TODAY was the kind of day that reminds me full-force why exchange is so amazing, and why I'm here. Getting to spend time with amazing people, see amazing places, and have wonderful experiences make all the kinda-rough patches, occasional missing, and uncomfortable situations worth it(none of which are all that common, by the way).
These are the kind of days I write about, so that way I can remind myself how lucky I am to be here.
Hope everyone is doing well,
jeg skal skriver mere snart.
(much love!)
-Rowen
Saturday, October 26, 2013
Saturday, October 19, 2013
Denmark in the autumn months
So, much to my dismay, time has indeed been passing. WAY faster than I would like it to, but what can you expect on exchange to a country you love? It is no longer summer, and definitely no longer August like I have been telling myself it is, and contrary to what I tell everyone: it's getting a little cold. Denmark is known for the gray-skies, windy, sitting-inside-with-a-cup-of-tea, hygge-encouraging sort of weather, and that is definitely what I have been experiencing as of late.
My life has gained a sort of nice, comfortable routine at this point. I don't feel like I'm going to faint of excitement every time I go into a store anymore, and now when I go to school it's school-- not a magical land of tall blonde fashionable young-adults and vending machines filled with magic beans. Walking around my city still gets me though, and I don't see that fading any time soon(hello people, cathedral, remember?). I've heard the next few months are the hardest part of exchange for a few reasons: 1. You are no longer a kind of novelty to your classmates and friends...you're just a person. 2. The 'honeymoon' stage of exchange is over- not EVERYTHING is new anymore, and not EVERYTHING is super amazingly fantastically wonderful. 3.This is when language starts to get frustrating, continues to be difficult, and is limiting in terms of what you can express(This is also a time where many host families stop speaking english to their exchange students, mine included.) 4. You realize you miss some things from your home country; friends, family, food-- whatever.
HOWEVER, all that being said, I am still having an amazing time, and calling this anything but lovely would be an under-exaggeration. I admit I can feel the pressure of language starting to kick in, and I know I need to remind myself that the only thing that will get me where I want to be with danish is persistence and hard work. But liverpastej with rødbeder is STILL heaven, and being around my friends and classmates is something I value a lot.
School for my classmates has started getting difficult, and the week before holiday they had to submit a massive, 1/3 of their final grade-worth paper, and knowing this is one of the toughest years of schooling-- I can see it continuing to be as stressful. This means a bit less flexible time for hanging out and relaxing, a bit less patience(probably) and people being a bit more worried.
The equivalent for me is, of course, danish. And danish lessons. I have an interview in a few weeks with my commune to see about some more danish lessons and level placement. And, as I've mentioned, I already have danish lessons(for the exchange students in my area) twice a week. The ones I have now are getting harder, and if I add in the additional lessons that will of course be more work as well. Also the art that I do for 6 hours a week(the billedkunstskolen) is really great, but pretty fast passed and some deadlines are coming up. All of this basically means that the attractive life quality of 'not busy and not obligated' is going away. Of course this is also a good thing, because it means I'll be getting shit done! Haha.
Denmark, in terms of autumn weather here, is pretty similar to back home in the states for me(wisconsin). The trees change colors(mainly to pretty golds and yellows), the wind picks up, the temperature cools down a few degrees. Also the danes have started pulling out the MASSIVE circular scarves that are so popular here, big jackets, and gloves(seems a little early for this wisconsinite, but I GUESS its cold...). The general aestehtic of my city has just changed, and it is really, really beautiful. Also christmas-type things have started coming out, and I've heard a danish christmas is not one to be missed-- so that's pretty exciting already! I've heard lots of sweet things, alcohol(like always, hah), and many varieties of pickled herring. Exciting stuff.
I think this update is rolling around to a close, but know that in general things have been kicking along, and it's really great.
ses till next time everyone!
-Rowen
My life has gained a sort of nice, comfortable routine at this point. I don't feel like I'm going to faint of excitement every time I go into a store anymore, and now when I go to school it's school-- not a magical land of tall blonde fashionable young-adults and vending machines filled with magic beans. Walking around my city still gets me though, and I don't see that fading any time soon(hello people, cathedral, remember?). I've heard the next few months are the hardest part of exchange for a few reasons: 1. You are no longer a kind of novelty to your classmates and friends...you're just a person. 2. The 'honeymoon' stage of exchange is over- not EVERYTHING is new anymore, and not EVERYTHING is super amazingly fantastically wonderful. 3.This is when language starts to get frustrating, continues to be difficult, and is limiting in terms of what you can express(This is also a time where many host families stop speaking english to their exchange students, mine included.) 4. You realize you miss some things from your home country; friends, family, food-- whatever.
HOWEVER, all that being said, I am still having an amazing time, and calling this anything but lovely would be an under-exaggeration. I admit I can feel the pressure of language starting to kick in, and I know I need to remind myself that the only thing that will get me where I want to be with danish is persistence and hard work. But liverpastej with rødbeder is STILL heaven, and being around my friends and classmates is something I value a lot.
School for my classmates has started getting difficult, and the week before holiday they had to submit a massive, 1/3 of their final grade-worth paper, and knowing this is one of the toughest years of schooling-- I can see it continuing to be as stressful. This means a bit less flexible time for hanging out and relaxing, a bit less patience(probably) and people being a bit more worried.
The equivalent for me is, of course, danish. And danish lessons. I have an interview in a few weeks with my commune to see about some more danish lessons and level placement. And, as I've mentioned, I already have danish lessons(for the exchange students in my area) twice a week. The ones I have now are getting harder, and if I add in the additional lessons that will of course be more work as well. Also the art that I do for 6 hours a week(the billedkunstskolen) is really great, but pretty fast passed and some deadlines are coming up. All of this basically means that the attractive life quality of 'not busy and not obligated' is going away. Of course this is also a good thing, because it means I'll be getting shit done! Haha.
Denmark, in terms of autumn weather here, is pretty similar to back home in the states for me(wisconsin). The trees change colors(mainly to pretty golds and yellows), the wind picks up, the temperature cools down a few degrees. Also the danes have started pulling out the MASSIVE circular scarves that are so popular here, big jackets, and gloves(seems a little early for this wisconsinite, but I GUESS its cold...). The general aestehtic of my city has just changed, and it is really, really beautiful. Also christmas-type things have started coming out, and I've heard a danish christmas is not one to be missed-- so that's pretty exciting already! I've heard lots of sweet things, alcohol(like always, hah), and many varieties of pickled herring. Exciting stuff.
I think this update is rolling around to a close, but know that in general things have been kicking along, and it's really great.
ses till next time everyone!
-Rowen
October holiday!
Hej alles! Hvordan har du det?
Today I want to talk about 'efterårsferie', or the week-long holiday in october that most danes have. Students get off from school, many adults get off from work. It's pretty common to go on vacation or trips during this time, and, fortunately for me-- my host family went to Berlin! Now, I know that talking about Germany isn't *exactly* about my life in Denmark, but knowing about other cultures, experiencing other ways of life, and being open about lifestyle is a very danish thing-- so this is still relevant, never fear!
I was in Berlin for about 5 days, and I had an AMAZING time! I don't personally have too much experience with big cities(I've been to Chicago, Budapest, Minneapolis....but never for long, and not too frequently), so the whole 'always alive' thing still gets me pretty excited. Many different aesthetics, different ways of living, different food, different stuff, different places....ah! I think the 'muchness' of it all is kind of overwhelming... and really good to experience.
Berlin has a reputation for being an top-dog art city(especially within Europe), and the amount and quality of the art that I saw while there definitely lived up to that.
I could write for hours about the art that I saw and the impressions that I gained, but this isn't really the place for that-- so I'll just try to summarize what we did.
First night: (as a note: Berlin is beautiful at night.) We arrived, and found our way to the apartment we stayed in over the week. After putting our stuff down, we decided to explore the part of the city a bit, and eventually made our way to the mauer(wall)'s east side gallery. The gallery is parts of the wall that are still left, and on one side there are photo projects; the other, striking graffiti/murals. (put picture here)
Then we just roamed around some more, enjoying just being in the place. But, seeing as we are people-- hunger came into play eventually, and after attempting(and failing) to find some really 'tysk'(german) cuisine, we settled for italian.
Next four days:
For one of the days, we biked through berlin-- and I think this might've been my favorite day, just because cycling is a very person and hands-on way to explore a place. Not too much to report from this day, but we did see the DDR museum(REALLY good!) and a lot of the more tourist-y must-sees.
Some other highlights from the trip:
-checkpoint charlie museum
-nues museum
-Hamburger Bahnhof gallerie
-berlinische gallerie
Basically I had a really great time seeing the city, and it was my first time in deutschland, so that was pretty exciting too! My mom was actually an exchange student in Germany when she was in highschool, so getting to see some of the places she was like, 25 years ago was really cool.
Okay, I'll write soon about more danish-ish adventures, but for now, vi ses!
-Rowen
Today I want to talk about 'efterårsferie', or the week-long holiday in october that most danes have. Students get off from school, many adults get off from work. It's pretty common to go on vacation or trips during this time, and, fortunately for me-- my host family went to Berlin! Now, I know that talking about Germany isn't *exactly* about my life in Denmark, but knowing about other cultures, experiencing other ways of life, and being open about lifestyle is a very danish thing-- so this is still relevant, never fear!
I was in Berlin for about 5 days, and I had an AMAZING time! I don't personally have too much experience with big cities(I've been to Chicago, Budapest, Minneapolis....but never for long, and not too frequently), so the whole 'always alive' thing still gets me pretty excited. Many different aesthetics, different ways of living, different food, different stuff, different places....ah! I think the 'muchness' of it all is kind of overwhelming... and really good to experience.
Berlin has a reputation for being an top-dog art city(especially within Europe), and the amount and quality of the art that I saw while there definitely lived up to that.
I could write for hours about the art that I saw and the impressions that I gained, but this isn't really the place for that-- so I'll just try to summarize what we did.
First night: (as a note: Berlin is beautiful at night.) We arrived, and found our way to the apartment we stayed in over the week. After putting our stuff down, we decided to explore the part of the city a bit, and eventually made our way to the mauer(wall)'s east side gallery. The gallery is parts of the wall that are still left, and on one side there are photo projects; the other, striking graffiti/murals. (put picture here)
Then we just roamed around some more, enjoying just being in the place. But, seeing as we are people-- hunger came into play eventually, and after attempting(and failing) to find some really 'tysk'(german) cuisine, we settled for italian.
Next four days:
For one of the days, we biked through berlin-- and I think this might've been my favorite day, just because cycling is a very person and hands-on way to explore a place. Not too much to report from this day, but we did see the DDR museum(REALLY good!) and a lot of the more tourist-y must-sees.
Some other highlights from the trip:
-checkpoint charlie museum
-nues museum
-Hamburger Bahnhof gallerie
-berlinische gallerie
Basically I had a really great time seeing the city, and it was my first time in deutschland, so that was pretty exciting too! My mom was actually an exchange student in Germany when she was in highschool, so getting to see some of the places she was like, 25 years ago was really cool.
Okay, I'll write soon about more danish-ish adventures, but for now, vi ses!
-Rowen
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