A Lay-Low Week

You can imagine how exhausted I was after returning from Norway on Sunday night. That led to me sleeping for twelve hours on Sunday night, which kickstarted a semi-lazy week for me. I started my new class, Cross-Cultural Psychology, on Monday, which is alright. But the most exciting part was that Sarah is now in Copenhagen and in class with me! Our reuniting hug was adorable, if I may say so myself. The week followed in similar fashion:

Tuesday: sleep in, go to class, make dinner, do homework, watch a movie, book hostels for Vienna and Florence (eek so excited!), go to bed.

Wednesday: class, lunch and walking around with Sarah, homework, movie, bed.

Thursday: wake up early, field trip to the Museum of Denmark for class, then lecture, and then here's where my week finally picks up! I made plans to go to Roskilde and meet with my Visiting Danish Family. So I hopped on the train, got to Roskilde at 5pm, and my visiting mom picked me up at the train station. We walked to their house, which is quaint and adorable. They have a Danish flag flying out front (of course) and a great backyard with tons of flowers and plants growing, a greenhouse, three pet rabbits in cages, three chickens in a cage, and a great patio area. So cool. I had met the parents, Kirsten and Jens, last time, along with their oldest son Søren (basically pronounced "Srn" because Danes mush all their sounds together). But this time, I met their other two children, whose names sounded like "Hillig" and "Sina" but I have no clue how they'd be spelled. Hillig is their 20-year-old son and Sina is their 16-year-old daughter, and they were both delightful and very smart. We had dinner all together outside, and it was incredible. Kirsten made some sort of smørrebro on rye bread with mushrooms, bacon, and a meat that sounded like liver - I was too scared to ask, but it was delicious! There was homemade potato salad with herbs from their garden, meatballs, beets, salad with fresh mozzarella, and a yummy dessert of buttercream and mini cookies. Everything was amazing! Needless to say, I was stuffed.
After dinner, we chatted for a while about lots of topics, and here's a few things I learned:
1. Denmark basically has a Hunger Games reaping for boys for the army! One day a year, every boy of a certain age in Denmark draws a number, and if they draw 1-4,000 or so, they have to go into the army. How antiquated!
2. Europe has their own version of American Idol called Eurovision, where every country has one performer/group compete, the countries vote for each other, and there's a winner each year. And this year Denmark won!
3. A competition riding horse costs the same amount as a nice car. AKA $20,000. Sina rides, so she gave me the low-down.

4. Danish GPAs are very, very complicated.

5. Everyone in Denmark loves Rihanna. Period.

Post-dinner, we drove down to the Roskilde harbor, where there's a Viking ship museum, a great view across the water, and on Thursday nights, a car show. Yep, every Thursday, people from all over Denmark who have cool cars and motorcycles drive them to the Roskilde harbor and park them for everyone to see. I'd guess there were over 500 cars and motorcycles there, and let me tell you, those were some reaaaaally nice cars! Afterwards, they showed me downtown Roskilde and the Roskilde cathedral, where Christian IV and lots of past kings and queens are buried. There was a free organ concert when we were there, so we got to listen to some of that, too.

Sadly, it was time to go, so I said my farewells and took the train home. It was the definition of a lovely evening, though, and I'm so happy to have had the opportunity to meet them!

When I got home, my floor decided to go sit out at New Harbor since it was still so nice out, so we walked around and chilled outside until bedtime. It was one of the best days I've had in Copenhagen!

Roskilde harbor

Nyhavn at night

Today: I woke up, went to my class (9:00, so early), grabbed lunch, and now I'm packing for Dublin! That's right, I'm headed to Dublin tonight for the weekend, and I couldn't be more excited. Then, on Monday, I leave for Berlin for the week with my class on our Study Tour. So much traveling, I can't wait!