Wrapping up a wonderful semester :( :)

So this week has been a roller coaster of good-byes...some good, some sad. First of all...finals are done! I'll never have to write a paper again! (haha, c'mon...I know...never say never, but I can hope!) I had my Danish oral final where I had to carry on a conversation with my teacher in Danish for about 10 minutes and...I got an A-!!!! Here's a great example of the Danish bluntness: After I received my grade my teacher said to me, "You've really improved Lindsey because before, you weren't very good." Haha, oh the Danish bluntness that I appreciate and yet hate at the same time. Other than that I had an exam, a paper, and a presentation to give, which I finished all up yesterday!

Sadly, it's become time to start saying good-bye to the friends I've made. First, on Thursday we (Chris, Hilary, Garrett, and I) had our last "family" dinner together. Throwing everything we had together we came out with a stir-fry consisting of 4 different kinds of noodles, haha. We're so proud! And my mom would be proud too! I eyeballed both the amount and time each type of noodle needed and we had just enough and none got mushy!

While I worked on the stir-fry, Hilary made strawberry shortcake. The boys just bought chicken and loaned us butter before showing up just in time to eat. Here we are...one of our last pics together :(

Then, later that night Hilary and I went out for coffee with Jonas and Anna. We met them right away in the semester when Jonas still lived in our block. Now he and Anna moved in together in another block just down the way. Such nice people...I think I got about 5 hugs each from them when saying good-bye.

And, be happy...this is the quickest I've gotten a post up after it's happened...these pictures are only a few hours old! This afternoon I had lunch with Erin (left) and Lonnie (next to me), whom I met in Prague randomly in our hostel. After lunch we had our closing ceremonies for the semester where...

...I was recognized for being a graduating senior! There are about 10 of us here.

We all got a rose and a really nice, Danish-designed bottle opener :)

I'm about to head to our closing reception that's going to be at a posh club downtown for my free glass of champagne! It's strange, my room feels like a cell again...I'm almost packed up. Thanks everyone for the love throughout the semester and turning my board from this...

...into this!


It still hasn't quite hit me that I'll be back tomorrow! It's so bittersweet. The weather has been wonderful but I'm so excited to see everyone again and I'm getting very antsy to get back, start making money, and do that 'grown-up' thing haha. So long Copenhagen!

Such a fun weekend! Going out with a bang!

I had such a fun last weekend here...first we all went out to Viking Bar where we had tequila shots with lemons?! These Danes have it all wrong haha.


It was just Hilary, Garrett, Jeremy and I for awhile until the bar became DIS Central and over half the bar was Americans. They did have some good tunes though....

Singing a little Whitney Houston's "I wanna dance with somebody.." Not the most flattering pose but this is what happens when catchy tunes are played :)

Hilary and I had a little photo session...here we are happy that we met each other...

...and sad that we're leaving so soon!

After awhile we decided to go on a 'Chris Hunt' and snapped this semi-blurry pose...my three favs here! Chris was at another bar with some friends which led to some pretty interesting things when we found him including...

....meeting this guy who was half-Danish, half-something else and ended up singing the Canadian national anthem "O Canada" with Chris (who's from Canada) shortly before Garrett asked him if he spoke Persian. Maybe it was one of those 'had to be there' moments but Hilary and I turned to Garrett like 'Did you really just ask that?!' Then, Hilary and I went back to DIK and met a creepy guy on the night bus. Overall, well-rounded night haha!

The next day, Hilary and I went to watch Jakub's (one of my Polish neighbors) soccer game. They were so funny as there were definitely more Poles out there so the teams were usually Poles against the American's and not-so-Polish people. Hilary and I were definitely like the soccer mom's out there. My two favorite quotes were from an American who took a break by us and said "You're like soccer mom's, have any orange slices for me?" and the other one was when one of the American's (who just couldn't keep up with the mad skills of the Poles) left the game and as everyone was saying bye and thanks for the game Jakub blurted out in a joking tone, "Thanks for the game Brian, you played like s*#%!" All in fun, but I'm still keeping it PG on here.

And, wouldn't you know the creepy guy was playing soccer as well on Saturday and invited Hilary and I to this Karnival (pronounced Car-nee-vaal) thing that was going on last weekend. It's like a mini-music fest with samba dancing attached to a big field where people just hung out and drank and played frisbee etc. before going to see the dancers (I got a not-so good picture of them as you can see...we're pretty far back). Anywho, we agreed to go since it was before we realized how sketch he was but began putting together the pieces when we were one of three groups of girls he invited of whom he had all met randomly. Then, he started laying it on thick toward Hilary and being quite blunt about what his intentions were....so I was the cockblock that night and we left early. Gotta watch out for those half-syrian, quarter-lituanian, something or other nationality he was!

The next day we took a short bus ride to this beach with a bunch of the Poles, a guy from Nepal, a couple Danes (I think), a guy from China, a girl from Austria, and a few other Americans. It was great...the sun was out and I think I got a slight bit of color to my pasty skin. I'm not sure if it was the Baltic Sea we were on or not but it was COLD!

Jakub, of course, was the first to dive in...

...while Huang, Penny, Hilary and I took slower steps of getting into the water.

We ended up playing basically a keep-away game with teams in the water and even ended up swimming for a short time!

Here's Jakub and Anna, who I finally found out are dating! Haha, they are so cute together but I didn't think they were because when I asked at the beginning of the semester they weren't, but now it's official! They're my two favorite non-Americans I've met here!

And, what's a day at the beach without someone getting buried in the sand?! Hilary, Joseph, and Szymon bury Bartek in the sand.

Here's Lieu, he moved in about a month ago and we share a fridge. He's from Nepal and it was fun actually getting to talk to him...he's climbed a mountain! This was his first time ever to a beach and he said he now knows to bring a towel next time to sit on!

Then Sunday evening, Baton, a student from Bangladesh made dinner for Hilary and I.

A traditional Bangladeshi meal of chicken, rice, and daal (or lentils). It was delicious and Hilary and I chowed! Baton is one of the nicest people I've met and is all about hospitality.

Well, I tried to get a little bit of the meal in there...the lentils turn yellow and mushy and you mix them in with the rice. Again, sooo good!

So, I only have a few more days left! I'm planning on getting two more posts up before I leave so stay tuned! I'm finishing up finals today, Thursday, and am following my list of things to do before I leave closely so I don't miss out on anything!

Ooout and Aboout in Copenhagen!

Alright, I'm back again...sorry posts are getting farther and father apart. With finals and less than a week left here now I've been out and about as much as I can! But, we'll rewind a bit to last weekend. Chris' cousin, Lisa, was in town for the week and we explored Copenhagen for a solid 9 hours last Saturday. As bad timing would have it, Chris went on a bike trip scheduled with DIS so it was just Lisa and me on Saturday!

I met her downtown and first we went to Rosenborg Palace, the summer residence of the old monarchies like Christian IV and Frederik III etc. But, on the way we came across the guards who stand watch around the castle (I'm not sure of their schedule but I think they just march around the grounds).

Couldn't get within 1.5 meters of them! I saw someone at Amalienborg (where the Royal Family currently lives) try to and the guard slammed his gun down and I almost gave the tourist a heart attack.

Lisa and me in the garden/grassy area in front of the palace.


Not really sure what the significance of this is...the tree looked and felt real but wasn't. We made that conclusion upon seeing that it was based in cement.

Finally, Rosenborg Palace! Also, where the crown jewels are held!

Before entering, I enlightened Lisa with my bastion knowledge and explained to her the pointed shape of this one. I'm sure she was forever grateful :)

First, we entered Christian IV's bedroom and one of the security people let us in on some down-low info....I'm looking through the peephole Christian used to when checking to see who was outside the bedroom.

And I'd like to talk to whoever designed the tile work in this room! I'm standing by the mantle on my left where they did a big no-no...tiles going opposite directions, yikes! Not too pleasing to the eye.

A busy-dressed Lindsey in a BUSY tiled bathroom!

Jeg spiller guitar ikke saerligt godt. That means 'I don't play the guitar very well' in Danish. Check out how detailed this thing is!

We thought this was pretty high-class for the 1600s-1700s...if you look at it this way, you see a woman...

...and from this direction--a man!

Again, things are so detailed here...this is a clock with tiny little figures around it. It was behind glass so a bit hard to get all the detail.

I think this is a sewing machine, it reminded me of my Grandma's old one she showed me how to use when I was younger.

The mirror room! This was quite entertaining as you can imagine.

A chandelier made out of Amber; amber is huge around here with at least two museums I've seen around town.

This is where the King and Queen would sit with...

Lions protecting them.

I think these ships are soooo cool! If I could bring a big ship in a bottle home, I would.

These little figures were lined up so nicely...made me want to play chess with them!

Ooooo man, check out their keg supply. They must have been quite the entertainers!

The wine room with some bottles dating back to 1615.

And so begins the Crown Jewel collection, starting with the Imperial Sword.

Even their dogs were high class!

This little book was so cute! I had to laugh, there were three older ladies who looked at this after us and I overheard one of them tell another that it must have been an album to put grandchildren's pictures in. Nice thought, but I'm pretty sure photography didn't come along for another 200 years! haha

Here's the Dane's favorite King's crown, King Christian IV.


And, up close:
An awesome septor!

I believe this is Frederik III's and his wife's crown. Frederik III was Christian IV's son.

Mom! Check out that emerald! I know you like emerald and all, but this was a little out of my budget for your souvenir. haha

One of three similar stationary sets, the drawer opens to hold the quills.

And, back outside we saw soon to be swan parents! It was cute, she was rearranging the nest while he stood guard.

This is a cool passage way leading from one street to the main pedestrian one, Stroget.

Where we saw something being filmed...not sure what though, it involved a couple of friends and a couch on a busy street, that's all I got!

And, what's a day without ice cream?! Especially when they made their own waffles and waffle cones!

Here is Gammel Torv, it's the oldest square in Copenhagen and only a half-block from my school. Every weekend and every weekday (since it's been nice out) for that matter tons of people gather here and drink. There were some 16-year olds next to us who were downing quite a few and wrestling around on the horribly dirty cobblestone. The legal drinking age here is 16 by the way. I was quite disgusted in that anyone would want to set anything more than their feet on these cobblestones as tons of people come around collecting bottles to turn in and get money back for and not only do they dump out the extra beer all over the cobblestone but just the other day Garrett and I saw a nanny tell the little boy she was watching to just pull his pants down to relieve himself in the middle of the square like it was no big deal! It's not the first time I've seen someone relieve themselves in the middle of a busy area. Danes are NOT modest, and even if I were here for another 4 months, I don't think I would get used to that.

After 9 hours of walking around the city, eating ice cream and checking out this cool hygglie cafe we were spent, so we walked back through the City Hall plaza and saw one of the cool rides in Tivoli in action!
It was so nice having Lisa here because she pointed out things to share with everyone that I never really took into consideration....like out nightclub/power plant we have here in Albertslund.

It was a lot of fun hanging out with Lisa during the day, and what a nice day it was! Even the Danes say that this spring has been one of the best yet as we've had a few weeks of pure sunshine! Check out this picture I took a few days ago, everything is in bloom including these extremely purple lilacs! I looooovvvveee the smell of lilac! Tivoli's in the background here. Unfortunately, this shot was snapped minutes before I had to go the library/museum for the next 3 hours to do research for a paper I should really start writing soon :)