Approaching The Present

Woofta. I realize the lengthy time between this post and the last has been tough for all my readers, so the only way I can somehow justify their pain is by writing one brilliant post (This is not the one). There are quite a few things I have done since my last post, but none of them have seemed significant enough to post on a blog about enlightenment (Or am I enlightened  by everything that comes into my daily life? I will leave that question for some other time). Anyways, I will give you some sort of synopsis of my enlightenment in Copenhagen.

I am studying with a school called Danish Institute for Studyabroad (DIS) and one of their marketing taglines is "Copenhagen as your home, Europe as your classroom." Therefore, the school integrates Field Studies, Short Study Tour, and Long Study Tour into our programs throughout the semester. Basically, I have school for two weeks at a time, four days a week. Every third week there is some sort of travel (not necessarily a break from homework though) and Wednesdays are reserved for Field Studies.

In the past few weeks, my Danish Language and Culture (DLC) class has had a few field studies where we go out into the city and experiment with experiencial learning. So far, I believe this type of learning works very well. First, we went out on a cafe night where we sat and enjoyed a little bit of Danish hyggeligt with our classmates, learning about each others lives and discussing our experiences in Denmark. Next, we went to a hippie free town experiment called Christiania. Lead through by one of the founders of Christiania, we traversed the frozen pathways, looking at unerwhelming buildings with surprisingly interesting stories. Just the night before this field study, I had been involved in a discussion at my host family's dinner table regarding the state of Christiania today. The guide of the free town was much more optimistic about Christiania than the dinner table conversationalists. Finally, my DLC class went to a Royal Danish Ballet called dans-2-go and it was quite the experience filled with intrigue, awkwardness, superior skill, boredom, and a wonderfully decorated building. None of these field studies were of huge significance to me.

Figure 1.

About a month ago, I visited Western Denmark or Jutland while on a so called Short Study Tour put together by DIS. This is the portion of Denmark that "juts" out of Germany in a peninsular form. I don't believe that is a real translation, but I think it works pretty well for our purposes. Travelling with my core course of Human Health and Disease Section C and with another core course HHD Section A, our group totaled 30 students in all. The trip was filled with the second largest Danish city called Aarhus which has a beautiful canal to see at night (Figure 1) and a few other interesting things such as the Aros Modern Art Museum. Modern art is not very impressive in my opinion, but anyone that knows me, knows that I usually appreciate the old more than the new in terms of culture. We also visited a little town where a few important things happened for Denmark called Jelling. My favorite part about Jelling was the museum tour guide named Mike (Figure 2). Although I loved this Short Study Tour, the largest impacts on my enlightenment experience have come elsewhere.

Figure 2.

One of the best things I have been doing in the past couple of weeks is developing a relationship with an immigrant who sits at the entrance of the nearest Metro station to my apartment. He is a Spanish man who immigrated to Denmark in order to find work as a delivery truck driver. Although my ability to understand him is very limited, I have enjoyed the over two total hours I have spent sitting, laughing, talking, misinterpretting, and smiling with him. Everytime I pass him as I go to and from my destinations, he gives me a huge smile and a big thumbs up. From what I understand, his situation involves a misunderstanding with the police--he can barely speak English clearly much less Danish--which has resulted in confiscation of his bag that contained his passport. He sits up against the cold, stone wall everyday with a hat sitting near his outstretched feet collecting his lunch and dinner money for the day. Due to his lost identifying documents, no one will hire him as a driver.  From what I understood during our last conversation, however, this Spanish immigrant is getting his passport soon and will be on his way to Norway! Thank the Lord that he has no children who are dependent on him through this troubling time. This is a significant experience.

In the near future, another post shall come regarding my time in Stockholm and Tallinn.