Thursday, September 23, 2010
Monday, September 20, 2010
Obsessed with Oslo
Whew, what a week. I think this is the first week that has been completely filled with classes for me! (rough life, right?) Anyways, here's a look at my week in retrospect.
Monday-Tuesday
Classes. Bleh.
Wednesday
Here on Wednesdays we don't have actual classes. Instead, we take field trips with our classes to places in Denmark that are relevant to whatever we are studying. This week I went on two field trips- One with my child development class and one with my Danish class. With my child development class I went to a school that was primarily Muslim. This was especially cool because there is such an interesting dynamic between Muslims and Danes here in Denmark. (Mostly that many Danes have a problem with immigration into their once homogenous society). After a tour through the school and having a Q and A session with several children of various ages, we headed back home.
My second "field trip" was to a famous church in Roskilde, Denmark. This was surprisingly cool because it had all the famous kings and queens of Denmark buried inside. After a nice 1 1/2 hour tour of this church I headed back to my apartment in Copenhagen.
Thursday
On Thursdays I also don't have real classes, but instead I spend the entire day in a Danish daycare. The kids I work with are between 3-5 and are the cutest little things I have ever seen. This particular daycare is interesting because they have children from all over the world in attendance. A few of the children are Somalian refugees, many are from Turkey, Iraq, Korea, Uganda, and of course- Denmark. The relations between these children are really spectacular. At such a young age, you can already see how they form groups based on race and ethnicity. To me this is really incredible because as a sociology major I am really interested in divisions based on race and ethnicity and such. So the formation of these groups (Danish children only play with one another, Muslim students with each other, African students) is really striking. In a couple of weeks, I am meeting the children's parents and I am extremely interested in seeing how the parents interact with one another, and potentially seeing how the worldviews of the parents are affecting the kids. Anyways, moving on. All day the kids played outside on a playground. Literally all day. We came inside for approximately 35 minutes for a quick lunch of apples, pears, and rye bread. (SO MUCH HEALTHIER THAN THE US). And then back to playground. So for six hours I played on the playground, which was surprisingly tiring.
Friday
On Friday I went to classes blah blah blah. Then after classes I packed up my stuff and headed off to Oslo, Norway via cruise! Jess and I met up with some of the Vandy kids that live around us and got on board. Since I have never been on a cruise before, I thought this was the coolest thing in the world. On the boat there were shops, restaurants, bars, coffee shops, a grocery store, etc. AFter looking around a bit, we took the elevator down to the bottom of the boat were our room was. Little did we know when we booked these rooms was that our room was legit under water in the BOTTOM of the boat. We also didn't know that our room was the size of a shoebox, where from the center of the room you can touch everyone's bed and the bathroom. Luckily, we made it out of there alive. After a little bit more exploring we spent the rest of the night eating a packed dinner, chatting in the coffee shop, and trying not to get too seasick from the boat swaying.
Saturday
At 9 AM we landed in Oslo! As we pulled into the port, I could immediately tell that I was going to like this city. The landscape looked beautiful and the whole city was surrounded by water and fjords. As we climbed off the boat, Jess and I took off as self-proclaimed "aggressive tourists," to see the sights. While in Oslo, we saw the Opera House, Parliament, the Royal Palace, a beautiful harbor, a really old fortress, the National Gallery, and the Museum of Modern Art. My favorite spot was easily the National Gallery. They had been advertising "The Scream" by Edvard Munch, which drew us to the museum in the first place. As it turns out there was a ton of other amazing art that hadn't been advertised by the museum since the artists weren't Norwegian. We stumbled into a room that contained the self-portrait of Van Gogh, two Claude Monets, and about 4 paintings by Pablo Picasso! At around 4:30, we wandered back to the boat and boarded- but this time for Copenhagen!
Sunday
After another 9 AM wake-up, we all headed back to our respective apartments in Copenhagen. After an afternoon of much needed rest, relaxation, and a tiny bit of homework, we headed to a FCK (Copenhagen's team!) soccer game against their cross-town rivals. This was such an incredible experience. The stadium is absolutely massive, and our tickets (provided by DIS!) were FREE. (A word I have heard zero times since my arrival in Europe). We sat in the fifth row and cheered on FCK to a 2-0 win.
Oh man what a week. Although this next week is pretty relaxing, I leave for London in just under two weeks for my long academic visit! After this, I will be heading to Dublin for the weekend with Jenny. I am beyond excited. This week, Jess, Jenny and I have made some pretty good travel plans for our two week break. Right now our plan is to go to...
Florence to Rome to Seville to the Canary Islands to Barcelona to Paris and back to Copenhagen! Yay! So that's all for now loves, but I hope to have more updates soon.
xoxoxo
Mandy
PS- I finally included some pics! Most of these are on facebook, but Mom and Dad these are for you!
PS- I finally included some pics! Most of these are on facebook, but Mom and Dad these are for you!
Sunday, September 12, 2010
I'm Baaaaack
I'm back! From Western Denmark! Specifically the adorably tiny town of Odense. What a wonderful trip. I'm sure some (most) of you share my original sentiment about Western Denmark which was "what the hell could possibly be over there? Cows? Pigs? Maybe a windmill or two? Well, as it turns out, Western Denmark is actually a really amazing place. My three days there were far too short, but let me tell you what I was doing while I was there...
I think I said in my previous post that I was studying child development in Denmark, which a multicultural twist (Denmark is becoming a more heterogeneous society and this is causing some problems with many ethnic Danes) This is especially interesting because the American and Nordic/Scandinavian methods of child rearing and development are incredibly different. (Feel free to skip this paragraph, I just think it's interesting!) In Denmark they put kids in daycare at the age of one with very few exceptions. All of the daycare is free due to their political welfare system here. When they are about 3 they move on to what we would typically consider preschool, (but they call it kindergarten), and they stay here until they enter "real school" at the age of 6. So here comes the cool part. In "kindergarten," they are literally allowed to do pretty much whatever they want. Here is an example- In the school I worked in this past week the kids wanted to go play in the forest. So the teachers rounded them up, took them on a bus then a train into the Danish forest. (no permission slips or calls to the parents!) When they got to the forest they were allowed to play however they wanted for the next 3 hours. I saw 3 year olds dangling from trees, chasing one another with sticks, throwing mud etc. Then at lunch time they all sat down and at their lunch with REAL CUTLERY. THREE YEAR OLDS WITH KNIVES. SHARP KNIVES. Albeit foreign to me, this is the Danish system of child development. They put a great deal of emphasis on freedom and individualism in order to create a well-rounded mature adult. But more about Western Denmark and Odense!
Day 1
After a 6:30 wake up I hurried to the bus with Jenny. As I approached the buses, it dawned on me that, in true Mandy fashion, I had forgotten my lunch in my apartment. I sprinted back to my apartment with all my belongings up all 4 flights of stairs grabbed my lunch and ran back to the bus. I frantically searched for the correct bus until I finally found it and ran on. As usual, I was the last one there but at least I made it-lunch and all. Our first stop was the HC Andersen School. What's really cool about this school is that only 30% of the school are ethnic Danes. The other 70% are Turkish, Somalian, and many other countries. We learned about how they work together and why this heterogeneity is so important to them. We talked with tons of administrators and a bunch of the students including one Muslim girl who was the most well spoken and articulate person I've ever talked to. And she's only 14. After a few hours here, we went to this gigantic outdoor playground. It was beyond cool. It has all this different sections for big kids and little kids and a ton of playground equipment, little houses to play in, a zip line, and a ton of animals. Many of the "kindergartens" call this their school and meet there everyday and play. (no matter the weather!). After taking a tour here, doing some observing, and a little playing ourselves, we headed to a place called "Act Now." This was a improv group for Muslim women and men. We did some activities with them which was really cool. This group of people was also reallllly talented. After all this activities we headed to a buffet dinner which was actually the highlight of my life. Here is my typical daily menu (due to serious budget constraints) compared to what I ate at this dinner.
Typical Menu-
Breakfast- yogurt+apple
Lunch-yogurt+apple
Dinner-Ramen, scrambled eggs, or sometimes chicken with frozen veggies
Buffet-
10000 pieces of chicken
30 lbs of salad
6000 dinner rolls
my body weight in potatoes
some chocolate
after slipping into a food coma, I headed back to the hotel and hit the hay.
Day 2:
Another early wake-up but it was well worth it. Our first stop was the Vollsmose (sp?) kulturhouse. This is where low income individuals can come in for counseling or help finding a job and they also had a wide array of extracurricular activities available. (Art, music, dance, running team). The next stop was probably the best thing I did all weekend. We went to the Hans Christian Andersen children's museum called the "Tinderbox" after one of his fairy tales. This place was like kid heaven. We literally did nothing academic here, we just acted like 5 year olds. Someone read us a fairy tale, then we had to paint a picture of what happened in the fairy tale with watercolors. Then we got to dress up like characters from the fairy tale out of their costume box, and then we got our faces painted. Jenny and I dressed up as chickens and got our faces painted like tigers. Basically the best day of my life. After this we had some free time where I went to the real HC Andersen museum (with my face painted like a tiger), and did some learning about him and his life. After this free time we went to a Turkish restaurant and ate some traditional fare there. After once again, eating my face off, we all went to a Ugandan drum show called "Drums of Love." I really can't put into words how amazing this was. People studying abroad in Europe- look for them coming to your area, they are so so so good. They are so full of energy and intensity, I didn't ever want to leave their show. After this I went home and fell right asleep.
Day 3:
After some breakfast we packed up the bus and headed back towards Copenhagen. On our way we made a detour for a little cultural visit. (because all of our other visits had been SOOOOO academic...) We toured a castle which was really cool because it was super old and had all these amazing and old paintings in it. After this, we had a little free time and walked around the tulip garden surrounding the castle and went in a butterfly house that had hundreds of really beautiful butterflies! So pretty. The next stop was the brewery on the premise. Our teachers idea. We sampled 5 different kinds of beer (bleh, none of them was any good), and ate some delicious tapas. Finally, after an exhausting marathon weekend, we headed back to Copenhagen!
Whewwww what a long post! More to come soon. Love you all
xoxoxo
Mandy
I think I said in my previous post that I was studying child development in Denmark, which a multicultural twist (Denmark is becoming a more heterogeneous society and this is causing some problems with many ethnic Danes) This is especially interesting because the American and Nordic/Scandinavian methods of child rearing and development are incredibly different. (Feel free to skip this paragraph, I just think it's interesting!) In Denmark they put kids in daycare at the age of one with very few exceptions. All of the daycare is free due to their political welfare system here. When they are about 3 they move on to what we would typically consider preschool, (but they call it kindergarten), and they stay here until they enter "real school" at the age of 6. So here comes the cool part. In "kindergarten," they are literally allowed to do pretty much whatever they want. Here is an example- In the school I worked in this past week the kids wanted to go play in the forest. So the teachers rounded them up, took them on a bus then a train into the Danish forest. (no permission slips or calls to the parents!) When they got to the forest they were allowed to play however they wanted for the next 3 hours. I saw 3 year olds dangling from trees, chasing one another with sticks, throwing mud etc. Then at lunch time they all sat down and at their lunch with REAL CUTLERY. THREE YEAR OLDS WITH KNIVES. SHARP KNIVES. Albeit foreign to me, this is the Danish system of child development. They put a great deal of emphasis on freedom and individualism in order to create a well-rounded mature adult. But more about Western Denmark and Odense!
Day 1
After a 6:30 wake up I hurried to the bus with Jenny. As I approached the buses, it dawned on me that, in true Mandy fashion, I had forgotten my lunch in my apartment. I sprinted back to my apartment with all my belongings up all 4 flights of stairs grabbed my lunch and ran back to the bus. I frantically searched for the correct bus until I finally found it and ran on. As usual, I was the last one there but at least I made it-lunch and all. Our first stop was the HC Andersen School. What's really cool about this school is that only 30% of the school are ethnic Danes. The other 70% are Turkish, Somalian, and many other countries. We learned about how they work together and why this heterogeneity is so important to them. We talked with tons of administrators and a bunch of the students including one Muslim girl who was the most well spoken and articulate person I've ever talked to. And she's only 14. After a few hours here, we went to this gigantic outdoor playground. It was beyond cool. It has all this different sections for big kids and little kids and a ton of playground equipment, little houses to play in, a zip line, and a ton of animals. Many of the "kindergartens" call this their school and meet there everyday and play. (no matter the weather!). After taking a tour here, doing some observing, and a little playing ourselves, we headed to a place called "Act Now." This was a improv group for Muslim women and men. We did some activities with them which was really cool. This group of people was also reallllly talented. After all this activities we headed to a buffet dinner which was actually the highlight of my life. Here is my typical daily menu (due to serious budget constraints) compared to what I ate at this dinner.
Typical Menu-
Breakfast- yogurt+apple
Lunch-yogurt+apple
Dinner-Ramen, scrambled eggs, or sometimes chicken with frozen veggies
Buffet-
10000 pieces of chicken
30 lbs of salad
6000 dinner rolls
my body weight in potatoes
some chocolate
after slipping into a food coma, I headed back to the hotel and hit the hay.
Day 2:
Another early wake-up but it was well worth it. Our first stop was the Vollsmose (sp?) kulturhouse. This is where low income individuals can come in for counseling or help finding a job and they also had a wide array of extracurricular activities available. (Art, music, dance, running team). The next stop was probably the best thing I did all weekend. We went to the Hans Christian Andersen children's museum called the "Tinderbox" after one of his fairy tales. This place was like kid heaven. We literally did nothing academic here, we just acted like 5 year olds. Someone read us a fairy tale, then we had to paint a picture of what happened in the fairy tale with watercolors. Then we got to dress up like characters from the fairy tale out of their costume box, and then we got our faces painted. Jenny and I dressed up as chickens and got our faces painted like tigers. Basically the best day of my life. After this we had some free time where I went to the real HC Andersen museum (with my face painted like a tiger), and did some learning about him and his life. After this free time we went to a Turkish restaurant and ate some traditional fare there. After once again, eating my face off, we all went to a Ugandan drum show called "Drums of Love." I really can't put into words how amazing this was. People studying abroad in Europe- look for them coming to your area, they are so so so good. They are so full of energy and intensity, I didn't ever want to leave their show. After this I went home and fell right asleep.
Day 3:
After some breakfast we packed up the bus and headed back towards Copenhagen. On our way we made a detour for a little cultural visit. (because all of our other visits had been SOOOOO academic...) We toured a castle which was really cool because it was super old and had all these amazing and old paintings in it. After this, we had a little free time and walked around the tulip garden surrounding the castle and went in a butterfly house that had hundreds of really beautiful butterflies! So pretty. The next stop was the brewery on the premise. Our teachers idea. We sampled 5 different kinds of beer (bleh, none of them was any good), and ate some delicious tapas. Finally, after an exhausting marathon weekend, we headed back to Copenhagen!
Whewwww what a long post! More to come soon. Love you all
xoxoxo
Mandy
Monday, September 6, 2010
So I guess I caved...
So I guess I caved on creating a blog! After reading through Anne and Katie's I just couldn't help myself. Here is a recap on where I am and what I am doing...
For the next four months I will be living in Copenhagen, Denmark and am studying child development. So in addition to taking classes I will also be traveling to schools throughout Copenhagen and the rest of Denmark to see how the Danish school system differs from our own. In addition to a child development class, I am also taking a literature class about European fairy tales, criminal psychology, and danish (which is impossible!). But that's super boring so let me get to the good stuff!
Copenhagen is the CUTEST city I have ever been to in my entire life. All the streets are so tiny and adorable and they are all made of cobblestone. My apartment is on one of these adorable streets right above a tasty cafe, and across the street from a park with a bunch more tasty cafes. The living situation I have is incredible, I was so so so so lucky. I am living on the 3rd floor of the apartment in a room with my friend Jenny. Next door, is my friend Jess living in a single. Then there are 8 other people who live here (2 more girls and 6 boys) and we share two bathrooms, a kitchen and a common room. They are all so nice so it's been really fun so far. The apartment is only a 3-5 minute walk away from all my classes, and more importantly, only about a 30 second walk away from the most delicious ice cream i've ever had. Seriously, I have to run by it with my eyes closed because otherwise I would eat it every single day. Our location is also really central in Cope, which is perfect because we are surrounded by amazing restaurants and all the good bars (sorry mom and dad :)). The only problem with this is that Copenhagen is EXPENSIVE. And I'm not talking like kind of a little bit expensive. I'm talking like coffee-costs-$7-in-some-places-expensive. Oh well!
Two weekends ago I did some local exploring in Copenhagen. I went to this place called "the Bar Harbor." Here they have a 5 meter platform you can jump off of into the ocean. Jess and I + a few new friends did this and it was really fun. The only thing putting a damper on this was the water temp. I don't know why this didn't occur to me earlier, but the seas surrounding Copenhagen are cold. REALLY COLD. But the jump was worth it! At night I went out on the town to a DIS (my program) sponsored party at a bar/night club around the corner from my apartment, which was also really fun. This past weekend I went to Malmo, Sweden with Jess and Jenny. It was such an easy and beautiful trip! All we did was hop on the train and travel 30 minutes over the ocean to Sweden. Once there, we walked around a bit and landed in the most beautiful park I have ever seen. It was filled with gardens, and canals and lakes and swans and ducks floating and little adorable Scandinavian children (think of blonde wispy hair on rosy cheeked kids!) running around and jumping in the water. There was also a wedding going on which we watched for a good amount of time. After wandering aimlessly around this beautiful park we walked the streets of Malmo, checked out the shops, and stopped for dinner. For me, this was a wonderfully-delicious hawaiian pizza. (Smac, this might have even rivaled the place near your lake house...) After eating the plate-sized pizza to the last crumb, we packed up our belongings and went home.
This week I will be going to western Denmark on what they call a "study tour." So from Thursday through Saturday I will be visiting schools on the mainland of Denmark and doing some touristy activities there, so expect a post after I get back.
Much love,
Mandy
For the next four months I will be living in Copenhagen, Denmark and am studying child development. So in addition to taking classes I will also be traveling to schools throughout Copenhagen and the rest of Denmark to see how the Danish school system differs from our own. In addition to a child development class, I am also taking a literature class about European fairy tales, criminal psychology, and danish (which is impossible!). But that's super boring so let me get to the good stuff!
Copenhagen is the CUTEST city I have ever been to in my entire life. All the streets are so tiny and adorable and they are all made of cobblestone. My apartment is on one of these adorable streets right above a tasty cafe, and across the street from a park with a bunch more tasty cafes. The living situation I have is incredible, I was so so so so lucky. I am living on the 3rd floor of the apartment in a room with my friend Jenny. Next door, is my friend Jess living in a single. Then there are 8 other people who live here (2 more girls and 6 boys) and we share two bathrooms, a kitchen and a common room. They are all so nice so it's been really fun so far. The apartment is only a 3-5 minute walk away from all my classes, and more importantly, only about a 30 second walk away from the most delicious ice cream i've ever had. Seriously, I have to run by it with my eyes closed because otherwise I would eat it every single day. Our location is also really central in Cope, which is perfect because we are surrounded by amazing restaurants and all the good bars (sorry mom and dad :)). The only problem with this is that Copenhagen is EXPENSIVE. And I'm not talking like kind of a little bit expensive. I'm talking like coffee-costs-$7-in-some-places-expensive. Oh well!
Two weekends ago I did some local exploring in Copenhagen. I went to this place called "the Bar Harbor." Here they have a 5 meter platform you can jump off of into the ocean. Jess and I + a few new friends did this and it was really fun. The only thing putting a damper on this was the water temp. I don't know why this didn't occur to me earlier, but the seas surrounding Copenhagen are cold. REALLY COLD. But the jump was worth it! At night I went out on the town to a DIS (my program) sponsored party at a bar/night club around the corner from my apartment, which was also really fun. This past weekend I went to Malmo, Sweden with Jess and Jenny. It was such an easy and beautiful trip! All we did was hop on the train and travel 30 minutes over the ocean to Sweden. Once there, we walked around a bit and landed in the most beautiful park I have ever seen. It was filled with gardens, and canals and lakes and swans and ducks floating and little adorable Scandinavian children (think of blonde wispy hair on rosy cheeked kids!) running around and jumping in the water. There was also a wedding going on which we watched for a good amount of time. After wandering aimlessly around this beautiful park we walked the streets of Malmo, checked out the shops, and stopped for dinner. For me, this was a wonderfully-delicious hawaiian pizza. (Smac, this might have even rivaled the place near your lake house...) After eating the plate-sized pizza to the last crumb, we packed up our belongings and went home.
This week I will be going to western Denmark on what they call a "study tour." So from Thursday through Saturday I will be visiting schools on the mainland of Denmark and doing some touristy activities there, so expect a post after I get back.
Much love,
Mandy
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