This was a really laid back weekend, and I guess I am writing here because it might be last time for about a month. I'm heading off the island for a nice 3 week non-Danish experience, with the open hearths of Gideon in London and Rachel in Dresden, Germany. My class is also going on its tour in Leipzig, Germany. And they just cannot stop complaining about it. "Tyskland! Jeg brokker mig fordi jeg er sååååå ked af at vi tager til Tyskland, det er bare... TYSKLAND... det er sgu åndsvag! FOr HeLVedE, min røv!" Yeah, Yeah, guys. I am happy to be going to Tyskland, because I get to spend time with my dear Mainer friend Rachel in her home-away-from-home. Maybe I will learn some Deutsch too....!

But on Friday I went over to a place called Bløden (ikke, Bjarke?), and proceeded to participate in a national pastime. It felt like home, somehow. I am glad to have found a nice little flock of friends. We can stay out late, drikke øl, play musik. It's just sad that it happened so late. But I guess the last 3 months of my exchange will be really really meaningful, but a little heartbreaking too, I think.

I also will be recording my first "album" over the Spring Holiday. I am going to this guy's house on Fanø (West Coast Stylee of Denmark), and there will be 6 or 7 songs. Seven if I finished the one I am writing now. So, I am thinking of asking for donations because Cds and shipping is really expensive over here. So, what about 6 bucks. Six songs, six bucks? Nå! But if you really want one I will give it to you, if you just burn some more copies and give them to your friends. Well, e-mail me at

emilypicha@hotmail.com

If you want strange recordings from the other side.

There is not much else to say. I am moving in the middle of April back to Frederikssund. I will send a mass e-mail about that and hope it doesn't end up attacked by too many junk mail filters. Take care, whoever you are.

There is a lot of work to be done in California. I was browsing through the California High Speed Rail site, with it's iffy dates and hypothetical situations. I thought about Denmark, and DSB website, where you can just about time your trip from any address in Denmark to any other address by the minute. I hope California's future resides in a 2.5 hour train ride from San Francisco to Los Angeles instead of a nasty and boring 8 hour one in a car, or an expensive 1 hour flight. Maybe it's just the wanna be urban planner in me but it's just amazing noticing the contrast between transportation mindsets in Denmark, where I always find myself standing on the bus, and California, where I am not even on the bus. But 680 miles of new track is a hell of a lot. I'd imagine the whole corridor would develop if the train was successful. That's my Wednesday night.

Oh, yeah....Happy Birthday Dad!

Sigurd and I played a wild game of badminton. My host Mom, Birte, and I have been really teasing him about what a pathetic gentleman he would make. The boy whipped my little... RØV. Min ægtig mor vil ikke have at jeg sige "dirty" ord.

There is so much going on in my head that sometimes I have to remind myself to breathe. I am a little scared of the next six years, afraid of making some sort of mistake. But I know that there are plenty of people that take some half-ass major in college just to get out. I don't want to be one of them. I see what I want, but I cannot stick it in the right place. But next year is Santa Cruz, as well as 3 or maybe even 4 years after that. I think I'll chill out when I actually get there. It was like this before coming to Denmark. I just feel backed up against a very high cliff. A palisade. But when one actually is on this cliff, it's one stepatatime.

I'm going to London for the first time in a week with my dear Canadian friend. I am excited about that, about to be taken into the hearth of Very Generous People. That is what I hope to do when I am older. To have 5 guest mattresses and a pleasant room, a full kitchen and a slew of bus schedules, just so they could invade my house like I hope to invade theirs. I hope to have that many friends as I grow up that those mattresses are filled continuously.. and maybe I shouldn't even give a shit about this college crap. I know I'll always get by, because if you don't you're in the ground. And that's OK too.

I also got news of my dear friend and her arrival date to Europe for our Grand Tour. This is extremely exciting as well, as I miss her and love her and consider her one of the dearest people I have ever met.

I feel that I have to rack my brain a little bit after today. This week is turning out to be a really chill one, because of all the blok-days that I have which basically means I am free. Something that has been on my mind lately has been the questions that we recieve as exchange students. I am entirely sick of them, but sometimes the person seems interesting enough to want to find a good answer for them... but the trouble is that they are not patient enough to hear.

"Do you like it here in Denmark?"
"Do you miss home?"
"Why did you choose, DENMARK?"
"How do you understand class if it's all in Danish?"
"How much time do you have left?"
"Nej!!! Du snakker FLOT DANSK! Hvordan kunne du..."
"Do you know what Bush did yesterday? He...."

I get at least one of these questions every day from the strangers that I meet. And everyday the answer shifts. It usually is something like, "Well, I've been here 8 months so..." but the most common one is "I can't remember" or "I don't know." The thing is, I really don't miss home. I know that I am leaving in a few months, so it's like a suction tube. The time is going so fast! But it's just because we are on a downhill ride.

The thing about the language always gets to me. I still get people double-taking me when I speak Danish. I still get multitudes of "What did you say?" My observation has been that they do not listen. Their ears are tuned into one kind of Danish, and that one of a 50 km radius. They have trouble understanding people that live 2 hours away, let alone some girl who comes in with her homemade hats and her jumbled up grammar. But I am proud that I understand accents in my own language, and wish that Danes would only listen more carefully. At a recent get-together weekend that the exchange students had, the leaders basically refused to speak Danish with us. Shouldn't they expect that after 8 months, we should be able to manage?

But the most annoying question is, "Do you like Denmark?" What a broad question! What do they really want to know? Do they really want to hear my opinion on Denmark, or do they want a smile and a yes. Do they want me to use my now very sarcastic humor and say something about the weather, or do they want me to be optimistic and dejlig and say that I think that the nature is just so flot? I just don't get it. I have so many complex feelings about Denmark, as it is now a home. As anything goes, one feels both good and bad about something. Sometimes I wish I could just escape out of my boring geography lessons and drikker mig selv fuld in Spain.

But I digress. It's just something I have been thinking about lately after reading the Danish ex-exchange students' list of most hated questions in their returnee book. It was the best advice on exchange I've heard so far, and they give it to their future exchange students in Denmark even though it has all sorts of musings on drinking and sex and host family crises.

YAAAY! I found out last night when I got back from the Bornholm Get-Together that I had gotten into UC Santa Cruz! Alas, the quiet ocean (Pacific Ocean translated to Danish) will be part of my next year. "shut up you hippie."