Dillon Rahkola: Great Weekend.

Hey everyone,

This weekend was truly great! Everyone I know here in Denmark, is going out of their way to show me a great time while I am here. This friday, my class was assigned to be in charge of the coat check at the first school party of the year. The party was for first years only, but because my class was in charge of coats, I was lucky enough to be apart of it. The school parties in Denmark are a heck of a lot better then the ones in Canada. First off they serve alcohol, which was a big shock to me, and people actually come to these school parties! At my school it is always difficult to get students to attend school events, other then semi-formal and prom. The first years seemed like they had an amazing time. Every class dressed up in a different theme, which was neat as well. Guys from my class picked me up, to bring me to the party and we just hung around the school, socializing until the party was over at around midnight. Then we moved down the street to the local disco (or club). They insisted that I came, to experience Danish teenage culture. It was pretty cool, especially because I have never been in a club before. I left early (2am) and my host father was nice enough to stay up for me and pick me up. It was a great way to meet new people, lets just hope they remember me at school on monday!

Saturday was looking like it was going to be a relaxing day, filled with hanging around the house and watching the Danish Football match at 8pm. So, thinking that this is the way the day was going to turn out, I slept in until 12pm. My second host family (who are lovely people) called me and asked if they could take me out. I was very excited because I have the cutest little host sister, that seems not to like me one bit, but I'm fine with that. Hopefully she will warm up to me by the time I change host families. And hopefully by that time I will be speaking decent danish so I can talk to her! We went to the top of "Sky Mountain", which is just a big hill! But its a huge thing in Denmark. The view from the top is so beautiful, it looks right over a gorgeous lake where we were able to see the worlds oldest working steam boat pull off to pick up more passengers. We walked down to the bottom of the "mountain" to see the steam boat. It was incredible. It is so old but still working beautifully. Unfortunately I forgot my camera at home so I didn't get a chance to take any photos, which I would of liked to. All in all it was a great day, getting to know my second host family who are so kind, and such a nice family.

Sunday my host family planned a trip out to the west coast of Denmark to see the North Sea which I was so excited for! My host father Kim said, "If you are a true Danish Viking, you will go swimming in the ocean with me". Thinking that he was kidding I agreed to his plan, but of course he pulls out his bathing suit, throws me a towel and sure enough when we got to the ocean we went swimming! The west coast is very dangerous for swimming. It has very tall waves and sometimes dumb tourists (Germans) get caught under and drown. But this didn't scare a true viking like myself, so I ran straight in with out thinking twice. It was cold. Very cold, but after being in the water for 5 minutes, and my whole body went numb, it started to get warmer! I was diving into the waves, and having a blast. It is something that I will always remember.

I thought this weekend was worthy enough for a blog update, so I hope you did too. It was such a great weekend. Here are some pictures of the west coast. We also visited Denmark's very first windmill that was made in the country, which was neat!