Week/Uge #11

At the moment in Denmark, there is a thing called a 'Lockout' happening. This is kind of like a strike, by one of the teaching unions (over an issue where the government and the union cannot come to an agreement). So in all of the junior schools (preschool-year 9), the teachers are not coming to school and therefore there is no school on. This also affects my language school, because the language teachers are members of the same union, so I have no been able to go to language school, which is quite disappointing. The school that I attend, which is called a gymnasium (like a senior school), is not affected. This is happening all over Denmark and no one knows when the issue will be resolved and the schools will open again. Next week will be the second week that this has been happening for.

On Tuesday night, I cooked a traditional Australian meal for dinner for my host family. I made an Australian Meat pie, complete with a pastry gum leaf on top. It is a special thing that my dad always does when making pies, putting a pastry decoration on top in the shape of something different every time. To go with the pie I made mashed potato, honey carrots, roast zucchini and mushy peas. The meal turned out quite well, and I served it the Australian way, as a complete meal on the plate, rather than the Danish way of serving yourself from dishes in the middle of the table.

  

On Wednesday night, I went to watch a locally produced musical in Viborg, with my counsellor Alice and her friend, plus her daughter Katrine and her friend Debbie, who both go to the same school as me. The musical was called 'Our House' and was advertised as a 'London love-story'. Katrine was very impressed when I read the program about the musical in Danish and understood pretty much everything that was on it. It was performed in the 'Viborg Teater' (Viborg Theatre), which is a very beautifully decorated, over 100 year old building in the centre of the Viborg town. The building has high round ceilings that are covered in paintings, and seating that is over 3 levels, with a ground level and 2 balcony levels. The entire musical, including all of the songs were in Danish. A lot of the time it was a little difficult to keep up with what was being said or sung, but because it was a musical, I could still figure out what was happening. I thought that the musical was very good and a lot of fun to watch.

  

On Thursday afternoon I went to Natalie's ballet class with her, to watch. It was great to have the opportunity to watch the dancers and see what going to dance classes in Denmark is like.

Friday was Arly's birthday, so we all got up nice and early to sing Happy Birthday to him. Then I left early to attend the breakfast meeting at 7am, of the Viborg Morning Rotary Club. After eating breakfast together, I spoke to the members about myself, Australia and being an exchange student. I started my presentation by speaking for a minute or so in Danish, introducing myself; they were quite impressed by this. At the end, I answered questions and presented them with a banner from my sponsor club, the Caboolture Rotary Club. It was great to meet more people, including my future host mother, Heidi, from my third host family. As a gift for speaking to them, the club presented me with some delicious Danish sweets, including almonds coated in white chocolate and licorice powder, mint chocolate toffees and salty licorice (which I will have to try again before I can pass judgement on).

We did have plans for Saturday, to watch my host brother's school musical and have a birthday dinner for Arly with the grandparents, but most of my host family has come down with the flu, so the plans were cancelled and we spent the day relaxing instead.

On Sunday morning I went to breakfast at my next host family's house, with my current host mother Eva, my next host family and my counsellor Alice. The breakfast was lovely, and it was great to be able to organise and sort out the plans for the next few months and my moving in with them in 2 weeks. My next host brother, Casper gave me a quick tour of the neighbourhood, before it began hailing (just like it would normally begin raining in Australia, which was very tiny soft balls of ice, that stay solid on the ground without melting). 

On Sunday afternoon I went horse riding with a girl from my class, Julie. She lives on a farm, just outside of Viborg. We rode across wide open fields, that usually have corn growing on them in summer, but are bare at this time of year, along small roads, through the small town of Foulum and along tracks that ran between the fields. It was very cold, at one stage we were even riding while it was snowing on us. By the time we got back, my fingers, face and feet felt frozen! The horse that I rode was called Herman, and he was very tall. Despite the cold, it was a very fun afternoon, seeing the Danish countryside by horseback!