Tuesday, February 23, 2010

Berlin: Poor But Sexy



This weekend some of the coolest Keops girls and I hopped on a plane and headed to Berlin, an absolutely amazing city! After running around the airport in an attempt to determine where our plane actually was (all the way in the other direction of course) we finally landed in Berlin very late Friday night. Then we had to figure out Berlin's public transportation system and get to our hostel. Challenge number 2 was successful, with only a slight run in with an incredibly drunk man on the train. But our super cool hostel was right outside the train station and as soon as we got in we pretty much went to bed. It was incredibly late and we knew we had a big day of sightseeing ahead of us. I was elected chief navigator of our group, and the next morning, which was stunningly beautiful and warm, we headed into town to start our Fat Tire Bike Tour! I think it is safe to say I might be a Fat Tire Bike Tour groupie now, after having done their tours in 3 out of 4 cities they offer them. And I highly recommend doing them if you come across one! The are amazing!! Navigating the icy streets of Berlin was a little treacherous, but totally worth it as we made our way from Checkpoint Charlie, to the Berlin Wall, to Hitler's Bunker and everything in between. Bike tours are defiantly the best way to see the city. We stopped in a beer garden for some German sausages, and finished our tour in the late afternoon.



After our bike tour we went to an authentic German restaurant where I throughly enjoyed my traditional pork dish with some amazing sauerkraut. I absolutely enjoyed embracing my German heritage through food! Then we headed back to the hostel for a quick shower, only to return back into town for a little night life :)

The next day we woke up super early and headed back to the building that houses Parliament so we could go up into the dome (also the building pictured with the bike tour). The dome was reconstructed after the war, and is all glass with a double helix path way up to the top and back down. You can see the whole city from the top of the dome and it was once again an amazing day! Then we went to the East Side Gallery. This is an area of the wall that was left intact and artists come and paint on it every ten years. Some of the art that was shown was incredibly powerful, while other things were a little abstract.



As the trip started to wind down, we did some souvenir shopping, got McDonalds, which is way better in Germany just in case you were wondering, and also got a HUGE thing of ice cream. I was unaware of the size of the thing I was ordering until I got it, but it was fantastic. Even though I hardly made a dent in it.

So, overall verdict: Berlin is amazing. It is definitely shows that the city is millions of dollars in debt, considering that we utilized their public transportation system for free almost the whole time we were there, but it was totally worth the trip. The unofficial model of Berlin is Poor but Sexy and after last weekend I completely understand why!

Tuesday, February 16, 2010

My Super Awesome Visiting Family!!!

Since I live do not live in a host family, DIS offers students the opportunity to have a "visiting family" in order to get more involved with Danish culture. I finally got in touch with mine and was able to visit on Sunday. They were amazing! Karen and Ebbe, and they live in a town about 20 minutes outside of the center city called Herlev. I met them a the train station and they took me a tour around their town and we eventually made it to their local library. There we looked at a small art exhibit by local artists and there was also an exhibit on their town. It depicted the town about 80 years ago and how the town looks now. So much has changed! Learning all about how the farms got turned into cities was very cool, and also happened very quickly. This exhibit made me want to learn more about the history of my town. I also saw the tallest building in Denmark: The Herlev Hospital. I hate to say it does not compare with New York City. After that we continued to walk to their house where we had lunch consisting of traditional Danish foods. Finally!!! I had my first smørrebrød and several more after that! I had the herring, and the curried herring and it was all delicious. They also had me try some Snaps and we chatted about everything from traveling to American politics. After lunch we enjoyed some pastries and tea and some good conversation. They were just as curious to know about me and where I came from as I was about them.

After our pastries we continued to talk, I learned about their former DIS students, I met their cats and birds and also learned about their family. Around 7:30, their oldest daughter arrived with her husband. We then had some delicious steak and potatoes!! And finally we had ice cream for dessert! It was a fantastic day. I ended up back at Keops at around 11, full and exhausted.

Monday was an equally tiring day. I had class all day and then I met with my Hans Christian Anderson teacher because I am a class representative. This entails being a liaison between everyone in the class and the teacher, informing the teacher of things that people like, dislike, or need more information on. I really like this system and wish we did something similar in the United States. It allows for anonymity when informing the teacher of issues and also allowing the class to progress, just in case it needs some improvement. We went to a small cafe and had tea and Hans Christian Anderson cake. Fortunately this class has been good so far and we just had nice conversation.

Today was an easy day, my paper that was due next Monday got moved to next Thursday which is awesome considering I will be in Berlin this weekend most definitely not working on that. I also have no field studies tomorrow for once, so I will probably sleep in and then head to the library to work on some other papers and study for my exam Friday. I am so excited for this weekend it is unreal!

Saturday, February 13, 2010

One Looooong Week!

The week began with a small accident. Unfortunately, Kelli got hit by a bike, causing her to hit her head and bleed quite a lot. We found out the hard way that the Danish medical system is much different then ours, resulting in a different style of treatment. Rather unsatisfactory in my opinion and Kelli's as well, but Kelli is fine and 5 days later shows almost no injury at all!

Then Wednesday I had 2 field studies. The first one was incredible! With my Biology of Marine Mammals class we went to the zoological museum, which also doubles as a research center for the University of Copenhagen. They house over 10 million samples of animals, which is in the top 5 biggest collection of samples in the world. We began in the basement where we got to see the whale bones. The were enormous!!! I was fascinated, I probably could have stayed down there for hours. The whale heads were crazy big, we saw baleen whales and sperm whales and everything in between.



After that we went upstairs to another room that housed more marine mammals, the rest of the mammals as well as reptiles. There were shelves and shelves of bones as far as you could see. I saw an orca's scull as well as a hippo and many other incredibly interesting specimens. Once again, I could have spent hours in this room. It was probably the worlds biggest puzzle seeing as most everything was kept in pieces for easy storage instead of assembled.



After visiting all the bones, and also taking a quick peek at the exhibition area, which reminded me of the Natural History Museum, I had to run to my next field study for my Cross Cultural Encounters class (literally run...). This field study was slightly less exciting for me, but I did find it interesting. Essentially we got to hear from representatives from integration groups in Copenhagen. I was surprised to find that they have a lot of programs in the works to attempt to get immigrants integrated.

As if my day wasnt long enough as it was, I then went to the Global Climate Change Seminar. One of the things I look forward to every other week. This week our speaker discussed oceans and how they are important in mitigating in climate change. I learned an incredible amount and thought she was an amazing speaker. I am looking forward to the next seminar for sure. Finally, I came home and needed to write my first paper for my Hans Christian Andersen class. Which went well I hope! I had an amazing day Wednesday, but I am very excited to have this next Wednesday off.

Thursday was a long day as well. I had class all day and then had my very first wine tasting class. It was very cool, I had no idea you could learn so much about wine in 1 hour. I am beginning to get very intrigued in the art of drinking wine and look forward to my next class. Unfortunately I had to leave class early to attend a debate for my Cross Cultural Encounters class, which was crazzzzy. We had 2 people representing opposite political parties on immigration issues and the room got quite heated. I had no idea that you could have so many opinions about integration/immigration. I had never really seriously debated the details of people entering your country. I am certainly glad our teacher provided us with this rare glimpse into the world of Danish politics.

Then came Friday. Finally! I was so glad the week was over, and I was supposed to go see my visiting family for the first time. However, due to poor planning I somehow missed them at the train station :( Not to worry I have plans to see them tomorrow!

Saturday I slept in and got a chance to see Valentines Day which was soooo good. I kinda teared up a little towards the end, I felt very dumb, but I think anyone with a military family will understand where I am coming from, but I don't want to give away too much of the movie. Thats all for now. This week promises to be much slower and I can't wait to see my visiting family!!!

Sunday, February 7, 2010

Study Tour Update!

I got back from our Short Study Tour last night and am happy to report that all is well :) My study tour stopped in Odense, but was mostly in Århus, which is in Western Denmark. I had to wake up bright and early Thursday morning to catch the bus but managed to fall asleep on the bus. Since my core class is focusing on integration of immigrants that is what our short tour also focused on. Our first stop was in Odense where we met with representatives from the Ethnic Job Team, we spoke with 4 people who immigrated to Denmark and now help new immigrants find jobs in the area. Our next stop was a museum in Odense called the Brandts Museum, where we got a tour of the exhibit called I-Lands. This was a collection of art from different artists who had depicted an island in their work at some point. All of the pieces represented were made previous to the exhibit, not for the exhibit, which was really cool since they all seemed to work cohesively while maintaining some individuality. My favorite part of the exhibit was this piece made from moving boxes about a community on the island of St. Kilda. This exhibit made an incredibly strong statement about community vs. the individual. After this we had a delicious lunch at a resturant called the Ugly Duckling where we had a buffet of traditional Danish lunch. Our final visit of the day was a lecture by a well known researcher of Danish integration. The subject of the lecture was "Is Denmark really a racist/Islamophobic/xenophobic society?" While the lecturer had quite a few interesting things to say, he also said quite a few controversial things during his lecture, which lead to a lot of good discussion. After we arrived at our hotel the rest of the evening was on our own. We grabbed a small dinner at an italian restaurant and then joined the rest of our class at a small microbrewery where our teachers treated us to a round. It wasn't too long after that when I fell into bed out of exhaustion. Little did I know the next day would be just as jam packed as the first.

The next morning we woke up early again to go visit a school called Søndervangskolen. At this school, 85% of the students are of ethnicities other then Danish and while we were there we got to speak to a teacher as well as some students. Their English was amazing, and makes me feel terrible that I know only one language. Most of these children in the 9th grade now know 4. I also liked their teaching style here. They get one teacher in beginning in kindergarten and they have that same teacher all through to 9th grade. I think that is a really cool way of doing things, and I think I would be much more interested in teaching if that was the way the education system in the United States works. After visiting the school we went to a Turkish Bazaar where we got to eat lunch. I was not as much of a fan of this place. It was interesting but we spent a lot of time there when there was not that much to really see. I did buy some baked goods, that I didn't really like, and some candy that I did. The food was also very good, which is good considering in 3 weeks I will be headed to Turkey! Our final stop of the day was the worst ghetto in all of Denmark! Which looked like a normal apartment complex in the United States... Whoever said socialism is a bad idea should see Denmark. Here we had a lecture about their plans to rejuvenate the area and hopefully provide everyone that lives there with a job. After meeting with the housing association we met with a group called Youth 4 Youth. Essentially these people work with the kids in the area and provide them with entertainment to help keep them off the street. I really admired the work that they did, and wished I could volunteer for something like that. We had a group dinner at another delicious buffet and once again went to the same microbrewery to hang out. Once again I was so tired I went to bed not long after.

The final day, our only stop was at another modern art museum, where we got a tour. I really don't like modern art at all, however this museum was very interesting. It was mostly art to laugh at which was cool, instead of modern art that I can never figure out. We had one final meal together, another buffet! I think I gained like 5 pounds on this trip. Then we finally jumped on the bus to head back to Copenhagen.

Despite the long hours on the bus, and the lack of sleep I did have a good time on this trip. I am glad I got to know more people in my class and it was interesting to see so many different perspectives on immigration. I wish we would have been able to do a few more cultural things. Even though I went to the second largest city in Denmark, I don't feel like I saw anything but lecture halls. I am really glad to be back though. As soon as we pulled into Copenhagen I felt home. I had totally missed my Keops girls and we spent the better part of the rest of the night catching up with each other swapping stories from all of our study tours.

Today I got the chance to sleep in and then go see the Little Mermaid with a few of my friends, catch up on some grocery shopping and some homework. I also went to this fantastic bakery to top off my weekend full of food! I hope I will be able to see a little bit of the superbowl tonight, but I have a quiz tomorrow in one of my classes.

Unfortunately, I did not take very many pictures this weekend. Class rooms are not very exciting to look at. This week promises to be a busy week for sure, and I can't wait to go to Berlin!!!!!

Wednesday, February 3, 2010

Settled :)

I am happy to report, that not only have I settled into Copenhagen quite nicely, but I was able to sleep in today!!! I had pretty much forgotten what that has felt like. The past few days have involved nothing exciting, except snow and tons of it. Bus and other transportation delays all over the place. Thankfully none of which affected me! I am preparing to go on my short study tour to western Denmark to see Odense (again) and Århus (the second largest city in Denmark). Only this time from an immigrants perspective. I am not sure exactly what this trip entails but I am sure it will be exciting. I also heard from my visiting family today, who I hope to be able to see when I get back from my short study tour. Thats all for now I think. Julie and I are going to head into the city for a little while, at least until the sun sets or the weather gets bad, which ever one comes first.