This week we had Danish classes; which are not compulsory, but we have chosen to do them to help us to develop our awareness of Danish vocabulary and grammar and to equip us with some useful phrases. I enjoy these classes and practising the language with the Danish people we meet on our travels. The accent and pronunciation can be easily misinterpreted, for example ‘jeg’ means ‘I’, but is pronounced ‘yigh’, which is completely different to the spelling of the word ‘jeg’. Therefore we are quickly learning that we shouldn’t read Danish with our English interpretations! Ironically, this week our electric went out and I ended up applying and attempting some of my Danish in a phone call to our maintenance man’s wife! This was quite the experience as his wife didn’t speak any English and his English isn’t great either. However I managed to say “Hej, jeg hedder Kerri og jeg taler engelsk og jeg bor i Vordingborg Domea , Kuskevej. Vi har ingen elektrisk, kan du hjælpe?” ( Hello, I am Kerri and I speak english and I live in Vordingborg dorms Kuskevej. We have no electric, can you help?) and his wife was instructed to reply, “Try again in 5 minutes.” So perhaps I didn’t do too badly. Although our electric still didn’t work, so Fionnuala and I resorted to asking a builder on site if he could help and luckily he spoke English and he tripped the switch, which gave us instant electric once again!
This weekend we took the train to Copenhagen and Soren (our Danish friend) picked us up and brought us to his parent’s house; where we were invited to stay for the weekend. They were such friendly and accommodating people and were eager to entertain and feed us! That Friday night we had a delicious pork roast dinner with red cabbage, boiled potatoes, peppered sauce and crackling (something I had never tried before!). The food they made for us this weekend reflected Danish culture and was sometimes similar to the food at home. Soren’s dad educated us on and introduced us to traditional Danish delicacies, including; minced pork, egg and breadcrumb burgers, lemon half cake, dream cake, bakery bread with cheese and jam combined, brown malt-type bread and remoulade and béarnaise sauces. Trisha and I shared our love of the Frankfurt sausages and hot dogs that we have been getting since we arrived and Soren’s parents have promised to take us to their favourite hot dog place the next time we visit! We also learned that the Danish people get up every morning very early in comparison to home. They like to have their coffee by 8.30am at the latest and schools and classes start at 8.30am (our Danish classes start at this time and classes in the next few weeks will begin at this time too). We also learned that ‘handball’ is a popular televised sport in Denmark and Soren’s family as well as the Danish tutors we have met are very passionate about it and the Danish team.
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| The Anderson Family! |
Soren, his sister Maria and girlfriend Christina took us on a tour through Copenhagen while we were there and we seen the city hall, royal palace grounds and the changing of the guards, we also walked through Stroget street (the world’s longest shopping street). However as we were all freezing walking around, we cut sight-seeing short. Other sights to see will give us something to look forward to in the coming weeks; hopefully when the weather gets warmer! We thoroughly enjoyed our weekend experiencing a typical Danish family culture and enjoyed the relaxed, laid-back atmosphere and way of life. The family were very open with us and eager to engage in English with us as well as help us with our progressing Danish. We look forward to seeing them again and learning more from them. We were also so appreciative of the T.V. they gave us for our Vordingborg room!
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| Us outside the royal palace gounds |
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