Lazy Friday

Rainy days suck the energy from me.

I woke up this morning with every intention on going into the city and doing some sightseeing, but when you look out the window and you see rain, and then you look at your phone and it says its only 55 degrees outside, all you really want to do is hit the snooze button and snuggle up. And that's exactly what I did today. I don't have any classes on Fridays so I decided to have a "Me Day" and do everything (at home) that I wanted to do.

1. Finish getting caught up on How I Met Your Mother...the new season starts on my birthday!!

2. Instead of going on a long run like I planned, do ab/arm/leg workouts in the house...while using my international humanitarian law book as a make-shift weight

3. Read my HC Anderson stories for my short analysis due Monday and starting working on it...well, at least I read the tales (it's Friday, give a girl a break)

4. Make lunch! I had a delicious spinach, tomato, and avocado salad that I forgot to take a picture of until I was halfway through...not so pretty looking then

5. Watch Lilo & Stitch...yes I know it sounds COMPLETELY random (and it is), but I have had the urge to see this movie for months now, so today was the perfect day to do it :) Extra bonus: There's a mention of The Ugly Duckling in the movie so it totally related to my Danish studies and wasn't that random

6. Email potential internship opportunities...next summer I am thinking about interning at either The State Department to work with government human rights programs, or intern with a law and human rights organization in South Africa! Cambodia is also an option, but I think South Africa is going to win (for now at least). My friend Stephanie is probably going to be there next summer too working with marine biologists so it would an amazing opportunity if we could go together!

7. Make dinner! My host parents were out this evening for different work-related commitments, which meant that I had to fend for myself. I decided to chop up as many vegetables as I could find and make a delicious stir-fry! Since I again forgot to take a picture, I will just describe it: red bell peppers, onions, broccoli, zucchini, button mushrooms, and small yellow potatoes all tossed together with some olive oil, salt/pepper, lemon pepper, and balsamic vinegar...YUM. It was nice to go vegetarian for once since every day I've had some sort of meat with dinner. I'm all porked out.

7 1/2. Make dessert! What the hell, I'm on a roll with the cooking so I might as well make something sweet (with chocolate duh). I looked up "easy microwave desserts" and found this delicious looking chocolate-mug cake. I measured everything correctly, however I think I overcooked it just a little...and by a little I mean it was hard as a rock. But have no fear! I was determined to make it work, and what makes everything better? Chocolate chips and ice cream. So this was the final creation:

(It tasted a lot better than it looks)

I'm going to have to practice more, but it was nice cooking again. I forgot how much I like to whip up spontaneous dishes (most of the time without any recipes). I can't wait for Thanksgiving so I can cook for my host family. Back home, it's turned into somewhat of a tradition for me to find the recipes and do most of the cooking for Thanksgiving dinner...which has been a blessing for my Grandma. I don't know what they're gonna do this year, but I'm hoping to bring a little bit of one of my favorite American/family traditions to Denmark.

I think I'm going to turn every Friday into Foodie Fridays and start posting at least one thing I make once a week.

Hej hej,

Emily

Program Study Tour: Denmark and Sweden!

Little wisdom from my host parents today: "There's a saying in Denmark that if you can eat, you're not sick." I guess that's true for me since even though my nose feels like a water balloon (not a good image?), I was still able to eat and get a long run in today.

So anyways (after that awkward introduction)... here's Part 2 of my study tour week:

I got back from my study tour to Hamburg around 9pm on Sunday, and then I had to get back up at 6am for my Justice and Human Rights short study tour around Denmark, yay!

First stop: Danish Navy Military Police Headquarters

This place was so cool...we met with Senior Chief Petty Officer Klaus Lund who explained to us Denmark's NATO mission in the Gulf of Aden to fight piracy off the coast of Somalia. And before the image even pops into your head, these aren't Johnny Depp pirates...these guys have AK-47s and RPGs (Rocket Propellor Grenades)...not so comical, eh? A couple of highlights to the trip were:

1. Got to hold both Danish military police weapons and confiscated pirate weapons

(and try on gear)

2. Take a tour of the newest ship in the Naval fleet being sent to the Gulf in October

(it looks like a giant toy boat)

After the tour, I was so amped up on patriotism and fighting the bad guys and secretly wishing I was in the Navy so I could wear the really cool berets (and spend months on a boat with attractive Danish soldiers), but our next visit reignited the girl in me: Egeskov Castle

Can you say fairy tale princess?

This castle is on the island of Funen (Denmark's second biggest island and the home to HC Anderson!). The family who lived here for hundreds of years still owns the property, but it is now used as a museum. Here are some pictures of the castle, its gardens, and a few surprises:

 Pretty gazebo in the gardens

 Sooo many flowers

 Just some peacocks wandering around...casual

 This picture doesn't do the dollhouse justice, but a hundred years ago, the Duke who owned this castle had a dollhouse built for his daughter's fairy queen friend. The house, or mini-mansion has every room you could think of: a ballroom, dining room, a chapel, a toy room, a music room, etc. And every room is fully decorated with handcrafted furnishings for the fairy family. It took twenty years, and you can see why. Absolutely no detail was spared.

 This is exactly what you're thinking: a creepy doll that's haunted in the attic. Legend says that if anyone were to move this doll, it would come to life and murder you on your birthday...just kidding, but seriously if you move the doll the castle will fall into the moat on Christmas Day. I still think the evil, possessed doll story is better.

 A maze that I totally thought I would ace and definitely failed. We gave up halfway through and got ice cream...

And then we found a high-rope bridge maze thingy!! This was the coolest part of the castle by far.

We ended the day in Aarhus, Denmark at our hostel, and with the night on our own, some friends and I decided to explore the city and the Aarhus Music Festival that was going on the week we were there! 

 I love these walls! There are a bunch of lines and people write, "Before I die I want to ___"

Blues Brothers, anyone?

Day 2 of the trip began with a visit to the Danish Navy Fleet Headquarters. We learned more about piracy and Naval operations. I'm basically an expert now. After a long morning of talks, it was time to relax...or kind of. I had never been kayaking before, so when my partner decided to jump out of the kayak into the water, three different times, I was definitely not prepared. Needless to say, I was soaked. I needed some warming up, and that's what bowling was for!! Following dinner we all went bowling at our hostel (professors included). I love bowling. My friends and I go all the time back home...and I get really into it...like really. My professors, Ulrik and Nicolai, and I had a contest to see who could get three strikes first. Ulrik however was booted from the competition because he's a strike-machine and it wasn't fair to the two of us... so technically I won :)

Moral of the story: When you play a game with your Danish professors and win, they will buy you a beer (or in my case, I wanted ice cream)

Day 3 of the trip started with a guided walking tour on the beach of Ringkobing of Hitler's Atlanic Wall. During WWII the Nazis built concrete and steel bunkers all along the Atlantic coast of Europe, and because of hardcore German engineering, they still exist today. I have never seen anything like this...

 The dunes of Western Denmark

 Looking over at the North Sea!

 One of the bunkers

 So apocalyptic...shifted in the sand over 70 years

Plus I saw one of the prettiest and BIGGEST German Shepherds ever...I need one.

Our second trip of the day was to the Jelling Stones! The Jelling Stones date back over 1000 years ago, during the Viking Age. King Gorm the Old (the first king of Denmark) and his son, Harold Bluetooth (yes, same as Bluetooth technology), are honored with naming the kingdom of Denmark and Christianizing the nation.

 The actual stone with ancient rune carvings that has a picture of Jesus on it

 The actual stone King Gorm had inscribed for his wife that has the first mention of the word "Denmark"

One of the ancient mounds Harold Bluetooth built...totes rolled down it

So that concluded my adventure around Denmark, but the week wasn't over yet! On Thursday we went to Lund, Sweden to visit the Raoul Wallenberg Institute of Human Rights and Humanitarian Law, and afterwards we got to explore this little college town.

 Beautiful Lund Cathedral...later I found out was built by slaves (downer)

Amazing astronomy/astrology clock inside the cathedral

And finally FRIDAY!! We went to the Danish Resistance Museum that explains all about the Nazi occupation of Denmark in WWII. It was a small museum, but we learned a lot about how Denmark was the only country in western Europe to save the majority of its Jewish population (around 90%).

I'm so grateful that I had the opportunity to see so much of Denmark because of this study tour...otherwise I probably would have never even thought to visit Jutland and see the North Sea. The Danish countryside is gorgeous, even in its flatness.

Glad I got this shot while riding in the bus, playing hearts, and watching Black Hawk Down...

Now that this extremely long post is out of the way, I'm ready to get back into the regular swing of things and make smaller posts :) And least until my next adventure...

Hej hej,

Emily

Study Tour: Hamburg, Germany!

I knew this would happen...life has been incredibly busy this past week and I haven't had any time to update my blog. Also, I thought I had fought off the everyone-getting-sick-at-the-beginning-of-the-semester bug, but waking up this morning was a struggle. I am definitely not working at 100%, not even 40%, and probably by the end of this long Monday I will be at a measly 5%. However, I had had an amazing and jam-packed week, filled with trips all around Europe! I took lots of pictures so this entry will probably consist of mainly photo content rather than written text...and I don't think my brain can function enough to extensively explain the details of my trips. A picture speaks a thousand words, right?

Last weekend (September 1st-2nd) I went with my Holocaust and Genocide class to Hamburg, Germany!

Our first stop was a visit to the Bullenhuser Damm School. This place, now used as a kindergarten, is the site where 20-30 children were experimented on by Nazis as part of the Neuengamme Camp. Here those children were murdered, along with 20 Soviet POWs, and now there is a rose garden commemorating their lives.

Rough translation: "Here you stand in silence, but when you leave, do not be silent."

After the short visit to the school, we went to our hostel. The place was so much nicer than I expected. Each room had its own bathroom and there was even a bar on the ground floor! We had the rest of the day to do what we wanted so before dinner I decided to go to the Kunsthalle Art Museum. This museum has the largest collection of German Renaissance art, along with pieces by Monet, Picasso, and Salvador Dali (my favorite). There was also this really creepy/odd/incredibly fascinating exhibit on Alice in Wonderland. Here are some photos from the museum:

 Carl Blechen- Stormy Sea with Lighthouse (1826)

 Claude Monet- Pears and Grapes (1880)

Creepy display in the Alice in Wonderland exhibit...

One of Dali's pieces, but I didn't write down the name

We were lucky to have gone to Hamburg on a weekend that the city was having a huge art, culture, music, and food festival! Even luckier is that the festival was within walking distance from our hostel (score)... so after dinner we decided to head out and experience German nightlife. I feel like, as Americans, we fit in a lot more with the Germans. It's really difficult to look as trendy and hip as the Danes every day (even though I'm trying my best...no sweatpants in public yet!) and the Germans look much more American: track suits, t-shirts, bad hair dye...okay maybe I should stop. The festival was so much fun though, and people were really friendly! As an added bonus, there were FIREWORKS!!!

 I wish I could say I went on the ferris wheel...but no :(

 Gah!!!

I don't think anyone understands how much I love fireworks... it's kind of a little bit ridiculous 

The next day we visited the ruins of the St. Nicholas' Cathedral in the heart of Hamburg. During WWII the cathedral was actually a bombing target for the Allies since the tower was the highest point in the city. However (strangely enough) even though the church itself was destroyed, along with the entire city of Hamburg, the tower remained virtually undamaged, and it still stands today.

 The view from the top of the tower! (gargoyle)

Even though I've been skydiving, I still get scared of heights...don't look down!

The trip culminated with the visit to the site of the Nazi concentration camp- Neuengamme (I hate to use wikipedia, but this link has good pictures and lots of basic information). This camp was built by the Nazis in 1938 as a labor camp. Most of its prisoners were POWs, political adversaries, many Soviets, and a few Jews (who were there not because of religious reasons, but because of their political views). It is estimated that over its seven-year operation around 50,000 of the 100,000 people who passed through its gates died in the camp. I have had previous experience visiting concentration camps. My freshmen year of college I went with my professor and a group of students to Poland for two weeks, over Christmas, in the middle of winter. Let's just say the weather was not in our favor, and most of the time we were trudging through two feet of snow. However, it's hard to complain about the freezing temperatures when you realize how bundled up you are, and the lack of protection from the elements that the Nazis' victims faced. You don't forget experiences like that, and every new Holocaust or genocide site I visit is just as important as the first one I set foot in. My experience at Neuengamme was very different than my experiences in Poland, mainly because we couldn't have picked a more beautiful day to go. In the middle of the gorgeous German countryside, you can't help but be captivated by the tall trees and lush green grass that surrounds you... you almost forget where you're standing.

I can't describe to you what it's like to see a concentration camp. Every person has his or her own unique reaction. What I can tell you is that it changes you. It changes the way you look at the world, and maybe, just maybe, that spark of change will grow and you will continue learn about the subject, and hopefully live your life with a new sense of reality: Genocide happens, it shouldn't, and when you educate yourself, spread that education to others. With knowledge comes action, and with remembrance comes prevention. I could go on and on and on (I am a human rights major after all...) but I highly recommend that you see a place like this for yourself. It makes those facts in the history books much more real.

 The corn field across the road from the camp

 The guard tower

 The piles of stones represent the place where wooden barracks once stood to house the prisoners

 The site of standing cells if a prisoner "acted out" not enough to be killed, but enough to suffer more. The irony of having a prison within a prison...

 My professor is an amazing man. Here he stands where the crematorium once stood. No gas chambers here, but they still needed a place to dispose of the bodies.

 The canal built by the prisoners. It took two years.

 If you look closely, you will notice an interesting Nazi design in the windowpane. In almost all concentration camp sites, swastikas or symbolic swastikas have been removed from the buildings. This is the first one I've ever seen, and the only one my professor knows to still be in existence (unless it's in a museum).

Where roll would be called every morning and every night. The Germans were so meticulous with numbers that in one instance the roll-call lasted over 24 hours.

 The main industrial component of the camp: the brick factory. The ground in this area is perfect for making bricks, so the prisoners were put to work in wet, muddy trenches to dig up the clay. The natural elements were brutal, causing the majority of fatalities. Imagine, dying by something as minuscule as a mosquito bite.

I think this is enough of a blog post for now, so I will post tomorrow about my core program's study tour of Denmark and Sweden. Lots more stories to tell (along with historical fun facts and the politics of the Danish Navy that I'm sureee you will find fascinating).

To end on a lighter note though, since I know the topic of genocide isn't an easy one to think about as you start your week... here's a video of Hakuna Matata from The Lion King:

Added bonus: it's in Danish...

Hej hej,

Emily