Busy Week of Traveling

Within the last week, I've been on two rather large trips. One, I had the pleasure of spending last Sunday with my host family down in Flensburg, Germany. It was awesome, beautiful scenery ( amazing how different it was, even being less than 30 minutes away from my home here) Wandered around the streets looking at all the different shops and stands. It was all beautifully decorated for the Christmas season. I bought myself a nice little white hat, haha. Or rather, Dennis bought it for me, I didn't have any Euros on me at the time. I still need to pay him back. Took lots of pictures, some with the family, so if you're wondering what they looked like as well, you can see all those pictures here-http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=130970&id=587188838&l=61e7c20d2f

Then yesterday, an older couple from my Rotary took me on a tour of Copenhagen. It was filled with even more activity than usual, due to the upcoming Climate Conference. ( Obama is coming... ewwww) Lots of demonstrations around the streets, added security, extra tourists.
I saw the little mermaid statue, of course. The diamond building, the Queens palace, the giant library looking over the canals. Also spent a bit of time in Tivoli at night, which was also beautifully lit up for christmas. I hope all my pictures turned out okay, considering it was dark, and my flash is tempermental. I dont have those posted yet, but hopefully I will soon.
Did quite a bit of shopping. I mostly just looked around since I'm trying to save my money to get my hair done next week. But I did manage to get a little christmas shopping done. Ate lunch in a cute little cafe by the water. The couple who took me was very generous, Ill have to thank them again at Rotary on wednesday.
I think about half the trip was spent in the car though. It takes about three hours to get there, so we spent just under 6 hours in the car that day. I was supposed to go to school the next morning ( today ) but being out in the rain almost all day, I came down with a bit of a cold.

All in all, not a bad week =)

Danish Christmas

So, this last Wednesday was the Rotary Christmas party. Ate dinner ( duck is the traditional holiday meat I think) sang some Danish songs. We sang a song to the tune of 'Silent Night', except that the lyrics were much different and the beat was upbeat and happy. I felt like they had violated one of the most sacred songs we know lol.
Then the little kids started making a ring, and dancing around the christmas tree in the middle of the room. I had fully intended on sitting that one out, until my counselor dragged me ( almost literally) into the circle. I was also forced to sit on Santas lap for a bag of candy. Seems like the fricken paparazzi showed up when I did, at least three people took my picture. So much for forgetting that incident =P. For dessert we had these little pancake ball thingys, that you can dip in marmalade and sugar. Pretty tasty. Then we drove home, blasting Snow Patrol in the car and singing at the top of our lungs.

I suppose I'll take the time to jot down a few Jule ( Christmas) traditions. Dancing and singing around the Juletræ is one of them ( as I found out at the christmas party). Another one, is to take a bowl of rice pudding, and bury an almond somewhere in it. And as the family eats the pudding, whoever finds the almond in their bowl get a present. Of course, it has to be by chance, you cant go digging through the bowl trying to find it, haha.

I don't know if I've mentioned this before, but the Danes are HUGE on candles. They pull them out at the slightest occasions. But they're even more common around Christmas time. They have one large candle with measure marks on it ( like a ruler) and they burn a little bit of it each day of December. They also have 4 candles on the dinner table, and they light one each sunday of the month.
Speaking of Sundays of the month, they also have an 'advent calendar', where every sunday in december the kids get a present from their family. And since my host family is awesome, I was included in this. They bought Anna and I tickets to go see 2012. That may not seem like much to you Americans, but going to the movies is a pretty big deal here. It's extremely expensive. 90 kr per ticket, which is almost twenty american dollars.

Tomorrow we're going to spend the day down in Germany, see the towns, maybe get a little shopping done. I'm excited, I haven't been to Germany ( Tyskland) as of yet.

Vi ses!

New Hostfamily

So, as the title indicated, I have switched host families as of last weekend. And let me just say, I absolutely LOVE it here. This family is wonderful to me. My host parents, Dennis and Lena, have two children- Anna, who is 14, and Emil, who is 10. Both seem to be very interested in attaching themselves to my hips.
Dennis reminds me SO much of my dad. Intelligent, highly sarcastic. We get along very well. He was also an exchange student when he was younger, to Japan. We're interested in a lot of the same things, good literature, psychology, etc. He gave me a few books from his personal library to read, and I'm anxious to get started. We always seem to be able to find a good conversation topic.
Lena is a very sweet, motherly type, but also very bright. She is kind and laid back ( not to mention, a very good cook) This morning, she packed my lunch for me ( because she had ' extra time' ) and when I got home, she settled me into the tv room, and brought me home made pebbernødder, juice, and crackers to make it more ' hyggelig' for me. I feel so spoiled. By the way, for those of you who don't know what pebbernødder is, theyre traditional danish christmas treats, like little sugar and cinammon cookies. They taste a bit like teddy grahams haha, but I've grown to love them.
Anna loves Greenday, and Twilight ( like most girls these days) She's a good student, and has a good sense of humor. I think she wants to be an exchange student as well.
Emil reminds me a lot of my brother, Sam, who is very close to his age. I was accepted by him as soon as he found out I liked Star Wars and Lord of the Rings. Not to mention my father being in the special forces, you should have seen his eyes pop. He likes to hang out in my room, see what I'm up to, and play the parachute game on my Ipod. And on weekends, you can be sure to hear the 'scratch scratch' of him searching through his lego box at 7 o'clock in the morning.
They also have a puppy, named Smut. ( To smut, or smutte, in danish means to leave quickly. Like if you have to be somewhere, maybe you're in a hurry, you can say ' Jeg smutte nu') Which fits him well, because he's a 6 month ball of energy. Always willing to play. Last night, he nudged open the door of my room while I was reading, took one of my flip flops, and ran back down the stairs. I had to chase him around for at least a few minutes trying to get it back. He's a quick little buggar.

Another plus is that, since Løjt ( where I live now) is only ten minutes from where I go to school in Aabenraa, I get to sleep in an hour and a half longer than usual (6:30), and I only have to take one bus! It's a very nice change.

Things are going very well for me. Granted, of course it's still hard being away from home during the holidays, and I still miss certain people like crazy, but I'm in a much better mood more often. It's not that my last host family was bad or anything, they were very nice. But they were older, more introverted, and I tended to be ignored a lot. Spent a lot of time alone in my room because there was nothing else to do besides watch TV. Not to mention, with my seemingly constant lack of sleep, I was almost always tired, which dampened my spirits a bit too.

Next time, I will take a moment to jot down some Danish christmas traditions. They celebrate a bit differently than we do =)

Take care everyone


-Sydney

P.S. The way my name would be pronounced in Danish is " SOOHL-nee" The family teases me by calling me that sometimes. =)

Apologies for not writing for so long. I've had a really rough month for reasons that have little to nothing to do with my exchange.
Anywho, things with my exchange have been going well, I can't complain. Picking up on the danish ( slowly it seems) since I am in fact learning two different types of Danish. I hear proper Danish at school, and at home they speak a dialect called Sønderjysk. ( I think thats how its spelled) So its a bit hard for me, but I shall prevail, as always. My understanding is probably up to about.. ohh... 30-40 percent if I concentrate. It's sounding less like gibberish every day, which is definitely a plus.
It is also in fact, getting colder by the day. Apparently I dropped in just in time for the coldest autumn Denmark has had in nearly twenty years. That's me, just sharing a bit of the sunshine state with Scandinavia. The Autumn colors are beautiful though, I really really need to get better about taking pictures... my camera is more often than not out of battery.
I should be switching families some time this month. Although there was an unfortunate incident with my second host family that involved an old refridgerator and their house suffering severe fire damage. I'll find out soon whether I'll be going to them, or if we have to turn my third host family into my second. I suppose we'll see.

I promise to make an effort to write more frequently.

Ill just leave with a couple random things I've noticed about the Danes ( in case anyones interested)

1- They LOVE black licorice. You know how in the states its kinda hard to find on the off chance there was actually anyone looking for it ? Yeah, not here. You cant go into any store that sells some sort of snacks without finding it. 'Lakrids' they call it. Lakrids candies, Lakrids lollipops, I've even seen Lakrids ice cream syrup. Yum.

2- As far as fashion goes, leggings, skinny jeans, and scarves are all the rage. Perhaps thats just all over Europe, I'm not sure. Oh, they also have this strange trend where the girls thought it would be cool to have a dentist put a diamond in their right kanine tooth. I bet the look on my face was priceless the first time I saw it. " Wait a sec... did I just see a diamond in your tooth...?"

3- I'm pretty sure this one goes for all or most of Scandinavia. During a conversation, in addition to an occasional nod, or an 'mhmm', people like to take a sharp breath. Like a gasp. This confused the heck out of me for a while. I'd be telling my host father about something completely normal, and he'd gasp, with a straight look on his face. Uhh... I'm sorry, did I say something that surprised you...? Somehow they even manage to say ' yeah' while gasping. I dont know how in the world that becomes natural. I still cant do it if I try. Still catches me off guard. =)


Well there you go, Vi ses!

-Sydney

Had a great weekend with my third host family. My host sister Anna showed me around the nearby farm. It's kind of like a farm hotel haha. Quaint, cozy lil farm life experience for tourists. Kinda cool, climbing wall and horse rides for kids. Got to pet a goat, haha. Fed some chickens, rode horses with Anna. That was fun. =]

We went up to Ribe for the day, I got to watch the end of a Danish wedding. It was really cute, the bride and groom riding away in a black horse drawn carriage with the Danish flag waving overhead. I got pictures and stuff, which I have yet to upload. I'm pretty talented at procrastinating.

Had danish chinese food, that was interesting. Seeing blonde-haired, blue-eyed, danish-speaking girls in kimonos was pretty hysterical. Hard not to laugh at them, haha. I thought I ate quite a bit, but my host family ate nearly twice as much as I did, and I still could barely move. Surprised I was even able to walk out of there without help lol.

Went out to a field to watch a ' local phenomenon', something about half a trillion birds all gathering together at once. It was pretty cool, though I'm not sure it was worth standing out in the wind for an hour.

Det var en god weekend =]

Introcamp

Hey guys,

Just got back from Intro Camp up in Bjerringbro. Unfortunately, I came back kinda sick, so I won't be at school for a day or two while my body kicks these germs' asses.

Learned a bit of Danish, the basics at least. So, from now on dearest Klasse 1e, ye shall help me speak it whenever possible, and ye shall speak to me only in Danish unless absolutely necessary.

Tak =]

Made a couple new friends up there, Carol from New York and Jacklyn from Colorado. We hope to see each other at least once a month. Though the train is expensive, perhaps I can get a pass for it like I did with the bus? I'll have to look into that. Found a new favorite breakfast food- swiss cheese and strawberry jam on soft white bread. Delicious. Mom- I'm making you guys try it when I get home. Be prepared. We went to an interesting art museum in Arhus, the third floor still kinda freaks me out when I think about it O.o Weird stuff. Can't believe it passes as art.

By the way, Dad, if you're reading this, I need to talk to you about something, so email me if you could and we'll try to set up a webcam session on Skype.

Finally got pictures of Stevninghus up, as well as Intro camp, the links to those pictures are here- Enjoy =]

Stevninghus-

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=104607&id=587188838

My introcamp pictures

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=104616&id=587188838&saved

Introcamp

This is on carols profile, so I dunno if everyone will be able to access it- http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=34073&id=1379520046

Stevninghus!

Before I start, let me just give a shout out to my buddies from Klasse 1e, I know you guys read this probably more than my family and friends do back home. So if I write about you in here, don't take it personally, or let it inflate your ego too much. =P

Since Denmark appears to be much cooler than the states, we went on a camping trip with our class. The campgrounds were called Stevninghus ( hence the title ) which was about 15 km away, give or take. We rode our bikes. Which wouldn't have been so bad except for the hills. It was actually rather nice at first, I had my Ipod in, there was a slight breeze, beautiful Danish morning riding by the harbor. But Aabenraa is basically a valley, so we had to go up up up up and out. Gosh, everytime we'd get over a hill, it'd flatten out a little bit, and I'd pray- please God, no more hills! He just kinda laughed and told me he couldn't change the amount of hills in my course.

Touche God, touche. But a little extra strength would be much appreciated. At least half the way was uphill. Not to mention we were going against the wind. And keep in mind, I hadn't been on a bike much in over two years. And all these kids were just passing me by like it was nothing, and I thought- Wtf?! Then I remembered they'd been biking since probably before they could walk.

Danish bikes are kind of odd too. Bigger for the most part, and the seat is far too high for my taste, forces me to bend over farther than I'd like ( that's what she said, haha)

Anywho, it was a pretty interesting 28 hours. Got there, set up tents, all that good stuff. Played some strange ' team building' activities to get us closer as a class. Something about an obstacle course with a log between our legs O.o Walking across a field on a big wooden structure shaped like an A. Left, right, left right. hahaha, the best was ' jousting'. Reminds me of " A Knights tale" They get on a bike and try to get the stick through the tiny metal ring. Pretty amusing to watch.

I took some pictures, ( with my new camera, bahaha) unfortunately I forgot to bring it with me during the activities. But still. I'm not used to being the center of attention. Those darn Danes ask so many questions =P ( just kidding, I don't mind I just dont always know how to answer them) Had a pretty good time though. I think they have a hard time accepting the fact that I won't drink or smoke, but they'll get over it =]

P.S. Remember that you can comment on these posts, it doesn't have to be only a one way communication. If you have some thoughts, please, let me know.

Back to School

So, I've come to realize, that I've been at the bottom of the school food chains for quite some time now. By being at the bottom, I mean in the youngest grade of the school. Traces all the way back to sixth grade. Sixth grade was the beginning of middle school in Hawaii, 7th grade was the start of Jr High in Utah. I did online school for 8th grade so that doesn't count. 9th grade was the start of highschool in Florida, Tenth was the start of HS in Utah, and 11th is the start of gymnasium in Denmark! Which turns out, is more of a college than a highschool.

When students here reach 9th or 10th grade ( can't remember which ) They graduate highschool, and they can choose to either- stop school and find a job, go to a specified college based on their interests, or they can go to a gymnasium which is basically a college for people who don't know what they want to do with their lives yet, or who want a more rounded education. Which is what I am currently attending. Aabenraa Statsskole.

I knew there was too much freedom for it to be highschool. I have free periods sometimes between classes, there's no dress code, teachers can let you out of class early if they feel like it.

Also, it's not like American schools where you change teachers, classrooms, and peers multiple times a day. You ( for the most part) keep the same classmates, and you just switch teachers. It's a really good thing if you like the people in your class. You get more connected, etc. But it's not a very good way to meet a bunch of new people.

On wednesday, all the first years go on a camping trip with their classmates. So we'll see how that goes. I've made a few friends so far. People seem to be pretty nice to me, although I get laughed at a bit. The poor little lost American wandering around the hallways. Yep, that's me.

Honestly, I'm more concerned about the bus systems than I am the schooling. I have to wake up at five, take two buses and spend an hour and a half getting to a place that's only 15 minutes away by car. Then I have to walk 10 minutes after getting off the bus, because heaven forbid it drop me off anywhere near the school hahah.

That's okay, more to come later, I'm sure I've made this post longer than it needs to be already. Farvell =]

Klostermærken

Good news! Mom is sending me a new camera, but my host father its letting me borrow his for now.

Today I went to a Danish Carnival, called Klostermærken. It's very traditional, takes place once A year. We walked around, looking at all the different game stalls, and etc. Lots of colors, voices, very interesting items, haha. Almost like a carnival/flea market. We rode the ferris wheel, got an amazing view of the city and the carnival

We toured the old church nearby, it was very beautiful. Simple but beautiful. The grounds were, a cemetary per se. But their graves are much more decorated, organized, very pretty. They almost blend in with the gardens. Its very peaceful, I wish I could've just layed down in the grass and trees in front of the building. The old danish houses are very... quaint.

Helmuth bought me the biggest sausage I've ever eaten in my life!But ,it was yummy. As well as some VERY strong black licorice. That one I suppose I could get used to if I had to.

We also had the pleasure of meeting what must be the biggest dog in existence. I swear that thing must have polar bear blood in it!

See pictures of what I'm talking about here! ---> http://www.facebook.com/album.php?

I have arrived ( after a very long day and a half of traveling) safely in Denmark!

One of my bags got stuck in Copenhagen, and I can't seem to find my camera, but I'm sure both of them will turn up. =/

It's beautiful here. Flying over the landscape, there were a lot more open spaces than America, not quite so densely populated as a whole. Quite a few windmills, even some out in the ocean.

My family is very nice and helpful to me, they all speak english to some degree.

I have 3 host siblings, Peter is 23 and doesn't live at home, but he stops by to visit.

Torben is 21, he sleeps in the room next to me.

Nina is 16 like me and her room is just down the hall.

My windows open out to a beautiful view of the Jorgensens floral gardens, not to mention a quaint little church if I turn my head to the left.

My room is awesome too =]

As soon as I find my camera up pictures of all these things I'm describing.

Culture Camp

This was from a while ago, at the culture boot camp we went to. This is myself and a few other students also going to Denmark standing with the Danish flag.

Yay Danish Pride!!

t minus five days until departure

Hello People,

I have created this blog in attempt to keep those who wish to be updated, updated on my upcoming foreign exchange to Denmark! Instead of emailing you all individually, journal entries on my progress and experiences, as well as loads of pictures will be posted here.

Wish me luck!