Host Family, Adopt Me

So my host family is amazing.  My host brother and sister are very special children - amazingly independent and passionate. Andreas is 13 and loves speaking english.  Rebecca is 11 and slightly shy but around the dinner table, with a little help from parents to translate, the fully vibrancy of her personality comes through.  She has a great smile and is very creative.  I love coming home to this energetic family and all the hubbub of two children in grade school.  Today was my first day exploring the city and commuting on the S-tog train.  It took a lot of poring over maps in freezing snowy weather but, along with some new friends that are doing home-stays nearby, we figured it out.  Walking around copenhagen all day was amazing but I was so excited to get back to my warm and cozy house.  There is a concept of "hygge" here in Denmark that roughly translates to coziness and I definitely feel it in their home.  I expect that I will be spending a lot of time here just hanging out with the family or bringing a friend back for dinner... a dream come true for my homebody side.  Having meals at the house is practical too because things are very expensive in Copenhagen and eating at home and packing a lunch is a much better deal :)  I am loving it here so far.

There are almost a thousand students in DIS but I have been pretty reserved (for me) about meeting them all.  It just is not a top priority right now.  I am very excited about my classes to meet other psych students and about some of the girls in my area but I am not frantically trying to be friends with everyone. I think it will just come naturally and I am shockingly calm about the whole thing. I am going out for drinks with a couple girlfriends now and everything just feels very cozy and enjoyable.  I think I completely lucked out with my living situation because I am fully submerged in the Danish culture with a family that really likes to spend time together but also have a few wonderful ladies either walking distance from me or just a train stop away. I think this will turn out to be a really great balance.  I can't wait for classes to start on thursday so I can meet students in my classes and just start to get my schedule solidified.

FYI: I have a danish phone number now: +45 2394 4674 (so don't freak out if my US number is disconnected for a couple months.)  This is free (for me) if you want to call but there are also some awesome options like skype or a new messaging app called "whatsapp" that allows free international text messaging.  One awesome thing about my 20 minute s-tog commute is that there is free wi-fi the whole way! So that will come in very handy.