Week 6 ¦ Time to Explore ¦ Professional and Cultural development

It comes to me as a great shock that I am already finished my first and writing about my second week of the Erasmus Programme and although I cringe at the thought of saying this, there is no other saying that makes more sense than; time really does fly when you’re having fun!

We began the week with a democracy lesson with the one and only Aase, who decided to spend a great deal of time delving into the history behind her name. She enlightened us that her name originates from the God’s and can either represent those such as a peasant or a princess. Once she was educated us on herself she then began to teach us about the democracy in Denmark, she each asked us questions about our own countries and then compared this with the way of life in Denmark. One aspect of the lesson that I found particularly interesting were the views everyone had when they first came to Denmark. The biggest point raised was the fact that people rarely speak to each other, whether that be on public transport or within our accommodations and coming from a place where the saying ‘oh they could talk for Ireland’ is given to almost everybody, to a place where each and everybody keeps themselves to themselves is such a culture shock! So the fact that everyone else in the class had the same opinion was comforting.

'One’s destination is never a place, but a new way of seeing things.' – Henry Miller

On Tuesday we had the opportunity to go to one of the most visited forests in Denmark; Riis Skov where we spent time, both with the class as a whole and in our study groups. One activity we had to carry out in our study groups was using items we could find in the forest, measure the height of a given tree. Luckily for us we had a maths student in our group, Lara!

We then took a walk round the forest and down to the beach where we learnt that years ago bones from animals like cows and horses were thrown in the water and in recent years the remains have begun washing up on the shore, so we looked out for them and even got to take some of the ‘treasures’ home with us again!  We then continued our venture through the forest were Dorte opened our eyes to the unique aspects of nature that we can incorporate into our lesson plans as we proceed along our career paths.

Also as Tuesday was Shrove Tuesday, Jessica, Leah, Poppy, Kate and I decided to introduce this concept to our class. Even though they were slightly baffled by the whole idea of pancake Tuesday our class really enjoyed the night, so much so that we have now made the NHD tradition of Pancake Tuesday, every Tuesday.

On Friday we had a short tour of the library and were given a few tips, but after that we were given study time or as Kate and I seen it; time to explore Aarhus. We went out to Marselisborg Havnevej, a small marina just outside the town itself and admired the yachts along with the beautiful stretch of a view across the water. We managed to spend hours there without even knowing it and then decided to treat ourselves to a harbour lunch.

As we approached the weekend, we did what we do best, went out and partied! On Friday I went into the town with a few of the other NHD students in my class and on Saturday the two Croatian girls, Lara and Ivona hosted a little party for our class which again resulted in more partying!

Come Sunday we were exhausted and decided to rest and get ready for another packed week on Monday.


References:

Henry Miller - http://www.goodreads.com/quotes/133768-one-s-destination-is-never-a-place-but-a-new-way