Thanksgiving and Malmö

Tuesday

I went to class at 10am and no one was there so I checked my email and there was one from the professor saying the guest lecturer is sick so there's no class. This was the second time in a row that I went to class when there was none, haha. 

Then I went back home but bought myself some pastries to eat my frustration with that class.

I called the doctor to make an appointment to get a prescription refill, but I called the kommune instead of the doctor three times.

I finally got a hold of the doctor's office, but the soonest appointment was in two weeks.

She mentioned I could come in if I could get there in ten minutes because there was a cancellation or something so I said OK then ran outside and closed the door and got to my bike and realized I didn't have the key so I just ran to the bus and the bus passed me and it said "not in route" so I went back and realized I didn't have the house key because it's connected to my bike key. HAHA.

So I called Bjarne and he said I could knock on the neighbors' doors until I found someone who could give me a key or I could wait an hour until he got home.

So the second door I knocked on said they might have a key, so I waited for 10 minutes while he looked for it and then I got back home hahahaha.

So I missed the opening at the doctor's so I called again and she said I could come in Thursday at 8am.

Then I went to my second class and we learned how to put IVs into each other.

I got mine into Josie's arm almost perfectly and on the first try!

Ramya was going to do me but she said "I'm so scared" and so I was kind of freaked out and then there was a long delay while she had the needle in her hand while the instructors were talking in Danish and delaying her turn so she poked me with the needle finally and it hurt so I inhaled sharply and she took her hand away and got scared so I just got stabbed haha and then I didn't want to try anymore.

Wednesday

We had a field study for psychology today so my Developmental Disorders class went to Bispebjerg Hospital at 1pm for a lecture from a women who used to have borderline personality disorder.

Very interesting. And they fed us sandwiches and tea and coffee and cake.

Thursday - Thanksgiving!

It was really weird to go to class on Thanksgiving...I don't think I've ever done that before!

I stayed at DIS for a while because our Danish class was going to the Crazy Christmas Caberet at Tivoli's Glashallen theater at 7pm.

Jo invited the buddy network to a cafe for a little Thanksgiving treat but I was the only one that came so she bought us coffees and banana chips! We planned our little Christmas event which is on Tuesday so we think we're going to go ice skating and get hot chocolate. We are also going to have quite a bit of leftover money because so few people came to our few events, so we decided to have another cooking together day near the end before everyone leaves!

Then she bought us hot dogs with DIS money, haha, and she went to her parents' for dinner and I went to Tivoli for the show. Our whole class of 20+ were invited but only about 7 came! It was funny in a crude sort of way with a few jokes of bad taste, so theorhetically I was offended but I laughed anyway! It was kind of a parody of The Gladiator with Russelis Crowis and a bit of Danish and British humor. Vivian McKee puts it together every year, apparently.

Then, after about 3 people left, our professor bought the rest of us a waffle or crepe or aebleskiver, so I got a waffle. We discussed our last field study which is next Wednesday and after we visit the parliament he's going to take us to a cafe and we're supposedly going to try some glogg and gluwein which is like Austrian glogg. And we walked around a bit.

Friday

I checked my email before leaving for my 10am class because, you know, it was cancelled at 8am by email the past two times.

We had class, though.

And thankfully since we all did poorly on the last case study, our teacher is giving us two weeks to write this one.

We went to Rigshospital for my second class and we went to the CEKU which is where the med students have stuff to practice IV and sutures and ultrasounds and everything! It was super cool.

We practiced IV on mannequin arms with red water in their veins and it was actually harder than on Josie for me, but since I had done it before the med student supervising was like, "you got this, great job". Then we did sutures on foam arms and the med student supervising said I was a pro! Haha, task-oriented medicine is my calling.

Then Taylor came over and we couldn't figure out how to turn the electric stove on to make dinner so we heated up some pumpkin soup and ate a piece of bread with it and a banana. We couldn't find Molly's food either so we gave her some meat and cheese and bread! She was being super funny because we weren't feeding her right like Linda does, haha.

Then we ate popcorn and candy and had some tea and watched three episodes of American Horror Story and then the movie The To-Do List with Aubrey Plaza.

Chloe went to London so Taylor slept in her bed and it worked out pretty well! 

Saturday

Taylor and I woke up around 9am and got ready to go to Malmö for fun and we met up with Taylor's date Dana at Central Station at 11am. We ate pastries from 7-11 for breakfast and we brought some bananas from home, too.

One way tickets to Malmö were 105kr.
We took the train over the bridge to Sweden and it was pretty cool!

We didn't plan to do anything there so we just walked around and found some cool stores to browse in.

It reminded me a lot of Copenhagen, and it was decorated for Christmas, too.

There were Christmas markets in the street, and they had mostly the same things that they have in Copenhagen but I saw donuts here and not in Denmark, so that was nice.

We went to a cafe for some coffee and a pastry. I got a mocha and a Swedish cinnamon knot thing, kanalbullar. Dana got one with cardamon. 

We kept browsing stores, and the two of them wanted to look in this science fiction bookstore, and it turned out to be way awesome because apparently Game of Thrones is science fiction so I found all the books by George RR Martin in there in English!

Then we walked around a cemetery that was also a park.

The decorations were super cute in the town squares!

And we had gone to a furniture store called Bolia earlier, and then there was this lamp statue in the middle of a square! They like their home goods, them Swedes.

Then, I was getting really hungry for real food/lunch.
We walked around for FOREVER trying to find an open cafe. 

But we found this place called Tre Vänner which means Three Friends and we split a family sized margherita pizza that came with cole slaw. I also got orange juice. Swedish was kinda similar to Danish but there were definitely differences that I couldn't understand.

And I finally got to the pharmacy to pick up my prescription while it was open. The whole process of going to the doctor was easy, though. I came in during a kind of 'open hours' and got in right away and they had the same type of medicine under a different name and I just swiped my CPR card and everything was smooth! And at the pharmacy, the prescription was cheaper than it would have been in the US!

Movies and Baking

Saturday

I went to the Hunger Games: Catching Fire movie at 12:30pm in the big colorful theater right next to Vesterport Station.

I went with Josie and Becky and two of Becky's friends.

The theater looked like old architecture but it was definitely up-to-date in terms of really nice seats and movie playing stuff.

The seats were SO comfortable, which was good because it cost 95kr.
The lady tried to make me pay 100kr but I came back and told her none of my friends paid 100kr so she gave me 5kr back, MUAHAHA!

Then Becky, Josie and I went back to Josie's house. She lives an even longer bike ride away from her train station than I do. Quite the long, cold ride.

We started watching the movie "Arthur" while we waited for Josie's host dad to come back from shopping, and that was the weirdest movie I've seen in a long time.

Then we started making Napoleanshatte cookies. 

I mixed the crust with my hands!
Josie's host dad put nougat between layers of marzipan and apparently that's a traditional Danish candy!

This is what they looked like before we spread chocolate on the bottoms.

And for dinner we had potatoes in cream with onions and steak and a salad and tuna mousse on homemade bread (so delicious)!

Napolean Hats with chocolate on the bottom, instead of dipping the corners in chocolate.

Josie's host dad made crepes/pandekager for dessert, so that was also awesome and I took some home for breakfast.

We also started making homemade brown bread with seeds and dark syrup and stuff in it, but it wasn't done before the host dad drove me home (so generous) and so Josie will bring me some on Monday during class!

Sunday

I watched the rest of Downton Abbey season 4 today, and Molly cuddled with me because Simon wasn't home! I also did homework and readings and got the feedback on my psychology case study that I knew I did terribly on and I got a B- overall, so it's basically like being at Macalester, haha.

And I forgot!

On Wednesday after dinner, Chloe had some friends over and Bjarne and Linda made homemade hot cocoa and 

Æbleskiver and gløgg and roasted chestnuts and it was super delicious while we watched "Love Actually" which Chloe says is a Christmas classic. 

There was whipped cream for the hot cocoa and it wasn't the sweet kind so it went perfectly, and the leftover hot cocoa I saved in the fridge and have been drinking it with breakfast, haha.

We had jam and powdered sugar with the Æbleskiver and salt with the chestnuts. The gløgg had vodka-soaked raisins and almond slices and hazelnuts in it and it was all so hyggeligt and laekkert!

Christmas Markets

Monday

I went thrift store shopping with Taylor for a bit only to find that the Red Cross didn't have much good stuff and this great store (Episode) had a ton of great things and even made diy stuff from old styles in their shop, but it was pretty expensive for used things, like $18 for a sweater.

Then I went to the post office to return the hair dryer I bought for gramma and I had to pay for the shipping so that sucks.

But the city is all decorated for Christmas with garland and hearts!

Wednesday

I had to meet with a group to work on our presentation for Medical Ethics on euthanasia at 11am, and then I went to Tivoli!

It's all decorated for Christmas, too.

It smelled like pine and it was like Christmas magic!

A lot of the shops were the same as during the Halloween set-up like mittens and hats, but there were also a ton of Christmas decoration-type things for sale.

And there was a reindeer by a sleigh!

There were some really great candles that I wanted in the shapes of Christmas trees and flowers.

There was a sweet Christmas castle thing with robot elves, too.

And a Trojan horse reindeer, for I don't know what.

And, duh, I had cinnamon sugared mini-donuts.

Friday

I woke up to get to class by 10am, but when I checked my email on the train, I learned that class was cancelled. This is the second time this teacher has cancelled class at the last minute so that a lot of people showed up to class.

Anyway, after being pissed that I learned I could have slept in, I decided to hit up all the Christmas markets since I was already in Copenhagen.

The Christmas market at the Stork Fountain on Strøget was just opening when I got there, and no one was opening their stalls yet.  

So I went to a branch of the bakery that ma and gma and I got all our pastries at while they were here, and I got a coffee and a kringle. The kringle had raisins and a lot of sugar and custard and it was amazing.

After slowly eating my kringle, I went back out to the market, and a lot of stall still weren't open so I just looked around. There were a lot of hats and mittens and scarves and ornaments and food.

The temperature hit freezing last night, so there was some frost!

Then I walked over to the Christmas market on Nyhavn.

And it was a lot of the same things I've been seeing at all the Christmas markets. But all of them were very prettily decorated and it smelled good and I definitely missed any large crowds. 

Then I walked back to DIS along Strøget, and at an intersection a woman tapped me on the back and started talking to me in Danish. She asked (in Danish) if I spoke Danish and I was like "eh" so she asked me in English if she could take my picture for a magazine. She said it was about street fashion, so she asked me for my name and after she took about 4 pictures, she asked me if I knew the brands of things I was wearing. I didn't really so I let her look at the tag of my coat and she wrote that down and thanked me. Then we said goddag to each other and I felt really awesome.

This is what I was wearing.

This isn't the picture for the magazine. I don't know if it would ever be published or if I made this face in the real photo, but I just asked some random girl on the street to take my picture so I could put the photo in my blog of the outfit I wore that got me some paparazzi, LOL!

Haha, and the Facebook status I wrote about this got more likes than anything else I post on Facebook.