Still alive...and in Scotland!

Right now I am on a bus headed to the Edinburgh airport.  I'll fly to London, sleep a few hours in a hotel and head back to Copenhagen in the morning.  I have had the most wonderful time with my cousin Hannah in Dundee.  I can't believe it is over so soon. We had so much fun doing with Seyb cousins do best: eating, watching movies, giggling, dancing and exploring all sorts of places.  I miss her already, but I get to see her again in a few weeks when we meet up in Barcelona on our spring breaks!
So...here is some stuff I wrote a few days ago on my trip to Scotland.  Sorry if it is a little jambled, I'm trying to get all caught up on the last few crazy weeks.

"Firstly, profuse apologies for not writing for so long.  It definitely doesn’t mean I didn’t have anything to write about…just the opposite actually.  These last two weeks have been packed full; some of it has been fun, some of it not so much.  Right now I am sitting in the airport waiting for my flight to London, where I will then fly to Glasgow, Scotland and board a train that will take me to Dundee, where my awesome cousin Hannah is studying.  I am so pumped.  We have all sorts of fun things planned and after this past week of school work, I’m not even going to think about the projects I still have to do.  It will be so nice to have a little bit of Iowa love over here in Europe.  I figured this whole day of traveling would be the perfect time to write some very long blog posts.  Prepare.

I hardly know where to actually begin.  I have not yet talked about the hyggeligt evening when I transformed from American Rachel into European Rachel…by that I mean I got my bangs cut. No, I guess that does not necessarily make me European…I just like to think it looks that way :)  Two days before I left for Milan, my host family had their hairdresser come over to the house for a whole afternoon/evening of cutting hair.  I don’t know how they do it, but the Danes can make just about anything hygge (an equivalent American term might be ‘cozy‘, but that doesn‘t  do hygge justice).  I have been contemplating bangs for awhile so I finally decided it was now or never-- and even if they looked stupid, hair grows so it’s not like I’d be doomed to bad hair days for a year or anything.  While I was getting them cut, Karina tooks a few pictures and said “Rachel, I think this has to go in your blog”  I completely agreed.  After the hairdresser cut my hair, Karina’s hair, Jesper’s hair, Rebecca’s hair, the neighbor’s hair, Jesper’s brother and brother-in-law’s hair  (it was a lot of people!)…we all sat down to a delicious dinner together.  How awesome is that?  I’m not sure if this is common in Denmark or just because my family knows their hairdresser so well, but nonetheless it was a pretty cool thing to experience.

Okay, I know I wrote a few posts from Milan but I think I will briefly go day-by-day just to give you an idea of what our Long Study Tour was really like.  One of the reasons I chose DIS was for this long study tour.  Each core class goes to a different place for 5-6 days and has academic, cultural and social events.  It is an absolutely awesome way to see a new place and experience in a context no “tourist” really can.
Here goes
Sunday, March 6th:  Left airport early in the morning and took a quick, 2 hour flight to Milan.  From there we took a one hour bus ride through the pretty Italian countryside/’suburbs’.  We went out to lunch together and then took a walking tour around the city.  It was the most gorgeous day, especially compared to the standard from Copenhagen.  It was so nice to get to know the city since we stayed there for 5 days.  The evening was free so Lauren, Katie and I wandered around, found a cute pizza place and enjoyed an Italian meal.  Memorable quote from that night:  “You conquered that pizza the way Napoleon conquered Milano.”  (in reference to the history lesson we got during the walking tour around the old castle)

Monday, March 7th:
This was our big day of academic visits.  We first went to a lecture by Antonella Della Fave, a leading researching in Positive Psychology at the University of Milan.  She discussed everything from the cross-culture issues surrounding positive psych research to her personal research on optimal experience and ‘flow‘.  Flow is the state when you are doing something you love and you lose all track of time.  Usually hours fly by when you think it has just been a few minutes.  During flow, you can so absorbed you maybe forget to eat and you will not notice any fatigue you feel until you finish the activity.  Flow is an important part of well-being and that was a fun discussion to have because we all started thinking about what we are doing when we experience flow.  A way to utilize her work is by encouraging people to do things that will help them achieve flow more often.  It can have a very significant impact on a person’s overall feeling of satisfaction with life.  The cross-cultural part of Antonella’s lecture was interesting as well because of some methodological differences that have created a discussion/debate with our class ever since the short study tour.  American psychology focuses strongly on empirical studies, ones that have variable that can be measured.  These variables can be analyzed for correlation or possibly for causation if one of the variables are manipulated while the others are held constant.  This is the method we are taught and we read in the respected psychological journals.  European psychology, however, focuses much more on qualitative methods, which is when you make observations about behaviors and analyze those to create theories.   (Gotta go catch my plane!)

(Momentary pause:  Right now I am sitting in the Queen Street Train Station in Glasgow, Scotland.  I caught the bug from the airport quicker than I thought I would but then I missed the earlier train by 2 minutes.  The next one doesn’t come for about an hour.  But that was the one I told Hannah I would take so I might as well just do a little people-watching and blog writing while I am waiting.  It is funny how different from Copenhagen Scotland looks and feels.  The downtown area of Glasgow has a much different façade look than Copenhagen and the train station, while fundamentally the same, is also very different.  ALSO they drive on the left side here and the entire bus ride to the train station I just couldn’t get over it.  It is so funny to see cars that look so similar to home, Denmark, everywhere else I have been…but then see inside and the driver is on the left! Hannah made sure to warn me to look carefully before crossing the street so I didn’t get run over by someone coming the opposite direction than I’m used to.  That would’ve been a not fun way to start out this little trip.)
Anyway…back to Milan.
Monday afternoon was another academic visit at a place called Ayurvedic Point.  Ayurveda is a type of alternative healing that comes from eastern cultures (mainly Indian) and includes many therapies.  The doctor who spoke with us and showed us around was previously a neurologist in America.  He did research on the neuronal and molecular level and he said after a while he just didn’t feel like it had any meaning anymore, so he started this ayurveda practice.  The purpose of our visit there was to find the connections between positive psychology and ayurveda, which isn’t too hard since they are both alternative ways to increase well-being and enhance life satisfaction.  It was an interesting visit and although I would not trust all of my health issues to be dealt with through ayurveda, I certainly see it’s worth in some cases.
Monday night….hmmm, what was Monday night?  I’ll get back to you when I check out the schedule from that trip because right now I can’t remember.  The days are kind of blending together a lot in my mind so I’ll have to sort it out later.

Tuesday:
Our academic visit this day was with a graduate student named Nicoletta at another University in Milan.  She presented her work on gender differences in well-being.  None of the information was earth-shattering, but it was especially interesting to see what methods she used and how she went about collecting her results.

That afternoon was our group wine tasting.  We had free time before we were supposed to meet so we went to the Duomo cathedral and climbed to the top. It was absolutely breathtaking.  I will have to post lots of pictures.  What a massive building.  It took 450 years to build.     After wandering around for awhile due to very-not-good google map directions, we eventually found “That’s Wine”, the site of our tasting.  It was a little crowded with all 30some of us in there but we had a jolly old time.  We got to try 3 different kinds of wine, a spumanti (sparkling, white wine), another white wine, and a red wine.  The spumanti was definitely my favorite.  We were also served bread, cheese and meat and told all about the wine-making process works.  It was, dare I say it, very hyggeligt and I really got to know a few more people much better because we had quite a lot of time to just sit and chat and enjoy.  After the wine tasting we headed to dinner.  It took us a bit long to find it, and if I recall correctly, we were all exceptionally….happy, after those three glasses of wine.  Group dinner afterwards was delicious Italian food (we had plenty of that!) and then I think we had some time for exploring.  That may have been the night Katie, Lauren and I stumbled upon the most expensive street in Milan.  Full of Pradas, Dulci Gabanas and Tiffany stores.  Pretty sure the cheapest thing on that street would've cost me the rest of my college tuition.  So now worries, we only window shopped.  Just some funny pictures I enjoyed.

Wednesday:
Our first visit on Wednesday was to see the Last Supper, that highly iconic painting by Leonardo di Vinci.  I did not know much about this painting except that we see it everywhere and it is a main focus in the di Vinci code book and movie.  A few facts:  The Last Supper is painted onto a wall in what is now basically a museum for the painting.  With this painting, Di Vinci tried a new “dry” technique.  I don’t remember the details of the technique itself, except that it makes the painting incredibly fragile.  Throughout history, however, that building was used as a stable, a barn, a fire station…and at one point during a war, the building was bombed, destroying a lot, save the room with di Vinci’s mural.  Later on, the building was used by monks and they decided to increase the size of the doorway, cutting off Jesus’s feet.  After all the years and uses that building has been through, we are lucky there is still some of the painting left.  It is deteriorating at an alarming rate now and therefore they are taking many steps to preserve it.  Only 15-20 people can enter the room at a time and each group can only stay for 15 minutes.  To see the painting, you have to book about 6 months in advance, then when you get there you have to first go through glass doors and wait in a smaller room until the previous group is finished.  Also, the outer doors to the waiting room must be sealed before the doors will open to the room with the painting.  It’s a very interesting process.  The room it is housed in is rather large and there are some chairs so you can either stand or sit while you observed.  You can also go closer and read some information about the different characters in the painting.  I had no idea how much detail was in the faces and limb positions of the disciples.  Because di Vinci was representing such an emotion moment (right after Jesus said, “One of you will betray me.”), you can see the responses in everything that is going on.  15 minutes was not enough time to be in awe of that work of art.  The Last Supper will not be around forever, much less than that actually, due to how quickly it is deteriorating.  I will forever be thankful that I was one of the lucky people to personally experience that piece of history.
Of course no pictures or videos can be taken inside the room, but here are the windows that are on the wall to the left of the painting!

I'll be back with the rest of the week later!

Speedy fast update

It is simply too late right now to tell of all the tales of Milan, but I promise I will soon!  Fate has it that this is my busiest week yet, with two papers due Friday, one group project Monday, a midterm next week and then another group presentation due the week after...so I am working a lot! Thankfully (sort of) the weather is icky so I am not as tempted to just go sit outside and enjoy the sun.  There is no sun and sitting outside would result in some rather wet jeans.  Therefore I am determined to stay in, work work work and soon I will reap the benefits!  (such as when I go to visit my cousin Hannah in just a little over a week!!!)

Right now I can tell you the Milan trip was fabulous.  At the end of it, I was sad to leave Milan but happy to be back to Copenhagen and my host family.  (I missed them a lot and I was surprised to find that I missed danish food a lot too! And not just the pastries. I was sure happy to wake up to a wonderful "danish" breakfast on Saturday. That lovely and simple Saturday morning breakfast of toast and toppings, yogurt, sometimes cereal, and tea is something I want to take back home with me--the idea, not the actual breakfast foods obviously)
Anyway, I have made a video of highlights from my trip, so if you want to check that out here it is!

I had a lot of fun making it, but 5 minutes simply can't capture all the good memories I have taken away from those 6 days.
Stories to come. For now, I better get sleep so I can wake up for my 8 am class!

One more day in Milano

In just a few minutes we are headed out to dinner and a jazz show for our last evening in Milan.  It has been a really wonderful trip.  For my class (positive psych, the one I am on this trip for) we have been asked to write at least one blog about the trip.  I will definitely be writing more on my own blog as soon as I get home, but for now here is what I wrote for my class blog:

Based on the amount of notes and the number of pictures I have taken, I feel as though this blog could be incredibly long. But…tomorrow is our trip to Lake Como and I certainly don’t want to be sleepy while I’m trying to spot George Clooney! (and learning the fascinating history of the city and lake, of course).  So instead I’ve decided I will just reveal the highlights of my trip so far; the cultural and academic things that have struck me the most.  Cultural first, then I will get down to serious academic business.

Cultural things I have learned in Milano:

1.       Gelato is good. Any time of the day.

2.        Gelato can cure almost all ailments. 

3.       People in the streets will not tie rainbow colored bracelets around your wrist just because they are nice. They definitely will want five euro and they may even be a little too forceful about getting it. 

4.       Other “kind” strangers may put seeds in your hand and when the raise your hand in the air and whistle, pigeons will flock.  It will be terrifying. But also kind of cool.

5.       If strangers do the aforementioned act, they will probably ask for ten euros.  Only give them one or two. 

6.       Lying on green grass, in the sun, surrounded by statues and buildings that have seen the span of hundreds of years full of war and history, is simply amazing.  It can also a great place to take a brief power nap right after a large plateful of pasta.

7.       Cotton candy, though called by a different name, is made the same way and tastes about the same as in the U.S.   I believe the Italian word for that is delicioza (though that may be wrong). 

8.       The phrase no comprende is pretty multi-lingual.  An older Italian woman can say it and I will know exactly what she means even though she, (as she told me in Italian) “doesn’t speak English.”  I even learned that we can bond over clothes in Zara regardless of the language barrier.

9.       And finally (for now at least), I have learned that American influence is everywhere.  While it is kind of nice to recognize the beat of “What’s my name?” or a similar pop song playing in a cute littler European cafe, sometimes I really just want to get away from the same old club music and the same old hamburgers and French fries.  Although I promise I have not been to a Italian McDonalds’, I can already tell they are quite a bit classier than at home.   I suppose I wouldn’t expect anything less from Milano!

And now…academic things I have learned in Milano:

1.       Blogging is an excellent way to achieve maximum savoring.  This I actually knew before this trip, because I have my own blog that has been updated on the entire Denmark adventure, but the fact that I have a real excuse to sit down and write my thoughts about the trip and the academic visits really proves that reflecting on an experience makes it much more meaningful.

2.       Favorite quote from Antonella della Fave: “Never think you have a brilliant idea and you are the first in the world to think it up.”  This is somewhat depressing for me, but even more so it is inspiring.  One of my dreams is to be a researcher and starting at this early stage in my research career, I often do think that I need to come up with the most elaborate, new, unique psychological idea or theory.  The talk from Antonella helped me see that that is simply not the way it works.  I will have ideas, I will have interesting thoughts, but I am certainly not the first to think them.  The best I can do is expand on them and contribute my part to the world of psychological research.

3.       The concept of flow is more cross cultural than I imagined and I certainly did not know actual research was being done on “optimal experience”.  I find that fascinating and am anxious to read a few more articles on this concept and how it could be incorporated into life to increase quality and meaning in the larger scheme.

4.       There is no perfect culture in the world.  I knew this before, but had never thought about it in such explicit terms.  Each culture is different and even though I come from a specific “Iowan” cultural, that does not mean Iowan is the only way to go, or even the best way to go.  The real idea is that there is no best way to go, and that is helpful when you begin doing cross-cultural research because before you can integrate and work between cultures, you have to realize that they are different, but not separate by levels of “rightness” or “wrongness” or “weirdness” or “normalness”.  Our culture seems right and normal to us, as does their culture to them.  And that simply cannot be forgotten when one culture creates measures to use in the context of another culture.

5.       I am beginning to understand the validity in qualitative research methods. I have to say, even after that debate at Aalborg University, I was still skeptical about the usefulness of these methods.  I have spent my three years of college reading, analyzing and critiquing empirical methods.  To suddenly have qualitative methods served to you on a platter is quite eye-opening.  But it is even more eye-opening to see how those methods can be used effectively and can help bring about actual changes and improvements in some type of suffering  environment.

6.       This is not entirely academic, but seeing the Last Supper today was mind-blowing.  I was not quite prepared for the scene that actual lay before me as I approached the wall.  Of course I have seen that painting in photographs and heard all about it in The Di Vinci Code, and when you are not standing in front of the actual wall it can be easy to somewhat dismiss its importance.   But when you stand there, and you see the detail of the floor and the tablecloth and the ceiling, and you see the expressions on the faces, and you see the twisted agony of the limbs…you know it is real and you suddenly feel like the train of history ran into you with full speed and jarred every bone in your body.  That painting is hundreds of years old.  That space used to be used as a barn, a barracks, a fire station.  For many years the painting was exposed to open air and not regarded as a most treasured item.  And now it is preserved as though our lives depend on it…and we got to see, up close and personal.  That for me, was a most amazing experience.  

I should wrap this up now.  So many more wonderful things have been seen by my eyes and experienced by all of my senses, but I simply can’t describe them well enough at this sleepy hour of the night.  Hej hej for now!

Dear word document: Hello from Milano!

Right now I am sitting on my comfortable hotel bed in Milan, Italy.  Unfortunately, internet is expensive here so I haven’t been online since before I left Copenhagen early Sunday morning.  I will try to get to an internet café to post this tomorrow but if not, I guess my cyber world will just have to do without me for a few more days.  I am anxious to hear from home and let people know I am fine, but this disconnect from the virtual world is actually kind of nice sometimes.   At first I just wanted to check facebook and my email but once you go without it for a day it really makes you live in the moment much more.   We departed Copenhagen airport around 8:30 and as tired as I was, I stayed awake for long enough to watch as we flew over water, islands and finally clouds.  I fell asleep shortly after we began flying over the dense mass of clouds. It was beautiful as well, but I didn’t feel like I was missing quite as much as when we were flying over Danish islands.  We arrived in Milano around 10:30 am but I awoke about 20 minutes before landing.  I was lucky enough to be in a window seat and as soon as I woke up my eyes were met with the most amazing view of the Swiss Alps.  I could hardly believe it.  I could even see cute little villages sprinkling the mountainsides and the valleys.  I’ll try to include some pictures before too long. 

We landed safely and retrieved our luggage. And then we stepped outside.  Holy cow.  Copenhagen has had a few nice, sunny days but I was absolutely floored by how beautiful it was outside.  It was a sunny, warm, breezy day.  I seriously wanted to just bask in the sun instead of getting on the bus.  But I did get on the bus and soon we were on our way to our hotel.  I gazed at the peaceful Italian fields, buildings, and trees as we drove towards Milan.  By the time we checked into our hotel we were all tired and hungry and we had time for a little catnap before finally headed to our first Italian restaurant.  We were all happy to see the bread on the tables when we arrived.  Our wonderful meal consisted of first course: thinly sliced (possibly smoked?) meat and olives and second course: lasagna and third course: espresso.  The food was delicious and very Italian.  I don’t normally drink coffee of any kind so I declined the espresso but I did try a small bit of my friend Katie’s.  As we left the store I noticed my heart beating very fast.  Hello espresso, I guess you really do know how to wake me right up.  That was pretty interesting. 

From the restaurant we met the guide for our walking tour, a cute little Italian woman who knew more than I ever thought I’d learn about Milano in just one afternoon.  We walked all over—the castle, some fountains, the pedestrian street and the covered, but open on all ends, shopping “mall”, and the breathtaking cathedral, Duomo.  I figured an Italian cathedral would be impressive, but I had no idea just how impressive.  I think my jaw literally dropped as soon as I set eyes on it.  We learned that it took 450 years to finish.  Wow.  Napoleon was the one to finally finish it because he wanted to be king of it.  There are something like 180 spires, all with statues on the tops, and there around over 1,300 statues total in the cathedral.  I just could not believe how intricately designed every single detail was.  It was amazing.  Tourists can walk to the top, or take the lift.  We went to do that last night after exploring the inside a little and experiencing part of the Sunday night mass, but we were just a half hour too late.  We will definitely be finding another day to check that out.  I cannot wait.

Back to the beginning real quick: our first main stop was the castle.  There is an actual Michaelangelo statue there that we got to see. Very cool.  We also had about ten minutes to explore before meeting back up with the group.  I took some pictures of a cool statute and then I laid down in the grass.  I simply cannot describe in English words how amazing that felt.  The grass was actually green and the sun’s rays were warm and comfortable on my skin.  I laid there in utter bliss until a few minutes of free time remained.  Then I played some hacky-sack.  Hacky-sack is my all-time favorite leisure game but I rarely find anyone to play with.  I had to play by myself this time to but I did it and it was wonderful. 

On our walk to the fountain I learned an important lesson:  even if a person carrying pretty little bracelets looks very nice and seems to offer to put one on your wrist for free, you should probably just walk away.  What did I actually do?  I said hello and then put my wrist out when he motioned putting the bracelet on someone.  I was so happy, thinking I was going to get a great little Italian souvenir for free on my first day in Italy.  I even gave him a happy high-five after he got done tying the bracelet.  He also came over and put bracelets on my friends. Then he started asking for euro.  Oops.  I didn’t even have any euro with me.  I had not exchanged any of my kroner for euro yet.  I tried to say I don’t have any, I don’t have any but he was very insistent saying “Just 5 euro, just 5.” He even got his wallet out to explain what we needed to give him, as if we did not understand him saying 5 over and over.  Finally my friend Katie got out her wallet and gave him the money so we could walk away.  So I got this tiny thread bracelet for the equivalent of 7$.  But I think it was the lesson I learned that was more valuable because even since then I have been confronted with people selling all sorts of trinkets around the city.  I hate saying no but I simply can’t go home with flowers, bracelets, purses and silly balloons. 

So once the tour ended at the Duomo (cathedral) we were all on our own for dinner and the rest of the evening.  My friends Katie and Lauren and I stuck together and explored Milan.  Withing 10 minutes we had found an adorable little café and we had our first Gelato.

Soooooo delicious.  One scoop chocolate and one scoop strawberry cheesecake.  If I had to choose between gelato and Danish wienerbrod (pastries) I think I would just burst into tears because it would be such a hard decision.   

We then walked down a few shopping streets and were amused with the vast number of fancy stores that we would never buy anything at.  Eventually we found a cute little café and we enjoyed some pizza.  It was quite hygge. I wonder if the Italians have a word equivalent to the Danish hygge.  If they did I think it would have to include bread, pizza, pasta and gelato. 

We made it back to the hotel around 9:30 after dinner and I laid on my bed and pretending like I was going to do homework.  Except then I did no homework and I fell asleep right around 10.  It was amazing.

And that was day one J

I am actually done with Day 2 as well right now but all the walking in the new city absolutely exhausted me today, so for now I will rest my tired eyes and I will try and update on today tomorrow.  Did that make sense :S ?

Hope you all are well—and especially hoping that Terp went well over the weekend! I thought about you all so much.  Can’t wait to see the video!!

Take care, everyone!  Hej hej. 

Happiness hit her, like a train on a track.

Before even starting I just have to give a shout out to the absolutely beautiful day! The sun was shining brightly when I woke up around 8 and it was even better around 9 when I actually got out of bed.  Days like these just make me want to throw open the windows and clean...so I did!  I started my laundry (otherwise I would have very few clean clothes to take to Milan) and vacuumed and cleaned my bathroom.  After my windows had been open for about 15 minutes I realized it was a bit chillier than I had first presumed, but it was still lovely.  This has renewed my hope that spring really is on the way!

On to my thoughtful post about happiness and trains.  To get to school each day I take the form of public transportation called the S-tog. (Toget is the danish word for train).  There are many different lines of the S-tog that go out to the different "fingers" of the Copenhagen suburbs. Little lesson in urban planning:  In 1947, Copenhagen created this plan saying that as the city and suburbs grew, they would only develop along 5 fingers spreading out from the center "palm".  The spaces in between the fingers are to stay green and provide agriculture and natural recreation land.  The different lines of the S-tog travel along out the various fingers.  I happen to take the A train northeast out towards Farum and I get off at a stop called Stengården (just in case you happen to be in the Copenhagen area and want to pay me a visit :)  There is also the regional train that travels further out in different directions, one of which heads over to Sweden. That is the train I took when I visited Malmö for a day.  

Copenhagen (city in dark purple and the fingers in lighter purple)

The first few weeks when I rode the train I was like a little child staring out at a world full of candy.  The sights were delicious to my eyes. I soaked in all the housing styles and the buildings and pretended to know what the signs meant when I honestly had no clue.  However, the last week or two I have found myself dozing off into a light sleep most of the way from Stengården to Nørreport.  This is not surprising for those of you who have ever been in a car with me and know that I start snoozing as soon as we pull out of the driveway (unless I'm driving, of course).  But I certainly thought that the excitement of Denmark would overrule my desire to catch some zzz's.  Apparently staying up late and getting up at 6 overrules even the excitement of Denmark sometimes. Nonetheless, for some reason, yesterday on the train I was not tired and spent the entire trip analyzing the motion of my body in conjunction with the train.  (I realize this is a little odd, but stick with me and I promise I will have a point...and hopefully it will be a good one).

As the train is leaving the station is does start out slowly, but it picks up speed very quickly.  Your body wants to stay in the place it was so as the train moves you feel yourself lurch a tiny bit and slowly lean back.  When the speed picks up you can really notice the forces that are pressing you against the seat.  When the acceleration stops you realize your body is moving the same speed as the train so you no longer feel like you are in the Silly Silo, being squished to the seat. (Silly Silo is/was a ride at Adventureland where you spin around really fast inside a large cyclinder with a bunch of other people and you literally get stuck to the wall. The floor even drops out from underneath you. It's pretty awesome). So when you are in the middle of the trip between stops you no longer feel the forces of the speeding train. You are at one with its motion.  It feels perfectly normal to be moving that speed.  As soon as the train begins to slow, however, your body is again out of sync with the motion and you feel your body slowly lean forward.  Your body, of course, wants to continue moving the same speed but the contact between your butt (or feet) and the seat (or floor) won't let this happen.  And if the slow-down happens quickly, you have to make sure your body doesn't lean so far forward that you end up on the floor instead of in the seat (I don't think the Danes would look very highly on anyone, especially an American, obnoxiously tumbling to the floor during their serious, quiet train ride). 

What I find especially interesting is the feeling you get once it sounds like the train has stopped but you know this is not true because your body still feels like it is moving.  It is not until that little moment where you body lurches forward and then back again that you know it has actually stopped.  Sometimes this happens so inconspicuously you don't even notice it. Other times, however, it is almost unbearable to wait those 2 seconds between train "stopping" and train stopping.   This is especially unpleasant when you are focusing all your brain power on the motion of your body, as I was yesterday.  That lurching feeling is a type of resolution. And, like in a chord resolution, if you get through the entire motion (or song) but do not experience that last moment of resolving, the whole experience is sour.  I feel uneasy and frustrated when I hum a little ditty in my head but something happens and I am unable to finish the section.  My mind knows the beautiful finish is there and it just wants to reach it.  In the same way, my body feels uneasy when it is suspended indefinitely in that slight forward lean on a nearly stopped train, waiting expectantly for that final stoppage (my apologies for the made up word. None others seemed to fit).  

As I experienced this feeling over and over (there are at least 10 stops between Stengården and Nørreport) I began to make that into a metaphor for this study abroad experience.  At the beginning it was like I was pressed up against something and feeling the strong force of the acceleration.  No mater how much I prepared for the trip, I was still slightly shocked by being in another country and having to figure out how I wanted to make the most of these four months.  The first few weeks seemed full of that feeling.  I could feel everything around me speeding up while I was pressed to the seat of getting into the swing of classes and the everyday adventures of living in Copenhagen. It was like I couldn't quite keep up, mentally or physically with the speed of life.  Thankfully, somewhere along the way (I'm not sure exactly where), I began to feel like I was moving with life, not like life was pulling me along.  Classes happen every day, pastries happen nearly every day; I sleep, I eat, I learn as much as possible; I enjoy spending time with my family and my kitty and making fun plans with new found friends, and the days end up going by in wonderful blurs.  Even though each day is separate and unique, they do flow into each other and make me wonder where the last 4 weeks have gone.  This part of the journey is that middle, constant speed stage on the train. I will be in this stage for awhile (and not want it to end) but eventually I will begin to feel the impending slow down.  I will know my time is coming to an end and my body will be displeased.  It will want to keep moving forward while the ground under my feet tells me that can't happen.  I might even lose my balance once or twice and have to grab the railing before bumping into the person in front of me.  I think that this experience will not end when I leave Copenhagen on May 18th.  When I return home I will still be in that expectant stage, waiting for the lurch so I can finally settle into the fact that the ride is over.  I don't know how long that wait will be.  I think that is the interesting part of it.  I don't know when the reality of my experience will truly hit me.  Maybe after I have been home two days. Maybe not until I go back to Knox in the fall. Maybe not until much later.  But whenever it happens I think I will actually grasp all of the things that right now I am in the process of learning.  All of the factual things (psychology theories, architectural types, urban designs, ect) but also all the social and cultural things (social welfare vs. the democracy of America, the amount of responsibility given to Danish children vs that of American children, the cozy concept of hygge, and so on and so forth...the list could go on and on), will be much more real and clear to me than they are right now.  I have to experience them now to be able to analyze them later.  And hopefully at some point I will feel that relief of resolution where I can see how the whole Denmark experience fits into and shapes my future life.

I do apologize that this blog was a little "out there" and maybe more philosophical than I should be, but hopefully you found it interesting.  If you weren't able to empathize with the feelings I described, just head over to Copenhagen and take a few rides on the S-tog ;)

Oh! My title. I nearly forgot about that.  The song Dog Days are Over by Florence and the Machine starts with the line "Happiness hit her, like a train on a track."  I absolutely love that line (I love the whole song actually. If you have the chance you should definitely look it up on youtube. It's worth it. It might make you smile, although the video itself is pretty strange.)

I do think that is a good description for how happiness often works. We can go through an experience and not realize how we feel about it until suddenly something makes us sit up and notice how good we have it and how many little things there are to be happy about.  It can come as a shocking wave of realizing where you are and what is going on around you (I still sometimes say to myself 'Holy cow, I am in Denmark!') or it can creep into your mind almost unnoticed until you feel a wave of warm happiness that seems to have magically appeared out of nowhere.  

I have gotten somewhat off track (no pun intended, ha), so I think I will wrap it up before I derail (ok that one was intended).  But before I do, I have to switch gears (oh man I am too funny :P ) and say a huge thank you to my St. Luke family.  Yesterday I received a package from my church in Newton. I opened it up to find my prayer shawl, which I received from them when I graduated high school.  Situated on and in and under the shawl where tons of notes and letters from the people at church.  I could hardly believe it. I was so happy and felt so loved when I saw those.  I want to read them all right now but I'm trying to spread them out so they last a long time.  Thank you all so much- I can't quite explain how wonderful that was to receive.  I'm actually snuggled in the prayer shawl right now since it's still a little chilly from me leaving my windows open earlier today.  Tusind tak, St. Luke. I love you all :)

And on a final note, I am thrilled to be heading to Milan early tomorrow morning for a study tour with my positive psych class!  We will be going on academic tours, but also experiencing some cultural events (such as a group wine tasting and a tour of Lake Como, where George Clooney has a house!) and we will also have time to explore the city on our own.  I can't wait to tell you all about it!

Vi ses i fredag Copenhagen (see you on Friday cph).  Hej hej!

Dog days are Over: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iWOyfLBYtuU   Enjoy :)

Unjamming the story jam

Happy March!! (I realize it's the second day of March but it still deserves a nice recognition that I forgot to give it yesterday).  

This will be an attempt to finally finish writing about last week so I can then start writing about this week.  Getting behind in a blog is like a traffic jam. All the stories just get stuck behind one another but once the light turns green all the cars still have to pass through just one or two at a time so it might take awhile. I got in a bit of a story jam but I don't want to skip any of them, so here they all are!  

Back up just a tiny bit from my last entry, to Thursday morning. 

Thursday was a day of biking.  I went to my therapy appointment which is just a few train stops past where I go to class.  I rode the S-tog with my bike (well, Jesper's bike) to Enghave and got there a little early so I went riding around the city.  Silly me started riding on the main road, which was great until I wanted to turn.  I was so intimidated and wasn't quite sure what to do so I just kept riding straight muuuuuch longer than I meant to.  Then I had to hurry my butt back towards the station and head to the therapist's office.  I did get a tiny bit lost on the way but I made it with one minute to spare!  Here is where I go to therapy:

 Haha, just kidding.  In case you can't read that, it says Carlsberg, which is one of the main beer brewing companies in Denmark.  And the building where I do actually go to therapy is, I think, an old building that used to be a part of the brewery.  Most of the buildings in that area now have been turned into apartments and office spaces.  It's pretty interesting.  After therapy I saw this for the first time:

Believe me, I was as befuddled as you are. What on earth could this possibly be?!?  (wanna know the answer? keep reading)

After my appointment I rode to DIS and had danish class. Following Danish was when I had my whole hat and candy adventure :)  After the lovely time I had listening to the clarinetist and eating candy, I met up with my European Urban Design Theories class.  We went for a bike ride around town, stopping at different places to see particular aspects of architecture or city planning. It was cooooold, but it was definitely worth it because my mental image of the city became much more accurate after physically being on the roads and figuring out where things are in relation to one another.  We rode away from the city hall square where we met and our first stop was at this awesome park, with a few buildings on one end and this brick fancy-looking wall on the other end.  The story goes: The King used this area as his hunting ground. It is sort of on the edge of what used to be Copenhagen many, many years ago.  As Copenhagen grew the King did not want to move his hunting ground far away, so he kept this space green in the middle of the growing city.  When a few citizens got injured he decided to put up a wall.  Then whenever he wanted to hunt he would let all kinds of animals out onto to grassy space and just go for it.  

Parrot playground!

Hunting lodge I think

I was so tempted to play on this!

We kept riding only to stop a few blocks later in this cool housing area.  Back in the day the apartments near the street were the most expensive. This isn't a very good view but maybe you can see that they actually made little courtyards and wrapped the apartments around so everyone had a view of the courtyard and then the owners were able to make a little more money on the apartments too. 

 Then we headed down Sonder Boulevard which is a not very busy boulevard that ends up at the Carlsberg brewery (where I was approximately 4 hours earlier!) I finally found out what the befuddling hanging strings were.  "Art" that you can play on!

So much fun!

 The Carlsberg area is getting turned into a more social, community area so they have a few really fun installations to encourage more people to come into the space. We certainly did, and we had a blast!

Fun bouncy, springy things.  

Acoustic speaker that you can put your ipod or iphone in and it will increase the volume so you can jam out to music while hanging out on the cool hammocks and such.

And on the other side of the building there were cool mounds to ride over, skate over or just play on. 

So turns out the Carlsberg Brewery area is way more fun than ever expected.  Guess that's one way to get me to go back to therapy :P  Anyway, we stopped a few other places and then rode on the "green" bike paths that are off the main roads, going through residential areas and parks and such. It's a very lovely way to go to work or school.

Cool sculpture at a park in Norrebro. 

Love this :)

And then we made the cold 10 minute trek back to DIS, where we had some chocolate and coffee. Man, I love biking around this city :)

Phew that was long. Onto Friday and the massive birthday party.  I got home from classes around 1:30 and dozed until the house came alive around 3 when Andreas and his friends got home from school and started getting ready for the party. Holy cow. This is what the living room (which usually have a desk, a couch, a table and some stools) looked like:

The party started at 5:30 (before which I got to skype with my family for a while!!) and included a nachos and taco feast, lots of games about knowing the lyrics to songs, whistling songs, singing songs while listening to the music with headphones and all sorts of other fun competitions. Here are a few snapshots of the evening:

Host brother = Excellent host :)

Mother and son!

What's funny is that no one else could here the music but they had to sing the words so their team could guess the song. Sooo funny!

The boys really rocked out!

Beautiful "Vanna White"s for the games

A few weeks ago while they were planning the party Karina had asked if I would like to teach a song or two of Zumba for the kids. I was more than happy to but when it came time I had butterflies in my stomach! It was so much fun though and it turned out there was no reason to be nervous. The kids were awesome. They tried everything I asked them too and they followed me in a dance to a Zumba warm up song and then to a fun song they know called Welcome to the Club (Link to the music video is here You can double click the link and choose "open in a new browser" if you don't want to lose this page). It was mostly just really simple moves that included a lot of jumping and fist pumping :P And we had a great time! They really seemed to enjoy it and I had a blast! It's been awhile since I've been able to chorgeograph and teach Zumba so I was in happy mode :)  Afterwards some of the girls started talking to me about it and I made a few friends.  I ended up rocking out with them most of the night...which resulted in me being more tired than I have been in months at 9:30 at night. The party didn't even end until 10 but at one point I sat down on the dance floor. I was that exhausted. Haha, I guess I am too old to keep up with all the youngsters.  I also think I had too much yummy food in my stomach to be bouncing around quite so much.  

Here are some of the friends I made

And we danced...a lot :)

Fog machine! I told you this party was awesome!

Saturday was a nice, relaxing day of homework and cleaning up from the party.  I also had the chance to make my mom's famous chocolate chip cookies. I am sad to say they are all gone now :( but that means they must have been good! They were a good addition to my nighttime tea while I did homework and watched a movie.  Saturday evening after the cookie making I went to the city for Mexican and hanging out with some DIS friends.  We watched a few episodes of a ridiculous/hilarious show called Dating in the Dark.  It was a very hyggeligt evening.  

(I'm almost done, I promise. Hang in there!)

On Sunday the Larsens were invited to a brunch with one of Jesper's coworkers and his family.  They were kind enough to invite me along. We headed out a little early and went to visit some classic Copenhagen sights.  

You know a host family is amazing when they will walk along Amager beach in the freezing winds just to show you one of the places that is on your Must See list.  

Beautiful church where Jesper's brother got married :)

We stopped to get cakes to take as dessert. And these were just too cute not to photograph. 

Amager Beach

Karina and Rebekah getting a little relief from the very cold wind

If it would've been a little nicer, we would have been able to see Sweden from here

H.C. Anderson. And our feet :)

My host sister Rebekah!

Cute little village of Dragor. All the houses are yellow and absolutely adorable.

Eventually we got to the house of Jesper's coworker and we had a lovely meal with some traditional Danish food I had not yet had.  We started out with bread topped with butter, mayonnaise and shrimp. We also had cod frikadellers (meatballs), fish egg pate (I have to admit I did not try that one. Rebekah liked it though so I should have), hamburgers and a delicacy that was some type of thin meat on top of ryebread. While the females had hamburgers, the males had a delicacy (I can't remember the name of it) but it is bread, butter, raw ground beef, and some vegetables and dressing-type things on top.  That's right, raw ground beef.  My question was "How is that healthy?" but apparently it is very lean ground beef and it is quite delicious.  I definitely did not try that one although I shouldn't be one to talk about health because I offered raw cookie dough to my host brother without really thinking about the eggs in it. Oops. When it comes to cookie dough all I can think is delicious.  Perhaps salmonella-avoidance should take preference over the delicious aspect...but let's just hope I don't have to learn the hard way.  After the meal of yummy Danish food, Rebekah and I took their adorable dog on a walk at a super cute park nearby.  Rebekah and I cannot communicate very much because of the language barrier but it is so fun to be with her. I do wish I knew what she was thinking more often or I could more easily tell her how cute she looks, but we are able to depend on simple phrases and laughter to get our points across.  Here are some adorable photos of our adventure together

So many puppies at the park!

 Need I say we had a really great time?

Okay, I have literally been working on this blog for over 2 hours. I do believe we got the story jam...unjammed. To keep it that way I'm going to quickly bring you totally up to speed and then I have to sign off for the night!

Monday- Danish class then Danish architecture class that included a trip to see the IT (information technologies) University. Incredible building.

Tuesday: Psych class and developmental neuropsych class. Giant pastry. And then home again where I actually got real work done.  Later that evening I finally got to catch up with my best friend/roomie Emma from Knox.

Wednesday (today!): I did work this morning (man, I am on a roll with the getting work done!), then I went to the city to  meet up with Bridgette, one of the other Knox-ers here at DIS and we got delicious sandwiches for lunch and then explored the Botanical Gardens.  All I can say is that it was the most peaceful experience I have had in awhile and we both agreed we forgot how much that smell of soil and green things really meant to us. It smelled so good in there. And it was warm. And beautiful. And fascinating. We had a wonderful time. I took a million pictures. I will post my 3 favorites.

And finally, tonight. I made a very Clark-like dinner for the Larsens. I love being in the kitchen (even though I make a huge mess of it!) and I was so happy nothing burned or got knocked over (by me in particular) or got ruined in any other way.  Feast your eyes!

Parmesan breaded chicken breasts

Spring Celebration Orzo: a true Clark favorite!

And my super sweet host family!

Ok, are you still with me?  I cannot believe how long this is. You are a trooper if you made it through (even if you just looked at the pictures only, I am still impressed)  Thank you for being patient while I update you...now I will have room to write all about my upcoming trip to Milan! 

Tak for reading.  Until later, hej hej!