Hej hej from AMERICA. Can you believe it? Four months of cultural immersion, biking, Netto trips, and blogging have come and gone, forcing me to bid one last 'farvel' to the Happiest Place on Earth (NOTE: I am aware that this title is typically reserved for Disneyland in Anaheim, CA, but seeing as Denmark was named by Forbes as the Happiest Country in the World, I feel this title can and should be shared).

 

Disneyland

Copenhagen

Before signing off permanently, I would appreciate the opportunity to fill you in on the interesting events that were my last three weeks(ish) in Europe. As you may remember, my parents came to the Copes at the end of November and the three of us traveled to Stockholm, Sweden and Helsinki, Finland, both of which, as far as weather is concerned, made Copenhagen look like Miami Beach. It was a lovely time, though, and my mom and I both got some lovely faux fur ear muffs out of the adventure, which was exciting to say the least. Save for the fact that mine look not unlike a dead cat perching on my head [See "Cat Muffs" image below.] After my parents and I returned to the Copes, it was time to celebrate Thanksgiving. As a means of making us feel as much at home as possible, our SRA organized a "Fakesgiving" feast for Ravnsborggade which included but was not limited to grilled chicken (which is almost like turkey but different), sweet potatoes, cranberries, caramelized carrots, apple pie, green beans, bread, etc. etc. I contributed the cranberries and carrots and therefore links to recipes for both of these traditional Thanksgiving accutraments are provided below. The event was quite hygge, especially because some of our international roommates were in attendance, this being their very first Thanksgiving celebration. 

Cat Muffs

 

 

 

 

Cranberry Orange Sauce
Brown Sugar Glazed Carrots

The following day, it was time for me to head off to Krakow, Poland for my Auschwitz: From Genocide to Memorial study tour. I was admittedly nervous about visiting Auschwitz, as I was not sure what sort of emotional response to anticipate. I had been to the Holocaust museums in both D.C. and Jerusalem in the past, but I had a feeling this trip was going to be unique in its academic approach to a subject I had always understood as a religious and emotional one. However, I was so far from being disappointed in the nature of my Poland trip, as our teacher, Torben, is one of the most intelligent and eloquent men I have ever met. He took us to Schindler's old factory (which inspired Liza and I to watch Schindler's list on the floor of the fire exit room upon my return to CPH), the old and new synagogues of Krakow, and of course, Auschwitz I and Birkenau. Visiting Birkenau was incredibly surreal and so immensely moving. Imagine the sets of every Holocaust movie you have ever seen - the train tracks, the barbed wire, the barracks - and that is exactly how Birkenau looks. But this surprising similarity to a Hollywood set is not what made this place so unbelievable but rather the shocking beauty and calm that characterized the camp. I have only included a few pictures in this post out of respect to the memories of camp prisoners and their families. 

 

After my return from Poland, I came to the realization that my trip was definitely on the downhill slope - the final leg, the last hurrah, and so on and so forth - and therefore decided to spend my remaining days frolicking about the city with my friends on a plethora of adventures that included the following [Photos included]: 

1. Watching movies in the common room 

2. Dancing with Santa

3. Icebar V2.0

4. All you can eat sushi bar

5. Going to my visiting sister's gymnastics recital 

6. Christmas formal

7. My bike key breaking off in the lock (Fortunately, the resourceful man at the front desk of the gym just so happened to have brought a pair of pliers with him to work that day, which was quite fortuitous to say the least)

8. Falling off my bike in front of Irma (The excitement induced by an organic grocery store was too much to bare)

9. Visiting the Christiania Christmas market 

10. Attending the Nutcracker at the Royal Theater with my visiting family

11. Turning in my bike deep in the heart of Norrebro (and then missing my bus stop on the way home)

12. Cheering at a Danish soccer game (and then missing two buses and being refused cab service in the 30 degree night air) 

13. Saying a sad goodbye to the Copes and all my new friends. 

 

 

 

 

 

I am sure there are things I have forgotten, as this last month was quite the whirlwind. However, should I recall an event that is significant and blog-worthy, I will be certain to add it in as an addendum to this post. 

Well, I suppose the time has now come for me to sign off one last time. I thank you all for your patronage and support over the last four months and hope our paths will cross once more somewhere else in the blogosphere. I appreciate you tuning in to read about the many adventures that where my wonderful study abroad experience and I sincerely hope you enjoyed reading about them as much as I enjoyed sharing them with all of you. 


Upon my return home, I have come to see the following: I have realized that I am a completely different person now than I was four months ago and that I have made wonderful friends with whom I was fortunate enough to grow and change. I realized that I am scared ... scared that I will never be able to fully articulate what my experience meant to me in a way that does it justice and I am scared that I will never again have the opportunity to be the person I was whilst on this great adventure. And I have realized the importance of being open to frightening journeys and unknown experiences ... to 'strange' new places and 'strange' new people ... new people who have proven to be the best of friends. 


And after reflecting on all of this newfound insight, I have decided that were I given the chance to talk to the girl I was four months ago, I would tell her this: Living in Copenhagen will teach you that it is never to late to grow and change and that questioning the way you are most certainly does not mean sacrificing who you are. Embrace every day – take the long way on your bike, stop and stand by the lakes for a minute on your way home from school – because these next four months will be the best days of your life. 
 

Thank you, readers, thank you, Copenhagen, and as always ... Farvel! 

Ord af semesteret (word of the semester): "eventyr" = "adventure" (As in, "I spent the last four months in Copenhagen and it was a big, fun, scary, exciting, and hysterical 'eventyr.')

As promised, I will pick up where I last left off, which was in an apartment alone in Paris, moping over my lost goods. I would once more like to apologize for such a downer of a post and even more so for neglecting to follow up on a lighter note soon thereafter. So here I am with some exciting details of the many ways in which my two week vaca drastically improved from what was undoubtedly a low point in my life.

That night, Alex arrived in Paris with two of her friends from Florence and one of their friends from Barcelona. I was so happy to be reunited with Al that words cannot adequately explain it (NOTE: It was actually a miracle that Al and I were reunited at all, seeing as she realized after getting on a train to the Pisa airport that she had left her passport in her apartment, an incident that gave us the sneaking suspicion that our trip may have in fact been jinxed). After a very good night’s rest on our futon bed, Al and I headed to meet our rather eclectic land lady, Genevieve, at the Louvre café (which was not unlike an overpriced version of the food court at North Star Mall) for a quick bite to eat. At last, it was time for Al and I, two art history enthusiasts, to make our way into the Louvre itself. After a failed attempt at following a Rick Steves audio tour on Al’s iPhone, we decided to take matters into our own hands, eventually making our way to the Venus, Nike of Samothrace and of course, the Mona Lisa where we were fortunate enough to snap some great photos with a minimum number of our fellow tourists in the background. After leaving the Louvre, we decided to continue on our artistic voyage and head to the Musee d’Orsay, only to find out that it closed 5 minutes prior to our arrival. Dead set on not allowing this get us down, we forged forward and onward to the Eiffel Tower, making it just in time to see it light up as it does every hour on the hour during the evenings. Determined to look as American and touristy as possible, we took approximately 478 pics in front of the tower, both individual and couple shots, before heading back to our lovely little Parisian walk up to get dressed for dinner. And that about sums up our evening.

The next day, we planned to go to the Picasso museum near our apartment after grabbing coffee at a quaint little Parisian coffee shop called “Starbucks” (NOTE: French Starbucks do not, shockingly, serve oatmeal. They do, however, offer pre-made crepes as an exciting alternative). Therefore you can imaging our disappointment when we discovered that the Picasso museum will not be open to the public for another year. We then decided we should try Musee d’Orsday once more. Seeing as we actually made it into the museum the second time, we considered the event a success. After seeing some Cezanne. Van Gogh, etc. etc. and feeling as though our cultural capital was adequately expanded, we grabbed a bite to eat and made our way to Notre Dame with Kara and Amanda where we climbed the steps with great determination and vigor after being temporarily locked in the gift shop. After this, I made my way to a Parisian pharmacy where I successfully purchased two bags of syringes without a prescription, an exciting accomplishment to say the least. I then headed to a photo exhibit at the Bibliothèque nationale de France, highlighting authors who have been published by the now 100-year-old Gallimard publishing house (i.e., Simone de Beauvoir, Jean Paul Sartre, Jack Kerouac, Ernest Hemingway, etc.) before journeying home to prepare a fine French meal of brown rice, kidney beans, salsa, and guacamole. You can take the girl out of San Antonio, but you can’t take the San Antonio out of the girl, or so I’ve heard.

The following day it was time to migrate yet again. Destination: Aix en Provence, France. I will spare you the boring details of my trip to the airport, save for the part where a young lad with a disturbing number of facial piercings tried to convince me to get on the wrong train, sat next to me on the correct train, and ignited in me a panic attack so severe that I got off the train 8 stops prematurely out of a genuine fear that he was going to bomb the train. #Neurotic (NOTE: As of late, I have been unable to control my urge to use TweetSpeak in everyday life, so forgive me should I unnecessarily use hashtags as a means of expressing complex thoughts and deep emotions). Anywho, long story short, I found Kate at the airport and we endured the mildly terrifying turbulence of our short flight to Marseilles. Once we arrived in Aix, we headed to her “auberge,” picked up Gillis, and made our way to Samos’s, a little Mediterranean restaurant owned by the charming, mildly overweight and surprisingly sexy middle-aged Turkish man, Samos. After our meal, Samos invited us into his cellar for tea, which was only mildly strange and only temporarily frightening. Sadly, Samos spoke not a word of English and I not a word of French, but Kate and Gillis explained to me that Samos said I spoke with my eyes, an extremely romantic observation. The evening grew even more romantic when Samos refused to allow me to pay for my meal, leading me to believe that he misinterpreted the severe exhaustion in my eyes as some sort of mating call. But his generosity was flattering nonetheless.

The next day,  I went to class with the gals, where once again, my inability to speak even a word of French proved to be a bit of a complicating factor. That evening, we made a rather delicious batch of Ratatouille and quinoa. And that was that.

Aix day 3 began at the marché, which is an absolute utopia for a produce enthusiast such as myself … Granny Smith apples and dried figs coming out the wazoo. After the market, the girls went to class and feeling quite bold, I decided to go get a haircut. Seeing as language barriers seemed to be characterizing my stint in France, I should not have been surprised when the hairstylist did not know a single word of English. Despite the fact that this situation had all the makings for a horrid disaster, all turned out well and I am quite enjoying my new buzz cut. That night we went to a lovely little club, the name of which escapes me, where we danced the night away to fabulous French hits such as "Right Round" by Flo Rida. 

The next morning, I decided to go for a run, an activity in which I partake approximately once every 6-8 months. Fortunately, I survived and was able to make my way to Cezanne’s old studio, which was really cool and only a tad creepy (NOTE: two of his jackets are still hanging on the wall. I cannot help but wonder how much MSG is required for such preservation …) as well as the Musee Granet where I saw Picasso’s Woman with a balcony. That night, we went to a fondue party at Kate & Gillis’s school and engaged in some quality sisterly bonding. The next morning, I once again packed my bags and headed out like the bold and fearless traveler that I have become, thus ending the wild and crazy adventure that was my two week travel break.

Now I am back in the Copes, settled and mostly happy save for the fact that the sun is now setting by 3PM and I have most certainly developed a mild case of seasonal affective disorder as a result. Fay and Alan are in town, which was been a treat. Since their arrival, noteworthy Seeman family adventures have included seeing Explosions in the Sky at Vega, watching Fay and Alan dodge death about 76 times to date as they perpetually jaywalk in front of moving bicycles, and explaining to them the small but important difference between 2 and 3 zone klippekorts. We are now at the airport, about the board our flight to Stockholm where we will be staying for a day before heading to Helsinki, where the weather is predicted to be a pleasant 28 degrees. We are preparing to board so I sadly must bid you a ….

Farvel!

Ord af dagen: "sultende" = "starving" (As in, "Seeing fresh produce markets in Aix en Provence made me realize that I am in fact 'sultende' to death in the Copes" ... no offense to Netto.)

Good morning, everyone! I am so excited to be back, seeing as I have many a fascinating stories to share about my adventures the past two weeks. As you know, I have spent the last two weeks traveling about Europe, familiarizing myself with the cultures of Dublin, Edinburgh, Paris, and Aix en Provence, all lovely locales with their own unique charms. 

I am sorry for not writing since my somewhat negative post from Paris after the unfortunate "two gypsy girls stole my wallet in the metro station" story. But fortunately, things could really only go up from there. 


Now, seeing as I have so many things to share with all of you, I am going to be locking myself in a quiet place for 4-5 hours at some point this week to get my tales down on paper (i.e., computer screen). So I am sorry for the delay, but I beg of your patience and ask you to please tune in again in a few days. I assure my next post will rival the Justin Bieber baby mama story in both shock value and cultural appeal (NOTE: I rather devastated by said baby mama story and would like to refrain, if possible, from every speaking of it again). 


Tak!


Ord af Dagen: "billet" = "ticket" (As in, "My wallet was stolen in Paris, I failed at using the new debit card my parents sent me, and was therefore forced to ride the Metro home from the airport last night without a 'billet,' ... a rebellious move, indeed")

Long story short (NOTE: this will actually not be a short story in all likelihood, seeing as I have quite a lot of feelings at the moment) I am a bit of a miserable human. In fact, my current state of depression is so severe that I am very seriously entertaining the idea of standing on the balcony of my Parisian apartment (yes I'm in Paris) and belting some tunes off of Korn's greatest hits album as a sign of my angst.

So I'm on my two week travel break. I went to Dublin. It rained a lot and I learned that it is quite a common occurence for people to burst into song on buses at any given moment, which made me very much wish I had listened to my parents when they told me I would regret quitting my Irish folksinging lessons in 7th grade. I saw a William Butler Yates exhibit. I saw an Alice Neel exhibit. I love Alice Neel because I did a project on her in 9th grade and found her to be quite a fascinating creature. My dad hates Alice Neel because for said project, I had to create a Neel-esque portrait, chose my dad as the subject, and somehow, created a final product that made him look bald ... Quite odd. Hannah and I went shopping on Grafton Street. I bought a new sim card because my phone recenty ran away from home and the sim card I purchased in Copenhagen turned out to be less than perfect. Hannah and I went to the Guiness Storehouse where for about 3.5 minutes, I was convinced that I actually like beer. We went to Kilmainham Goal, an old prison that made appearances in several movies I have never seen. We ate at the Brazen Head, the oldest pub I'm Dublin. I woke up at 3 am today to catch a flight to Paris (NOTE: I had an amazing time with Hannah but today's events will explain my seemingly bitter attitude toward my present travel excursion).

I arrived in Paris at 9:07 this morning and successfully made my way onto the hour and a half bus ride from

the rather odd Bouvais airport to a metro station in the city center metro station, which is where the fun began. Two seemingly kind young girls helped me carry my suitcase up the metro station stairs. Moments later, I noticed my purse was open and my wallet was gone. This means I was alone in a Parisian metro station with no cash, credit card, drivers license, health insurance card, Danish CPR card, DIS student ID, Danish public transportation pass, and most importantly, my frequent users Baresso card, which, to make lemonade from lemons, only actually  had two stamps on it. Fortunately, a random man in the station helped me dig through trash cans looking for my wallet and file a "report" to a "security guard," who I suspect was just a man in a blue cotton shirt standing near the security counter. The landlord for the apartment Alex and I are renting was very lovely and once I was able to find her, took very good care of me, seeing as Alex isn't to arrive until later this evening so I was basically destitute. And I had yet to put in my contacts or brush my hair at this point, so she also probably took pity on me for my less than stellar physical appearance. She took me to the market and I made a rather interesting lunch before going on an adventure around Paris. There was a bit of a downpour outside, but I still managed to make it to Notre Dame and the Bastille (NOTE: I am not actually certain whether or not I saw the Bastille, as I have zero clue what it looks like and the signs were ambiguous to say the least). Then I got lost. So I took a cab, using a large portion of the euros my kind landlady loaned me. Then I made dinner. As it turns out, Parisians haven't heard about non stick pans. So that was that. Then I sat down to blog. Then I wrote said blog. Then my iPad deleted said blog, thus being yet another reason for my current state of bitterness.

But I realize being such a downer while in Paris is ... Well ... Wrong. So in an effort to end this day asap and start a new, more positive one, I am going to go to bed now. Well, I am going to listen to some Korn and then go to bed (NOTE: If you must know, I am actually listening to Simon and Garfunkel's "Bridge over Troubled Water" on repeat... in large part because I am disgruntled by the fact that we are forbidden from flushing the toilet between 11pm and 7am due to the noise complaints received by neighbors ...  Troubled water indeed).

May the force be with you all.

Ord af dagen: Vole = stolen (As in, "My wallet was 'vole' today because my gigantic suitcase and North Face backpack scream, 'Rob me. I'm American.'")

Contrary to popular belief, I was not abducted by a group of angry Vikings nor did I join a traveling ABBA tribute band. Rather, I have been out and about, "taking Denmark," if you will, which is why I have neglected my blogging duties as of late. Hopefully this post will make up for my absence. I am going to begin by discussing my recent adventure to Stockholm, Sweden before moving onto my lovely visit from two fellow sisters of Chi Omega, and will wrap up with a few fun facts about my day as well as details of my pending travel break. So here we go. 


Last weekend, Amanda, Dan, Daniel (dorm friends), two of their friends (Court and Michael), Brooke, Sarah, and Mary from CMM, and Sophie (Brooke's roommie who happens to go to Trinity ... i.e., every time I see her I get the incredible urge to scream out, "Remember the Alamo!!!," "Viva Fiesta!", so on and so forth). Amanda, Michael and I were the first to arrive in Stockholm and therefore decided to explore the city a bit before heading to the lovely Hotel Satra. As it turns out, Satra was a bit different than we had imagined. I had a feeling things were going to get interesting when we discovered that the hotel occupied only one floor of a building and was situated on top of a hospital of some sort on the same premises as the Satra train station. And I had a feeling thins were going to get interesting when the reception desk was closed upon our arrival (i.e., no one was there to give us our key). And I knew for certain that something was not quite right when another hotel resident got our key for us from a clearly very high security "lock box." In hindsight, I realize I probably did not show due thankfulness to our fellow hotel-dweller for taking the time to find us our key, seeing as the day of our arrival, he was actually busy moving into Hotel Satra permanently at the recommendation of his social worker.


Needless to say, we were somewhat eager to venture beyond the just-missed-clean beige walls of Satra, so Sara, Mary, Sophie, Brooke, and I went to the Photography Museum where we had a lovely dinner and attended  the opening of an exhibit by "portrait" artist Nick Brandt. I put "portrait" in quotations because that is a self-proclaimed title in response to his audience's tendency to label him as a landscape artist. Brandt takes incredible photographs of African jungle animals that seem to have been shot from an impossibly close proximity. Brandt says that what makes him a portrait artist is the fact that he captures his subjects' spirits the same way he would were he photographing humans. A portion of his artist statement can be read below: 


"Aside from using certain absurdly impractical techniques, I do one thing that I believe makes a big difference : I get very, very close to the animals. I don’t use telephoto lenses, as I want to see as much of the sky and landscape as possible – to see the animals within the context of their environment. That way, the photos become about the atmosphere of the place as well as the animals."

After dinner, we went to the Ice Bar, which was rather interesting and only caused me mild physical discomfort. It will, however, be good preparation should I ever decide to move to Antarctica. After this, we stumbled upon a rather swanky looking Swedish club and somehow managed to weasel our way in (NOTE: by "somehow," I mean we stupidly paid over 200 Swedish Kroner to be allowed entrance). However, it was quite an experience and we danced the night away with a plethora of ridiculously well-dressed young Swedes. It was a somewhat surreal experience, made all the more interesting by a pair of silver sequin stilettos, a lot of black leather, and what appeared to be a back piercing. But to each his (her) own. 


After a lovely night out, we needed a good night's sleep in order to be ready for more adventures. The next day, the same group of girls and I went to the old town for breakfast before going to the Nobel Museum, the Royal Palace, and some other historically significant sites. The Nobel Museum was my favorite and solidified my hope to one day be granted the Nobel Peace Prize in either Economics or Science. In the afternoon, Michael met us for a canal tour, which was a terrible idea seeing as said tours only run March - September. So we spent the rest of the day meandering about, going to the Vasa Museum where we saw a really old ship that had been excavated after 300 years under the sea (fascinating, I know)  and ultimately met up with the rest of the group at the Modern Museum where there was a special exhibit on Monet, Turner, and Twombly, a quite interesting combination in my opinion. Despite the fact that I am (at least for the time being) an Art History minor (NOTE: if I hope to earn my college diploma in less than 12 years, I will have to reconsider said minor...) I had never heard of Twombly but I really enjoyed his work. Here is a sample ...

That evening, we went to dinner before the boys and I attempted unsuccessfully to get into the one and only casino in the city of Stockholm. But that is another story entirely. Sunday, we went to the Globe (a location uncannily similar to the London Eye) before heading back to Old Town for a bit and ultimately making our way to the airport where I enjoyed a lovely pre-packaged Greek meal. 

On Monday, Kate and Gillis came to visit from Aix en Provence by way of Istanbul, Turkey. It was lovely to have them!!!! I was volunteering at Mellemrummet Cafe (the cafe below our building that is part of Actionaid Denmark, i.e., the nonprofit behind our building) for a few hours on Tuesday and Wednesday, but Tuesday evening we were treated to a lovely homemade meal by some Vandy boys before Kate and Gillis were able to indulge in the remarkable experience that is Kulor Bar. Wednesday evening, we had dinner and did a bit of shopping and spent a significant amount of time sampling dried fruit at the market. 

Nothing incredibly significant happened at school today so despite the fact that I said that I would share with you the details of my day, it seems that I do not really have anything to share. My bike basket was stolen approximately 2.5 days ago, but that does not really have a whole lot to do with anything and is actually quite irrelevant to the rest of this post. Therefore, I will not discuss the matter any further. 

An exciting weekend is looming, though, that includes but is not limited to the following: Halloween, Sensation White, and TRAVEL BREAK. I leave Monday for Dublin, then will be heading to Paris, Aix en Provence, and finally Edinburgh. Then Fay and Alan will arrive in the Cope on the following Monday. So, all in all, I have quite a bit to look forward to and I hope that you will enjoy the details of my upcoming endeavors. 

Farvel!


Ord af dagen: tåge = fog (As in, "There was so much tåge this morning that I thought I had somehow descended into Hell.")