5 | First Week and First Trip

Well, you could say it's been a busy week! I had my first week of classes and took my first trip!

I STILL do not have a concrete schedule, because getting everyone to reply to emails and to sign a sheet of a paper is more difficult than initially expected. I got my final signature today (yes, a week after this all began), and I will turn in the form tomorrow before my classes and then pray that the Dean accepts the changes. Other than that last week went well! It is definitely a different system that will take some time to adjust to, but I am excited to delve into the material in at least most of my classes. Sorry dad, I'm not that hype about the accounting classes. All of my professors speak at least decent English and seem to be enthusiastic about the material.

Now to the more exciting stuff: my trip to Sweden and Denmark!
On Friday, I left my apartment around 4am to hop on a flight to Malmö. From there I took a bus to Lund and then a train to Helsingborg, where Macy picked me up from the station. We hurried to her university building for her 10am-12pm class. That's right. My whole travel time was around 6 hours - what a joy! But obviously it was worth it, because I had an amazing weekend. During her first class, I walked around the city a bit. Afterwards, we went back to her apartment so I could drop off my bag and we could cook up some lunch. Well, Macy tried to poison me with some frozen chicken nuggets (very Swedish, trust me) that she had gotten on sale. They never quite turned white even though the potatoes we had been roasting we completely done. So, we ended up going to the Swedish version of McDonald's, Maxx, to get some of their nugs. Macy left from there to go back for her 2-4pm class, and I promptly got lost on my way back to her apartment for a nap. After eventually finding her building and napping, I met her back at the university to be taken on my first official Helsingborg tour led by the finest tour guide of them all, Macy Osman. We walked through town along the water towards the beach and then looped back through one of the oldest pedestrian only shopping streets in Sweden (a very prestigious title). I was informed one could not walk along one of the oldest pedestrian only shopping streets in Sweden and not stop at Milly's Candy Emporium. So like the good Swede and tourist we were, we made a stop in for some delicious treats. The rest of the night was spent eating cheese bread (that's bread, butter, slices of cheese, topped with jam) and munching on our candy.

City Hall

The beach - if you look close enough you can see Denmark!

Saturday was spent at several fikas with some necessary walking in between. We began at Macy's usual first stop, a friend from church hosts a fika for the congregation every Saturday. So, I got to enjoy a cinnamon roll and tea while hangin' with Macy's church friends. Afterwards, we walked to the Kärnan, the last remnant of the medieval wall from before the Danes invaded and subsequently controlled that area of Sweden. From up there we also had some lovely views of the city beneath us. 

The hostess with the mostest

View of Helsingborg

After running a few errands, we found ourselves at our second fika. We first ate some lunch and then dove into our lovely desserts, a sort of undercooked brownie/cake and a chocolate ball with orange flavoring. Eventually, some of Macy's school friends joined us before the restaurant closed for the day. We closed the day with a viewing of Black Panther at the cinema close to Macy's apartment!

Some ~tasty~ treats

Sunday we woke up and got ready for our day trip to Copenhagen! We took the ferry to Helsingør, Denmark and then a train to Copenhagen. We didn't have much planned for our day besides some major (specifically free) sites we wanted to see and figured we would see some neat things along the way. We started off towards Nyhavn, a colorful canal, then made our way to the Little Mermaid statue, which was a real trek. 

Nyhavn

THE statue

At this point, we were both quite hungry, so we decided to wander the streets until we found a good cafe. We filled up on sandwiches and warm beverages then got back out into the cold to find the Botanical Gardens, which was quite a ways away, but we got a chance to see the changing of the guards at one of the Palaces and an old castle on our way. 

The greenhouse from the outside

It was a lovely garden AND it was quite warm inside

We then headed towards Christiansborg Palace, where you can take an elevator to the top of its tower for FREE. 

da view

Before heading back on the train, we decided to have one last fika. We headed to a pastry shop/cafe we had passed on the way to Nyhavn for some sweets and tea. I got the best piece of cake EVER, and Macy got the worst cinnamon roll EVER. We can't all be graced with the ability to pick out great pastries. 

Layers of cake split by chocolate mousse, surrounded by marzipan covered by a chocolate shell with a pear jam between the top cake layer and the marzipan. Heaven.

Afterwards, we meandered back to the train station to begin our journey home. We awoke early this morning for me to make the hour and a half train/bus ride back to the airport. All in all a great and tasty weekend!! 

Sorry this was a bit long, but I tried to spice it up with pictures :)