I think something that surprised me is how much Europeans in general smoke. Most of the people in my dorm from European countries smoke. Or I guess I should say, I’m surprised at the amount smokers smoke. Usually when I got outside I’ll see the same few people smoking and it just seems like they smoke multiple times a day. I don’t know how expensive cigarettes are exactly but they must be literally burning money because I’m pretty sure one pack of cigarettes is like 20 USD. I’ve heard of an alternative that you leave in your mouth (I think) and I’ve been asked if I had any a few times but that also seems really expensive.
On the other hand, something that really impresses me and never ceases to amaze is how clean Denmark gets. I have no idea how they do it but every night there’s usually a bunch of garbage (including a ton of cigarette butts) on the streets, especially the main ones in the city center, but the next day if you go around, you won’t really see all that much garbage. Don’t get me wrong, you will still see trash in the streets. But relative to the amount of garbage that was in the street the night before, there’s no comparison. And I don’t really know when they have time to do all of this. People are out and about until maybe 4 or 5 am, but by 9 am the streets are pretty clean. I’ve never seen anyone picking trash up in the streets either. It’s ridiculously impressive how clean Denmark gets compared to the amount of trash you might see on any given night.
Also, the temperature and sunlight have begun to finally even out! I abandoned taking my winter coat out a few weeks ago because the temperature was around 17 degree celsius, which I think is about 60 degrees fahrenheit. Such beautiful weather and temperature. I actually had gloves that I intended to use during the beginning of the semester and just saw them a few days ago. The gloves hindered my dexterity which was already pretty bad, so I just figured I would suffer for a little bit while I was out getting groceries rather than use the gloves (which honestly didn’t help that much) and potentially drop something important because I couldn’t feel properly through the glove. But anyway, the weather has been amazing for a few months. The sun is coming out for more time now so my circadian rhythm isn’t getting messed up anymore. It’s pretty bad but I never really got used to the lack of sunlight that Denmark had and was still getting way more sleep than I needed simply because the sun would rise and set so quickly during the day. Now I kinda have the opposite problem where the sun is beginning to rise and set much further apart so I’m getting a lot more sunlight for a much longer period of time. No complaints here though. It’s really nice waking up with the sun even if that means getting up around 6 am when the sun begins to peek through my curtains.
I am getting sad, or at least bracing to be sad because my roommate will leave in about a week. He’s been absolutely amazing. So just a little story (hang on, it does relate back to my roommate) I saw my neighbor in the hallway and suggested we all have dinner together since she and my roommate are good friends. Her and my roommate actually ended up cooking for I think 10 total people, mostly Brazilians, and I wanted to cook for everyone else as well since cooking for 10 people is a pretty big task. Anyway, come to find out she can’t eat garlic or onions and is actually allergic to them? I had no idea that was even possible. I had asked if she had any allergies and she said “not many, I’m just allergic to garlic and onions”. That totally freaked me out because 1) I had never heard of that kind of allergy 2) she had gone to the emergency room for it before 3) the vast majority of things that I make have some form of garlic or onions in them. So anyway here’s where it connects back to my roommate: I tested a bunch of different recipes for loco moco out on him, trying to make both with and without garlic and onions. Honestly, some of them were REALLY bad but he still ate them and gave me good honest feedback that helped to make the next batch better. I have no idea how much he’s eaten at this point but I believe I’ve made him at least five. I hope they’ve been progressively getting better. I think the good thing about him is that he is really nice, but he’s also honest like I said. So he’s not overly nice to the point that he won’t give any negative feedback. He’s awesome. I got really lucky with roommates. I’m not sure if I mentioned this before but the person that lives above me has been drumming basically since the beginning of the semester. I have never met this person and no one I’ve talked to really knows anything about him. And I have no idea how he’s making these sounds because it sounds like a legit drum set. He will drum for maybe 20 minutes so not that long but it used to be really bad because he would go off and on throughout the day. So when I’m trying to take my incredibly important midday nap, I was not a happy camper hearing drumming at 1 pm which would last for maybe an hour. It’s gotten a lot better but still I can’t imagine having to live near that. All to say, I’m very happy that I got my roommate and not someone else.
But unfortunately, all good things must come to an end. I think he might be one of the first people to leave. He’s graduated already (graduated here in Denmark) and is now going to work at this huge telecommunications company in his hometown so I’m very excited for him. I wish he could’ve stayed for longer but I’m happy he gets to go home and begin his true adult life.
My roommate (black shirt) and his/my friend (button down shirt). Beautiful beautiful people.
Unfortunately, no loco moco survived long enough to be photographed.