The vikings stole my internet

I'm sorry it has been so long since I have posted. I hope you enjoy my experiences the last two months as much as I did. Here are my feelings about Christmas in Denmark as I described it to my Rotary club, a rigtig spændende oplevelse (a really exciting experience), and it really was.

Thoughts turned to Christmas in Denmark on the first advent, which falls on the sunday of the last weekend in November, a little similar to the States. However Christmas spirit doesn't really get into its full swing until about 2 weeks before the actual day. About two and a half weeks before jul (christmas) I baked vaniljekranser (delicious round Danish cookies) with Lene and Amalie. You can see just how much fun we had based on my facebook photos. Not to mention the cookies were absolutely delicious! Two weekends before Christmas, I went out with my family to get the jultræ (Christmas tree) at a christmas tree farm. A first and for me and a hilarious adventure. It sure beat the heck out digging the christmas tree out from storage in the garage. My host mom was determined to find the perfect jultræ. My host dad, Amalie and I walked around pointing at Christmas trees asking her "hvad med denne træ?" (what about this tree?) Her response for the first half and hour was "det er for stort" (it is too big), "det er for høje" (it is to tall) "det er tomt på toppen" (its to empty at the top). hahahaha ah so fun. Anyways, after searching about in the balmy december, Danish weather (insert sarcasm) we found the perfect tree. Sure it had a funky top, but the invention of the saw could handle that quite well. When we arrived home, we drank gløgg, warm, spiced, red wine) and ate æbleskiver (sort of like waffles rolled into a ball with sugar and marmalade) while feeling returned to our frozen bodies. On the last advent day (last sunday before christmas) I made maricipan confect with Amalie and Lene. I love marcipan!!!!!!! It tastes so good, and we buy it in large tubes and make delicious, chocolate covered masterpieces. America should really adopt this custom. In the afternoon, I went with my first host family to see my sister, Julie, and my mom, Mette, sing in the concert they have had annually for many years. It was beautiful. They are both amazing singers as well as the others they sang with. After school let out, I headed down to for a short trip to Odense to visit with Irene, the former exchange student that lived with my mom's family in 1983, and her family. It was very hyggeligt. While it snowed and snowed and snowed some more outside, we made more marcipan confect and talked. It was really great to see them again. Without too much train trouble, I made it home on the 23rd to find that my two older host sisters had come home from Århus. It was awesome to see them again. That evening we brought the Christmas tree in to decorate it. After getting the tree to fit in the stand, we began to put the ornaments on including real candles! I thoroughly enjoyed the fact that the Danes don't let fire safety stand in the way of a good time. I explained to them that we didn't do that in the States since our trees were made of plastic, which they thought was a little weird. I got to put the star on top of the tree, which was awesome since not just anyone gets to put the star on top of the tree. The next morning, juleaften (Christmas eve) and Denmark's biggest Christmas celebration day, was crazy busy. We got up early since it was also Frank, my host dad, birthday, and we had family over for a birthday breakfast.Once we were finished with breakfast, we had about two or three hours break before we started preparing Christmas eve dinner. When we were finished we all sat down together and ate. I tried duck, the main dish, for the first time. It tasted amazing! Once we were finished with dinner, Lene broke out the risalamande. Risalamande is similar to rice pudding; it has almonds, whipped cream, rice and is served with cherry sauce. Now the risalamande is fun since there is one whole almond put into the giant bowl, and the person that finds the almond gets an extra present. As you could imagine there was quite the competition going on between all the family members, especially my host sisters to guess who had the almond. My oldest host sister, Ditte, found the almond to the dismay of Amalie and Laura. She won a trivial pursuit game, which we played a few rounds of. Next, we all gathered around the Christmas tree in preparation to dance around it and sing Danish christmas songs. Luckily they had a song book, so I could sing a long! Ahhhhh it was sooo much fun! I apologize that my last sentence was so spastic, but I'm pretty sure that at that moment dancing around the Christmas tree and singing was one of the happiest moments in my life. I couldn't stop grinning ridiculously. We sang one sang for every family member that was there. The fun doesn't stop there. Then we ran around the house, through every room, singing "nu er det jul igen! nu er det jul igen!" I'm pretty sure there were other lines but that was pretty much how the entire song went. The evening goes on. Next we opened presents. Yeah thats right America, I got to open my presents 24 hours before you did :) We opened the presents one at a time, so it took about three hours. I got some really nice stuff. Beautiful clothes from Camilla and both of my host families, Hans Christan Andersen's fairy tales in Danish from my third host family, a book about Denmark from my counselor and his girlfriend, a beautiful Christmas ornament from my current host family, and in good fun a hinbær snitter (Danish cake) that I had asked for on my Christmas list as a joke. It was definitely the most tasty Christmas gift that I have ever received. I was surprised by all of the gifts that I was received, and it made me feel so loved and a part of both of my families. I couldn't have had two better host families.

Well that paragraph is getting a little long, so now I will use a new one to talk about what I did on Christmas Day. The next morning we headed out to Lene's mom's house and had a Christmas lunch with Lene's family. I seriously have never eaten so much in a short period of time. It was like having Thanksgiving dinner and Christmas dinner back to back. That afternoon I was pretty sure that I never wanted to eat again. After eating, we played pakke spil, which involves ridiculous gifts that you roll a dice for. If you got a six you took a gift from the middle of the table, and in the second round you took a gift from someone else. I won a bag of candy, some gum, pig fat (that I "accidentally" left on the table) and tattoo arm warmers. Not to bad considering my host sister Amalie went home with only a pink spatula. When we returned home, Amalie, Ditte, Laura and I got ready to go up into the city, which is what the Danes did Christmas night. I had a fun time hanging with Amalie and her friends from her gymnasium class. On the second christmas day (dec. 26th) I went to the Hansens house, my first host family, and had Christmas lunch. I was pretty sure that I would burst since I had consumed so much food in the past three days that it would be impossible to eat again until New Years. After eating I played another game of pakke spil. This time I won a candle holder, napkins and a reading light. How cool is that?! Now I can read a book in the dark while wearing my tattoo arm warmers eating candy from a napkin and chewing gum while holding my candle holder.

On the 27th of December, I took the train to Copenhagen to spend a few days with exchange student friends that I had in the area. We had a pretty good time. We spent the two days walking around Roskilde and Copenhagen as well as just relaxing and talking. I was home a couple of days before New Years began. The day before New Year's Eve, Frank, Lene and I went on a day trip to Skagen. I love that city. It is so hyggeligt and beautiful with the nearby beaches. We had a coffee and the biggest pieces of lagkage I have ever seen at the Brondums Hotel. It is the hotel that all of the famous Skagen painters lived. There was even some of the original paintings up on the walls. Very cool. The awesome thing about New Years in Denmark is that you can buy fireworks and shoot them off! Needless to say the sound of fireworks filled the night air long before New Years. On New Years Eve I started the evening with Frank and Amalie down at neighbor's party. We watched the queens's speech and ate together. It was a delicious Italian meal prepared only by the men. So good. Later that evening I took a train out to Sindal to meet up with Esther and her classmates for a party. It was wild and so much fun! Erin, another one of my good exchange student friends was there and we had such a great time. We shot off fireworks, well the boys did while the rest of watched from a safe distance. It was the best New Years party ever!

There isn't really much other to report than that. I'm just busy living life going to school, learning Danish and hanging out with friends. In February I'm going with my host family to Austria to go skiing for a week, and I am so excited. Now I something to give my dad grief over after all of his repeated reminders of what a fantastic snow year it is in Nevada. Happy New Year to everyone! Vi ses :)