the sea cottage

Last friday when I got home from school at 6, I hopped in Laila's little tiny black car with Flemming, and we headed up to northern sjaelland near a small town called Nykøbing where their sea cottage is located. It was rainy and cold, but when we arrived, Laila came out to greet us and had a fire inside and dinner ready!  After dinner Tine insisted that we go for a walk on the beach. It was not raining at the moment, and the moon was bright through the clouds, and with all of the wind, the ocean was crashign on the sand, and it was really great. we made a small loop and came back through some woods for there cottage is in the woods that lie just behind the sand dunes, about 80 m from the ocean down a little boardwalk.
    They had made it sound like a very quaint little cabin that was drafty and not at all as nice as this was. It was tiny, 2 little bedrooms plus a little guest gazebo and a small living room and kitchen combined, but they had renovated it 8 years ago, and it was so cozy and adorable. and in danish terms, Hyggeligt! and dinner was fabulous too. I got to sleep in the little guest house with a tin roof, and with the rain pouring down, it was the perfect place to fall asleep at the end of a long week. Tine had her friend Anthea over, and the next morning after breakfast, we all went into town with Laila and did a little grocery shopping. when we came out of the store, there was a big truck pulled over on the side of the road with a police car stopped, like he was getting  a ticket, except that he wasn't in his car. It was definitely not too exciting, but everyone coming out of the store and in the parking lot was entranced. It was hilarious really. Laila also took us to a spot with a huge rock from Viking times that is apparently the center of Denmark (if you fit all of Denmark inside of a circle).
    When we got back and later that afternoon Anthea's parents came up and we had hot chocolate and a pastry and then went for a long walk on the beach. For dessert later, I made apple crisp, and it was fabulous! we had it with their version of vanilla ice cream and Anthea helped me with it, and it was so delicious--it really hit the spot and made it feel like fall. so great.
     Then next morning Flemming took Tine and me to this part of the shoreline that is all round pepples, and behind the shoreline, some very steep ridges and hills, perhaps the only ones in Denmark, that are from glaciers that pushed up dirt to make way for themselves to slide into the ocean. we climbed up them and had a great view of the foggy and completely glassy sea.  Then we went to the shore where people have built hundreds upon hundreds of cairns everywhere. A german guy started it apparently, and Tine and Flemming had never heard of it outside of this area and thought the German guy had invented it. He certainly did for Denmark. Tine and I each made our own, and then we headed back to the cabin for some more hot chocolate. I went straight to the beach when we got back, so I could go for a run, and ended up staying out for an hour, and i even worked up the courage to put my feet in the ocean. never again. it was so so cold that my achilles tendons and the arches of my feet cramped up instantly. but after about 10 seconds everything went numb and it felt okay. I saw a man go swimming while on my run, and I was very impressed. according to laila and flemming, its the viking blood. True vikings can swim in the ocean anytime. they are all just so proud of the vikings. : )  Sadly we had to go home that afternoon, but not before stopping by this funny country shop that was already selling christmas ornaments etc. since they don't celebrate thanksgiving or halloween, they get out christmas stuff months in advance. crazy. I am already in the mood!  So even though it rained all weekend, it was so relaxing and peaceful, and also beautiful, I just wanted to stay up there forever.

On saturday I am taking off on our two week break of traveling to Greece, Italy, and Switzerland!

Pumpkin Pie

I made pumpkin pie last night for my host family, but almost every ingredient was different from the kind we make in the U.S. I had part of a huge real pumpkin, which I didn't really know what to do with, and Denmark does not have evaporated milk, so I used 250 ml. of an unknown milk product-- I think it was cream, and it seemed to be somewhere around the amount of evaporated milk that was required, but I didn't even measure it. They also don't sell pie crusts, so we bought this stuff that laila thought would be perfect, which turned out to be pastry. finally, we only have dark brown sugar in denmark instead of lightbrown, and it actually tastes a little different. It was a pretty ridiculous ordeal, with me trying to blend semi baked pumpkin to no avail, and the pie still had chunks of pumpkin in it when I put it in the oven. It cooked for almost two hours, and the center still looked runny. I was a little worried, since the top was getting a little brown and had inflated to an inch over the rim, which I don't recall them doing normally. however, once it cooled off a little, it deflated, and solidified into the rigth texture. It even tasted like a normal pumpkin pie. I was shocked that it turned out so much like a normal pie when the only ingredient that perfectly matched the recipe was the cinnamon. It actually tasted delicious!  

The End of Berlin

living room of Monika's apartment

The other living room in Monika's apartment

some goats we saw while hiking...... just kidding. they were at the zoo!

lizzy, me, and a zebra :)

the stoplights in Berlin. the red one is a communist man and the green one is the obedient worker marching off to work. they were in east berlin while the wall was up, and they were removed when the wall came down, but east berliners wanted to keep them as a memory, and now they are all over east and west berlin.

currywurst: a sausage with a tomato curry sauce on top, delicious, and on the side I chose 4 different mustards: one flavored with beer, one flavored with rosemary, one flavored with figs, and an original spicy on in front. all were delicious and so was the sausage. Lizzy and I got these at a sunday market where we met up with her friends who were also visiting berlin

The day I got home from Berlin, went to school, and came home to an empty house, so I went for a bikeride. This is one a street near their house on the way to the ocean.

I biked out to the ocean and then tried to do a popular walk to this very cool point that is almost an island, but the cows were aggressive this time, and the cow in front was not going to let me pass. he started snorting at me and walking towards me and even pawing his foot on the ground. thought he was going to charge, so I took a picture and quickly retreated.

on the retreat

it was a really beautiful day

Pictures! Berlin and Poland

Street in Poland

Square in East Berlin

Berlin Wall East Side Gallery

Girls from my class and me at the wall

My class's teaching assistant Astrid. the entire class went out for a drink on our last night.

Lizzy and Me at a cafe in a square in Poznan, Poland

Bowling in Poznan, the ball got stuck on my thumb. I was 2nd to last with a score of 69 in the first game and the second game ended after only 8 rounds, but I won with a score of 90! and i would have cleared a 100 if we had finished the game! it was a ton of fun

A table with a mirror surface in our hotel. I am wearing a new coat I got in Poland

our first meal in Berlin,  we were served a huge hunk of pork? i think on the bone with some sauerkraut and a pretzel roll. really strange and we were all nervous, but the meat was cooked fabulously! fell right off the bone, however, i still couldn't finish it. 

A really strange show we went to after dinner in Berlin, the dancers were not quite synchronized, and it was an odd combination of a circus, strip club, and gay bar. It was pretty outrageous, but the acrobats were very good.

The huge roof of the sony center in East berlin, it changed colors at night

me and my baby mini! there were so many of these around, along with mercedes, bmws and VW. lots more than in denmark

2 girls from my class and me outside the Jewish Museum in Berlin, extremely cool architecture

park outside the jewish museum

open roofed cathedral we stumbled upon in east berlin

we fixed eachother's arms in class before we left for our trips!

Street in Poznan

open aired cathedral

the bear is the symbol of Berlin and these painted ones are all over the city

our bike tour paused over the spot where Hitler's lived his final 6 weeks in a bunker below ground.

These little adorable cars were all that people in east berlin could buy, and they had a waitinglist of 8-14 years to get one.

the memorial to the murdered jews of europe. very cool

also the memorial to the murdered Jews

Parliament and Lizzy and me

Brandenburg Gates dividing the east from the west

old church with the top rebuilt after WWII which is blackened to make it look old.

Ritter Sport flagship store with so so so many flavors!!!

More pictures to come!!

Last day in Berlin

Yesterday was another fantastic day. We got so lucky with beautiful, cool, sunny weather and colorful leaves. Lizzy and I woke up and headed to the zoo after breakfast, and the animals were amazing. the zoo we went to ( because there are two in Berlin.--one in the east and one in the west) has the greatest number of species than any zoo in the world. The monkeys were unquestionably our favorite. We found one monkey pen where there were lots of them running everywhere and tackling eachother and playing, and then one entered the room holding a very very small baby. 2 monkeys were clearly in charge of the baby, and when they brought him down to the bottom floor, he began to run all over, literally rebounding off the walls and attempting to jump onto other monkeys who would playfully pick him up off of them and then roll him around a little before he would run of to one of his parents and put his hands on their faces. they were so human, it was really bizarre. they even have toenails! this little monkey tried to reach up to the platform off the ground that led to the upper level of the room, but he couldnt reach it so he kept jumping up and grabbing it adn trying so hard to pull himself up, and when he couldnt he would drop back down and stare up at it and put his little hand on his chin like he was totally flabbergasted and perplexed. it was almost the cutest thing i have ever seen. We stood in front of the exhibit for at least 15 minutes totally mesmerized.
   we also saw a lot of other cool animals including our dear mascot the polar bears, which we were very happy about. we even spotted a dinosaur, which turned out to be some very strange kind of one horned rhino. scary. 
    After the zoo, we headed to an insane flea market where we met up with lizzy's friends and got currywurst, which is a sausage  topped with a tomato curry sauce and mustard (very german and very tasty) followed by a pancake with cinnamon and sugar. delicious. we eventually left and walked across part of town to the area of berlin that has both parts of the berlin wall still intact, with the no man's land between them, and we climbed a tower to see what it used to be like and read about the history of it. That was also really cool, and we had been hoping to see it. we later headed towards the tourist center of town stopping at a cool cafe along the way. From there we went home for the night. We made some red and white pasta for dinner, and lizzy commented on how colorful they were. turned out the red ones were flavored with chili, very spicy. I really enjoyed it, but lizzy couldn't eat it, so we had to make her another kind. it was a pretty funny surprise though. Monika came home and it was nice to see her again. i cant believe how welcoming and generous she was, and she invited us back later in the semester!

Saturday in Berlin

     Lizzy and I are staying with my family's friend Monika, who lives in Berlin.  she gave us pastries and tea upon arrival and had breakfast for us this morning consisting of granola with dried fruit and yoghurt plus bread with either jam, butter, some tasty german sauce kind of like a cross between cream cheese and sour cream, and an assorted plate of meats, cheese, and cucumbers, tomatoes, and carrots. we had plenty to eat, with some tea to go with it. She makes the tea by mixing earl grey and another loose leaf black tea in a huge thermos that keeps it hot for a really long time. delicious.  This morning she told me all about her life before now and her travels, which are remarkable and extensive.
    we left her flat around noon and walked out into a beautiful day of sunshine and golden leaves. Her neighborhood is very close to the city, really just a part of it, and it has tons of little shops, restaurants, and cafes. there were people everywhere and we followed them towards the nearby open air saturday market. there were tons of stalls of jewelry, leather, wooden crafts, food vendors of all types, and tons of produce, cheese, and bread stands. It was amazing and bubbling with people. It was  a perfect fall day. I bought a really cool ring made of a shell, and some chocolate truffles for monika, easily the best I have ever tasted.  When we finally pulled away, we headed towards the touristy area of Berlin to get some postcards and find a birkenstock store. I got some blue open-toed birkenstocks, and I am thrilled with them. I have wanted some since 2nd. grade and for some reason just never got them. 2 years ago I knew I would be coming to berlin before too long and decided to wait til I came because they sell them for much cheaper and with many more varieties. This rumor turned out to be true, and I am very glad I waited.
   eventually we came back to our neighborhood, got some crepes of buckwheat flour, with mushrooms, leeks, cheese, and winesauce, and now we are relaxing a little at home before going out for the night.  tomorrow we are going to the zoo!

Berlin!

       berlin is awesome. yesterday was a day full of firsts for me. we woke up pretty early and went to the berlin medical history museum where we saw tons of specimens and learned about the awful medical practices that existed before anesthesia. left there feeling a little sick and we all went to the anatomy building of the university hospital and medical school. Here we went into one of the cadaver rooms and our guide had 2 corpses in the room both wrapped in white cloth. you could see their entire shape beneath, like mummies, and it was kind of creepy. she pulled it off of the female, who had been a pretty old lady who died in 2007!!!! her skin was pretty hard and pale (we got to touch it with gloves on) and then she pulled back the lady's whole breast and stomach (pre-cut) and taught us about all the organs while we looked at and identified the lungs, heart, diaphram, liver, small and large intestines, and ovaries. it was actually amazing, and it was easy to forget that we were looking into the real body of a real human. which is kind of scary.   we also got to feel human bones that had been soaked in acid to dissolve all the organic substances, which made them bendy!, really bizarre.

after this extremely cool visit, a few of us went to a nice italian restaurant for lunch, and it was so delicious and really cheap. and i think my noodles were made in the restaurant. I had them with a creamy mushroom sauce. then four of us (in our 5 hours of free time) went to the Ritter sport chocolate flagship store and spent over an hour there and might have bought quite a lot of chocolate. They have at least 30 flavors/varieties of chocolate. it was insanely awesome.

then we ran over to the East side Gallery of the berlin wall, where it has been painted on a lot, and looked at all of the art. The wall is so cool to actually see. next we went to a blind bar for dinner with the rest of the group, and it was actually pitch black. there was no way we could see a thing and we all had to get in a line and put our hands on the shoulders of the person in front of us to be led blindly to our table. the servers are also blind. don't know how they do it. we couldn't tell what we were eating so we all had to eat with our hands and fingers. with the fork it was too hard to tell where we were on the plate. we had  tofu, red peppers, and potatoes and for dessert vodka sorbet, a coffee mousse, and mango jam or something, which i discovered by accidentally putting my hand right into it after he set it down in front of me. it all made me kind of claustrophobic, but we all felt that way so we just talked a lot and tried to eat slowly so as to have something to do. (we didn't know what we would be served ahead of time)

finally after dinner we all (22 of us) went out together and spent a long while walking down this street of bars that had a prostitute every 10 feet. I have never seen one and it was totally surreal and sad and disgusting all at once, and it made us all really curious. they all had thigh high boots, either black or white "leather" that were also platform, then hose and a super short tight skirt, either black or hot pink, and then a leather jacket on unzipped in a way that maximized cleavage exposure. plus the leather jackets were like corsets around their stomachs and up to the bottom of their chests, and then the whole jacket poofed out above it. really strange, so it made their torsos look tiny and their boobs huge. then they were coated in makeup and all wore fanny packs. and they were all tall with very long skinny legs. and we saw probably close to 50 of them. never ending. so extremely eventful day.

and this afternoon lizzy and i said goodbye to the tour group as they headed back to denmark and we went and found the house of my family's family friend monika, and the flat is gorgeous! i am going to take pictures its so beautiful--and old fashioned. we hung out with monika for a while and then took off for this huge open area in berlin where the soccer game between  germany and turkey was going to be shown on a huge screen. The crowds were wild and huge, and we were afraid of getting trampled on the way in because they had to sets of fences to regulate the flow of people and tons of police as well. it was so cool, and most of our crowd was actually turkish immigrants. It was a very cultural experience, and we had a great time. tomorrow we are hoping to go to the Zoo which has more species than any other zoo in the world (and was the first zoo in europe).   

Traveling!

     So yesterday morning we woke up bright and early to make it into copenhagen by  7.45 to begin our 12 hour journey to Poznan Poland.  I caught the 6.50 train into the city and ran into several other students on the way. we started the journey with a 2 hour bus ride and then took a ferry for 2 hours to germany. That was actually really cool, although most of us were really tired. then came the next 6 hours where we watched american beauty, a movie I hadn't seen yet that I must say was just really bizarre. we finally arrived here and headed straight to a restaurant that served us a delicious salad, then a fabulous chicken entree followed by a wonderful fruit sorbet.
     This morning we had breakfast at 6 which included a buffet of breads, danishes, cheeses (brie), smoked salmon, and hardboiled quail eggs. very delicious. and then we took off for a hospital to learn about gynecology. It all seemed really old fashioned actually, and the people here are really terse, almost rude, and they brought to my awareness just how attractive the Danes are. After the hospital we all at lunch and walked around the city and then met up at 1.30 for a trip to the huge lech brewery.  It was really cool actually, and at the end we got to have a beer to sample. now we are back at the hotel relaxing before a nice dinner and then some bowling. Poznan is really different from denmark. The people have dark hair and are much shorter than the Danes, just to start, and their public transportation is trolleys, which are extremely jolting and crowded. They are also quite old-fashioned. it is clear that the city has much less money than Denmark and that it is probably still recovering from WWII. There is some sort of body of water nearby though, and many parks, and a few beautiful old squares. 
      Tomorrow we are going to see a pediatrician and then take off for berlin, which is about a 3 hour drive. i meant to write a little about the weekend on saturday night, but I ran out of time. Friday evening several of us went to Anya's house for dinner with her host family where we had a great lasagna and some homeade bread with a colorful salad. her host mother is a ton of fun and doesn't take life too seriously, which is quite refreshing. after a few hours there, we all headed into copenhagen to meet up with a few other people. I didn't stay long though because I had to wake up at 7 for my haircut, which sound ridiculous I know, but I didn't schedule it. on the metro into the city, this girl who was alone just started throwing up like crazy, which was really gross, and also kind of sad. my t
    my train home was sadly at 12.41 which got me into roskilde at 1.12, just four minutes after my bus for home left. I had to wait an hour, and I was so tired I had already fallen asleep on the train. I tried to sleep on a bench, but it was too cold and windy, so I spent the hour walking around the empty town--pitiful.   So Tine and I got our haircuts the next morning by her aunt and then headed home to get ready for a birthday party laila was hosting. I went for a run, and then had to pack, but the party was great. it lasted from around 1 to around 11pm, and it involved much wine, coffee, chocolate, and some very danish food that I didn't really know how to approach. they always have platters of sliced meat, and I don't even hardly eat meat, but not only do i have to try it, I have to have a little of each kind, and I don't ever know what kind that is. but they were all pretty great, and overall it was a very cheerful and hyggileg day. Also, I would post pictures from recent times, but I don't have my computer with me, so it will be a week or so.