Personal and Cultural blog
This has been an eventful week! We came back from Copenhagen after a weekend away; staying in a nice hotel with Fionnuala’s parents and brother, and as the expression goes ‘back to porridge’. We had a brief taste of luxury-living once again i.e. watching English TV channels in the hotel room, sleeping in comfortable beds, having a big ensuite with a bath and being treated to dinner in restaurants. It heightened my appreciation for my lifestyle back at home and made me realise just how apathetic I have become about material things and luxuries over here in Vordingborg.
Trisha was surprised to find her Turkish roommate had arrived when she entered and was greeted by her and a crowd of other Turkish students. There was an instant introduction to Turkish culture when we exchanged a hug and a kiss on each cheek with them. Unfortunately we also discovered that Trisha’s personal belongings and furniture had been moved and someone had been smoking in the room; which led to Trisha’s move to our confined room. Fortunately, we met with our tutor the next day and were given the option for the three of us to move to a bigger room; where the majority of ERASMUS students live.
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| Pancake Tuesday with the ERASMUS students. |
This week we also hosted Pancake Day for all of the ERASMUS students and we also celebrated ‘Austrian Carnival Day’ by wearing brightly coloured clothes and vibrant eye make-up. It was nice to get everybody together to mix and engage in conversation with each other as we didn’t have this opportunity in the previous semester, when all the other students had international dinners. This taught me that if you want something to happen you need to take responsibility to organise it over here as so far, nothing social has been organised for the ERASMUS students. The event was successful and everyone from all the different cultures and countries enjoyed the pancakes, so much so, that we got invited to Turkish tea and cake by two Turkish students two days later.
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| Turkish Tea At the end of this week we also were invited to dinner by the three Dutch girls; three Austrian girls and a Norwegian girl also came. We instantly bonded with each other and shared the same sense of humour; a bonus when we all come from different backgrounds and cultures. I also was impressed at how fluent all the girls were in speaking English and it made me question our education system back home and our apparent ignorance to learning foreign languages. Obviously we are at an advantage with being native English speakers, however I’m beginning to think that if children in Northern Ireland were to engage in foreign language learning at a young age, communication barriers would be minimised and cultural awareness, increased. I love that ERASMUS is giving me the opportunity to engage with a variety of cultures and communicate with people from different countries. We certainly are learning a lot from each other and about our cultures! I’m looking forward to organising more socialising opportunities with the ERASMUS students and widening my knowledge of their cultures as well as entertaining them with examples of typical Northern Irish culture! |
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| Dutch girls' dinner |
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