3 more weeks!

OH NO my european experience is soon coming to a close =( Although I look forward to cooking without sterilizing everything before I touch it and spraying the bathroom with Ajax before I go in, I will miss it here.

Thursday. The school set up a mid-summer party for us at a place called Vega. It was fun, except the fact that there was no air conditioning whatsoever so it felt like an oven.

picture with kyle

oh Hawaii people, always find our way to each other

Friday was our "study" day, which actually turned out to be a sleep day. I didn't mind it ;) We then had dinner at my aunty's house and brought our Singaporean friend Lin with us. It is during these times when we eat an actual meal! Usually we eat small yet satisfying meals. When we go there, I get my rice! We also ate a pint of icecream, each -_- Thats how the Filipinos do it, feed you and feed you and feed you, and if you're filipino, you know that the polite thing to do is never say no....I was deceived when I thought I would lose weight when I came here, haha.

Saturday was shopping day!

Lesson 13: Everything closes at 5, except on Fridays where they close at 8, and Saturdays where they close at 3, and on Sundays where they're always closed, except the first Sunday of the month!

I really don't know the logic behind their store hour system, but we still have to accept it right? It's a bit confusing though because some places are open later on Saturdays, and there is 1 store we know that is open every day, so it's that type of thing that you just have to know from staying here a while. It also stinks because since everything is in danish, we can't really understand when they display their hours of operation, but I think we're getting it.

Sunday was the canal tour (round 2)! This time CBS (Copenhagen Business School) set it up. It pretty much went around the same route as I did last time so pictures are the same.

Week 4 The reality of school has now hit. I have to start working on a 10 page paper on the EU and a presentation about cross-cultural issues. I might be able to go to Berlin this weekend and Oslo, Norway the following weekend. We also want to go to Oxford to visit our fellow fish scholar Mariam so hopefully that materializes! Other than that, I still want to see the city..again. I want to be as touristy as possible these next couple weeks :D

Ok until next time, Aloha.

We are half way into our third week of summer school. Insane no? Time goes by so fast I can't keep up. From the last time I wrote, I said that the 2nd week of school looked promising and indeed it was! On Wednesday night, everyone and their mother (no joke) went to Ofelia Beach here in Copenhagen to watch the Germany versus Spain World Cup Match.

In this man-made beach, they set up a HUGE screen where everyone can come and watch the game for free and trust me, everyone took advantage of it. There were loads and loads of people! It was the first time Michelle and I went to watch a game there but they've been showing the game since the World Cup started.

a picture of the front and side of where we were sitting

As you can see, we were reppin Germany (and Hawaii apparently). There are about 3 people in our dorms that are from Germany and one of them painted the German flag on our faces. I kinda felt a connection with Spain just because I'm a little Spanish, but I dare not go against these group of people....

German fans standing

The whole area behind where we were sitting was filled with German fans! See the guy with the flag? That's our friend Mario who painted our faces.

Lesson 6: EVERYONE smokes

Back in Hawaii, we have this "Smoke-Free" law so I have been use to not smelling smoke for a long while now. I believe Denmark has the same type of law but it applies to workplaces and indoors. Outdoors however is a different story. During the whole 90 minutes of the game I could not get even one breath of fresh air. Everywhere I turned, right, left, back, front there was someone smoking. THE WHOLE 90 MINUTES. oh em I literally thought I was going to get lung cancer just by staying in that spot. I couldn't move either because that would mean straying from the group and if you saw the ending of the game, you know that there were many sad german fans =( sad story but still a great experience.

Lesson 7: Hotdogs are AMAZING!

Thursday. Since Michelle and I can't cook, we usually eat out. We heard that the hotdogs were good so we decided to try it and ho shucksness it was soo good! So aside from the hotdog, bun, ketchup, mustard and pickles, they have this special dressing that they put on it which makes all the difference! Plus they add fried onion bits that just tops the cake :D They also have fransk hotdog that are also good but I think I like these better.

Lesson 8: McDonald's Drive-Thru = McDrive (true story)

So for dinner (same day as hotdog..lol) we decided to find the McDonalds that's close to our dorm. Yup we're totally eating healthy..chee! But it's true, when we're home we never think of going to McD's, but when we're away we totally crave it. Comfort food I guess? So we walk in and look at the menu. 4 types of burgers. Yup, only 4. Big mac, some chicken sandwich, and 2 others that I couldn't read. Would you like to know the price of a meal? 55 kroners, around $10. Can you imagine?! SO guess what we got, 20 kroner cheeseburgers and baby carrots! Which is still quite expensive. We had to add the baby carrots so it felt "more healthy". Good news? Of course! The cheeseburger tasted EXACTLY like the one back home :D woooot!

Lesson 9: Daim Chocolate is the BEST McFlurry Ice Cream Topping

As shocking as this may be, they don't have Oreo Topping for McFlurry's here! But do not dismay, Daim is where it is at! It's like chocolate, caramel, toffee type deal. Simply amazing. I'm not sure if you can tell but this cup is mini compared to those in the states, and yet this also costs 20 kroners ($4). It was soooo worth it though...It's funny because Michelle and I share the same love for icecream. I'm extremely happy about it because I could be like "hmm, you wanna get icecream?" and she would never turn down the offer :D

Weekend. About half of the house went to Bornholm which is an island in Denmark while the other half of us stayed home. It was a good time to just chill and relax. We were able to do our laundry and shop (JOY! tehe). We also spent alot of time with my aunties. We ate dinner with them on Friday night, brunch on Saturday, then they brought us to a party with them in the afternoon. Meet my new friend!

Nikky, Chow Chow (seriously looks like a mini lion or bear..shoot)

On Sunday I was finally able to go to church! YAY! It was funny trying to figure out what to wear though. Some churches are chill and aren't really strict on what you wear yet others are. When we got there we found out it wasn't that strict so I'm glad I wasn't overdressed :D

3rd week. Time is seriously flying by. It's time to think about projects and papers. I'm actually up for it though. I also need to learn how to cook something before I leave. We asked our friend Matt to teach us how to bake so today we went to the grocery store to buy ingredients for cookies.

Lesson 10: EVERYTHING is in Danish.

So although everyone speaks english so there is no problem getting around, it is very difficult to go grocery shopping. We have no idea what anything is. Could you imagine trying to find confectioners sugar? Not only grocery stores but literally everything is in danish. Signs, announcements in the bus/train, laundry machines, menus! Everything on the labels are in danish. Guess what appelsin is. You would think apple right? Nope, its orange. No one warns you that you wouldn't be able to read anything here. The great thing is that the Danish people are sooo nice in helping. One danish lady saw our confused faces when looking at this box of sugar and we asked what kind it was and she goes "umm...sugar but white" and in total excitement i go "powdered sugar?!?!" and she says 'YES thats it" YAY!!

Lesson 11: They do not sell chocolate chips anywhere, no joke.

We asked the stores if they had and one store goes "we don't have but you can get regular chocolate and cut it up." That is exactly what we did!

We mixed a whole bunch of stuff together and refrigerated the dough. We had to wait 4 hours for it to cool so we watched a movie to kill time. FINALLY at 11pm we were able role up the dough, add MORE sugar, and bake for 12 minutes.

Lesson 12: We had to convert everything!

So apparently America is stubborn and we still use Fahrenheit and other forms of measurements that are different from the rest of the world. Our cookies still turned out good though!

Matt calls them "black and white." Original I know. They were good though! I ate like 5...after midnight...it is now almost 2 in the morning...and I'm not sleepy. LOL great job I know, but I really wanted cookies! And they taste the best when they just get out of the oven :D

Ok maybe I should go sleep, goodnight!

I have returned!

First Week: Ups and Downs

You might have noticed but I haven't blogged since we came back from Rome. It is not because I was lazy or because I didn't have time. It is because our housing didn't have internet for the WHOLE first week of class! OMG right? That honestly had alot of us upset. We couldn't talk to our families, check our e-mails, or go on facebook! You could imagine the horror. Not only did our internet not work, but upon arrival our housing was not clean. Since I had my aunties with me and my mom was still here, we were the ones mopping and dusting and sweeping my room. The bathrooms however were horrendous. The kitchen was just as horrible. As you can see, all of these things put together resulted in a pretty rough first week.

Bright side? of course! haha. The classes I'm taking (as well as Michelle, yup we didn't register for the same ones but they put us in the same ones...lol) are pretty interesting. We're taking Managing Across Cultures where we look at different cultures, see how they work together, analyze the conflicts and see how they resolve it pretty much. Our other class is Business in the European Union where we look at the EU, what it consists of, their rules and regulations, etc. Another bright note is that though our housing is not the greatest, the people are very nice. Michelle and I were planning to move out because we pretty much got fed up with everything but we decided to just stick it through. I'm glad we did. Another positive is the fact that my aunties live 2 bus stops away from our house so we were able to eat dinner there couple times (hurray for rice!).

Pros and Cons of Arriving Early

One of the benefits of arriving early is the fact that we were familiar with the bus routes and how to get around. My aunties also briefed us on alot of useful information about the stores and malls and some customs of the danish. Being here early helped us get into business pretty quick in regards to school since we traveled a bit before classes started.

On the other hand, it took away the excitement of being and studying in a new place. While the others took picture of anything and everything around them, I felt it a bit old because I saw everything already. That is why during the first week I didn't take very many pictures. Hard to believe I know, but ok continuing on.

International Dinner

As part of our social program at school we had an international dinner on Thursday. We were to cook and bring our favorite dish from our country. As awesome as michelle and I are, we do not know how to cook, BUT because we are from Hawaii, we were able to pull off bringing pineapple! I told this to my best friend and she goes "You know how to cut a pineapple?" YES, well kinda. I watch my uncles and dad do it all the time. I am a weakling though and the knifes in the kitchen aren't very sharp so it was still quite a challenge but we did it! I forgot to take a picture of it =( but here's a picture of my plate during the dinner.

McD's Cheeseburger and McNugget, sushi, fried rice, dessert!

My tummy was controlling my choice of food, not my desire to try different food.

Lessons Continued

Lesson 5: Denmark loves loves LOVES icecream!

On Friday, Michelle and I went to the city to just walk around. Literally every 1 out of 5 shops were icecream shops. They absolutely love it here! I can't complain because I share the same love for icecream. We're always eating icecream now.

this is me by the harbor eating icecream :D

I said icecream alot...

Sweden: Round Two

On Saturday some of us took the 30 minute train ride to Malmo. If you read my previous blogs, the first time I went to Malmo we got lost, so not the fondest of memories. This time around it was good though. Our friend Matt had a book with a little map and the different sites we could go to.

Little Prague!

I might not be able to make it to Prague during this trip but at least I got a taste of it :D

Malmo Castle

Ok so we kinda got lost trying to find this place, but check out the sign that we saw before we entered.

OMG right? Our two other companions were haole (white) so they had nothing to worry about but 3 of us were asians. You could imagine our confusion and even a bit of frustration when we saw this. We then found out that it was part of a Nelson Mandela exhibition and this was a real sign in South Africa.

inside the museum

of course I take pictures of the instruments. lol

St. Peter's Church

Oldest building in Malmo

We then walked around more, found a restaurant where we could eat and watch the World Cup game then went home when the game was finished. All in all, it was a very fun day.

NOTE: more Malmo photos on facebook.

Independence Day!

Sunday was of course the 4th of July. A bunch of us Americans were pretty sad because we weren't home to spend it with our families but we made the most of it. The school set up a picnic type deal at a deer park. It was quite beautiful. Acres and acres of land, deer running around and horse drawn carriages made it unique from all the other parks I suppose.

can you kind of see the deer? haha.

After, we went to Bakken which is the oldest amusement park in the world. We all headed home quite early and still felt incomplete because there was no barbecue or fireworks for our 4th of July. We then went on a pursuit to find some burgers and fries! I suggested McDonalds because that is seriously the most American thing we could have eaten in Denmark. Of course they were not up for that so we found a small restaurant that sold American Burgers :D

Our 4th of July Dinner!

Second Week: Promising

As we go into our 2nd week of school, it looks promising. Everyone's making an effort to clean our house. Our internet finally works. It's getting cooler (because it was scorching last week). I had to make a valid effort to get out of this state of discontentment and look at the brighter side EVEN MORE than I usually do. I only have 5 more weeks here and I seriously want to make the most of it. I'm enjoying my time here and although I miss home, I know I may never have this opportunity again so I'm going to embrace it.

Until next time folks, Aloha.

Rome: The Eternal City

I'm back! wooooot :D

I couldn't blog while I was in Rome because it was 5 euros an hour to use the internet -_- it's funny, Michelle and I were joking with each other saying once we get home, everything is going to seem cheap because EVERYTHING here is way more expensive than Hawaii, oh my...

Rome. Beauty in every corner together with it's rich history made Rome an ideal place to go to before we start classes at the Copenhagen Business School next week. Special thanks to my mommy for treating (lol) and for letting me choose the place and Michelle for coming with, it was all in all incredible :D

Downer. We were constantly being warned by friends, family and other American tourists of the pick pocketers and how they are soo good you can't even feel it. 3 women, rather tiny compared to the rest of the world, in this foreign land that has seen their share of tourists, you could imagine my anxiety. Rome quickly turned from a city of wonders and amazement to a place where I didn't even want to explore with the fear of getting jacked. Nevertheless, we all found ways to "pick-pocket proof" our bags (while making it Jericah proof too..haha). After surviving the first day without anything getting stolen, I was able to relax just a bit.

Arrival. We arrived at around 10am on the 19th, took a taxi to our hotel but our room wasn't ready yet so we asked if there were any restaurants close by and they gave us a card to a restaurant down the street. First adventure in Italy! Walking the dirty streets with cars speeding past was not the greatest I must say, but I felt real girl-scouty..haha. Down the street ended up to be a 20 minute walk but we finally found the place.

yup, we were on table 1. Why?

we were the only ones in the restaurant. lol

oh wells, I had the fettuccine and it was amazing!

Scams. After we ate we asked for our check. We saw things we ordered on the check, but then there was something for 6 euros that we didn't order. We asked the waitress what it was and uncertainly she goes "the bread?" (the ones they give while you wait for your food) and we said "oh we thought it was free..." then she goes "did you not eat the bread?" but we said we didn't order it so she was like "oh ok, 6 euros less." We thought that in italy we have to pay for the bread, but then we read in the Rome book that they will try and charge you for things you didn't order. Good thing my mom thought twice because if it were just me, I would've just paid it. So yes, bread in Italy is free....The rest of the day we just stayed in the hotel and started our exploring the next day.

Vatican City. The next morning we took the bus to the Vatican City because this was the closest stop we could catch the "Hop on hop off" Tour Bus, which served as our tour guide and transportation to all the different tourist spots around Rome. What totally slipped my mind was that it was a SUNDAY! Oh my walking from the bus stop to the Vatican was literally breath taking! Singers in the background while the Pope speaking, it was the perfect introduction.

He was in the screen of course, lol.

St. Peter's Basilica

can you tell i was extremely excited?!

Favorite Restroom. I just have to talk about our "favorite restroom." So since we took the bus to the Vatican every morning, we found a clean restroom in one of the cafes. The thing is, the reason it's so clean is because there's a lady that's always cleaning it. In return for the use of this restroom, people give tips. We went to the cafe at least 3 times a day to use the restroom, so we invested plenty of money to the cleanliness of that bathroom :D

me waiting in the cafe...lol (yes I just had to)

Castle San Angelo

Right across the street from the Vatican

The Vatican from across the street

Gelato. Of course we had to eat gelato. "Italian Ice Cream contains twice as much sugar as American Ice Cream" says Mrs. Ungermeyer from The Lizzie Mcguire Movie (tehe).

Trevi Fountain. This is one place I just HAD to go to. When the tour bus said Trevi Fountain we "hopped off" and followed the sign and the crowd. There's just something about the walk to the place where you've only dreamed of going and being just seconds away from seeing something you've only saw in movies that just thrills me. Like walking to the Vatican, seeing the Trevi Fountain first from its side was just majestic! I believe the crowd of people plays a role in adding to the excitement because they are just as excited as you to see it!

from the side

from the center

Michelle and I before we made our wishes!

Coliseum. The next day we planned to spend most of our time by the Coliseum. You could imagine my excitement! (I get excited alot). Just thinking about how majestic it must have been at it's prime! "Top notch" facility at that time, loads and loads of people and of course, the gladiators and animals. Our tour guide said that the gladiators consisted of slaves. If they won, they would win not only money, fame and women but also their freedom. Sad thing is only 2% of gladiators survived. Blood shed at its max. I could not imagine having to fight that hard just for my freedom. To think this served as entertainment during their time. If only they knew the value of life....

we weren't sure if we were suppose to smile or be sad...

inside the coliseum

No shoulders, no shorts... So our 3rd day we decided to concentrate on the Vatican City. We read in Michelle's Rome book that if we went to the Vatican, we can't show our shoulders or wear shorts. We thought it fine because the previous days were cold, but no, that day the sun came out and it was scorching. It was worth it though, kinda...

haha the sign before you enter

inside st. peter's basilica

Spanish Steps. We took a break from the Vatican, hopped on the tour bus, and went to see the Spanish Steps. Once again, same feeling while walking towards the steps...

...no photos. Ok Vatican continued. We then made the 1 kilometer journey from st. peter's square to the Vatican Museum where the Sistine Chapel is!

sign was deceiving! because there were literally 20 of these signs until we actually reached the Sistine Chapel. We had to walk around the whole museum first before we reached it.

some of the art that we passed on our way to the Sistine Chapel

last sign! FINALLY....

The walk in seemed like slow motion, dark and cold, people standing in awe of the ceiling. I take out my camera about to take a picture, then comes a loud voice "No Photos! No photos..." The one place we walked endlessly to see is the one place we couldn't take pictures! I think Micheal Angelo wouldn't have mind if I took a picture of his fantastic work of art to show my daddy! ;) oh wells, was still amazing.

ha! the last stretch before we got out of the museum

Last Thoughts. I always seem to be thinking.

Flavian Palace Ruins

Together with our Coliseum Tour was a tour of Palatine Hill, where Rome is said to have its origin. This is the hill where Emperor Domitian built his palace and the emperors to follow altered it as they pleased. While on the tour, our guide did a wonderful job of painting a picture of what it looked like at the time. Marble everywhere, his very own stadium for chariot racing, a huge fountain right infront of the bedrooms for his family to look at, can you see it? And yet, today they are as the picture above displays it...just ruins. It must have taken years to build. Plenty of time and energy and strength. After all these years, all that remains can't justify the beauty that once was. It makes me think of all the things I'm living for. If it's just to obtain money and even fame, I just think that it will all fade. If I live for something much higher than what this world could physically display, then I believe it is much worth my time. Impacting lives, enjoying the time I have with people I love and loving Jesus, those will last :D

Long blog. but it's Rome. haha, back to Denmark! If you're still reading, thanks! Hope you enjoyed it.

Until next time