutes after I went to bed, the fire alarm went off. We all went downstairs and this Danish girl (couldn't be older than 18) started yelling at us to go back inside because it wasn't a real fire. Someone talked back to her and she threw a beer bottle at them and then started lunging at everyone outside. Her friends were holding her back... basically, this went on for 3o minutes and at one point, she pushed our SRA into a row of bikes and then he pinned her to the ground. It was getting kind of scary, but the Police came. I went to bed at 1 (that means only two hours of sleep...) but I could still hear this girl doing her guttural speech for a while after. Luckily, she's getting evicted.

October 9th... Woke up at 3 after 2 hours of sleep. Tried to ride my bike to the metro, but the girl knocked my SRA into my bike so the wheel was messed up. Luckily, I had looked up how to get to the metro by bus. Since it was so early, I had to take a night bus and I found out later that the lady who was waiting for the bus with me works at the Copes airport. It was so funny seeing her a couple of hours later in security. I took advantage of every free second I had to nap... while waiting for the plane, while on the plane... I woke up right after they handed out pastries on the plane and the guy next to me got our flight attendants attention and got me one! So nice of him! Once I got to the airport, I found out the metro at the airport is under construction, so I had to take a shuttle to another terminal to catch a bus to take two metro lines to get to my hostel. But I navigated it all and there were two girls who were going to the same stop I was from the airport, so I helped them get there! Who knew I was good at directions? I checked in at my hostel and had two hours to spare until I was meeting Kath and Sarah at the Eiffel Tower, so I decided to walk there from my hostel! It's about an hour, hour and a half walk, but I got to see a ton of things on my way. I walked through the Louvre and Les Jardins de Tuilleries, (I want to live outside the Louvre. I love it there!), Place de la Concorde, Les Invalides and then stopped at a grocery store to eat some lunch by the Eiffel Tower. Once I met up with Kath and co., we went to Notre Dame and then walked through the Louvre/Les Jardins de Tuilleries again.

At the Louvre with Sarah, Kath, Bridget and some of Sarah's friends from Lux.

Luckily, Kath and I both had to use the same line to get home, so we dropped my stuff off at my hostel and then went to her apartment for dinner. We made some pasta and had peaches, plus waffers for dessert! We then went to the Eiffel Tower at night to watch it when it sparkles on the hour! (My other favorite part about Paris!)

October 10th... 10/10/10!... I survived my night in the hostel. It's actually a nice hostel and I shared the room with three other people who were normal enough! I met everyone in Montmartre that morning and we walked up the stairs to see the Sacre Coeur. I love in European churches, how you can light candles inside. Very hyggelig. One the way to Les Jardins de Luxembourg, I got pickpocketed on the metro. There goes all my pictures from Paris. Kim met us at the gardens and we had lunch at a cafe!

Gamma Phi takes Paris!

Then Kath was kind enough to replicate my walk from the day before so I could recreate all my lost pictures!

Where I want to set up a tent and live forever!

By the end, we were worn out. We got banana and nutella crepes by the Eiffel Tower and watched a break dancing show with very attractive men.

Our last stop of the day!

October 11th... woke up at 3:30 and got picked up by shuttle at 4. Shuttle was the genius way to go... didn't have to worry about getting lost or running late. The guy dropped me directly off at my terminal. I napped for a solid hour and a half at my gate then an hour and a half on the plane. I landed at 9:20, got into Copes by 9:50 and got to class a few minutes before 10. I was running on who knows what, but managed to be awake for class all day!

Last week was crazy with midterm papers and everything! On Friday, it was Kultur Natten (Culture Night) in Copes and you could go to all these different places. We went to the Copes Zoo and I was inches away from baby lion cubs! They were so cute!! Then we went to the Carlsberg factory and there was this trippy light show and music going on. Then we stopped in a dance studio on our way to the S train. We tried to go up the Round Tower, but the line was crazy long, so we opted out. We saw all these ice sculptures right outside Christiansborg Palace and then tried to take a canal tour, but the one before us was the last one!

On Sunday, I went with Anna to Johan and Taylor's basketball game. Anna, her friend, Marie, and I went to a cafe after for dinner. When I came home, Tåsingegade was going all out fall style. I carved a pumpkin-- we made an owl--, Umit made pumpkin soup and hot chocolate for everyone and we watched Johnny Darko.

Today, my Danish class had a field study to a bakery and then the Danish Resistance Museum... all about the resistance during WWII. In Denmark, only 116 Jewish people died. Kim and I made fajitas tonight at her kollegium :)

It won't be another month until you hear from me!

Hej hej!

I've taken the next step to becoming Danish... I rented a bike for the semester!! I'll put a picture of Barney up later!! I was nervous to take on the road with my bike, but I survived! Riding your bike in Denmark is the same as driving a car. That night, I had to go with Laura and Christian to take Laura to the hospital. It's either mono or a throat infection... hopefully not mono!!

That Wednesday, I navigated my way to DIS by bike all by myself without getting lost!! Thursday was the start to our short study tours with our base course. We left Copenhagen early, arriving at the Koldinghus in Kolding, Denmark after a three hour bus ride.

This castle had a Beatles museum in it!?

My base course is Children with Special Needs, so our first stop after the Koldinghus was the Village Landsbyen Solund in Solund. This is a home for adults with special needs to live. We had Vivi, one of the leaders there, talk to us. We learned that it is customary in Denmark when one has company, to give them tea, coffee, fruit and cake. After, we walked over to the Snoezelhuset in the Village. This is a multi-sensory stimulation environments for clients with special needs. It is basically an environment designed to make you happy... so we spent a couple hours in a playground while other programs spent all day in lectures. This place was awesome and extremely interactive. There was a screen on the ground that could be flowers or fish and when you stepped on the screen, they would move away!

There is a room with a ball pit too!!

There's another room with a huge swing and hammocks and mats! One room is completely white, but when you turn the projector on, it projects an image onto the wall and "Cave", making it look real!

This one is Antarctica!! How cool!!

After playing for a while, we left for our hostel, which was amazing! It was basically a campgrounds and we got to stay in cabins!!

We went canoeing on the lake at our hostel!! It would get so windy at times that we could barely row!

A preview of the canoeing to come at the Snoezelhuset!

The lake at the hostel with everyone in their neon orange life jackets!!

That night after dinner, we had a bonfire where we made Smores and roasted Danish dough.

The dough was not so easy to bake over the fire!

Friday, we had a long list of things to do. We made our first stop at Stilling Skole, a regular public school, where they gave us tea and coffee. They gave us a tour of the school. The crazy thing about Danish ideals is that at age 3, they are allowed to use a knife by themselves. They can use potato peelers in the kitchen and use a stove... just trusted more than in the U.S. After our stop at the school, we made another stop at Cafe Galleriet for coffee, tea, fruit and pastries... these pastries were fantastic!! After, we visited Egmont Hojskole, which is a school for young adults with special needs. Coffee, tea, fruit and pastries again. The cool thing is that there are also students who just finished with "high school" who come here to be partnered up with a special needs students and see if they may want to go to school to be a pedagogue. We ate lunch there, then left on our way to the last academic visit of the day, the Videncenter for Radgivning and Specialpaedagogik. It's an organization that plans and takes on assignments for children to teens with special needs. This one was longgggg and lecture-filled, which was really hard to sit and listen to after a full and long day. But... surprise, surprise... cake, tea, and coffee! We then went to the hostel in Odense, home of Hans Christian Anderson!

Stopped by HC Anderson's house!!

We went to see the Odense Symphony Orchestra later that night, which was great, but we were all worn out from such a long day. The best part was at the end, we learned that all Danes clap in unison... literally, for 10 minutes, they all clapped together. We found this quite amusing!

On Saturday, we made our first stop at the Fyrtojet Workshop, aka the Tinderbox. It is this place for kids where they read them a fairtytale of HC Anderson and they get to act it out in a sense.

But first we stopped outside to take a picture of our Rainbow of rainjackets!

Once we got there, we read Clumsy Hans, and then went upstairs to draw a picture of the story.

Crayons and watercolors... the life of the child development program.

Then we picked out costumes and got our faces painted!

The CDD group all dressed up!
The big playground!!

After lunch (there was cake there... shocking!), we made our way to the HC Anderson Museum and then the Brandts Klaedefabrik Modern museum. This museum had a wild things exhibit with "wearable" art...

They even had a whole interactive section where you were on the green screen for a news report or recording a song for a band or being interviewed for a tv show... we were thoroughly amused by it all! It was then time to leave Western Denmark to our lovely home in Copenhagen.

Sunday, Tim and I had to go on a scavenger hunt for class... this involved going to the major parts of Copenhagen and answering questions about the different stops. One stop was the top of the Round Tower, which you have to climb this steep, slanted path to the top. It was awesome to see all of Copenhagen from the top!

You can see Copenhagen Cathedral in the middle of the picture... only a block from DIS. It was built in the 1800s!

We got to the bottom and realized that our answer sheet was all the way at the top of the round tower... so we had to climb all the way back up to the top to get it. Whoops! The scavenger hunt took a lot longer than expected, and we only got half of it done that day.

This is Greyfriar's square... just one of the many cool places we had to stop at for our scavenger hunt!

My week from Wednesday on was just sooo busy! That Wednesday, I had two field studies... one for Children with Special needs and one for Danish. We had to wake up early for our field study to Helsingor Lilleskole, a private school North of us. We took the train in and walked to the school.

The double rainbow we saw on the way to school!

We hung out in the 10th grade class, where the kids speak awesome English!! It is so impressive. They gave us a tour of their school and explained what they do there. From 7th to 10th grade, they go on a trip with their class. The 10th grade goes for 3 weeks to Gambia in Africa!! How cool is that?! And they do a lesson called "factory" where everyone gets a job and they produce and sell bird feeders that they make in their woods shop. We played a "speed dating" like game where we got to talk to each of the students. We left around lunch time and I had to go straight to DIS for my Danish field study to the cemetery. We had to talk for five minutes about one of the people we were going to stop by. We went to Kirkegaard, HC Anderson, Niels Bohr... We also went to Natasja's tombstone. She was big in Denmark... youtube natasja calabria... you'll recognize it.... and this lady started taking pictures. She pipes in to correct my teacher (Morten) as he's speaking. It was Natasja's Mom! Then we headed over to Von Shorten's (I think) tombstone (looks like a house) and this guy started talking to us. Turns out he's talking to Congress this week about the reparations from Denmark to those in the U.S. Virgin Islands who were slaves. Shelley Moorehead... look it up. And he was hanging with this girl whose family goes back in Denmark to before the slave era... who knew the cemetary was the place to be?! It was quite a coincedental day! Then we stopped at a cafe and I got a fruit pie... yum! That day I was gone from 7 to 5:30... crazy busy.

The next day, Thursday, was my practicum day! The kids had gone to the forest all last week! I was so sad I couldn't have gone with them!! Next week, we are going to a farm to pick vegetables!! Still not easy that they speak no English, but it's working out really well!! I love it!

Right after I got home, I had to go straight to Ballerup to meet my visiting family for the first time!! It's a little over an hour to get there. We had an awesome dinner and homemade ice cream!! It was amazing! Anna and I took the train back and I had to study for my Copenhagen test the next morning. Kim came over Friday night and we made dinner!!

On Saturday, we decided to go to Sweden for the day! (Sounds crazy, right?!) We took the train into Malmo and got some lunch!

We're in Sweden!!!!

They were handing out free Pepsis in the square?

We went shopping around some of the stores in the Malmo version of Stroget. It started getting super windy as we walked towards the Harbor! Can't believe a day trip to Sweden is that easy!!

So pretty there!!

Jimber and I just doing some world traveling :)

Until next time, hej hej! (That's bye in Danish!)

It's Already Been Two Weeks!?

Geez Luis, I haven't written for over a week!? It's just proof of how busy we've been in Copes! Friday was the DIS welcome party at the discotek, which was jam packed full of us Americans! I was still slowly recovering from jet lag because on Saturday, I woke up super early, before anyone else was up. So I sat in our common room in Tasingegade and watched Despicable Me and knitted :) We went to a botanical garden really close to Osterbro, where I live! It was so pretty and I got lots of good pictures!!

That night was the Tasingegade pub crawl, where Christian (our SRA) took us around to some of the bars in the city!

Here's just some of Tasingegade taking on Copes.

On Sunday, Laura, Natasha and I decided to wander around the city. When we got off the bus at the Town Hall Square, we walked into this huge basketball tournament that was there!

They had a dj and this guy who was rapping in English. It was awesome! Haha. Then we wandered over to the harbor, where a Triathalon was going on!

People swam in the harbor... which is so big!! You can see people swimming in the water!! We made our way over to the new library of Copenhagen, which is SO nice!! It's really modern and has the best view of the harbor!

On Mondays, I have my three hour seminar for my base course. It feels realllllly long. But then we have our Practicum seminar with crazy Alis who is really entertaining. I now can count to ten and ask "Do you want to play?" That night, my Danish class got together at a cafe for dinner (and DIS payed for it too!). My teacher, Morten, is awesome. He's this awkward, nerdy guy who loves film (that's what he teaches) but is such a nice guy. I had my first real Danish meal! It's called smorebrod or something like that, which is an open sandwich. Chicken salad sandwich with bacon... so legit.

Tuesday is my long day for class... I have 4 classes basically from 10 until 4. But luckily, my Classical and Renaissance Rome class doesn't start until this Tuesday!! In my developmental neuropsychology class (it's once a week, but three hours long... gross), we watched a video about a boy who has Sydenham's Chorea... this class is going to be awesome! Every Tuesday, Tasingegade has "cafe" where we all hang out in the common room and they have 5 kroner beers. It's a blast... I love where I live!

Wednesdays we don't have class, but Natasha and I had a study tour for our developmental neuropsychology class to a special needs school. I don't know how they spell it in Danish but everytime she said the school name, it sounded like super school. So... we spent the first half of our day at a SUPERSCHOOL! At the school, they gave us pastries, fruit and coffee!! Best surprise ever! At 10:00 everyday, all the students get together to sing a couple of songs and if it's a kid's birthday, they get a Danish flag. Some of the students came and talked to us about the school. Their english was almost perfect! And they all love the school, it's really cute! The school gets 8 million dollars a year from the government. And the government pays for a taxi to and from school everyday for the kids who live far away. The school has everything! Including a woodshop and a pool!

Once we got back, everybody in Tasingegade wanted to be lazy and watch a movie. But I was in the mood to do something, so Tim and I rallied a couple people to go on an adventure with us.

The crew who joined us on our rally adventure!

We went into the city and sat at a cafe by the harbor and had a beer. Then we took the harbor bus (such a cool way to see Copes) around and decided to go visit Christiania.

The Royal Palace from the Harbor bus!

Christiana... This place is unlike anywhere else I've ever been. A long time ago, the hippies all moved to this area, which is in Copenhagen, but not a part of Copenhagen. It used to be a little bit more unruly, and they were stealing the city's electricity and water, but now it is much more civilized. In Christiania, they literally sell pot on the sidewalks at picnic tables. It's very much so it's own community and can't be described, only experienced.

Thursday is my practicum and I was SUPER nervous. I managed to navigate to the school with no major problems! And the train ride to the school is on the water the whole way and I can see Sweden the whole time! I am in a class with about 20 3 to 6 year olds. I already have a best friend in the class, Isabella. It's so cute. We were outside for a good amount of the day. We walked around and picked leaves for a while. Lotte, the main teacher in my room, said she was impressed by how well I was doing :) It's really tricky when I can't say anything to them besides my name! For lunch, we had fish potatoes peas and this sauce. It was soo good! One little boy, Valdemar, took me to this hidden house in the forest and made me a sand dinner with a sand drink and a sand birthday cake with candles! It was so precious! I'm in love with all my kids! I wish I was going back next week, but we have our short study tour to Western Denmark for a couple of days!

On Friday, after class, some of Tasingegade left for our cruise to Norway! We got off the bus and instead of waiting for Christian, decided to walk towards the water... major fail and ended up in the totally wrong place. We were running so late (aka we were supposed to be there and were nowhere close to being where we needed to be...) and had to walk to the real place. Luckily it didn't leave without us!! We hung out on the top deck and watched as we left the dock!

We staked out a whole portion of the top deck!

The dinner was soo good!! (More exciting than the food we've been making here). The cruise ship was so much bigger than I thought it would be!! Look!

Here is the whole group from Tasingegade/DIS on top of the Opera House and in front of the harbor with our AWESOME cruise ship!

This cruise ship was amazing... And it's got a discotek on board!! We got off the boat Saturday around 930 and wandered all over Oslo! We saw the Opera house, a museum with Edward Munch's Scream as a main attraction, Parliament, the Royal Palace, Viking ship museum, an outdoor museum of old houses, and a million other places!

Norway back in the old days.

The viking ships that are over 1,000 years old!!

We had to take a boat to get to some of the museums too, which had such a pretty view! When we got back, we sat out on the deck again and just looked out at the water. Best life ever.

Enjoying some time to sit after being "whipped around like Japanese tourists" as Christian would say.

Overall, Norway was beautiful and so awesome! I wish we could cruise there every weekend!

Today I went for a run through the parks around us. There were these big time soccer games going on! I went by the game with Nigeria vs. Ghana! So cool! Everybody is starting to get sick in Tasingegade... hope my immune system holds up!

Until next time, peace :)