Denmark 2013: Two Months!

I know this is a long post but I didn't write last week since I didn't think much happened. But of course, as soon as I began writing I realized I actually did do lots of things! Ooooops:)

I've finally gotten into a routine these past two months. Every day I wake up at 6:30 and go down to eat breakfast around 7:15. I then walk down to the bust stop in order to take the bus at 7:42 to go to school. On Mondays and Wednesdays I have four class through out the day starting at 8:30 and ending at 3:40. After school on these days I get home around 5 and then leave to go to soccer at 5:30. On Tuesdays and Thursday I have three classes through out the day starting at 8:30 and ending at 1:50. On these days I get to leave class early to take a bus to extra Danish lessons with the other exchange students. So basically every day I'm not home until 6 or later... It feels good to finally have a scheduled routine every day. One thing that is extremely different in school here is the P.E. class. Back home when we had to take gym class we would usually run twice a week for ten minutes straight or play dodgeball or volleyball. Here, we run and run and run. We only have gym once a week but it last two hours long. This week we had to run about 6.5 kilometers which is a little over 4 miles. My school is practically in the middle of nowhere with just farm land surrounding it so the wind is crucial when running. Along with the wind, the rain and cold also play a huge factor. Although it's nice to get out and run and i don't have a problem finishing the 6.5 kilometers, I just have to say that I prefer the gym class back home!

The view of farm land surrounding my school.

Last Friday I was asked by one of the YFU volunteers to make a presentation at the social school in town. The social school is a school where many people of any age older than 15 can attend in order to become some type of social worker. The volunteer sent me an email telling me to speak about school in the U.S. and my daily life. She told us to explain that school is different than their stereotypes created by High School Musical. Once I read this, I began to think about how Clements High School was. After thinking about it, I came to the conclusion that in some ways Clements is just like High School Musical just without the singing and dancing. Because I didn't want to strengthen their stereotypes, I let Sarah (from Minnesota) explain what her school was like. After taking a tour of the school and doing our presentation, the other exchange students and I went to the city to eat at a cafe. It was a really nice Friday with the other exchange students. On Saturday I went shopping with my host sister Nanna and I finally bought something! I ended up buying 2 sweaters, a jacket, and 3 shirts. Yes it took a lot of convincing to finally buy something since the prices are so ridiculously expensive. You couldn't buy a single sweater less than $50!!! After we went shopping, I treated (more like my parents ;) ) Nanna to mexican food for lunch. Of course is was nothing compared to the Tex-Mex food I've been craving, but it was actually really good! I ordered the burritos which were more like enchiladas without the chili sauce on top. P.S. Thanks Mom and Dad for lunch and clothes :) Love y'all

Sculpture in town.

Arthur is from France and also attends my school.

Arthur(France), Sarah(Minnesotta), ME, Thea( Danish YFU volunteer)

Thea and Arthur being crazy.

My host suggested that I invite all the girls from my class back to our house for dinner and desert after school today. We talked about what we would like to have and we both decided on tacos. Since leaving Texas, I have missed my moms Slut Brownies (chocolate chip cookie dough with oreos and brownie batter baked) that she makes and decided I would make them for dessert. The only issue here is that I have to make EVERYTHING from scratch! That means no buying a box of brownie mix and adding water, oil, and eggs or buying a roll of pre made cookie dough. Because of this, I had to find a brownie and cookie recipe that I could make from scratch. Once I found a recipe along with a video, I realized that everything is measured in cups and that in Denmark they measure everything by grams. My plans on baking then turned into a math class by trying to convert the weight of 1 1/3 cup of butter into grams and how many grams 2 cups of sugar weighed. I have to admit that converting everything was very complicated especially because one wrong conversion and the whole recipe would be messed up. Working hard in the kitchen, I successfully assembled everything into the pan and put it in the oven to bake! It ended up looking normal when it come out of the oven but I guess we will just have to see how it taste tonight! I also bought vanilla ice cream to put on top!! :)