Togbus to Viking Country

I meant to write this yesterday since I got cut off earlier, but nevertheless here I am . Returning in all my glory.

I guess I’ll start off with a little mini-adventure. Well once upon time my relatively peaceful yesterday turned into all out chaos within a matter of 15 minutes.

What happened?

Well after my riveting Nordic Mythology class where we recounted how ancient Viking priestesses worshipped and used horse ding dongs (you know what I mean) to prophesize... need I say more? Didn’t think so…continuing on…

I left class to walk back to Norreport station to catch my train back home. It’s an easy 10 minute walk from DIS to the station but I was grateful to arrive out of the wind once I had reached the train. Thirsty, I reached back to grab my much beloved CamelBak water bottle to find that it wasn’t there. This may not seem like a big deal, but water bottles are a rare commodity around Copenhagen for some odd reason. So losing mine was not an option. If I did, I would be reduced to having to use some plastic, BPA contaminated water bottle over and over again. Oh the horror!  So I booked it back through the wind to DIS in hopes that my precious water bottle was not lost.  After almost tripping over these hooligans..

Real characters.

I burst through the door to see my water bottle safely under my seat. Yay!! I was so happy that I didn’t lose it and now I could…..

BAM.

Let me back track and say that DIS is basically fortress. The doors resemble and are as heavy as bank vault doors.  You have to press a button to unlock each door and then heave your way through each one. Why it is like this…who knows. Unsolved mystery.

BAM. As I was staring at my water bottle, the door literally slammed on me squishing me in between the door frame and the door. It would have been comical if the door hadn’t been as heavy as Al Roker (pre-gastric bypass, of course.) 

Grateful that nobody was there to witness that embarrassing episode, I hastily ran and got my water bottle and re-opened the door and walked through……except not really.

As I was leaving that door, the door handle caught a strap of my backpack and literally body slammed me back into the door frame. WHAT IS THIS?!  I did sign up for a WWF tournament today.

Gathering myself once again, I went back to the station to literally come upon the whole entire population of Copenhagen waiting to get on the A train to Farum. Really…..this place was deserted 10 minutes ago. 

The transportation here is either really great or really bad. You have days where you have the whole train to yourself and then you have days like yesterday where even the old woman will probably drop kick  you so she can get on first.  Danes are very lovely people but when it comes to getting on a full train/bus do not tempt to get in their way. Well this is where my alter-ego La Randolph comes in. So instead of being a southern lady and letting people get on before me, I do what everyone else does and go absolutely SPARTA on them.

“Excuse me,…excuse me….pardon…please……MOVE IT SMALL FRY.”

This is the usually what comes out of my mouth when this occurs. Only the strong survive. Or as my brother would say… “pain is weakness leaving the body.”

Touching.

Always a good time with the togbus.

Well, that was small tale for today.

Now onto another Danish adventure…

This past weekend I got to do what everyone dreams of doing……going on a Viking expedition to unlock the ancient, mystical secrets of the Viking/Nordic lifestyle. Absolutely riveting.

I could not wait to wake up at the crack of dawn for this adventure (slight sarcasm) but I am glad I did! It was AWESOME.  Even though I had gone out the night before with my Danish friends….

The Danes know how to party!

I was still fresh as a daisy!

Early in the morning, I met with my Elon friends Pat and Evan and we got these great seats on the double decker bus. Second floor, first row….best way to go on a bus tour. Our first stop for my Nordic Mythology field trip was Roskilde. Despite being know for it’s Woodstock-like music festival, Roskilde is also the home to Denmark’s Viking ships. Who knew.

We got to see some excavated ships from the fjord and then we headed off to a Stone Age burial mound.

What amazes me is that these things are plentiful as bunnies. Like…o hey…we just have a 1000 year old burial mound in our backyard. No big deal.

My friend Pat was so excited that he skipped across the field towards it, slightly looking like an idiot but I let it slide.

Then all 20 of us crammed into a burial mound by entering the symbolic “birth canal.” Such a poetic time…the Stone Age.

Earth's birth canal....I kid you not.

After learning some knick knacks about the area, we headed off again to Beowulf’s Heorot hall. I remember reading this strange story my Senior year and certainly recalled that this hall was supposed to be the greatest thing since slice bread. Well, technically since sliced bread didn’t exist at the time this saying is actually irrevelant. Moving on…

Well, we got to a pasture.

Me: Where is it?

Teacher: Right here.

*Silence…except for cows munching beside me*

Me: Okay, well unless the Vikings were smurfs, I really don’t see this great hall.

My Viking-esque teacher (seriously this guy is a Viking, he is 7ft tall) points to a raised part of the ground and raises his hands and says, “Welcome to the Heorot Hall.”

Well, that is an anti-climax if I have ever experienced one.

Luckily, we got to go to re-created Viking hall somewhere else where our teachers gave us mead and we toasted to the Nordic gods. How epic!

Overall, a very interesting day. Onto Germany this weekend for another field trip!

Until then….FARVEL!

I have discovered......coffee.

Who knew that the key to having a great morning was coffee? Well, besides the rest of the world, I was unaware of this fact. I had an epiphany this morning in the form of 7/11 coffee. 
Let me start off saying that I have never really been a fan of coffee. The taste was subpar and the feeling of scolding hot liquid searing my taste buds wouldn't be what Foldger's has coined "the best part of waking up." So, the past 20 years of my life have been dedicated to abhorring the world phenomenon of coffee. Thanks to Mother, I have found my caffeine fix through 7/11 fountain Diet Coke, but seeing that Denmark doesn't do the whole "fat ass American" way of dining, I have been without my 7/11 fountain drinks. 


What to do? Well, it so happens that Europeans are fans of coffee and there is plenty to go around. So, with some coercing from my friends (Hey Margaret) and a couple unpleasant mornings of slug-like behavior I decided to give it another try this morning. 


An hour later, I now have 5 pages of Russian notes speckled with deer drawings and a miniature portrait of Stalin. My mind was READY TO GO. Big deer, little deer, Disney deer,deer jumping over the Kremlin, a picture of a bare tree,horses, a Victorian woman, squigglies, a picture of Stalin, o and of course notes on the Russian Orthodox church. I am assuming that this deer inspiration came from the fact I had Disney's Pocahontas soundtrack going through my head. Can I paint with all the colors of the wind? Let's try! How high does the sycamore grow? I don't know, but I am going to google it as soon as I get out of class. Coffee is obviously going to be new Danish buddy here. O thank heaven, for the Danish 7/11! (O and thank you to Diane, for helping me figure out the coffee machine. That was a doozie.)

And you thought I was kidding...
Just page 1.

Well, that was random. Seeing that this is my Danish Adventure blog, I probably should blog about my experiences here rather than my strange mind excursions. Minor detour.
Back on the main road? Good. I am actually going to go in reverse and go back to last week. My lovely Communications class took a trip to ADTOMIC! Isn't that an awesome name? I feel like I should throw confetti in the air every time I say it. One more for funsies, AADDDTOMIC!!! * throws confetti* Woo, sorry, I am still on my coffee high. Settle down, Nancy. 
Adtomic is one of the top advertising agencies in Denmark and has a wide list of famous clients including Denmark's Carlsberg beer. Well, early Wednesday morning we set off on a little walking tour through the city.  To get there you have to travel through the candy forest and over the rainbow bridge and... just kidding. You actually have to walk through the red light district. Our group was in such a happy place as we walked past Tivoli and smelled the light aroma of Danish pastries in the air. What a quaint Copenhagen morning!
 Then with a snap of the finger we were walking down ISTERGADE (pronounced like eastergard.) Just the word is foreboding. Dark, dark place. I felt my little bubble pop  around me, as the neons signs flickered and the windows slowly changed from pastries to whips, and the dark eyes of seedy women and shady men preyed upon me. Okay, ugh yes.... it was like 9 in morning and I am making this a lot more dramatic than it actually was, but I am taking advantage of the fact that I was on the street of hookers and druggies! You cannot past up writing about that experience! Thus, I was able to make a harrowing escape from being "taken..." dun dun dunnnnnn. Great story right?


Luckily, we were all able to pop back into the sunny Copenhagen and make it to Adtomic. How do I explain this...Adtomic just oozes coolness. Everyone had on their edgy retro glasses as they typed on their brand new Macs while sitting in their highly modern, neon furniture. This was a place where you could pull off wearing thigh high boots and still look classy, just because you were that cool. I felt like I needed to change out of my danskos (embarrassing) and into Converses asap and get a grass shake mocha or something complicated like that. Luckily, they forgave my idiocy when it came to fashion and the CEO gave us a great presentation on how to advertise. 
This guy was funny. Real class act he was. He actually assigned us to work on their new ad campaign for Carlsberg, and told us that he will not withhold from stealing any of our ideas and passing them off as his own. Thanks? So we broke up into teams and came up with ad campaigns. Okay, I honestly thought I thought our team had the best ideas ever, I was so excited to present it because I knew everyone would get up and clap and maybe they would start crying at the brilliance of it....okay too far, but nevertheless I was excited. So when I finished telling everyone about it (beaming like a idiot) I closed my eyes and waited for the roar of applause............


waiting.......


ahem ahem....I am done now.


I open my eyes. Blank stares. Maybe they are dumfounded from the brilliance of it. I shall explain. "Ha ha...I mean....like this is Carlsberg.. and...ha..get it?" *bows head in shame and walks back to her seat* 
Someone cue that depressing Charlie Brown Christmas music...



Quick kick to the shins that was. 


However, not all hope was lost! They actually took one of our ideas and developed it into an actual ad campaign! So although my future in advertising blew up like a kamakazi plane (too soon for WW2 jokes?), our class still prevailed in making one good idea. So if you see Carlsberg phones in a bar nearest to you, you know who to thank. Not me, but one of my class members.


Ah, well time has seemed to catch up with me even though I have oodles more to tell you.
Never fear, I shall make a reappearance quite soon.

Rapper Cat

First Study Tour to Jutland: The Land of Apparent Danish Hillbillies

It's official. I have failed at learning to speak Danish. True, I could be taking a Danish language class to help but ehh I am not really in the mood. It's embarrassing that I can't pronounce the names of towns or the names of people. For instance, one girl told me her name probably 14 times and after I choked up some weird "oo" sounds to kind of make up one syllable of her name, she finally just stared and sighed then said her name was probably Katherine in English. Fair enough.
It's kind of like when you go to a nail salon and the Thai girl says her name is Patty, when in fact it is Bai-Ling. 
Most people here have English names, they just have different ways of pronouncing it. So about 65% of the time I sound like Helen Keller when I try to speak Danish.  Baby steps, we're working on it. When I say we're, I mean I.


Well, well what have I been up to. 


Wellllllll this weekend I went to Western Denmark aka Jutland! Seeing that most people think I am studying abroad in Amsterdam I should probably supply a map of Denmark.

O...that's Denmark.

Ahh, now you know where Denmark is. Yes, yes. Denmark is in fact made up of over 406 islands. I am on the island of Zealand (where Copenhagen is located). The biggest mainland is Jutland, which is connected to Europe (namely Germany). According to the Danes in my folkhojskole, they think that Jutland is made up of hillbillies. Which is not so! It is gorgeous! It's like English countryside and ahh just so lovely. 


Maybe I should back track and tell you the reason why I am in Jutland. Well, my core class is "Communications: Current Trends in News Media." With this class we get to do several "field trips" including going to London. Hey ho! Verrry nice. Well this past weekend we did a little class bonding and went to Jutland together. 


Waking up at literally the crack of dawn, I got on the train then the bus. At first, I was the awkward loner girl on the bus because I didn't really know anyone but that changed because you know me! We drove to Odense on the island of Funen, where we stopped at the Univ. of Southern Denmark. There we met up with a professor who was telling us about the Muhammed cartoons. One big difference between Americans and Danes is that Danes are brutally honest. They just tell it straight up. So when they say something that would be considered inappropriate in America, they just say it. They don't mean to sound rude, it's just the truth. Sorry, they're not sorry. After that we went the Brandts Museum, where we saw many modern art exhibitions including a Hentai exhibition (aka anime porn). I am sorry but it was just wrong to see Sailor Moon portraying the Karma Sutra. Not my style. 

This is just weird as it is. 

But the museum also had a media exhibition where we got to do a actual newscast! We wrote, edited, compiled, and filmed a news cast. It was pretty crazy because none of us had actual broadcast experience, but somehow in the 5 hours we had, it all came together. It was a good thing too because the Danish man who was teaching us was literally about to have aneurysm towards the end. I was coming close to charging up the defribillerator in the hall. CLEAR. 

Tonight, with DIS Nightly News..

After that we went to a symphony near Hans Christian Andersen's house, which was honestly the most gorgeous thing I have ever been too. I started crying in the middle of it. Yes, I cried. Moving on.


O then our professors took us out for drinks at a Irish pub. O my lucky charms, one thing I have to say about DIS is that they have AMAZING professors. The professors are so down to earth and really know what they are talking about. Most of them have real world experience in their fields and they really try to make your class as informative as possible. It really makes my classes that more enjoyable. They aren't afraid to say jokes or state the obvious. It is just fabulous. Like I said, our professors took the class out for drinks!! We had a good time laughing and getting to know our classmates but soon it was back to the hostel for us. The next morning, our professor took us to the Egreskov castle where the count and countess lived. SO pretty! The first thing I saw where peacocks roaming the grounds. Peacocks= Malfoy Manor for me. So naturally I coined the castle as Malfoy Manor. We went inside and saw all this neat stuff but I was not prepared for what was in the attic........
DEAR GOD. NO.

WHAT IS WRONG WITH THESE PEOPLE?!

I should probably mention that I have a deathly fear of dolls. Dolls.. big, small, Madam Alexander, Raggedy Ann, the whole works..ABSOLUTELY NOT. They are all creepy and I will slay each one that comes within a 15 foot proximity of me. So note to little children...if you want Malibu Barbie to have legs for her leg warmers then I suggest you keep her safely away from me.
Back to the story, WELL this little wonder was hidden in the attic. This..this...play thing...has been in the attic for 300 years and the legend is, is that if it is removed then the castle will sink into the moat. Well, to my class's chagrin I almost had a conniption when I saw the mummified child replica quietly laying in the dark. Ahhhhhh gosh I am gagging thinking about it. 


Well it was safe to say I booked it out of there. Why is there a trail of fire down the stairs? Because I was moving that fast to get out of the attic. Happy to be breathing normally once again (and moving at a normal pace) we all went to the...canopy walk? Yes, this place had canopy walk where you could walk from tree to tree. They also had a Dracula crypt where I mistaken a woman in a wheel chair to be the Dracula replica, but that is besides the point. But the cherry on Washington's cherry tree was the stable. 


*Another side note...I have a slight animal obsession. Nay, I lied. I LOVE ANIMALS. I even love non-existent ones. Pegasus, centaurs, griffins...I love them all. Unicorns? They are completely real, don't challenge me to this debate.*


Well the stable was a time warp. It was like I stepped into the time machine (or maybe it was that sketch doll working it's voo doo magic)  and popped into the 1920s. The groom was dressed in a old fashion groom uniform and there was this man...this AWESOME man.. who was like the Mary Poppins of men. He had a on jacket with tails, classic gray pants, a waistcoat with a perfect pocket watch, and perfect round spectacles (not glasses, spectacles.) He asked if I liked horses and whether I would like to have a tour. I responded with such enthusiasm that he made a hearty chuckle at my exuberance (big words everybody). By this point, I was in such heaven that everything started adopting that soap opera glow to it. The groom let me groom the horses while the man told me the pedigree of the horses. Keep in mind, I was the only one in the stables so this was some special VIP treatment. Because this was just so perfect, some logical questions started popping  into my mind.
A) Wait...where is the rest of the group?
B) Seriously...why am I in 1920s England?
C) Who is this character speaking to me? 
D) Shit...am I dead? 


So I snapped out of it and asked what this man's occupation was. He said he was the butler of the royal family. BAM that is it! You are SO a butler! I can't believe this, you.are.a.butler. You should model for the butler agency because you are the quintessential butler. At this point, the rest of the class wandered in and they all stopped short when they realized I was in a stall... with a horse and a butler. Hey guys.

Chillin with the Queen's Oldenburg stallion, Orfeus.

Not hallucinations.

 The next morning we woke up and drove to the medieval town of Ribe. Sidenote: Ribe is the one town in Denmark I can actually say. We watched some disturbing yet very good Danish movies on the way.

We got there and climbed the oldest cathedral in Denmark, which made me question how the hell Quasimodo climbed all those steps to ring a damn bell everyday because I was basically was dry heaving by the time I got up there.

Okay, well obviously he opted for the quicker route. 

Show Off.

We then had another lovely dinner where we ate delicious food and had some wine. Some of us went to bars after that, but I chose to go on the night watch tour with the rest of the class which is A GOOD THING I DID. It was la awesomeness. The Night Watch man is a man (obviously) who during medieval times would walk the town of Ribe and lock the dates and protect it at night. Well this sassy son of a gun had the treat of recreating the medieval times for us. It was so much fun, because our professor translated everything and we got to go around this classical town at night. Was it cool? You can bet your bottom dollar on it. 

Certified BAMF.

Well if this trip couldn't get any better. We went blow karting. Yes, I said and spelled that correctly. Blow Karting. Imagine sailing but on land, and even cooler on a beach.  We went to this beach that was completely flat and the it went on for miles making it seem like we were in limbo (curse that doll's voo doo). We were introduced to this Aussie chap who taught us the fundamentals of blow karting and then we suited up and we were good to go. Make no mistake, these things can FLY! Pull the sail and you move at the speed of light.  Everyone had so much fun and we were all covered in sand in the end, but it was amazing. 

Did you see that? Of course, you didn't. I was moving too fast.

After that we went back to Kobenhaven. I love Denmark that is all. Skole to Jutland!


NOTE TO AMERICA. Girls.....please stop talking in fluctuating octaves. You hit decible levels unimaginable to the human mind. One minute your Cindi Lauper and the next you could pass for the japanese grudge girl.  Merci.


NOT A CUTE SOUND.

Lies...God doesn't live in heaven. He lives at the Frederiksborg Castle.

One of the many lovely wonders of living in Europe is that you can walk anywhere. To there, from there, somewhere...anywhere! Well being the quaint little person that I am, I decided to walk over to the local town castle (casual). I present to you, FREDERIKSBORG CASTLE.

Ill take the liberty of picking your jaw up from the ground.

Hallelujah, hallelujah, hallelujah....cue the white birds flying and the rainbow to pop over it. Yes, this bad motha is in my little town of Hillerod. Jealous? You better be.


My mind actually short-circuited when I went inside this monstrosity. I wouldn't be surprised if the local tourists thought I was the town drunk or something because I couldn't form words much less function in this castle. Each room I went inside I had another epiphany. I would even dare to say that this castle was even prettier than the Vatican. HA take that Catholic Church, the Lutherans do it better. Suckaaaas. Don't believe me, o ho, take a look.

BAM.

WHA?!

Oh, we stow away the ugly guests here.


That was only a sprinkle from the cupcake. There were about 5 billion other rooms that were even more grand than the ones I just showed you. What was even better was that I had the whole castle to myself (once I drop kicked a few Japanese tourists out of the way). I would be lying if I didn't say that I pretended to be a princess running through her castle. Because I did, and I had an awesome dress like this..

Pretty in pink! (except in the winter)

True story, I was in this one room that was basically encrusted in gold with priceless paintings in every crevasse and a diamond chandelier every 10 feet....so I naturally assumed it was the Grand Hall. When I asked the security guard he just smiled and pointed to the little staircase to left so I turned and my mind literally blew up. I had an actual mind-gasm. I couldn't process thought, feeling, or just my general state of existence. The security guard's laughter brought me back to the real world and I continued to walk around this...this..I don't even know what to call it. It was heaven. This giant wonderland was heaven. Heaven is not in the clouds, it is here in Hillerod.  The Grand Room was the size of a football field and was covered completely in gold. Every area was covered in detailed, priceless murals and ornate carvings. There was a fireplace that I could easily walk into and this random huge lion that sat in the middle of the room. You just have to go. AMAZING.

Chicka, chicka yeah!

After several brain hemhorrages from all the mind-gasms I had, I somehow stumbled out to the garden where I suffered another stroke of disbelief. Behold.

Tis' nothing but a few rose bushes.

This is considered a "running park" for the local community. To me this is saying that instead of getting a goldfish for a pet, I get a unicorn and a billion dollars. There is just no comparison. 

"Hey guys."

Yeah, so that happened. This is why you need to study abroad in Denmark. If you do, you are able to stumble upon these little treasures everyday. I am not even joking. Today, I found this amazing sandwich shop. Denmark= Treasure chest.

Keep it classy and keep it real.