Byeee Seattle!

After marijuana has been legalized, 5 guys have been robbed, tons of Americans have had their home changed into cemeteries, lots of experiences, tons of new nice people, lots of shopping, trips to Portland, Vancouver, San Francisco and Lake Tahoe, and flat credit cards later we are unfortunately forced to leave this strange but great country. 

It has been such a great experience and I’m sad that we are already leaving. Being here has taught us all, I guess, a lot about the American culture and some things have truly surprised me…

One of the things that I have been struck by is the disparity between rich and poor. The times we have visited Seattled the main shopping streets have actually been almost over-crowed with beggars. It seems unrealistic that people are living on the edge of nothing whilst they are lying in front of luxury stores with diamonds and shiny, super-duper-expensive stuff. It is really hard to understand, I guess especially for us Danes that are quite used to equality regarding conditions, that people are that badly exposed whilst others are capable of living the fat life. 

Something that has surprised me while we have been here is the Americans relation to sexuality and sex-issues. I thought that America would have sort of the same relationship and opinions on boys and girls’ interactions as our part of the world but it doesn’t work quite the way I expected. In fact I learned that my Taiwanese host-sister is even more loose with the whole “sex-thing” that my host-mother (I believe though, that my host sister is an Asian exception though… J). 

One of the first things that my host-mom told me was that I could not bring guys to my room – only Laurids as he supposedly had a girl friend back home… J Just generally it seems that sex-talk is more of a taboo than it is in Denmark. American youngsters we have been around have also told that they don’t discuss that kind of stuff within their families. I mean, it’s not because we discuss that constantly in Denmark but I guess that our relationship to it is more relaxed and I’m surprised that it is this tabooed here.

Americans’ relation to politics has also surprised me. Or maybe shocked is a better way to describe it. First of all Americans are able to vote when they turn 18 however they can not drink before they turn 21 – that signifies that they are capable of taking responsibility for their entire nation but they are still not able to make their own choices regarding themselves… So public responsibility before personal… The interest in the election has been disappointing, I mean, it has appeared that some of us Danes at times knew more about the election than some Americans did themselves (and that is not admirable, as we are not particularly knowledgeable on that area). Naturally I have also met people that are admirably much involved in politics and truly are taking great responsibility for their nation.  

TV’s role in a family has also surprised me quite a bit. A couple of days ago it was thanksgiving, which I celebrated with Camilla’s host family. The entire day her lovely host-mom spent cooking tons of food while we were waiting. When the food was served everyone sat around the TV and dined focusing more on the TV than talking. Generally Thanksgiving resembled Christmas Eve in Denmark, however in Denmark we would eat for hours to sort of enjoy all the cooking, here we finished within 40 minutes… It was a great experience and the people were just great, however I was surprised by the fact that so much time and energy were put into cooking and then it was just over so fast!

Generally it seems as well that fear is a greater part of the everyday life in America. As they are not endowed with universal welfare the risk of losing money and ending up in a horrible economical situation is much greater than in Denmark. Money-issues are therefore much closer every single day. The fact that one’s life is not as stable along with the disparity in rich and poor might as well cause that one is closer to committing crime than Danish people are, as they live in greater stability. Therefore the fear of being robbed and the fear of crime/danger is generally a greater part of the everyday life than it is in Denmark too.

I have come to truly appreciate the multi-cultural aspect of America – no one is considered “immigrants” in the same way as in Denmark. Everyone is generally accepted for being whoever they are and different cultures are accommodated. Us Danes are able to learn a lot from that

Also I do admire the accommodating aspect of the American culture. Americans are a lot more used to small-talk that us Danes are and therefore you do more easily get into discussions and conversations with people you don’t know. 

The last two months have been just great and I have learned and experienced so much. I do really appreciate that we have been so fortunate to come!!! :)

Thanksgiving and a bit more... :)

Last weekend 8 of my class mates and I went to Portland to do some cheap shopping (as there is not tax on material goods in Portland. The state tax is alternatively paid through the inhabitants income) and also watch a basket ball game.

The basketball game turned out to be just great, I liked that a lot more than American football. The atmosphere was a lot more intimate here, as it was inside and also people cheered a lot more than at the Sea-hawks game. Portland Blazers (the home team) won in the last minute so it was just great and in fact super-duper exciting. We had bought really cheap tickets so we were placed quite far away from the court. In fact we were sitting on the very last row… But that just signified that we were able to act up like crazy J

That night turned out to never end though… We had to go up the next morning at 5 in order to catch a bus back to Seattle, as we had to go to school. But as our course is almost over, we were going to have a math quiz the very same day + had an assignment in math due. Stupid as we were we had kept on postponing finishing the math assignment, so we ended up staying up to almost 4 and then we slept an hour before going to school… Living the American life is quite tough…!

After the quiz at school Laurids and I went to celebrate my host-sisters 19^th birthday. The rest of the week went with thanksgiving, Black Friday and the last trip to Seattle.

Yes, Thanksgiving and Black Friday have passed – and both have been great experiences!

We got off school Tuesday because of Thanksgiving coming up. Wedensday we had thanksgiving at my house, as my host-mom was going to her dad’s house on the real thanksgiving. So we celebrated Wednesday night with Laurids’ host-family. The food was actually great and we all got to “thank” for different aspects of our lives.

At Camillas on Thanksgiving :)

Thursday I went to Camilla’s house to celebrate Thanksgiving with her host-family. Here her host-mom’s relatives came over. As we were a lot more people and because it was the “real” thanksgiving there was a lot more food – in fact it resembled a Danish Christmas Eve quite a lot. J

Black Friday was crazy! Black Friday is always the Friday day after Thanksgiving and it is “Christmas sales” starting at midnight. Camilla and I had decided to go, so we took a cap with Laurids and Jeppe there and were met by a 500 meter long line in front of “Best buy” an electronic store. Some people had been waiting for hours and when we arrived they were just about to open the doors. I have really never seen anything like that.... Greedy people basically ran in and we could see how they started just pulling stuff down the shelves...!!!! 

So we were shopping all the way to 6 in the morning. And I tell you, there were just people everywhere! Families and even kids were running around like crazy screaming and pulling clothes and stuff from the shelves in the shops…! Camilla and I went back to her house with two dead Japanese girls (seriously her host sister was walking in her sleep!), slept a couple of hours before we went back to shopping in the afternoon. I have never been much of a shopper so I think I have shopped for the rest of my life…!

Anyway, now it is Sunday and we only have three days left here… Can’t believe it… Two months has passed already! 

 

San Francisco - city of 2013

Yes, it is true. I was so fortunate that i got to go to the city that has been ranked as #1 2013! 

http://urbanland.uli.org/Articles/2012/Oct/RazziET2013

This was the two crazy people I went with, Lise and Laurids ;)

Lise had invited Laurids and I to come along with her, as she wanted to visit some of her friends in SF. We stayed with some friends of her family in Sacramento and they were just awesome. Already from the moment the lady Marta picked us up in the airport waving with a Danish flag it appeared to be a very promising weekend.

She has been living in Denmark and also worked for Novo-nordisk for many years so her Danish was quite well. However, she preferred speaking English, which was good, as we better keep on practicing our English. Both her and her husband appeared to be very open-minded, friendly people that knows a lot about everything! I feel that we learned so much from just being with them – got to discuss so many different topics and gained a lot of knowledge about what it is like being American.

 And Laurids opened up for San Francisco! :)

 This is called the "coit-tower" has been the emblem of San Francisco's skyline since its completion in 1933. After one of the cities firefighters died she donated money for ornamentation of her city. The tower was therefore named after her. 

A Catholic church from the Italian city part. 

The alcatraz cruise that they didn't allow us to get on...

Well, Saturday Marta took us to SF, which is located like 1,5 our away from Sacramento. Lise was supposed to meet one of her friends so Laurids and I would have to explore the city on our own. We had both been there before but as I had never visited Alcatraz (an island on which a prison is located) we had decided to do that. In fact we had both excited each other about going so much that we could only be completely disappointed when we reached the pier and realised that the tickets were sold out untill tuesday… L
So Laurids spent some time travelling there with me mentally. I felt so bad for myself so now I have decieded that I have been there anyway…! J


As an alternative we spent the day walking around ”sensing” the city. We went to a hippie district, which was quite cool.

Sunday Marta took us all the way to Lake Tahoe, which is one of America’s many National Parks. It is half way located in California and the rest is in Nevada, which signified we got to visit two states!

J And in fact we went to a casino in Nevada, as it is one of the only states, in which casinos are permitted. As you see the nature around Lake Tahoe is just amazing and it is supposed to be a great skiing area. Unfortunately the lifts do not open before this weekend and therefore we were not able to ski… It was strange however, cause we went from California, Sacramento, in which there was around 16 degrees Celsius to Lake Tahoe, which was covered in snow – and it was only a 2 hour drive away! J
Monday we were back in San Francisco.
Here Laurids and I went to a Science academy and was actually quite surprised when we had to conclude that the rainforest in Randers was better than this one!




Besides that I guess I should mention that Obama has just been reelected, which has brought great joy to our group! I was however, chocked to see how little some Americans cared about the election. On the election day some from my class watched it together and were sort of into it… Meanwhile we were watching the family we were at were watching series on their laptop and did not participate.

Another thing is that the Americans also voted for some initiatives. Here in Washington state Marijuana has actually been legalised along with gay-marriage. That signifies that from December this year marijuana can be bought at stores… Wonder how that will affect the program next year… no, just kidding ;)

Lill' of everything

So the last week and a half has been full with so much different stuff... 

We were all invited for a high school football game with Victors host family last weekend and that was definitely a CRAZY experience...! It was the team's last home game this year so everyone was like crazy much into it... I don't really know the rules of American football but I did get that both parents, grandparents, cheer-leaders, pets and students were a lot into it. With a huge group of smiley-face cheerleaders, a big orchestra and a full station the culture about school sport is a completely different world from Denmark... :)

We have also visited the library in Seattle downtown, which is a doubtlessly a great piece of architecture. 

And finished off eating in China-town. Actually it is called the International District of Seattle, however a local guy told us that it is just to be ethical correct - cause it is mainly populated by Chinese people! 

 This weekend we were invited for a Haloweenparty at Edmonds Community College and as Americans are quite a lot into Haloween we all had to dress up....

This is one of my neighbors, which tells a bit about the standard of Haloween... 

And yesterday Laurids, Benjamin and I went to a Haloween-party at one of Benjamin's host brothers friends house and I have never seen anything like that. There entire house was changed into a horror house with a cemetery, devil-alters in the bathrooms, eyeball snacks, spiderweb, tons of pumpkins, gross dolls and so on. Haloween is definitely not just a lame joke here!!! 

And then we were out hiking in the twilight landscape yesterday as well. It was quite a wet trip but still quite beautiful

 And of course when we are forced to be together sort of all the time, you sort of learn how to love them... Yes, 2.y is growing stronger and stronger and cooler and cooler for everyday that passes :)