a bold choice

im makign a bold choice- due to the amount of reading i have for certain classes here, i have just decided i may or may not "look over" the readings. i think its a little absurd to give around 170 pages of reading for one class on a given night. now some/most of my classes have a significantly less amount of work, but still. i am mad and i dont care. rahr.

amazing is an understatement

im sitting in my new apartment in my beautiful living room writing this right now. i dont think i can even begin to describe the step up in my housing. My room is huge and the comforters and bed are amazingly comfortable. everything is white and brand new. also, the location is right near school, two train stations and pretty much everything else in medieval copenhagen. location is key and this is great!

after my last post i packed up all my stuff, which took a lot less time than expected and got a taxi to the apartment. after the long drive, i made it but realized i had to walk up ALOT of narrow stairs to get to my apartment on the top floor. upon entering i was amazed. after saying hello to some of the roommates, some of which i had stayed in the hostel with, i unpacked and chilled around. I ate some dinner and attempted to do some work. at around 1130ish my roommates and i went out, searching the streets for a fun bar to hit up. we ended up going to one called the australian bar, which is usually where all the americans are. we kinda wanted to go to a place to meet danes, but at that point we were freezing and just wanted to get somewhere. unfortunately for me, i didnt have my school (DIS) id and had to pay about 10 bucks to get in while everyone else got in for free. we got drinks, and i was so proud of my self because i actually finished the beers that i got, and knowing me thats incredible. we had a lot of fun, dancing, drinking and what not. after a while we left, and hit up some food and went back to the apartment, where more chilling took place. ended up going to bed around 4 and woke up this afternoon at 1. i was serioulsy surprised cuz i dont remember the last time i actually woke up that late. i dont know if i like it or should get used to waking up early again? we shall see. i cant sleep away my weekends abroad.

today i also didnt do much besides work. i went back to DIK to eat dinner cuz i had i had no food here and i knew i could get a good meal over there. it sucked cuz todya would have been a great day to go food shopping, but of course everythign is closed on sundays. and tomorrow i have class all day. but maybe ill find some free time during the day. otherwise, ill have to hit up 7-11/supermarket for some quick already made food.

im just chilling now taking a break from the crazy amounts of reading i need to do. if i had to say anything bad about this program so far, its the amount of work. if you want to go abroad to have a crazy party time dont come to copenhagen through DIS. you may get really lucky and not get a lot of work, but chances are you will. its about the same amount of work that i have at home. oh wellll. everything else is great here so i dont care to much about that.

off to go do more reading now, hope everyone is having fun wherever they are!!!

the longest day of my life

so last i left off i was in limbo of what was going to happen regarding the housing situation. Since my parents and myself complained and let DIS staff know i was very uncomfortable living in the area, they managed to get me a room in an apartment right around the corner from the school. (which i have to say is much safer and a much better location for when you want to get home after the partying, which youll understand why soon). I havent been there yet, but after i write this blog, im packing all my shit again, which is going to be hard since i have more shit now, and get a taxi and get there.

In other news, classes were great, though i was definitely falling alseep in one of them. After classes and shenanigans i had to deal with, i went back to my room with d-todd, and then chilled. around 6 we left to emilyss place, ate dinner, and then chilled for a little until we proceeded to go to the DIS party.

The party was in a club, and it was alot of fun: free drinks, dancing, people around. but after a while we left to meet emilys friends and proceeded to head to christiania (which is a place where people dont pay taxes and do whatever they sort of want to do. theres alot of artistic graffiti all over the place, and its sort of a hippyish place. the danish gov't doesnt like it but they dont really do much to stop it) we headed around looking for a bar and eventually found one and got drinks, even though we didnt stay there. we left cuz it was really crowded with older people and found a garbage can with fire to stay warm. (they have those all over the place in christiania) we left after a group of people came by and some guy through something in the fire that caused two smallish pops of fire which were like small explosions, and found another bar with a dj blasting music. we sat, had drinks and chilled. we waited a really long time for one of emily's other friends to arrive so we (or should i say danielle and emily) periodically got up to dance a little. it was lots of fun, but apparently not a usual night out.

after her friend showed up and we chilled for a little longer, we left. getting home was the very annoying part. we took a metro back to the center city and realized that the train home was either a very long time away or not coming (since they dont work at night. however, it was a weekend, so they should run every hour. we didnt know for sure, so we didnt take chances.) we walked to the night bus place but it was annoying too cuz danielle and i didnt know how to get home on the late bus, and emily and her friends who all lived together did. we just went back with them, and danielle and i would spend the night. i actually ended up going to bed around 445-5ish in the morning, and left emilys at 715 which is when the trains start movign every 10-20 minutes. since im on emily's line all i would have to do was take the train 3 stops and i was home. i left to the train station at 715 and missed the train so i had to wait 20 minutes in the freezing cold. finally got on and got back here around 8ish where i literally took off my jeans put sweats on and passed out until 215. understandable i guess.

all i can say is it was a fun night but i hope to never have to do that again. and i wont since ill be moving to the center city where i can literally walk home from most bars and clubs. if not i can take a metro that runs all night to the center train station right near the apartment. i also knw ill be the one hosting friends who dont want to go home, but we shall see sinc ei have a roommate now.

so much went on in one day. and i think after i get settled in my new place, im gonna start to take it a little slower. or hopefully itll feel that way. bye for now. i need to pack and get the hell outta here.

oh the dilemmas

so from where i left off i think was the night of the robbery and assault. so in two days its been CRAZY. yesterday we had two meetings with DIS abotu what happened, how we feel and what they were going to do. they offered for those of us who felt unsafe to stay in a hostel until they found something more permanent. i went last night but there was no way i could do another night with 5 other people in one room (meaning 6 beds in a room) wiht internet i had to pay for and one bathroom and nothing else, so i just opted to come back until they found something else. my parents called DIS and F&M to figure out what could be done, considering i feel extremely unsafe living in an area with arab gangs. i know i may be a little stereotypical but quite frankly i dont really care as im scared. fo sho. the area i live in seriously looks like a concentration camp, not even kidding. what does this look like to you. and even this is a nicer version because imagine it in gray whether and snow all around, and immigrants gangs chilling around.

http://wikimapia.org/730931/DIK-Denmark-s-International-Kollegium

in any case, DIS finally found apartments in the center of copenhagen for us to stay in. theyre suite style and hopefully they will be much better. but for now im back in the dorm waiting to see when they will move us. hopefully before the weekend is over.

in other news, today was the first day of classes.
i had:
european politcs and society: the EU
holocaust and genocide, and
church and state:religion and politics

tomorrow i have:
international law from a european perspective, and
history of the european ballet

on tuesdays i have what i have on fridays (tomorrow) except one more class: classical and renaissance rome (which takes me for 5 days to rome!)

on mondays i have the same schedule as thursday
and on wednesdays i have field tours to random places in copenhagen that are relevant to that particular class that takes us. shoudl be fun later on in the semester.
however, my classes, at least the ones i had today ARE FREAKING HARD. like mega. but if i can get through a semester in F&M i will be able to get through anything. or at least i keep tellign myself that.

tomorrow theres a DIS welcome party (free drinks woot, cuz its so expensive here and i hate beer, ugh) so ill be hitting that up wiht friends and then we will most probably do some other random fun stuff/finding a chill and fun bar or somethign like that. not sure yet. but hopefully it will be fun and something that can take my mind off all of this crazy stressful housing shiz and classes.

byez for nowwwwwwww.

dramzzz in good ol' denmark

well theres been alot going since i last updated.

heres a brief summary of what went on.

we had orientation which was boring on monday. all just lectures abotu what/what not to do...blah blah blah same old stuff.

then i came home, went food shopping, made dinner and pretty much chilled all night. if i ended up doing something i dont remember. lol all i know is i went ot bed really late and i had to get up mega early to be at the school at 9am. which i will have to do tomorrow (wed) as well. ugh. and its already 145am here. so anywyas.

today (tues) was fun. 9am-12pm we had a survival danish class where we practiced how to say hello and how are you in danish. (very hard language and i already started to give up). we also went to a danish supermarket (the most expensive one) to learn how to say differnt foods so that we can understand when we go shopping. it was really expensive but also really nice and tempting to just shop there. but for now i may just stick to dear old cheap netto.

after our survival danish we got split up into groups for a scavenger hunt around the city. btu first i had lunch with some fummers which was nice. then i found my group at the meetup point and we went from there. the hunt was from 1-3:30 but if definitely took our group longer since we toook our time at certain places. also we didnt even make it to one of hte stops. at each stop there were questions we had to answer but the questions were stupid. it was really nice seeign all the sights but i think i would have loved it if it was ALOT warmer out. the cold did not help, and my feet were killign me towards the end. i will upload pics soon on facebook for all to see.

after the scavenger hunt we went to an emersion fair to try and get us intergraded into danish culture. i signed up for a danish cooking class so that should be lots of fun. and yay food! also i finally saw emily!!!!!! so happy for that. shes great and i missed her so much so soosoooo happy to be here wiht her this semester.

after the fair we went to pick up books (which by the way weighed a ton, im taking 6 yes, 6 freaking classes and all have a million books (and big books) for each class. kill me now. happily three of these classes take me on tours around europe and one takes me to 4 ballets!)

we walked to the train station with our books and lugged them home.

then i ate dinner, and then left with a bunch of people from my dorm to go to a trip to ikea sponsored by our dorm (so we didnt have to pay to go with the DIS trip they were offering). IKEA was fun but my feet were killign me from all the walking done aleady and that was suckign majorly.

When we got back to the dorm chaos apparently happened. While we were out shopping, two DIS students' rooms were broken into by random guys who dont live in the dorms or go to DIS and stole a laptop, ipod and camera. One of the girls actually got assaulted by the men as she walked into her room adn saw them there and tried to tell them to stop. From this all mayham broke loose and students called DIS freaking out. DIS offered to let students go to hotels in the main city for the night if they didnt feel safe, and then would reimburse the students later. i was not one of the people to go, and right now there are a few international students and 3 DIS students in my unit including myself. THe other units have a bunch more. But a whole lot of people went. Quite frankly i think it would have been a fun experience to live in the center of the city for a night while DIS was paying, but i was already showered, so tired from the day, and unpacked the thought of packing a bag and traveling some more was not something worth thinking about. so i stayed. I figured the guys wouldnt be coming back tonight, and there are police surrounding the dorm units so no one can enter. also because i have to be up so early tomorrow i just figured being here with all my stuff would be fine.

so after all that drama i didnt get ANY work done for any of my classes (and theres alot) and instead hung around with the other two girls in my unit and the two RAs who were waiting for a repair guy to come and fix the doors and windows that were broken into. Thankfully my room is on a top floor and not a bottom so its much harder to get into.

Thats all my dramz for the night but i feel so horrible for the girls who go their stuff stolen. its a horrible way to start a study abroad experience. Tomorrow there is supposed to be a meeting with the housing people about what to do with all of us, since its potentially a security risk for us. ill update when i know whats up.

goodnight all. i need sleep.

made it to Denmark

after a long freaking plane ride in which i got absolutely no sleep, i finally made it to denmark. Not gonna lie, first impression kinda sucked as it was bitter cold, gray, and gloomy. It was a little depressing at first but things seem to be getting better quickly and i hope it continues on that way. After we arrived, we got our luggage and had to haul them into buses. After a 15 minutes ride, we arrived at a university in the new part of the city, had to haul all our bags again into a garage and then have a short orientation, registration and some other stuff. Needless to say, hauling two huge suitcases, a rolling carry on, my bookbag and a purse was an experience that i never want to do again (however, i know i will have to :() after that we hauled our bags again onto buses and made our way to our rooms.
I'm living in Denmark's International Kollegium (DIK), which is one of the Kollegiums that houses DIS students. Its about a 25-30ish minutes train ride to the city center where my classes will be held. DIK is made up of a bunch of units and my unit is mostly made up of girls from DIS They seem nice so far. However, they all seemed to be friends from before so theyre kind of a close nit group. Theyve been opening up slowly though. the rooms are not so attractive if i had to say it nicely. but at least i have my own room and a bathroom. its kind of empty, but maybe ill find someway to make it feel like a temporary home, as it doesnt right now.
its 7:31 pm on sunday right now and i still havent unpacked. with all that was going on today all i really managed (and wanted) to do was take a long nap. we had a pizza dinner hosted by our RA who is danish. Hes really funny so its entertaining to watch him talk and try to do things. I probably should start getting unpacked and stuff since tomorrow is filled with "fun" orientation things to do in the city center and I'll be out all day.
I miss everyone from home so much. Its been hard to adjust here when its feels so gloom and doom all the time. Luckily i have some of my favorite people here from home so that has definitely helped in transitioning.
Ill post again when some entertaining things have happened. Just wanted to let everyone know im safe in Denmark.

Getting Ready for a new beginning

SO, tomorrow (saturday) evening around 5:30pm I will be getting on a plane and heading over the atlantic to study in copenhagen, denmark!!!
Now I know everyones blogs start the same, discussing what they hope to do and experience while abroad, so I'm going to save you all the trouble since it is most probably the same as everyone else. However, i do know one thing. I WANT TO HAVE A KICK ASS TIME. and i most definitely will try my hardest to succeed in this.

so i'll try my hardest to keep updating pretty normally, but don't be surprised if i forget. I'm not the greatest at keeping up with stuff like this. Most of all enjoy:)
talk to you all on the other side!!!!!!