Prague

On the drive from Berlin to Prague we again lucked out with the weather. The countryside of Prague was equally as beautiful as Berlin, although more beautiful to me because it had mountains. I have never been so happy to see rolling landscape and something similar to fall foliage (although I have been spoiled by fall in Vermont, foliage here seems more like slowly dying/browning leaves.) We passed by some gorgeous castles and rivers but were reminded of the developing Czech economy by smog filled views and many poor neighborhoods and towns.
We pulled intro Prague at sunset and were able to watch it duck below the buildings turning the sky red and purple and illuminating the millions of turrets that line the hilly city. Prague is easily the most gorgeous city I have been to yet, and also the one with the best exchange rate! Finally some purchasing power!

We stayed in a hotel right near the Power Tower, an old powder house, from which we could easily walk to Old Town, Wenceslas square, the Charles Bridge and the thousands of tourist shops that managed to take a lot of money from me.

We went on a walking tour of the city where we visited some of the above places. Old Town is a large square full of beautiful buildings that is also home to a famous clock tower that around three in the afternoon becomes a hotspot for tourists as groups, including us, that line up to hear the clock chime the hour and watch the little doors to open to reveal small figures that dance through the windows. The astrological clock itself is beautiful but very difficult to read, and like other historical buildings in Prague, it is also laden with stories of torture. When the clock was constructed the government thought it was so beautiful that they blinded the man who made it so he would be unable to make any other clocks. In anger, his friends then destroyed the clock which was unable to be repaired until many years later!

Wenceslas square, and the National Museum, is another famous area in Prague that, like the rest of the city, is littered with way to many McDonalds, souvenir shops, hot dog stands, and other stores (including Burton snowboards?!) It again has a violent streak with two students, around 19 and 21 years old, having lit themselves on fire in protest.

The dark history continues with the beautiful Charles Bridge, over which a priest was thrown when he would not revel what was told to him in confidence (whether or not the King’s son was actually his, or if his wife had known another man.)
The statues depicting this along the bridge are ironically considered good luck, so like the other tourists I touched the stone and made a secret wish. From this bridge not only do you have an amazing view of the city and the palace on the hill, but it is home to many street vendors selling beautiful artwork, to which I fell prey, purchasing a watercolor that will sometime be framed in my house.

The best view of Prague was from the palace itself where, once we reached the top of the large hill, we visited St. Vitus Cathedral, the Old Royal Palace, St. George’s Basilica-the second oldest church a Prague castle, and Golden lane-an alley of 16th century houses.
On a business note, while in Prague we visited O2 Telefonica, a huge telecomm company that I think sponsors Manchester United, and also went to Skanska, a major construction company. While these visits were great as well, I think Skanska provided us with the best information that, depending on what my group thinks, may be who we write our paper on. DIS also treated us to a folklore evening, which was a great way to see the culture. We enjoyed amazing food while being entertained by traditional song and dance in a great atmosphere.
We spent much of our time in Prague wandering around the beautiful sights and killing time in the many shops. I found Prague more difficult to run in because the streets where much narrower, there wasn’t a park near our hotel, and the city isn’t exactly grid-like which made what I thought were rational running routes into long, twisted and confused jogs. At the end of the trip, I was sad to leave Prague and even more sad to have to get on the bus for a LONG, over-night drive back to Copenhagen. But after visiting Prague I would by lying if I said I thought I would never go back. The city was not only beautiful but also romantic and fun. It would be a great place for a honeymoon, not to mention another trip anytime in the future.

Anyway, I am home now for about 24 more hours which I am using to try to catch up on emails, publish these blog posts, do laundry and pack for China. It is really starting to hit me that I’m actually going. At this point I’m excited but nervous; completely convinced that I am going to have UNBELIEVABLE culture shock as I cannot even imagine what eye-opening experiences this culture, which seems like the opposite of the US, will provide me with, not to mention that I will probably, if I’m lucky at least, have a stomach ache the whole time. It will be an amazing experience, but it’s going to be a lot.
Our jam-packed, government unregulated schedule is posted online in case you are interested in checking it out, (http://www.dis.dk/Students/optional.php click on the Tour program link under China,) but I will let you know how it goes when I get back…

Berlin

The first few days of our long study tour with DIS took us to Berlin.

We met on Sunday morning and drove to the ferry which took us from Denmark to Germany.
From there we drove through the beautiful German countryside to Sachsenhausen, a Nazi and then Soviet concentration camp. Although not the warmest of all welcomes to Germany it was a truly sobering and powerful experience. I have read countless holocaust novels, but visiting a camp brings the whole experience to life. Over 30,000 people died in the camp at the hands of the Nazis between 1936-1945 and thousands more were killed in the death march. Interestingly, the camp was kept in use by the Soviets who imprisoned 60,000 East Germans, leading to the death of additional 12,000 people. We were given audio headsets which were a really great way to learn about the atrocities and lives of the prisoners at the camp including roll call, the toils of daily schedules, extermination and experimentation techniques and the various other aspects of life in the camp and the town which lay literally right next to the camp.

On a lighter note, we continued on the Berlin where we would spend the first half of our week long trip. While in Berlin we visited Bayer Pharmaceuticals and Gillette. These two companies presented us with great information and we were also able to go on a tour of the Gillette factory to see how the razor blades were manufactured, a process much more complex than you might think! At the end of our visit we were also given free razors and shaving gel! So exiting!

While in Berlin, DIS took us to the Jewish Museum, a really interesting museum that thankfully focused more on Jewish life throughout history and less on the holocaust itself. Another day we were also treated to lunch in the German Reichstag or parliament building, which is one of the most spectacular buildings in the city. We ate lunch at a very ritzy café and enjoyed the beautiful view from the top.



We also took a bus tour of the city, an amazing trek that turned out to be a tease as it was impossible for us to even make a dent in all the things we wanted to see while in the HUGE city that is Berlin. We stopped by many areas some of which I tried to get back to during our free time including the Berliner Dome the East Berlin Tower, the Jewish Memorial, Charlottenburg Palace, Museum Island and the Pergamon Museum (home of many unique exhibits including the Gates of Ishtar from 605 BC,) . and the site of Hitler's bunker, just to mention a few things. We also visited the HUGE department store, called KaDeWe, very similar to Harrods, with its 7 floors of clothes, food, accessories etcI finally got to try the German pretzel I had been dying to buy, but practically choked on it as I read the prices for American goods including a small container of JIF peanut butter (roughly 8 Euros, or $12) and Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups for about $1.50 a piece! Needless to say, I was not that desperate.

After an amazing dinner at an East Berlin beer garden (bratwurst and potatoes…yum!), we stumbled upon the Berlin “Festival of Lights” where we, and thousands of others, watched fireworks, lasers and smoke illuminate the sky. It was a nice show and I can’t believe how lucky I am getting as I have seen fireworks in almost every city I have visited, but like the others the show could hardly compare to any Fourth celebration in the states.
We ended our trip to Berlin the next day with a stop at the Olympic Stadium, home of the 1938 Olympic Games and the World Cup this past year. The stadium was amazing and had undergone significant changes that literally erased Hitler’s presence including his name on the plaque and his speaking podium in the stadium. The one room that was really cool was the chapel, complete with gold walls and prayers carved out in many languages. The chapel was available for use before games, and even for weddings and some funerals!

In general, I loved the city of Berlin as it is a very modern city because it has been rebuilt so many times. It also had this great park called Tiergarten, which was an amazingly peaceful place to run each morning, that connected the once separate East and West Berlin which still differ in architecture and are divided by the cobblestone-marked wall and a short remaining stretch, that used to break them apart.
The two biggest things I noticed about Germany was that people drove fast, powerful cars that made crossing the street significantly more scary than in Denmark, where your biggest issue are the bikers and the colder German people. While they were curious and would make eye contact with you, they seemed rather annoyed and slightly unfriendly. Naturally, almost everyone is annoyed at tourists, but the Germans were a much harder people to ask for directions than are the Danes.

My biggest regret was not making in to Check Point Charlie. Although we crammed as much as we could in as it was, I would have loved to visit that museum.

With much left to see of Berlin, we loaded the busses and started our journey to Prague…

Shipping Out

It has been a busy, sleep-deprived week, but now that it's over, I'm just finishing some last minute things before heading off to Berlin and Prague tomorrow! It should be a great trip and I am very excited to have mid-terms over with, hopefully they went well, and to have a few weeks to travel around. Although, traveling this much and this far is not exactly relaxing...

This past week has been busy! On Tuesday we visited the host Grandparents, which means I completely stuffed myself on lots and lots of amazing food. On Wednesday, amid my mid-term studies and after my 2+ hour OD run, which felt refreshing, I watched "After the Wedding" a really great, but VERY emotional Danish Film.

Thursday I had ski training again, after which we carved PUMPKINS!
It was soo much fun! My family had only carved them with one other student and had never tried roasted pumpkin seeds before and I was happy to be the first to introduce them! I don’t know why, but while I was walking through the city the other day I realized that I am going to miss Reese’s peanut butter cups on Halloween. Maybe it is because we have them a lot at school, or because they are one of the staple hand-outs when trick-or-treating… While I will be in China on Halloween and probably will have completely forgotten what day it is, the fall weather here has been making me think of home. The leaves are changing and it is getting VERY dark. I have to wait until around 7:30 for it to be light enough to run outside and it gets darker earlier and earlier every day! But the smell of rotting leaves and crisp fall air makes me happy and also a little homesick.

Anyway, Friday night was Kulturnatten here in Copenhagen, which is similar to ‘First Night’ in the US. You buy a button and then have a huge buffet of events to choose from. My friend Janna, from SLU, and I bought our buttons and met at school around 5pm, spending the next hour planning out our very busy night. We wanted, and succeeded in, getting as much as we could out of the free entrance to museums and shows. We visited the Round Tower, a site I have visited before but went to again because it was free, for sunset around 6:00 and then again at night to see the city lit up. While we missed out on a show we planned to attend, we instead visited the Danish Design Center and a natural food type display, before taking a bus to the other side of the city for a gospel concert at a local church.


The gospel concert was probably the highlight of the night. Although the church was not particularly easy to find, someone knew I was coming because once we found it there was a fire and s’more materials outside the church. I practically cried with joy as I helped a little girl assemble her s’more before making one of my own…delicious. It was also completely surreal, and exciting, to go to a gospel concert performed by a small choir of white, Danish men and women, singing classic American songs including ‘This Little Light of Mine,’ ‘Oh Happy Day,’ ‘Swing Low,’ and the particularly powerful for us Laurentians, ‘When the Saints go Marching In.’ It was a little odd, but amazingly comforting to hear such ‘American’ songs sung with such fervor!

After the concert we walked through the botanical gardens and wandered around to a few more unsuccessful stops before heading to the train station and calling it a night.

Today was a low key day of packing, cooking, and a little rollerski expedition (no matter how many times I try to meet up with other people, or just work out in general, every attempt is complex process.) I cooked a ‘Team Dinner’ for my host parents and a family friend of garlic bread, spaghetti and meatballs…I hope they actually liked it and didn’t just say so!

Well, anyway, now going to sign off and head to bed! Talk to you in a week!

Sverige

As Friday afternoon was drawing to a close and I was cramming to finish a reading due on Monday, I had to remind myself that this was all worth it…I was going to Stockholm!

A few hours later I was wandering around Slussen metro station attempting to find our hostel, called the Red Boat. Although we actually slept in the white boat shown here, the red one in the background was the main boat of the hostel.
I admittedly should have done more research on where I was going BEFORE I got to Sweden, but I mistakenly assumed that most people would have heard of it. After about a half an hour of asking for directions, I had checked in and was settling into my room with three friends in our floating hostel!

We spent our two days in Stockholm by trying to see as much as we possibly could by walking around the city. We started by crossing the bridge into the old town, Gamla Stan, which was full of narrow streets, touristy shops and cute old buildings. It was so much fun to walk down these streets, which we did many times, especially once we found an ice cream shop that put a basket of broken cone pieces on the window sill. We walked by this store window twice and cleaned out the basket both times…

On Gamla Stan we also walked through the Royal Palace and the Parliament buildings before heading on to City Hall. While we passed on a tour to see the supposedly beautiful interior, it was great to visit this building of which we had an awesome view from our hostel. While still in the city we also visited Jakob’s Kyrka, a bright red church, before walking to city center and checking out the Kulturhuset, a modern art exhibition building that also serves as a youth house, concert center, etc. While in the center we snacked on some lunch we brought and watched as they shoveled trucked-in snow in the middle of the Central Station.

After lunch we moved on to Kaknästower, a TV and radio tower that is actually quite ugly, but provides an awesome view of the city.
Unfortunately the weather was cloudy, but visibility was still relatively good, and the long walk out to the tower enabled us to not only see more of Stockholm, but also witness a car accident, check out a natural photography display, and explore a large park on one of the islands. We finished our planned day by visiting the Vasamuseet and seeing the huge Swedish battleship that sunk on its maiden voyage in the Stockholm harbor. While the ship proved unsuccessful, the museum was awesome, displaying the unbelievably well preserved ship.

We decided to head back towards Central Station for dinner, knowing that we could grab food around there and also watch the snow and skateboard competition while we ate. The live entertainment continued later that night as spontaneous fireworks lit up the city for still unknown reasons. It was amazing to stand in the old part of Stockholm and see the buildings aglow.

After sleeping very well, we woke up the second day to a few hours of sunshine! I went for a short run in the morning and managed to snap a few pictures while it was beautiful out. The sky soon clouded over and we spent our second day exploring the island we were staying on, discovering a few nice lookouts and a yellow church! The rest of the afternoon was spent at a more leisurely pace and included some light shopping and ice-cream eating in the city. I was the first to leave, taking a 4pm flight home. While I was sad to leave such a beautiful city with much more to see, I was pretty tired from our rigorous schedule and was happy to be home with enough time to eat dinner and finish some homework.

All in all it was a full weekend and this week is going to be a challenge. We are going to the grandparents for dinner tomorrow night and I have exams at the end of this week. Not to mention that I am still trying to cram in a good training week for skiing before we take our three week travel break! I’m really exited for our trips to Berlin and Prague, and then my trip to China for 2 weeks, but right now they seem so far away…

NEVER a Dull Moment...

Just in case you missed the last installment of the series of infamous Bednar bad luck experiences, I have a new one for you-

Despite the fact that I am still very tired from the rollerski race this past weekend, I decided to try to meet up with my ski coach and the Copenhagen ski club this evening for a rollerski. Unlike other training sessions, we met in the city which was a huge relief because I could carry all my ski stuff on the train rather than strapping it to my bike and biking the 25+ kilometers into and back out of the city. I actually found our meeting place on the first try, an extremely rare occurrence, but since I had come straight from school I had to ski with my backpack of school books, clothes, and ski gear until we reached the park about 30 minutes away from our meeting point. All was going reasonably well despite the fact that I was on skate skis with slow wheels and carrying a completely stuffed backpack.

The trails in the park were not paved and therefore basically useless for me. While apparently it is normal in Denmark to ski on unpaved trails by using rollerskis with larger, wider wheels, this is unusual in the US. And so, after attempting to roller around the forest on my skinny skate wheels and still toting my backpack, I took my coaches suggestion and decided to head back out to the road where I would do repeats until they came and got me. I found my way back out to the side entrance of the park, the one we had come in, and ditched my bag next to the gate. I then skied to a perpendicular road where I was going to do my repeats. I figured that every time I came up to the top of the hill I would be able to check on my bag as it was about 10 feet from the road I was on.

I started doing some double pole intervals up the hill, checking on my bag as I reached the top each time, when the group joined me on the road. After a quick name game and we started doing some hill repeats, but stopped our interval before I could see my bag. After about three or four intervals I was getting concerned about my bag and decided to go move it with the others at the bottom of the hill; it did have my train card, my cell phone, my wallet, etc. buried inside of it. As I separated from the group to go get my bag, a cop car pulled up beside me- “Are you an American?”

Oh crap. Usually that question doesn’t immediately mean it’s a bad thing, but it’s also not usually a good thing. The cops proceeded to explain to me that I had left my bag outside (although it was actually across the street from) an embassy. I’m not sure what embassy as no one else in the ski group even knew there was one there, but regardless it was obviously concerning to have a mysterious backpack, seemingly unattended for 15 minutes or so within its general area.

I managed to convince the police that I had no idea that it was an embassy, I wasn’t carrying explosives of any kind, and I would never leave my bag there again. Turns out the police had called my host family, who were now absolutely distraught with worry, but were kind enough to call them back to let them know they had found me and that I was okay. I’m proud to say I am the first student they have EVER hosted about whom the cops have called...perfect, just perfect.

After the incident was over I couldn’t believe my bad luck. What are the chances that the building across the street from the park was an EMBASSY? It’s gotta be pretty slim. Although, the woman I was skiing with did bring up a good point saying that I was very lucky it wasn’t the US, or some other intense embassy, or else I would probably be in jail. And she’s right, the situation could have been so much worse…

The rest of the night continued in a similar pattern with the discoveries that I had placed my backpack in poop of some kind while in the park and also that only one train was running meaning I wouldn’t get home until after eight. Needless to say, I made it home to my poor host parents with yet another miserable experience to share. I am CLEARLY much more trouble to them than I am actually worth.

I’m starting to get tired of my crazy stories…

Sweden, Moon Fest, and Muscle Pain

It was a full week. My host parents were vacationing in Rome and just my host sister and I were home together for the week. We took turns making dinner and otherwise got through the week.

Wednesday a friend and I decided to spend the day in Malmö, Sweden.
It was something we wanted to do and had heard about from other students. It cost us around $25 for a round trip train ticket over the famous bridge and after planning out a quick walking route we spent the day browsing the city. We started by going to the Twisting Torso, a beautiful structure that houses conference rooms and apartments. The woman at the information desk was nice enough to let us watch the information screens despite the fact that we were too cheap to pay to watch a 20 min movie and the 10 minute slideshow turned out to be plenty.

We continued walking through a park and to the museum, which was in Malmöhus Castle. We split up there with my friend visiting the museum while I went to St. Petri (St. Peter’s Church) in the heart of Malmö. It was great to visit the church, not only was there an organ concert going on, but being in the church was a really relaxing way to spend a half an hour.



We spend the rest of the afternoon shopping, visiting famous squares, art museums and other sites, and managing to see a good portion of Malmö while still making it home in time for dinner!


This past week was also Moon Festival in China. A friend from SLU has a Chinese roommate who invited a bunch of Chinese students over to help her cook a celebration dinner. They also invited some Americans to try the food and enjoy the experience. I tried Chinese Moon Cake, a very beany and pasty cake that I didn’t like much, although I learned that apparently not all Chinese agree on what this cake is supposed to be like as other students didn’t like it either. It was great to get a little more practice with my chopstick skills and also to meet some new people.


I capped the weekend off with a last minute entrance into the Danish national rollerski race, which may or may not have been a good idea. My ski coach here told me about it last minute and I decided to give it a shot. While I left over an hour to find the race location it took me almost an hour and a half to find the race start. After informing the surprised starter that I was a woman, despite the spelling of my name, I then got in line to next to a Danish girl who thankfully spoke English.

The crowd was diverse, although mostly older men and a chunk of very fit younger guys, maybe 30-40 in all. For me, the race was 32 kilometers long. The longest race I think I have actually ever competed in, which was probably my first bad move. I started off strong, taking out the first lap and a half at race pace, but I was getting absolutely mowed over by everyone else in the race. I mean I knew I was out of shape but wow! I apparently was slower than 80 year old men that were barely poling! I did eventually finish the 5 loop course although I dropped my pace to threshold at most and just fought to finish the race, despite being lapped many times.

I managed not to finish in absolute last place, which was slightly heartening, and after the race made friends with two of the other women who made me feel better by mentioning that clearly my wheels were slow, as everyone else had changed their wheels to fast ones for the race. It was great to meet some new people and especially nice to have them translate the awards ceremony for me, basically pushing me up front when my name was called. I managed to win my age group…beating...me, myself and I to take the title. All in all it was a nice experience and a great way to force myself to go for a long, hard rollerski, although it almost killed me mentally and physically. It took a lot to finish the race as I felt hopelessly out of shape and slow. Physically, I’m less sore today than I thought I would be, but I barely made it until 10pm last night before I passed out.

This week I’m trying to get as much work done as I can before heading off to Stockholm this weekend. It should be a great trip although I have midterms the week I get back. But after midterms we head off on our three week travel break which will include trips to Berlin, Prague and CHINA!!

It’s hard to believe it’s already October…