I leave for London in 1 hour, so I don't have time for a long entry. I just wanted to say, I had the most AMAZING time in Berlin. I hung out with my two tour leaders two of the nights and went to what we learned is the hottest club in Berlin right now called Berghain-Panorama Bar and the rest of the time I acted as tour guide to a group of students because I remembered my way around from last summer.

I leave for London today, Madrid Thursday, Bern on Monday, and Zurich on Wednesday. I return Nov 1st and will write about my travels that weekend.

Study Tour

I leave tomorrow for a week long study tour to Poznan, Poland and Berlin, Germany. I return Saturday and promptly leave again on Sunday for: London, Madrid, Bern, and Zurich. I return November 1st.

a local?

Today, walking to DIS for a field study was the first time in almost 7 weeks that I finally feel like a local. Though I don't know how long that will last or even why. But it was kind of nice. I think it had something to do with my outfit-black dress, tights, ballet flats...getting ready for synagogue.

and look at all these crazy letters I can use on the danish keyboard-æ, ø, å

Germany for the night

At 5:30 pm on Friday, I got on a bus with my Holocaust and Genocide class to go to Hamburg, Germany and the Neuengamme Concentration Camp for a quick 24 study tour. We arrived in Hamburg at around 10pm, threw our stuff down and went out. Stephanie's friend Jordan has a cousin in Hamburg, so she took the three of us out to the red light district of Hamburg. We had a wonderful time. The cousin's husband (early 20's) bought the three of us German beers to try. We got back to the hostel late and woke up early the next morning. My one night in Germany showed me again how much I love that country compared to Denmark. Something about how the people were acting and interacting.

This was my first time at a concentration camp. I was far less emotional than I thought I would be and I don't know why. With the little sleep I got, I thought it would affect me even more. We were given a two hour tour of the museum and grounds. It was truly surreal to walk on the ground that so many Jews worked to their deaths on. The only building still intact for visitors is a brick factory. It was massive and we learned was built by hand by Jewish prisoners. After a few hours there, we got back on the bus and made our way back to Copenhagen.

Stephanie, Zoya, and I finally made it to Rust, a popular Danish night club. It was a ton of fun and I even convinced someone I was in medical school. Not that hard to do.
Conversation went like this:
Where are you all from?
The states.
Why are you here?
Studying.
Where?
(This is where I start to falsly answer all our questions): Copenhagen University
What do you study?
Medicine.
Oh, so you have classes at Panum Institute?
Yes. (not a lie since my cancer class is taught there)
Wow.

Oh and we met an anti-semitic italian from westchester county, ny who has lived here for 5 years. it was fun telling him he was saying things to the wrong group of americans (3 jews).

It was raining when we left, so we had to run to the bus stop and wait in the windy rain for a bit.

It was a really good weekend and I am now more excited than ever to go on my three week vacation. I still have to get through midterms this week though.

I think I've made two new friends. And maybe they will become non-school friends. 

First month review

I have officially been here for one month. I can say that I have never (with the exception of one other current item) tried to be more positive about an experience before. I keep reminding myself that for the past three times I've moved in the past 10 years (wow how it been 10 years since I moved from Colorado), it has taken me a minimum of one school semester to acclimate and begin the process of enjoying myself. Well, I obviously need to speed up the process since I only have ONE semester here. I think I am starting to make some friends, slowly, but its happening. But per usual, they are school friends. Meaning, I will probably never spend time with them outside of class. Wow, classic Ariella move right here. I could probably write out the next few experiences that will happen to me over the next month just because it is all so routine.

The situation is this, I do not love Denmark. I thought I would. I wanted to. I assumed I would. I got myself excited. But I don't. Now, I don't want to sound like I'm uber depressed and sulking in my room all day. I'm not, though it occasionally happens. But I don't love it here. I had very very very high expectations that have not been lived up to. I had expectations of the people I'd meet, things I would do, and how I would be able to alter my own typical behavior in the first weeks of meeting new people. None of those were met, so now I am attempting to rebuild/build what never became reality. I am jaded from past travel experiences, thank you parents.

But the thing is, I'm remaining positive. If for the main reason that if I stop being positive, I might actually cry in my room everyday. So to prevent this, I'm staying positive. For those of you that know me well, you will understand that I am RARELY optimistic about things because when I am, I soon become quite disappointed. Maybe this is a new turn in my life. I am becoming an optimistic person. Its a good start, optimistic about two areas of my life. I am questioning my decision to come here though. I've looked forward to this experience for the past 10 years probably and even wanted to do a full year (thank god I'm not), but I'm still questioning this. Maybe it would be different if I chose another location, who knows. I really miss my life at Case, because my time here feels exactly like my first semester at Case when all I wanted to do was transfer.

I am having a lot of trouble finding people I like here. I realized today while walking to verstergade 7 (DIS), that the reason I don't like 80% of the people I meet, is that they don't go to Case/schools I applied to. The majority of people I don't like, go to schools I had no interest in applying to for a variety of reasons. I realized today how perfect my chose of school was even though my freshman college self would completely disagree with me.

NOW THE BRIGHT SIDE! My classes are overall interesting (although the quality of teaching is mediocre to me). I went to a real life European soccer game on Sunday (FCK vs AaB) and I got a second degree burn on my finger from melted sugar. Awesome.

Human Health and Disease: I learned how to do a gynocology exam on a plastic dummy, delivered a baby (on a dummy), got a tour of an endoscopy suite today, and saw a radiology suite last week. Bummer though, I'm missing how to put in an IV because of Rosh Hashana! I'm so dissapointed. So, daddy...want to teach me over winter break? Also, we are learning anatomy and phys that I learned in bio last semester. But thats ok because it makes class easier and the other students are struggling trying to read an ECG.

Cancer: Actually really interesting, but my teacher is horid. Mumbles, doesn't speak above a whisper, and doesn't answer questions. Material is worth it though.

Genocide: Very interesting, lot of reading. I'm visiting a concentration camp near Hamburg next weekend. Stephanie is in my class. Therefore, worth it.

Danish: Probs my fave class. Who would have thought. I'm actually picking up the language, though I'm too nervous to actually use it anywhere.

I'm going to the Carlsberg factory tour on Saturday.

Main thing I'm looking forward to: 2.5 weeks of class, and then I have 3 weeks off for travel.