last call

current music: "one step closer," u2

since arriving here on august 1, i have faithfully detailed my danish adventures. i have sat in the same chair, in the same kitchen, in very different states of mind. but it is all over. in fewer than 24 hours, i will be forced to bid a tearful good-bye to wonderful copenhagen. fernando and kurt left on monday morning, and i am still a wreck. my house threw a dinner party for the international students still left here, so i cooked the last of the food we all had in our cabinets, and we celebrated the end of denmark. even though our house was crammed with people, poker chips, and votive candles, i felt eerily alone and distracted. it seems that copenhagen has not only made an exhausting impression on me, it has consumed me. the only time i ever wanted to leave this country was when i woke up on monday morning to two empty rooms at the end of the hallway.
saying good-bye to nando and kurt made me cry so much that i felt dehydrated afterward. neither kurt nor fernando wanted to wait me up early in the morning on their way to the airport, so we agreed to say good-bye before we went to bed. even though we were all exhausted from cooking, cleaning, packing, partying, and good-bye-ing, we stayed up for as long as we could. finally, someone uttered "i'm going to bed," and it was all downhill from there. i turned the cornier into nando's room, saw him sitting quietly on his bed surrounding by luggage, and i lost it. i lost it big time. all i remember was fernando saying "it's been good, emily. it's been really good with you." i was crying so hard, and i hadn't even gotten to kurt. kurt met me in my room, and i was so sad i had nothing to say. i just hugged him and cried.
kurt shut my door, and i stayed in my room until the next morning. early the next morning i got texts from both of them at the airport. nando said that he was only at the airport and missed us all so much already. kurt's said that he was losing it. i read them, cried, and cried myself to sleep. the past two days have been a saddening haze of loneliness, reflection, and confusion. i got e-mails from bret, nando, and kurt today, all of whom telling me whati might have to look forward to. right now all i want is them back here with me. nothing else.
it seems that this city is barren without people i love to fill it. the streets, the bars, my house, just seem so empty without people to share them with. i miss them so much already. everyone says that you don't know what you've got until it's gone. it's my contention that it stings a little more when you did realize what you had before it left.
for now, my life is packed into two suitcases and a backpack. i have a plane ticket, tears in my eyes, and some of the best memories of my life. i have a special letter on my night stand from one of the most special people i have ever met and hopes that we will meet again soon.
i don't know how i am going to be able to convey the significance of this trip to anyone other than those i spent it with. it seems that studying abroad amounts to one big inside joke; a joke that i know will always make me smile. hej, hej.

closing time

i leave copenhagen in a week- this time for good. i think that i'm going to have to be dragged onto the plane next wednesday 'cause i don't want to leave this place. it seems that this vacation is coming to an end. forever. as excited as i am to see the sun, hear english, and eat normal food, i love denmark, and i don't want to go. i can't really remember a point on this trip where i felt so far removed from everyone and everything that i wanted to leave. certainly being here for several months does little to alienate you from a place. copenhagen has grown on me every day since i arrived here. from its cobblestone streets to its hoards of baby carriages to its undeniable scandanavian charm. i'll even miss the jumbled, gurgled mess that constitutes danish. i'll miss trying to speak danish with people, and i'll miss even more the feeling i get when they actually understand you. bartending at the student house has allowed me to make countless friends, feel like a celebrity, and make a complete ass of myself alongside others doing the exact same thing. i'll miss my cozy little attic room with its peeling walls, trusty radiator, and my vanilla candles. i'll miss halling my computer into the kitchen to read my mail while fernando and kurt crack jokes. i'll miss the sound of georgia's heels clacking up the winding, wooden stairs and her ever-faithful "hello!!" as she turns the corner toward her room. i'll miss ben's politician hair, the smell of his mouse and hairspray seeping through the bathroom door, and his obsession with making sure that we always have an adequate supply of toilet paper. i'll miss the hours of senseless banter, stupid humor, and intectual talks in kurt's room. i'll miss his piggy-back rides and the sound of him cheering for the cal football team (even if he is watching a webcast of a game taking place thousands of miles away). i'll miss the pasta dinners with georgia, the feeling i get when i see a piece of my mail at the foot of the stairs, and our tiny, danish shower. i'll miss calling my cell phone my "mobile" and calling text messages "sms"s. i'll miss my bike (the italian stallion), netto, and days with three hours of sunlight. i'll miss the 2a, the 82n, lindevang, the automated lady who announces the metro stop s, h&m, and our rickety red stove. i'll miss tesdorpfsvej and the people who filled its house with me. i'll miss their unique charms, their stories, and their faces. this tiny little country holds a huge place in my heart. i hope that these next seven days are the slowest of my life. peace...

czech this out

current music: “rodeo jones,” sunny day real estate

ok, you can hate me- I know that I haven’t written in this thing in what feels like forever. even though I have been planted in front of my computer for some four days straight now writing my blasted terms papers, I will, nonetheless, keep typing, but this time, to you. I don’t even remember where I left off from my last blog, so I’ll just write about whatever I want to…
kevin (and for those of you who don’t know the identity of this mysterious “kev” character, I will suffice to say that he is my best friend from high school who now goes to dartmouth) came to visit me here in wonderful copenhagen. copenhagen isn’t exactly the place you choice to stay in for more than a week if you’re doing the tourist-y thing, so we jetted to berlin and prague for a week. berlin officially holds the title of my favorite european city, hands down. after waiting in the copenhagen airport for more than two hours and wishing I could kill the time with beer like kev, we finally boarded our plane and landed in berlin. we spent about two days there, and I wish (almost!) that I could have studied in berlin- I found the that amazing. kev and I saw the brandenburg tor (the famous gate napoleon came through years back); the berlin wall; and checkpoint charlie (the u.s. army checkpoint that once controlled entrance to both east and west berlin). kevin and I were being historically observant, ya know, talking history and its implications on present day, and I turn around (now facing west berlin), and I see one of the funniest (and most disgusting) things I had ever seen. I already knew that kev would find this equally as entertaining, so all I said was “kev, you’re about to laugh so hard.” he turns around, and I direct his gaze in the direction of a business sign that reads “snackpoint charlie.” perhaps this sign holds little humor to those not standing below it, but, holy shit! it was hilarious. you know there was a guy just sitting on top of this “great name” for a restaurant who couldn’t wait for the wall to come crashing down. you know the second people started chipping away at it and david hasselhoff mounted it to start “singing,” he ran out and patented the name. aside from its purported humor, berlin was also wonderfully modern. I researched online (yes, I did say “researched”) the locations of all the starbucks in berlin, but for most of the first day there, kev and I couldn’t find any. we boarded a tram (in the wrong direction, by chance), and I had my back to the street when kev yelled “starbucks!” without thinking (I don’t know, this animalistic- or capitalistic- urge) engulfed me, and I nearly barreled over this woman as I leapt for the “open” button on the tram door. I raced across the street and into the caffeinated haven that is a starbucks lobby. I love berlin. a lot.
prague was another story. you see, I love prague, but I’m not in love with it… keep in mind that throughout this trip I was sick. really sick. like, coughing until you puke, fatigued, no appetite (shock!), sick. a five-hour train ride brought us to the outskirts of eastern europe, known as the czech republic. by this point, kev was buzzing off his seven euro train station champagne, and I feel so sick I want to fall over. prague’s not on the euro, they speak a scrambled version of gibberish, and its effing freezing. after obtaining czech “kruny,” i.e., currency, we search for our hostel for an hour, and I use the term “hostel” loosely. very loosely. basically, kev and i take a rickety elevator to the top story of this shaft-like building adjoined to a bus station. covering the elevator and walls of the hostel are friendly little phrases welcoming us to prague. allow me to recount some of them. aw, yes, there was the ever-pleasant: “this hostel will kill you- run now!,” and then there was the “you might die if you stay here.” welcome to prague. I was already scared of the grafitti and trash that colored the streets of prague, and after having lived in the white-washed utopia that is scandanvia, I was tar-rippin’ hard core. denmark is almost too perfect: it makes you scared of the outside world, ya know, the real world where people are hungry and trash is just something that exists outside of perfectly-painted receptacles. I convinced kev that we should peace-out of that hostel, but we had the unfortunate task of wandering prague late at night in freezing temperatures with no map. we found a hostel, but prague left with me a bitter first impression. however, prague was as beautiful (and tourist-y) as everyone says. I know now why prague tops the list of “must-see” european cities, but I wasn’t as taken by it as kev or most other people. it seems that berlin is a shoe that fits me better. I took a ton of pics and purchased my obligatory flag, so I was content to just take in the cites and pay what felt like pennies for everything. yeah, this just in: copenhagen came in at #5 for the most expensive cities on earth, and half the cities that made the top four were ones that I have been to. yikes! where is my financial aid check (and job)!
from germany, the czech republic, to sweden for the u.c. thanksgiving in lund. all the kids from copenhagen trained it on over to sweden to pig out on actual food. by this time I was feeling slightly better, so I tried to eat like a pig because just seeing mashed potatoes made me way too happy. apparently danes care more about bikes than they do food, so we were all freaking out. kev didn’t seem too impressed but seeing as how he hasn’t been abroad, he didn’t hold our over-excitability against us… and practically hours after finishing our meal, I sent kev on his merry way back to the states. good times, man.and still more! I leave denmark in exactly two weeks, still have class, u.c. excursions, term papers, christmas shopping, packing, and a ton of other things to do! funny how an entire semester can cruise by then all of a sudden I am expected to actually do something. hopefully I’ll remember where I put my work ethic when I get home. for now, I have to crank out three more pages of my culture class paper, and do a ton more reading for my soc class. much more soon. peace…