Slow Down!

The problem with having a blog that people tend to peek at occasionally is that...well, people look at it. Time is really speeding up here, (as of today it's 2 months until Aussieland) and whereas before I just lacked inspiration, now I also lack time. And as sporadic as these little posts are, I try to make them as funny and interesting as I possibly can. But my grasp on my mother tongue is rapidly decreasing, and with it, my ability to provide witty banter.
So we'll see how this latest installment pans out.
I am actually nervous.

These past *woah* two months have been jam-packed with action.
In order to cut my workload, I have prepared a little photostory because I'm lazy. :)

First thing's first. I am no longer the lone exchange student on Lolland.
A new batch of fresh-faced, skill-skinny nerds have invaded my little haven and begun to battle my army of grabby koalas with their North American slang and their constant referrals to "kraft dinner" and "Reesies"...
I adore them.

I don't have a photo of my actual Newbies, so here's a photo of some random Vikings.

Everyone in our little district of 1480 met for one weekend in Korsør, a little town with not much in it, for our only district get2gether that year. It was ran by an Inner Wheel club and constisted of 5 oldies and about 35 newbies. It involved a lot of the oldies tackling eachother to the ground with many a "I've missed you soooooo much", as the newbies looked on with a sort of confused concern.

Aussie Girls in 1480 <3

Sometimes the cold just gets to ya.

In the period of time I like to call B.E (Before Exchange) I worked at giving people food and mixing together lots of liquids to make fancier liquids (I was a waitress/barista). As lame as this sounds, I was pretty good at my job, and I enjoyed it. So, when the opportunity arose to work with the school party committee, or Kalas, I jumped at it.
Basically, I set up, clean up, and work the bar for a few hours. I also get free bar all night and free time to shake the parts of my body that now move independently from the main frame (exchange weight gain. sadface). I also get pizza. It's pretty awesome.

Just doin' my thang.

Time to slappe af...

Fun with friends 

I've also been travelling a wee bit. In the October holiday, I was lucky enough to spend 4 days in Jylland, visiting the only parts of mainland Denmark I hadn't visited yet. We stayed with some family friends, who also have an exchange student, Morgan, from Canada. Through her patience and guidance, I successfully lost my Thanksgiving virginity!

One huge turkey, stuffing, pumpkin pies, mashed potatoes, carrots with cinnamon and sweet potato with... marshmallows? All of this exciting food was prepared by us over a day and a half, and by the end, I was ready to not eat for a week. 

Cooks Extraordinaire
Photo with permission from Morgy Porgy Pics Inc.

We visited a huge ship, Fregaten Jylland, and had a little kodak moment...

"Jack! I'm flying!"
Photo with permission from Morgy Porgy Pics Inc.

Another stop along the way was Ribe, one of the oldest towns in Denmark. This included a walk up the very top of the belltower in Ribe Domkirke at noon (hello shattered eardrums), and visiting my first waterwheel. 

At the top of Ribe
Photo with permission from Morgy Porgy Pics Inc.

Swiggety Swag.

Cause we're the 3 best friends that anybody could have... 
Photo with permission from Morgy Porgy Pics Inc.

We also popped down to Germany to see this amazing natural phenomenon called Sort Solen, or The Black Sun. It's when a millions of little black birdies come to sleep in one spot, with their accumulative flocks making one huge flock that blocks out the sun.
Well, some of them missed the memo, because while there were tonnes of birds, there weren't enough to block out the sun.

Birds!
Photo with permission from Morgy Porgy Pics Inc.

Couple of dykes on a dyke.
Photo with permission from Morgy Porgy Pics Inc.

I stood on the border of Germany and Denmark, I realised that this life I live every day is s a privilege. Whilst at age 17 I have been to over 15 countries, some people back in Australia hadn't even left the state. I remembered my dad saying to me, "Georgia, travelling after graduating high school should be as compulsory as going to school itself." 
He was so right. Closed borders equal closed minds, and until you put yourself out of your comfort zone, you have no idea what potential lies within. Throwing myself into a whole new pond has taught me how much more of a strong swimmer I can be.

That's a lot of thinking to be doing whilst standing in the middle of a Highway.

Vi Ses,
Georgia

Social Media Blues

I hate social media.
No, actually I love it.
I love it for it's amazing abilities to keep the world in touch, 24/7. Even if the world is just you few who take the time to read these words from me. 

Because of the beauty of Facebook, twitter, Tumblr, and many, many other platforms, I can effectively keep in-the-know of most things going on outside my little Lolland bubble. (Except when people don't tell me. I know Djanga got out, Mum & Dad. Grrr.)

But sometimes social media makes me reeaaal mad. I know I promised this update to come out real quick, bam-bam, T-K-O. But Blogger blocked me out. I got all these messages, and firewalls and red tape, but the end of the story was that I was only able to gain access today. 

So I sat there, for a week, with a half-written blog that I needed to finish, like this.

Blogger will never realise my rage.

But anyway, I can finish this now. So finish it I shall! Prepare your battle axes!

I finally got a visit from home! On one happy Friday, we picked up my Aussie grandparents in Copenhagen and went on a cute canal tour, and lunched in Nyhavn like the tourists we became. Hvor dejlig!

BUT

*cue dark music* (play this whilst reading for full narrative effect)

A dark cloud descended upon their idyllic afternoon... 
A day of sunshine, al fresco lunches and over-price boat trips in their wake;
The happy four coasted down highway E47.
They awaited nothing but Jazz music, fields of corn, and broken English...
But something dark loomed on their horizons...

It all occurred in a mere matter of minutes. A bump. A gasp.
The terrible pain of disappointment.
The anger at Mercedes' anti-theft technology.
A puncture on the highway is no laughing matter! 

(You can cut the music now)

We couldn't change it because of some stupid anti-theft technology Mercedes cars have now, which means you need a special key to change it. We didn't have it, and added an extra hour and a half to our journey home, which cancelled our afternoon plans. But we came home to a throng of well-wishers, welcoming us home for a dinner party.
Food and conversation flowed like the wine, which flowed a little too well. 
The next three days I spent in Copenhagen with them, doing every touristy thing I could imagine. They also brought me TIM TAMS (omg) and more goodies from Australia, and in return I gave them some super special Kaj Bojesen tin soldier for them to take back home to Australia. It was sad to say goodbye, but it'll only be a couple of months until I see them again... so not so hard :)

He's gonna protect them on the plane.

August also marked the end of an era: I moved families again. I am no longer the ward of the Gunnersens, however I will miss them and their wooded glen in which I could do endless jump-punch dances and visit the woods without leaving my backyard. Now, I'm over in the 'Villa Quarter', and am back in a family of giants. Back to being at chest height again!

Anyway, in the week and a half that I have been with my new family, I have been pretty much Denmark 'round. 
My hectic 2 weeks went as follows: Valdemar Slot on Saturday, Aalborg Sunday-Tuesday. I my Grey Nomads (grandparents) were then with me from Friday-Monday. I moved houses on Tuesday. Wednesday and Thursday saw me in Randers with my new host family to visit my new host brother on his 18th birthday! We toured around Randers and then sped all the way home, with our grey people-mover breaking the sound barrier in a successful attempt to cut an entire hour off our travelling time. Friday saw me back at school and everyone else at work.
Normal day? No.  
That night, we hopped back into the Speedy Gonzales of a people mover and drove up to Copenhagen, where over the course of two days, we moved my new host sister into her swanky Hellerup apartment. That involved going to IKEA 4 TIMES IN ONE DAY. Never. Again.
Finally, finally, on Sunday evening, we drove home. It was strange, both the sense of permanence and the sense of finality. This is my last family. The very last.
The next time I pack my bags, the only place I'll be going is the airport. 

And that is a very scary thought.

And on that note, I'll see you in a few weeks!

Vi ses, 
Georgia.

Life Goes On...

I swear on the Father, the Son, and the Holy IKEA that I never thought my life would be so hectic. 

It's been x how many months since I posted, and I literally haven't been able to sit down and write a single word during that time. Now, I'm back at school, which gives me hours of time to kill, so I thought I'd stop drawing little vikings all over my book and dreaming about frikadeller, and put this time to good use.

So what have I been doing? Well... what haven't I been doing is really the better question. 

Commence highlight reel!

Before I had to say goodbye to all my friends from Eurotour, I commuted over to the concert capital of the country, Aarhus, for the Northside festival. I met up with many, many people on that cold and rainy day. Team up your best friends, and your favourite band, you no longer care about the weather! (Even if you have to wait 3 hours to keep your front row spot) That's right, I saw my favourite band, the Arctic Monkeys, for the first time EVER - after being in love with them since I was 10 years old. What an experience. I still can't fathom that I was less than 8 meters away from them !! AAAHH!!

On the way to Northside! ft. DJ Sleepy Laura

Next, came the amazing Studentergimlie… that being the graduation of the seniors at our little Nakskov Gymnasium. Two very special people were graduating, so, I bought two of the traditional single red roses you give to them as soon as they are given their special hat… a hat that looks good on ANYONE. I waited at 8.00am at the school with my two respective families on two different days (everyone graduates separately during the week and then they have a ceremony at the end of the week for everybody), and waited for them to finish their final oral exams. They receive their mark 10 minutes later, and they are given their hat by the person/s of their choice. It is a great honour to be the one chosen to place the hat on their head. 

After this, we gathered in the school garden for champagne (yes, it was 8am, I had eaten nothing) and then all went back to their houses for brunch.

Everyone writes on the inside of the hat, and then bites the cap as hard as they can to wish the graduate good luck. It REALLY hurts your teeth.
The graduates are given masses of presents, all precious gifts such as leather-bound notebooks, the famous Royal Copenhagen ceramics, and gold pens. After the ceremony at the end of the week, the class below decorates a horsecarriage for them, and the students go around to everyone in their class' house for drinks and nibbles. For a whole two days. After this, there are masses and masses of parties and the like. Long story short, a looooong hangover is in store for these happy kids.

Der er kun en rigtig hue, den er rød! Tillykke Sofie!

With the Studentergimlie, the summer holidays began!!
I spent the first couple of weeks were spent relaxing with my family in their summerhouse in Langø, hosting and going to barbeques or 'grillaften' as they're called in Danish.

The Danish system of barbequing is very strange.

1)  They ALL have Weber barbies. If your barbeque of choice is not Weber, you need to throw that ish away and go and get yourself one, son! Cause you're not doing it right!

2) They ALL run on coals, not gas. That means that there is smoke EVERYWHERE. It's gross, actually. 

The coals also mean that it takes at least 30 minutes to start the thing, and when you eventually do, It is impossible to regulate the temperature, so it is very easy to end up with a charred chook.
Needless to say, they were super fun anyway. I adored the Danish summer. It was fantastic to see everyone outside, enjoying nature, and coming out of their winter shells. The sunshine boosted everyone's moods and was reflected in the atmosphere around town :)

Vi hygger :)

The summer also meant I finally got to go horseriding with Julie! The place they chose was Møns Klint, one of the most beautiful places in Denmark. This famous cliff is pure white, and to look down was to seriously spike my fear of heights. I was on the edge of a cliff, on a freakin' horse! Don't tell me that's not terrifying. 

First time on a horse in 11 years... help.

Our guide took us through a Danish National Park, with fields of flowers leading into ancient woods with huge, old trees. I really felt like I was in a period piece on the ABC. On the way home, we made several stops, going into an town that you are not allowed to bring your cars into, going inside the tomb of a Viking king (terrifying), and went into a Danish lakrids (licorice) factory. Yuck! Sometimes the black heart of Danes (meaning that it is made of love for licorice) makes me wonder if I picked the right country. I. Hate. Licorice.

August kicked off with a tour to Femø for the annual Femø Jazz Festival. I can only say… I have never seen so many drunk old people in my life! That being said, we had perfect weather, great food, and a fantastic 2 days of classic, feelgood music. It was a very good idea that I brought my friend Gabby with me, because it felt as if we were the only people over 10 and under 35 there.
We slept in the smallest tent in the world and it was not nice waking up in there. 
I haven't been as humid a place since January, when I left my sauna of a hometown.

Temperatures dropped in the night and soared in the day. One day was definitely enough.

An overly-artistic photo of a smelly campground...

During the summer, I also got to have a run of Danish concerts. I saw Marie Key, Fallulah, Thomas Helmig and Tina Dickow! Lucky, lucky me. If there's one thing that's great, it's a Danish concert :)

Tina Dico!!

Another strange experience, one I never thought I'd have, was a domestic flight. Yes, in a plane. Within Denmark. Crazy, I know.
It was a special flight... they didn't even turn off the seatbelt sign.
Anyway, all of that was to go and be reunited with this guy!

A little bit of home!

Denmark-Cairns, Cairns-Denmark. It was just SO GREAT to see Emil again, on his side of the world this time! We completed the circle, me in his hometown, after he was in my hometown. I feel like we should get medals or something.

We had a hyggelig time as he showed me around Aalborg... with me on a broken bike and him on a bright orange pennyboard. It was unorthodox, but, if anything, that is a pretty good analogy of the life of an exchange student. And like the travel-crazy teenagers we are, we managed.
I loved Aalborg and I can't wait to go back and see that beautiful city and the wonderful people that live in it ASAP.
So, thank you Emil, for letting me visit! You've created a monster!

There is more to this story, but I'll save your eyes and patience; I've chopped it in two! So stay tuned, this is going to be two fast updates!

Until then,
Vi ses,
Georgia xo

Travellin'

Hello to all the people in the Internet that are STILL willing to read this silly blog... which hasn't been updated in over a month.
Yeah, I'm a bad person. I know this!
But my life has tres tres busy, because I am, of course, a woman in demand, being the foreign type in the new land that needs THOROUGH exploring. So this is what I have been doing!

For example:
Several tidings ago, I was in Odense with my niglets (read: exchange friends) for a weekend of resto-relaxo hyggeligt catchings up. After months of learning the native tongue of Planet Denmark, attempting to understand their culture, and eating their strange foods, it was comforting (and slightly horrific when we realise how bad our accents are becoming) to hang out, bag out a certain redheaded Prime Minister, and indulge in Vegemite without being judged by suspicious natives.

Odense is a tres pretty city, with much to see. We were in H.C Andersen's house,

Hot to trot!

We were in the park,

Not sure what's going on here...

and we ate wayyyy too much.

Before this, we ate pizza, and after this, we ate ice cream. And then nachos. And more ice cream.

I also found myself in Copenhagen for the ANZAC day ceremony, because I am a fantastic Australian.
Well, to be honest, the biggest draw for me was that I might, finally, get to meet the elusive expat Kronprinsesse Mary. My previous attempts of standing outside her house had, so far, proved fruitless. According to my secretive sources, she is often at the ceremony.
This is the ultimate chance, to send the photo I would take with her to everyone back in Australia, and win every bet ever. Simply because, Mary.

NSW or QLD in State of Origin? Mary photo.

Who's going to win the Melbourne cup? Mary photo.

Or other situations:
"What makes you think you're qualified for this job?" Mary photo.

"I can't grant you this home loan..." Mary photo. "Actually, we can grant you this with 0% interest and 50 years to pay it off if you require it..."

"Calculate the mass of the sun and then square it to the power of 79 and than take the potential circumference and apply it to this cake recipe..." Mary photo. A+.

The invite to the ceremony said to be there no later than 9.50am, for a 10.00am start. Oh, of course, this is Denmark. We cannot be late. WE CANNOT BE LATE.

So, when the train arrived at 9.40, minus one friend, we were forced to abandon her as we ran for our lives, and stripping ourselves of our dignity. WE CANNOT BE LATE.
But, upon collapsing in the front garden of the ambassador's house at 9.53am, we were greeted with a big, Aussie smile, and handed a welcome pamphlet.

"Sorry we're late! Oh no, tell us we can still get in!"
"It's all good, girls! No worries!"

Ahhhh, that sound. Yes, Aussies. 

Denmark, you've changed us. Worried about being late to an Australian thing? Psshh. We weren't even the last to arrive, and our friend made it too! (By the skin of her teeth).

After a gorgey-porgey ceremony, we were invited for nibbles. Little did we know that nibbles meant lamingtons, ANZAC biscuits and sausage rolls. Holy Crapola. Stuffing of the face is on the agenda.

We ate it ALL.

Not mention that the ambassador's house was schmicko as all get out. Possible dream job: ambassador to Denmark. Yes, that would be nice.

Pretty house; pretty girls.

We spent the rest of the day kickin' back in pretty, pretty Nyhavn, and were home in time for tea.

Back home in Lolland, it was time to rep it for my class in the school volleyball tournament. My singular beach volleyball lesson back home in mind, I happily signed up for it, in the hope that I would be useful to my class in something.

But... no.

We lost. Every match.
It was safe to say that I was not the only one that completely sucked, though.
With shattered dreams of joining the Brazilian beach volleyball squad one day, I retired to the showers and contemplated my utter defeat.

Next thing you know: bip bam boom, it's time to move.
One of the most equally heartbreaking and great things about rotary: 3 families, 3 months at a time. Last week, I found myself packing up my whole life, yet again. It was truly dreadful to leave the Petersens after 3 months with them... I felt like I finally had a proper home again, and as soon as that feeling sunk in, I was ripped up like a weed and replanted someplace else.

I guess it's a good thing if you and your family don't get along, but everything was peachy with mine... sigh.

My new family are super sweet to me. I have the type of mum that hugs me when I'm going to bed, and the type of dad that will help me with anything (like when I was freaking out about my Northside tickets that were lost in the mail). I have two sisters, an older and a younger, and a younger brother. It's like having a dynamic of my old family combined with the dynamic of my real family. Of course, this is just a parallel drawn to make some familiarity in the situation. I ride to school now, and the luxury of having the bike is just awesome. Not to mention the temperature's rising... time for shorts! (still gotta have at least a light jacket on though)

Anyway onto my biggest news:
EUROTOUR!
In three days, I will be bussin' it around Europe for 18 days with 50 or so other exchange students! Look out Berlin, Prague, Vienna, Lido di Jesolo, Venice, Verona, San Remo, Monaco, Avignon, Paris, Bruxelles, Amsterdam and Hamburg!!

I promise to blog about it! It'll be huge, and it'll take forever, but I'LL DO IT!
I'm to excited to think right now!

Vi ses senere!

Georgia :D