Ice Skating in Horsens

Wow it has been such a longtime since I last posted!!! Ridiculous! I have been so incredibly busy! SO MUCH HAS HAPPENED! So I am going to make a bunch of posts, one for each event! 

On the weekend if the 18th of January we had a special Friday night where the boarding students were sent to the homes of the church members at the local church for dinner. It gives them the opportunity to meet and get to know some of the church members, and to be in a home setting for the night. It makes a difference when the kids come to church and someone knows their name. It is a great thing for the kids. It was also so good for us! The student missionaries went to our Danish teachers house for dinner. It was such a Good night, having a different meal and spending time together as a group. It was really really nice. Nights like those are treasured! 

On Saturday afternoon (the sun set at about 3:45!) the school took the students Ice Skating in a town about 30 minutes from the school. It is tough to entertain the kids for the few hours between 'night' and the dark hours of the afternoon, so activities like Ice Skating was a fantastic thing to take he kids to. It was a really great evening! I was surprised at how quite a few of the students couldn't skate! This place is freezing and has winters cold enough to freeze large bodies of water! It was a good thing though, because I fit in quite well! It was a rink in the open air and in the middle of a really pretty European town. There were fairy lights everywhere and little ally ways and old buildings with this tiny little rink in the middle of this square. Coolest ice skating rink I've been to! I took some photos, but they are terrible. My mind was focused on skating and trying to stop my fingers from hurting in the cold!!!

Like I said, terrible photos!!! But it will give you an idea of what it looked like! The rest of the weekend was pretty relaxed and was good fun. Was a super cool thing to go skating in an open skating rink in skandinavia! 

Video 2.0

This is some of the snow falling. Not a huge amount, but kinda cool to watch. It was very pretty!

I can't upload the Set point video from the championship! But I will try again another day!

We are the Champions!

This weekend marked a huge point in history!

Every year, the adventist boarding schools in Norway, Sweden, Finland and Denmark get together here at Vejlefjord to compete in a Volley Ball Champion ship. It was exciting meeting people from all over Scandinavia, but the games were definitely the highlight! The girls played extremely well, and came off in thrid place in the comp. It was a massive effort, but the girls from Norway were machines, and took out First place. It was so good to be able to watch the girls play. One of our girls plays for a local team, and is particularly skilled at volley ball.

This is a snap shot of the girls battle with Finland for third place.

The boys team played EXCEPTIONALLY well, and made it through to the grand final! The match was set against Norway (No suprises there! They are a very good team!).

Team Hustle.

Let's go boys! We are the Yellow ones.

Mid game.

Just a few photos from the game. It was really exciting to watch, the boys are really really good players! Norway was breathing down our necks as they matched us point for point until the Vejlefjord boys took a small lead in the last few minutes of the game. The boys won the set point and for the first time in 30 years, Vejlefjord won the championship! A massive congratulations is due to the boys and girls teams :) I have a video of the set point of the winning game, but I cannot make it upload! I will try again tomorrow! It is worth watching to get a feel of the atmosphere at the game :)

Yesterday it snowed! The snow didn't stick around long, but it was so lovely having a reward for the cold weather!

THe grounds and tables.

The view out of the dining hall windows. Those buildings are private homes where some teachers live.

View to my dorm.

The 'football' field and some of the grounds.

The frosty lunch tables outside the dining hall.

This is my cozy little abode. I live here with about 40 girls and 3 Student Missionarys.

This is the view from my bedroom window. The building there is the church.

I have seen snow before, but I have never lived in a place where it snows regularly! So this has made me excited for the cooler months! I have heard it is meant to snow properly in Feb and April, and is looking to get a lot colder. I have heard rumours of -12 degrees celsius. I am not keen. But I look forward to lots of hot chocolate and looking out at the cold from the warm Hygge-liness from inside!

I am so busy usually that I forget that this blog even exists! I know it is terrible, so I will make a concerted effort to blog more when exciting things happen! I thank you for reading my words, and following me in my adventures. It is nice to know people are reading! Thank you for your prayers and comments. They make all the difference! Love from afar!

I now have a bed.

I have FINALLY been assigned a permanent room! I have been in here for two nights now, and it is the greatest thing! I have been sleeping in one of the guest rooms here at the school, so it is nice to have a sense of permanency. I have taken a few photos of my room, but there is a lot more to be done before I am totally settled in! 

There are two doona's there :) It's to cold for my poor Aussie bones here! 

My nifty little desk :) this is where I Blog and write letters :) and pin 

My bookshelf! Note the butterflies - these were given to me by my INCREDIBLE mother for Christmas. I love them so much! 

Yes, the heels are on display! 

And this is best feature in my room. The sink. It is so good to be able to brush my teeth in my room! My heater is always on, so this means I don't have to venture into the cold to brush my teeth at night! Woo!

This is my outlook. 

This is my window sill at the moment. Two vanilla scented candles, and some sort of Danish flower. I bought these at the local cheap shop for a couple of dollars each. They definitely make my room feel more cozy. 

The food here is VERY different to home! Breakfast is similar to the standard Australian meal, however, muesli is not eaten with milk, but with yoghurt. This makes it more like Bircher muesli. 

Lunch is the main meal of the day, where there is a hot main, with bread and cheese and a salad bar. 

Dinner however is the most different. Leftovers from lunch is served again, with the same salad bar. Sometimes there is chocolate served with hot bread rolls and cheese. The rolls are cut in half and both the chocolate and cheese are put on the bun, which is closed again. The cheese and chocolate melts together. This is apparently a common dish. I found it pretty unusual! But it doesn't taste to shabby! 

This is a photo of the second best meal I have eaten here in Denmark. So far, I have eaten a LOT of salad, because there are very limited gluten free options, but this salad topped them all! 

The best meal I had here at the school was a nice hot and creamy potato bake. Man it was good! 

I have been very busy settling in and learning names, and I have to say, I love it here. The kids are great, and the school is a great working environment. The cold is a bit of an issue, but I am beginning to shake the chill! Shock horror, I have even felt a little too warm after working hard on Pligt (duties or chores) with some of the kids. Every week we have three Danish classes, and so far I have learnt A LOT! Today in class I was able to, with the help of Jill (the cool Danish teacher), construct a short paragraph about what I did for christmas! I was pretty proud of myself! 

Today was my day off, but I spent a lot of my time getting odd jobs done in regards to settling in fully. It's been a productive day! But I am looking forward to collapsing into my toasty bed! 

Thank you all for your prayers, I ask you not to give up! I am sure I will need them daily. I love and am praying for you all, and wish you a wonderful week! 

I MADE IT

I am finally here! And it's freezing! 

This is the middle of the day, at the warmest. Warm enough to walk from one building to another without a beanie and a scarf!!! Experience the excitement!!! 

I am wearing thermal pants (merino) and jeans, snow socks and snow boots, thermal top (merino), Merino mid layer hoodie, and a 700 loft down jacket, this is just enough to be warm at mid day. Hand stay in pockets!!!  

I have been so busy preparing for this for MONTHS, but I am finally here, and can relax into the Danish lifestyle! Yes, I did say relax! I have been in Denmark for two and a half full days (I flew in midday on Monday, and it is now 6am on Thursday). I have lots of stories I want to share, so this post is going t be huge! 

The first flight (from Brisbane to Dubai) was really good. I was in one if the new and massive planes, so everything was big and flash. The economy seat I was in was really good! I sat next to a woman named Melissa. Melissa was so interesting! She has done some pretty awesome stuff. At the moment she is the chef and stewardess on an 80ft yacht that is owned by an Italian millionaire. So she is living in Italy with her Italian boyfriend (she is an Australian). 

The second flight (Dubai to Copenhaven) was really fun! I sat next to a Danish guy, Rene. He was young, and fun! We talked mainly about Denmark, and he told me a lot about what it is like, and things to look out for. He was really helpful! He has been going to uni in Sydney (mastering in civil engineering) for the past six months, so he understood Australian culture and Danish culture. So that was good.

Rene and I had a rogue Battleship Championship. He was worried I would cheat, so he rammed his newspaper into the gap around his t.v. screen. I still beat him :)

When I arrived in Denmark, it was cold. SO cold. It was only about 4 degrees (believe me, it's not as cold as it gets here!) but I was not really dressed warmly enough! I caught a train to the town near the school, and was picked up by the head of boarders son. I arrived just after dark (about 4pm!) so I didn't get to see much. That night we had dinner with Flemming (head of boarders) and his wife Lone. They are really lovelly and very relaxed. 

In Tuesday, we slept in a litre, but woke up just in time for the sun to rise, so Melissa and I (one of the other volunteers) walked to the fjord to see the sun rise... At 9am. 

We spent the rest of the day getting aquatinted with the school and taking pictures. 

This is the outlook from the main building. 

This is Melissa, from Washington state. 

The Danish flag, and a rare Danish blue sky.

The back side of 'main building', the larger girls dorm.

This is Girls Building. The smaller girls dorm.

The front face on Girls Building.

The front of Main Building.

Later, we had New Year's Eve dinner with Flemming and Lone at there house, and the was lovelly. We had a Danish specialty called rødt cøl (i think that is the way to spell it. It means red cabbage, and it is actually very nice. We spent New Year's Eve with the other volunteers. They arrived at about 9:20pm, so we ditched their bags at the school, and then went for a drive to the city of Aahus. I can't explain what it was like, but this video is close! The Danes start lighting fire works at about 4pm, and the ones in the video kicked up at 12am and didn't stop! We watched for half an hour then left.

The school, as seen from the too of the hill. Wednesday was more like a Danish winter!

The other angle of the school from the hill.

Wednesday was our last day to chill, and we did! It was freezing! We had a guided tour of the school with Flemming, and we're finally! Linked in with the internet. It was so good to get in touch with the world again!!!! So right now, it is 6:34 am, Thursday morning. The kids will be arriving from 1-3pm today, and planning a special party. The Queen of Denmark hosts a New Years party for dignitaries etc, and so does Vejlefjord. Complete with a Vejlefjord Queen! So that will be fun :) I cannot say how much I love it here. It is so cold, but the people are so warm and welcoming, and the place is incredible. I cannot express how lucky I am to be here. We walked around Vejle last night, and I was in disbelief that I was actually in Europe, and that I was going to be here for a year, and that Vejle is my local town. Wow. I plan to go back in to the 'walking street' when it is open and take lots of photos, so keep your eyes open! 

I thank God for getting me here, and all who have been praying for me for getting me through! Much love from Denmark.