Rogaland

The last excursion of my study abroad experience is over, and my Danish future now consists of relaxing, absorbing my surroundings, and packing. I returned yesterday morning from my trip to Stavanger, Norway, with just enough time to study and take my last final. It went fine, I figure study abroad is the only time you can take an international flight and a final exam on the same day, and consider normal.

My return to Norway went better than I could have hoped for. Chelsea and I had a really great time, spending time in town but also seeking out as much nature as we could get. One thing I really hadn't forseen about Denmark, was its lack of unaltered natural areas. That really goes for Europe as a whole. People have been maniputlating the environment, taming nature and prospering from it in Europe for thousands of years. North America really doesn't quite have this same characteristic, yet. Norway is an astounding exception to this phenomenon, as the whole country has less people than the suburbs of Houston, and enough mountain, fjord, and forest that widespread civilization never really took grasp. We took a ferry tour of Lyssefjord, the fjord that lies below the iconic Preikestolan or 'Pulpit Rock' so commonly associated with the Stavanger region. The next day we set out to make it to Manafossen, a beautiful waterfall and hiking area an hour outside Stavanger. Berge, Gaye's husband and a great host, set out all the train and bus plans and schedules for us to get there smoothly. Of course, things don't go the way they are planned in life, and we missed the bus to the hike area, which we soon learned was the only daily bus to the area. So we found ourselves in a little town called Algar in the Norwegian mountain backcountry. We made straight for the nearest forest and mountain trail, and spent the day hiking the area. Up through forests, fields, and rocky mountain sides, we finally scrambled to the highest point we could reach, and the view was spectacular.

After a well earned chocolate bar, we made our way back down, this time cutting through rocky hillsides we discovered to be sheep pastures. If there is one sounds I remember vividly from being a kid in Norway, it was those big sheep bells. Clonking away among the moutain sides, the bells stopped only when the wooly animals paused to stare at you, half expecting a hand out. They did this in the middle of the mountain roads as well. By about 5:30 that afternoon, Berge came and picked us up and drove us further into the mountains where we had dinner at the candle factory restaurant, and then stopped for some great views at a number of breathtaking lookouts.

Returning to Norway was strange, yet comforting. The first day we wandered around downtown Stavanger, and I was able to lead the way to the fish market, McDonalds, and toy stores just as if I was there yesterday. Life has been moving on in Stavanger, without me. Things were the same, but also different. For one, everything seemes so much smaller than I remember them being, my line of sight is a few feet higher off the ground than it used to be I guess. Still, the things I remember were still there after all these years, and this was settling to me. After wandering town, we bought a carton of the juiciest, reddest strawberries (just as I remember them being) and then ate them all on the steps in the middle of town. I remember doing this when I was younger, most notably with my Great Grandmother Brock when we ate two whole cartons of strawberries on the steps, she talked about it everytime I saw her for years. Revisiting these moments are what struck a note with me. The last day Berge drove us out to my old house and stomping grounds. Those walls contain so many memories, and the people currently living in it have no idea. Seeing my old backyard and bedroom window put something tangible to those memories. It was all still there, a little different than when I left it, but there nonetheless. All these things are remnants of my past, a time I treasured dearly, but they are only remnants, and will never be the same as they once were. This is hard to accept, but necessarry. Revisting Norway served a point, I believe, and it was long over-due. Norway will always be a special place in my book, serving as the setting for much of what I knew my father to be and also what I will always remember of him. However, I cannot take Norway with me, it must remain a remnant, it will always be there for me, and I plan to return many more times. I have been back, it was still there, and now I can move forward.

Detaching my fingers from the keyboard

This week was a blur. It is Friday afternoon, and I will never be taking another class in Denmark. Classes are over, and finals start next week. Of course, there are some (myself being one) who had final papers in place of finals, all of which were due today. I am breathing a sigh of relief and begining to depressurize, I turned the last of four final papers in an hour ago. I have one exam next Friday, but it will not be a huge issue. The issue at hand right now is to enjoy our last two weeks here, sans classes.
On this upcoming Tuesday a friend and I will be heading up to Stavanger, Norway. I'm fairly sure that accesability to Norway was one of the main (concious or unconcious) reasons I chose to study abroad in Denmark. I have been thinking about Stavanger since I left it 12 years ago, and I wonder what it will feel like to be back. Maybe like some form of home? I'm not sure how to even define that concept anymore. I spent five years there growing up (2 - 8), and I think it served a good deal in shaping me. I'm nervous even thinking about it now. We are arranged to stay with Mrs. Gaye, my kindergarten teacher and a friend of the family from our years there. I guess I shouldn't be calling her 'Mrs.' Gaye anymore. Although it feels strange to not say 'Mrs.'. I feel that the person who is to owe for your knowledge of the color wheel and alphabet deserves some kind of title bearing importance. I suppose I'll just have to ask her.

Just finished another Saturday morning brunch. Brunch is always a delicate art of eating just the right amount, a skill that I have never really mastered. I guess if I have to stuff myself with something, smoked salmon scrambled eggs, rye breads, and cheeses are good items to do that with.
Today I need to start another one of my final papers. It's that time of the year, no matter where in the world I am it seems that the end of April will always be a time of panic. I turned in the first of four of my final papers yesterday morning, for my Bio. of Marine Mammals class. I chose to research Killer Whale ecotypes and speciation for my final paper, and I actually found the topic to be incredibly neat. Fun fact: Killer whales are currently one species (Orcinus orca), but years of research have shown that seperate groups of killer whales exist around the globe that are very distinct from each other. These distinctions are strong enough that the orca groups make up different 'ecotypes', these ecotypes don't interbreed or interact socially with each other. Mostly they differ by what they eat and where they live; fish eating coastal type, the mammal eating coastal type, and the fish eating offshore type. More recently there have been three new types distinguished in the Antarctic regions, the seal eating antarctic type, the whale eating antarctic type, and the fish eating dwarf Antarctic type. And, here's the coolest part, newest mtDNA research of today is showing that the genetic lineages of these different ecotypes are seperate enough that many biologists believe they need to be raised to seperate species of killer whales, with some divergences between groups showing to have occured over 700,000 years ago. Cool? I think so.
Anyways, enough nerd stuff. Last night my fellow American students at my hojeskole spent the evening at Tivoli in downtown CPH, our DIS sponsored night out together. Tivoli is the first theme park ever, so it's obviously very old. It was really pretty, and definitely a step up from six flags type parks, with a balance of historical classiness and modern type rides, if that makes sense. There was a concert in the middle of the park that was pretty entertaining, some type of techno rap.
Fingers of sunlight are filtering through the tree branch outside my window right now, a tree branch that is finally heavy with fresh green leaves. I keep telling people how amazed I am at how fast the world changed into spring time around here. They're probably getting tired of hearing me rave about it. But it really IS amazing. When I returned from Greenland two weeks ago, I could look into the forests on the train ride into town and see far into the depths of the forest, seeing nothing excpet bare brown skeletal tree trunks. Now, I can barely see past the first row of trees, as the leaves have created a flurry of a green wall. Dandelions, I mean big monster dandelions, line the sidewalks and populate the backyard of my hojeskole. It is a sight.
Alright, I guess I should go be productive. Cheers!

Enter: T-Shirts and Shorts

I returned from a long day of travels late last night. It was phase two of my spring break, spent in a completely different world than the first half. I was in Perugia, Italy with my old friend Shannon this past week, and I spent some time in the life of a study abroader in Italy. The days were framed by no schedules, lit by cloudless skies, and filled with pizza, gellato, wine, and much laughter. Perugia was a beautiful little town, two hours north of Rome, where I flew in. Shannon went way out of her way to pick me up at the airport, were we spent the night in a hostel.  A quick trip to the colleseum in Rome, as quick as such an experience can be, and then we were on our way by train to Perugia. Shannon lives in a stone apartment or town home type residence, so it made visiting a easy arrangement.

Shannon emphasizing the size of the colleseum.



A little park in Perugia we layed around in for a couple hours.



The days there were truley spring break, if I ever had one. I felt the first true warth of the sun in months, each day was in the high 70s. I even managed a little sunburn, a required token of spring break regardless of where in the world you are. The food was spectacular, as can be imagined. Most notably, is Tuesday night's meal. We went out to an "underground" restaurant, where we had a five course meal that lasted from 9 pm until almost midnight. Probably the best food I have ever had, consisting of a mix of bruschettas, shrimp pesto farfalle, italian sausage, fried mozzarrella, and tiramisu. I'm not exagerrating when I say it was delicious, and I'm not sure where else my food experiences could get any better. In addition to this, I ate gellatto and pizza on multiple occassions, of which are completely different than anything I've had in the states.

Lunch my first day.

I had a chance my last night there to attend Shannon's creative writing class' public readings at a bar. All of the pieces had to do with Perugia and studying abroad, and there were many a tear shed at the thought of going home. It made me that much more excited about still being out here, abroad, living in Denmark, something I may very well never do again. I have just under a month left of this unique time in my life, and I plan on savoring it. Today was a good start to that, as I sat around in the green lawn of my hojeskole all afternoon, enjoying my life with people from all over the world. My biggest stress being what time dinner is. Grill outs and eating outside are becoming standard each night. As I walked to the cornor store this evening to grab a beer for tonight's bonfire, there was not one house I passed that didn't have it's resident families sitting on porches or the front yard, enjoying the fading sunlight. Savor this I will.

At the top of the world

I just returned from my week in Greenland. Accompanying my class "Greenland: A Scientific Expedition" was a one week trip to Kangerlussuaq, Greenland. The trip was aimed to (from the itenerary itself): "Provide a close encounter with the ice sheet, discuss climate changes, see magnificent wildlife, experience incredibly starry winter nights and learn all about the aurora borealis". The past five days have been incredible, I have never experienced a more brutally magestic place; Greenland is staggeringly magnificent, and intoxicatingly beautiful. It is hard for me to describe it in text, pictures and emotions are probably more adequate. I will at least provide a brief list of the activities the 12 of us did.
Day 1: arrival, introduction to Kangerlussuaq, population 556. Tour around area, lectures on local fauna and geology.
Day 2: Morning hike up snowy peak near camp, dog sledding all afternoon across a frozen fjord.' Kaffemilk' at local Greenlander's residence, a coffee and cakes social tradition. A visit to local museum of the history of Kangerlussuaq. Late night sky gazing, successful aurora light show.
Day 3: Departure to the Russel's glacier and the ice sheet. Many stops and discussions along the way.
Day 4: Morning hike. Muskox safari and hike to lake and grazing grounds. Visit to 'Kellyville', an atmospheric, ionospheric and climatic research station run by the US science foundation and Stanford. Amazing Greenlandic closing dinner and slideshows.

I had many long conversations with people, and got to hear many of the past adventures of our professor, who spent many years studying ecology in Greenland. I think that I really want to look into arctic ecology, there is so much going on up there. In a world that seems to have so few mysteries left, it was amazing to be in a place that still has so many of them.
I put selected pictures in an album for anybody to see on snapfish. Here's the link: http://www5.snapfish.com/snapfish/thumbnailshare/AlbumID=3416108028/a=4402702028_4402702028/otsc=SHR/otsi=SALBlink/COBRAND_NAME=snapfish/

At the ice sheet's edge. Massive.

The first day's group shot.

Swedish Adventures

I refuse to believe that it is April, that I am registering for me senior year courses back at Trinty, and that I have six weeks left abroad. I don't understand this passage of time phenomenom, and I sure as hell hope that real life doesn't happen this fast. This time next week I will be on spring break, a vacation from vacation that lasts for two weeks. After that, I have only a few weeks of classes left here in CPH, with all my course work being wrapped up by the 6th of May. End of term papers are in our midsts, and thier discussion is a common theme among most of my classes lately. At least the stress from those deadlines are enough to make the end of my time here seem distant.

I spent this past weekend on a hiking, climbing, and canoeing trip to the Swedish back country. We spent Saturday canoeing until noon on a very lazy river, which made it seem more like a social excursion on water than an outdoor excursion. After lunch, we set for the rocky coast to find an area called Nimis. Built over a period in the '80s, Nimis was hidden by its only creator for two years before being discovered by the Swedish government. The 'park' consists of over 70 tons of driftwood nailed into massive building and walk-way like structures. I didn't think much of this description, but after a 30 minute hike to its secluded location on the shore, I was, bewildered. We entered the location one person at a time, as the entrance walkway was barely large enough for me.  Very similar to a giant tree house, you walk along pathways that are way off the ground, held up by snarled twists of driftwood nailed together in absolutely no orderly manner.

There were towers and tunnels, some set walkways among the clutter of wood, but mostly you just climbed it like a jungle gym.  We spent a good hour clambering around the shoreline structures, I snapped some great pictures from the top of one of the towers. On the climb back of the steep rocky slopes, I had to take off my jacket. With the excercise and mid 50s F weather, it was too warm! That night we stayed at a hostel out in the middle of farm fields, and we had a giant fire pit set up for a barbeque. The weather was just right, jeans and a long sleave shirt was all that was needed outside while we played volleyball and then ate our bbq chicken, sausages, and potato salad dinner. S'mores (on digestive bisquets, a scandanavian thing due to the lack of graham crackers here) and ice cream followed, and the sun made its final farewell at around 8:30 pm. Playing some cards until a ripe hour of 11:30 that night (we could have sworn it was 2 am), I even manged a full night sleep. The next day was spent repelling over rock faces and orienteering. The repelling took place on giant rocky cliffs along coves at the coast. We went down two cliffs, one more of a practice for the second much more precarious descent. Only once or twice did I wonder what in the world I was doing there, usually after looking down. After we had an afternoon of orienteering, a scavenger hunt type of competition using compasses and maps to complete activities all over the hillsides. The day was very foggy, and at times you couldn't see more than 100 yards ahead. There were many references to Frodo and the Ring, as it felt very similar to wandering around Middle Earth. If only.

It was a refreshing weekend to say the least, and really got me thinking about planning my trip to Norway in May, somewhere I really hope to get to before the end.

Shedding the Winter Coat

People are out and about here in Denmark. Within the last 10 days the weather has done a complete turn around, and it would seem that spring is indeed here. At first I was hesitant to say this, as it was sure to raise false hope.  However, I think we can finally start to expect sunny days and lighter jackets on a daily basis.  Lately, the sun has been out most of each day and the daily temp ranges have been high/lows of 45/32 F. The daylight savings time shift just occurred today, so the sun is up much later than  usual. Soon dinner will seem like it's in the middle of the day, and it won't feel acceptable to lounge by the fire after eating until bed anymore.
This past Thursday my good friend Shannon arrived from Perugia, Italy. She is currently studying abroad as well, and we made plans to visit each other while living on opposite ends of the European continent. We spent a day in my town of Helsingor, and also checked out Helsingborg, Sweden. She was pumped to be able to check two countries off the list with one plane ticket. We then spent yesterday in Copenhagen, under blue skies and among many bustling people. It was the most crowded I have yet to see Copenhagen, Stroget, the walking street, was packed with shoppers and travellers of all sorts. We made it back to the Hojeskole for dinner, and then returned to the city to experience some of the night life. I took her to one of my favorite bars, "Den Glade Gris", or "The Happy Pig" in english. We found a table in the back, sat and people watched, talked about good times past, as well as our adventures abroad. Eventually a band began to assemble, four guys on instruements and an incredible female lead singer. They played cover after cover of American rock, alternative, hip hop and even pop songs, adding a little of thier own character to each. Of the bands I have heard here in DK, they all play mostly American music, which I still find so funny. They introduce themselves and talk to the crowd in Danish, and then burst out with perfect english in their songs. Really odd at first, but neat. Shannon left this morning after we went to mosey around Copenhagen a little more before her flight. It has really meant a lot to have both Mike and Shannon visit me this semester, and I know that there are others that would do the same if they could.
This next week is going to be very busy academics wise, I'm going to have to tighten my belt and stay focused. Once I survive that, I have a hiking and canoeing trip to the Swedish backcountry next weekend to reward myself with. Life is good, cheers to all.