Last days in Yankee territory

Long time no see!

My journey sadly had to come to an end. Right now I'm back home in Denmark, chilling at my parents' house. There are a few good things about being home though. It's really nice to see everybody again and I was kind of getting near bankruptcy :P

Anyways, after Vegas Hugo and I flew to Philly. We stayed there for one night before we took the bus to New York the next day (Friday June 4). Hugo got off in Newark, New Jersey to take the plane home to France but I still had almost a week left. I had a hostel for one night in Upper Westside, Manhattan. Saturday I met with a good friend from Bloomsburg and we took the ferry out to see Ellis Island and the Statue of Liberty. The weather was nice although it was very warm and humid.

Ellis Island is where all the immigrants used to enter America but now it's been made into a museum.

It was very interesting. I learned that there's more than 800,000 people in the US with Danish descent. There was also an area with artifacts donated from families who entered the US through Ellis Island. I got really exited when I saw a display case with stuff from a Danish family. But when we got close we found out that it was empty because they were doing some cleaning and preservation. So my bad luck from Vegas continued...

However, I did find and old Danish Krone from 1918. The only thing stopping me from taking it with me was that thick glass around it ;)

After an hour or two at the island, we took the ferry to the Statue of Liberty.

We didn't have tickets to get into the statue because they were sold out when we booked the ferry but it was nice to go out there and walk around.


Sunday I had to take the train back to Manhattan where I had another hostel for two nights before meeting up with Lotte whom I was flying home with.

This hostel was located one block from Times Square and it was way better than the first one. The first one was hot as hell. The AC didn't work properly and therefore I didn't sleep at all the first night. But here everything was perfect and the bathrooms were nice too. So if anybody is going to NY, I would definitely recommend you to stay at the Big Apple Hostel! I had two cool roommates, one from Brazil and one from Belgium. So we hung out for a few days. And finally I got to walk through Central Park. It only took me 3 visits to do that :)

Lotte came Tuesday and we had to go home Thursday. We went to a stand up club Tuesday night which was quite alright. Wednesday we went to an outlet mall in New Jersey. Everything was so cheap so I went as crazy as I could baring in mind that my suitcases were already pretty full. In a few hours I got 8 t-shirts, 3 shirts, 3 pair of shorts, 1 pair of pants and a sweater. I got it all for $300. In Denmark that would probably have cost me more than $1,000 since most of it was Banana Republic, Levi's and Calvin Klein... Why don't we have outlets like that here? Anyways, I managed to fit everything into my suitcases and Thursday night we boarded the plane to London. From there we flew to Hamburg, Germany where Lotte's parents were waiting for us.

Here we are in Hamburg at what would be 7AM Bloomsburg time... I didn't sleep much on the planes but funnily enough I wasn't that tired.

The weather was warm and humid like NY but as soon as we crossed the border I was like "What is going on here!?"

It rained all the way home :(

As I said, I'm currently at my parents' house. I think I'll do another post once I get back to Aarhus. Maybe I'll take some pictures so my readers in the US can see how I live here in Denmark. But other than that I don't know how active I'll be on this blog anymore. I don't know what else to write about...

So make sure to tune in some time next week for what could be the last post!

Take care :)

Viva Las Vegas

Currently I'm in New York again for the third time :) But that is not what this post is supposed to be about...

Monday we got a car and drove from San Diego to Vegas. It was a 4-5 hour drive where Hugo and I took turns to drive. This time we had a Chrysler PT Cruiser

Actually there was quite a lot of traffic on the way to Vegas but the last two hours into Vegas the opposite lanes were just packed. But after a few hours of driving in one of the most deserted areas I've ever seen, all of a sudden there it is - VEGAS

San Francisco

After LA it was time for a little road trip to San Francisco on Wednesday and, as I mentioned in my last post, Hugo and I had rented a car to drive that little 6 hour stretch.

It was pretty cool but it was also kind of thirsty! We used almost two tanks of gas but we managed since it is so much cheaper over here than in Europe...

At one point I got tired of driving so we pulled over to switch. By coincidence we stopped at a Danish hotel in the middle of nowhere!

Notice that it says "velkommen" in stead of "welcome"

Anyways, we finally got to our hostel around 7.30pm (which has been rated as #2 in the entire US and with good reason!). There was a board at the hostel with information about the day's events. That night there were $1 drinks all night long at a bar not far from the hostel, so we figured we might as well give it a try :P It was a pretty cool place but we paid the price in the morning! We had to get up early to turn in the car Thursday morning. Also, we had to be ready for a guided tour around the city at 10am.

Welcome to Hollywood! (Now with pictures and video)

This week we started our little tour of California. Monday we took the Greyhound to LA. Our hostel was right across from the Kodak Theatre on the Hollywood Boulevard. We got there around 2pm so we still had a lot of time to do stuff the rest of the day. The room was quite alright and the location was perfect!

 Kodak Theatre

Swimming in the Pacific

Hello again

I know it's been a while since my last post but I have been busy chilling by the pool and going to San Diego :P Also, our internet has been kind of crappy the past few days but it seems like it's okay now.


Hugo and I landed in San Diego last Thursday. He knows some people, Chastity and Daniel, that live 30 mins north of the city in a suburb called Escondido (I found it on google streetview) and we can stay at their place as long as we like which is awesome. They have been so nice to us ever since we got here and it's just been absolute heaven!  We have the guest house to ourselves and the first couple of days we just crashed by the pool:

Then on Saturday our hosts had some guests over for dinner and of course they asked us a lot of questions. We told them about our plans and that we were gonna go to Vegas for a few days before we fly back to the east coast. Then, one of the guests runs to his car and comes back with a gift certificate for two free nights at  Harrah's and gives it to us :D I can't wait to go and I just hope that I'll be able to, if not win anything, then at least just break even because even though we stay in San Diego for free, I have almost been spending money faster than I can count them :P

Also, one of my classmates from back home, Kamilla, lives in San Diego - 3 houses from the beach. Her roommates are Danish too, as well as the neighbors so it's cool to meet someone that I can speak Danish with. Even though it feels kind of weird because I have gotten used to speaking English all the time. It's funny... after having been away for so long, I have started to think in English. But it's always nice to meet new people and we have been to Camilla's place a few times to go to bars at night but during the day we stayed at the beach!

The water is not that warm yet but we were baking pretty well in the sand so we had to cool down!

Next week we're going to LA and San Francisco which hopefully will be a good time... but how can it not? I sure could get used to living in California!

But that was it for now... see ya

Greetings from Philly and DC!

Hi there!

Hugo and I arrived in Philly yesterday together with Lain and Dan. Hugo knows another French guy who studies at Temple here in Philly and we can stay at his house for free...

Last week in Bloom :(

Yup, that's right! Last week in Bloomsburg coming up... I am really gonna miss all my friends here but then again, I can't wait to go traveling this amazing country. I guess that all good things must come to an end :(

This week is called Final Week but I really only have one real final and that's an easy one.

My schedule is like this:
Tuesday: Online Journalism (Present a website that I did about Peter Eastgate)

Wednesday: 8am - PR final (Group presentation of a PR campaign we did about TWLOHA)
                    7.15pm - Management final (open book, take-home, multiple choice)

Thursday: 12.30 - Sociology final (real final)

Friday: 2.45 - Intercultural Communication (Research paper + take-home final due)

Saturday: Hungover and have to be out of the apartment by 10pm...

I already did more than half of my take-home for Intercultural and right now I really should be working on my research paper instead of posting this ;)

Anyways, if I can, I'm probably going to fit in a few bar visits this week which means that I'm going to be busy during the day doing school work which again means that this might be the last update for a while...

What I can say already now is that me and Hugo have some of our plans sorted out. We have a place to stay in San Diego for free as long as we like. However, if it's possible we really wanna go to Philly and DC next week before catching a flight to San Diego... but we're still working on that. Also, we're pretty sure that we're gonna be in Vegas from May 31st to June 2nd - so let me know if anybody is there at that time too :)

Other than that we are planning to go to LA and San Francisco before hitting Vegas...

Last, but not least, I've been playing a little bit of poker on and off - taking half an hour here and there. And I'm glad to say that I've been doing quite well (no jinx!). During the first two days I played in April I was able to get stuck around $800 (8 buyins) at one point. Ever since then I haven't had a single losing day which means that the status as of right now is plus $400. I have a funny ritual every time I finish a winning session. It's the only time I allow myself to play this song - it's called "For the Love of Money" by the O'Jays and, even though it's not as loud as my stereo back home, I always play it at maximum volume when I log off the tables. So I've been hearing that tune a lot lately... may that continue to last forever.

I think that's it for now - Peace

Buhuu

Last night we played the final of the intramural soccer tournament. We scored the first goal but it was like most of us were having an off day. Pretty quickly the other team got ahead by a few goals and they were able to cruise the game home. The final score was 8-2...

It was still a pleasure to be part of the team but I just wanted one of those champion t-shirts so bad...

Also, as part of my online journalism class, I uploaded a story to a campus news site called BU NOW.

See ya

My first B and TEAM USA!!!

Hey there!

Last night I had my second exam in my management class... In the first I got a 91/100 without studying for the test so I just figured I would do the same this time. However, this test was a bit harder and I ended up getting 82/100 which correlates to a B. The teacher is soooo boring in this class that I just can't bring myself to do anything at all and my grades will eventually be translated into pass/fail no matter how good I do over here. Now, I don't wanna complain about getting a B since that is what I usually get back home but I was sorta getting used to all the A's over here ;)

Also, my intramural soccer team made it to the play offs and we played our semifinal last night too. I was a close game all the way and it really could have went either way. They scored the first goal, then I scored to 1-1. They scored again and now Sam made the equalizer to 2-2. Same story again, they scored and Sam equalized. Then I scored and they made it even 4-4.

Now we had to play overtime. 2x5 mins, first goal wins. We owned them hard and Eileen scored the winning goal after 1.30 mins :D

The championship game will be tomorrow night and I can't wait!


I also played a good half an hour session of poker today winning 65$, so hopefully it won't be too long before I will be back in plus even though I probably wont have time to play before I get back home to Denmark.

That's it for now,
Razz

Video from Penn State

Here's a little video of a play from the Blue White game. If you guys wanna see it in HD, just click the video again to watch it on youtube...

Penn State and Blue White Weekend

This weekend, Hugo, Lain and me went to Penn State for the annual Blue White Weekend. Penn State is a pretty big University and they have one of the biggest stadiums in the country. On Saturday, the football team played a scrimmage game... Meaning that it's just a practice game where the team plays against itself.

We arrived Friday afternoon at one of Lain's friends... We pre-gamed at the house before leaving for the clubs and it was nice to see something else than Harry's for a change :) We came back to the house around 4am after having found a few things we were not supposed to do to do ;)

Quite a few people were crashing already so we had to sleep on the floor... but it wasn't too bad. Then we had to get up early Saturday morning to clear the downstairs living room. Dan (Lain's friend) and his roommates were throwing a huge party Saturday night with DJ, light show and everything. So, we took all the furniture out and left to do some tailgating at the stadium. The stadium seats around 110,000 spectators but we were told that they 'only' expected around 70,000 this weekend. Here is a few pictures:

New York again :)

Today is the day after Block Party, which was crazy btw, so this post might be a bit foggy ;)

Anyways, my timer woke me up at 4.30am. At 6 am we left Bloom. I pretty much slept all the way in the bus but I woke up a few times. One time, this was what I saw:

But I was so tired that I just fell asleep again... The next time I woke up, the view was a bit better!

Concert, TEAM USA is in the ropes, and NY!

As I wrote earlier I went to a concert with a band called Jack's Mannequin last Friday. Unfortunately, I forgot to bring my camera, so I can't show you any pictures from it... I had never heard about the band before but they were actually not half bad - I just wish I had taken some time to at least get to know one of their songs! But the best thing about the concert was the guys who warmed up... They were two guys on stage, one with a guitar singing and another playing on a box. The guy who was singing is called Kevin Hammond and I will bet a lot of money that he is going to make it big one day, or at least I hope so :)


Soccer
Up until Wednesday last week, Team USA was undefeated in the indoor soccer tournament but we only managed to make a draw. So, technically we were still undefeated but tonight we lost the game 4-3 against the number one team. If we had won, we would have been number one in the league but because of the loss we are now 3rd :(


On a side note, I had another exam today in Sociology and even though I only looked over the slides yesterday, I still managed to get a perfect 100 :) So far, the exams have been pretty easy but this one was by far the easiest one! But I shall be the last one to complain about that since I'm on exchange and wanna be able to a lot besides school...


The Big Apple
I also got the plan for the NY trip on Thursday:

6:00am: Depart Bloomsburg
9:30am: Arrive United Nations
10:15am - noon: United Nations Tour and Briefing
Noon - 2:00pm: Lunch at Rockefeller Center on your own
2:00pm - 3:00pm: Travel to Battery Park and Wall Street
3:30pm - 5:30pm: Metropolitan Museum of Art
5:30pm - 7:30pm: Dinner on your own
8:00pm - 11:00pm: Broadway Musical - Memphis (anybody heard if this is good)
2:00am: Return to Bloomsburg


So, it's gonna be a long day but 50$ for the whole thing was just too good an offer! The only thing that is bothering me a little bit is that my new favorite singer, Kevin Hammond is playing at a place called Piano's in NY that night at 9pm and it's free to get in - but I guess that a Broadway show isn't too bad after all ;)

Just to finish off with something that looks good, here is another song by Mr. Hammond:

Easter dinner at Dr. G's

What I didn't tell you in my last post is that I went to an Easter dinner at Dr. Ganahl's last Sunday. He's my professor in Online Journalism and PR: Theory and Practice and he is by far the coolest professor I have ever had but it was still kind of weird to get invited to his house. Apparently, he always invites his international students for dinner on Easter. This year I'm his only one though so he told me that I could bring a friend. So, I asked Hugo and he was game.

But as I said, it still felt kind of weird because there's no tradition for doing that kind of things back home in Denmarkistan. And, if any of my other professors had asked me, I would probably have been like "Oh shoot, I already have other plans" :) But Dr. G is something else, so I figured 'what the hell'...

Dr. Ganahl is the gentleman to the right

We got there at a around 5pm. The weather was really nice so we had some healthy snacks and wine outside in the sun. Then we went inside for the dinner. It was really good actually. His wife had cooked some ham, some kind of seasoned potatoes, vegetables etc.

But it was a good time even though it was a bit awkward at times but everybody there was very interested in France and Denmark, so we always had something to talk about.

By the way

Easter = Road trip to Lain's house

Last weekend, Lain (my roommate) had invited me and Hugo to go home with him between Friday and Saturday. We already knew in advance that his parents were gonna cook us some nice food... baked potatoes, salad and steaks on the grill - yummy!!! Furthermore, there is a nice mall close to his house (even though it's in the middle of nowhere) so maybe I could finally buy myself a spring jacket.

So, we left Bloomsburg in the afternoon and as you can see on the picture below, the weather was amazing!

Team USA still undefeated!

Tonight, we (Team USA) played the second game in a co-ed indoor soccer tournament. My roommate, Lain, asked if I was interested in joining the team. I don't know how much I like the name though. Basicly, it's 6 on 6 with 3 guys and 3 girls from each team playing at a time. Hugo (France), Sam (England) and my other roommate, Tim are also on the team. And I got a pleasant surprise because our girls are so good at soccer... it's actually unbelievable compared to Danish standards! No offense to my Danish readers, but as we all know, Danish girls can't play soccer! At all - period...

Anyways, I couldn't play in the first game (Monday) because I had my !"#¤#"¤# stupid management class that night. However, they managed without me beating the hell out of the other team. When the whistle blew, Team USA had annihilated the other team 12-2 - Well done!

Tonight we had more resistance but we pulled through and won the game 5-2. I can't wait until next Wednesday when, hopefully, we will be 4-0!


What else? Hmmm... have gotten a few more A's on various tests and assignments, so it's all good! Also, today the weather was fine but the next few days it's gonna be between 22 and 25 degrees and sun :D

Finally, Lain is taking me and Hugo to his house this weekend. He lives out in the country side but we're gonna have lots of fun. He has his own pool table and he says he is gonna beat me. I don't know about that though, since I beat him pretty convincingly last time we played... broke the 8-ball in the whole winning the game in one shot!

Then on Sunday (Easter), I have been invited to a dinner at Dr. Ganahl. He is my professor in my Online Journalism class and also PR class. Apparently he invites all his international students on Easter every year. He said I could bring a friend, so I asked Hugo. I look forward to that too since Dr G is a pretty cool teacher.

I think that's it for now...

Later

Fun story!

Hi everybody!

Not much has happened since the last time. I think I did pretty good in my exam in PR, though. I also got my grade for the other blog I have been doing for my Online Journalism class, Ace On The River. It turned out to be pretty good - 95/100 points :D

Anyways, as I said, not that much has happened since my last post. But I read this funny story today and I just thought I would share it with you guys. Just click 'READ MORE' if you want to read it...

A short update

Today I got the grade for my first exam in Intercultural Communication. In the exam there were 30 multiple choice questions, and 10 questions on two movies we have seen in the class. I scored 100% :D

But it's really not that hard when you get to take the exam home for two days to do it! So, until now it's been all A's for me in all assignments and tests - weeee :D

But I have a bad feeling that the good times are gonna change. I have to hand in an assignment on the book Dreams From My Father by Barack Obama on Wednesday and I haven't even started yet (on the paper - about half way through the book, though) - so that one is probably gonna suck! Also, I have a test in my PR class on Thursday. Even though Dr G is the coolest professor ever (he also teaches my Online Journalism class), I don't think I'm going to get an A on that test. I've heard from several people that his tests are pretty hard compared to other professors'.

To make matters worse I have an exam in my sociology class on Wednesday too... However, I thought it was today so I already studied for it. So, I guess I'm ready for that one...

But I really can't wait for Friday to arrive. I get out of class at noon-ish and at 5.30 PM a lot of the international students is going to a Cultural Diversity Festival thing. I've heard that the food is great there but, sadly, there's no alcohol - no worries, though! I got invited to a birthday party downtown later that night :)

Later

Sommer i Bloomsburg :)

De sidste par dage har vi næsten haft sommervejr. 15-20 grader og sol, sol, sol! Jeg tog lige et par billeder på vej ned til frisøren

Dette er et kig ned af Main Street fra Carver Hall som ses nedenunder.

Og til sidst kommer her et billede af selve Main Street... ikke meget gang I den som I kan se...

Ellers kan jeg fortælle at jeg havde en to-timers take home multiple choice eksamen i Management i mandags. Jeg havde kun læst ét ud af de otte kapitler som eksamen dækkede, men alligevel fik jeg 91/100... who needs studying!? :P

Onsdag fejrede vi St. Patrick's Day på Harry's. Alle klæder sig i grønt og drikker sig fulde. Jeg har stadig ikke helt styr på det, men det er en irsk tradition. Men på selve dagen er alle fra Irland :)

Jeg vidste på forhånd at min time i dag var aflyst, så vi benyttede lejligheden til at smutte forbi Harry's endnu engang i går... om torsdagen har de $1 drinks, så man kan gå i byen ret billigt! 

Håber I hygger jer derhjemme - jeg gør i hvert fald. Og vær endelig ikke bange for at smide nogle kommentarer... Det føles lidt tomt uden feedback en gang i mellem

Video from Daytona

Here's the video I was talking about in my post about Spring Break

This is where I reside!

Før Spring Break lavede jeg en lille video af hvordan jeg bor, og som I kan se, er jeg lidt af en linselus :P
Stedet hedder som sagt Mount Olympus og alle lejlighederne er ens. Lejlighederne er i to etager, og der er plads til seks personer i hver. To bor nedenunder og fire ovenpå. Men I kan se det hele i videoen...



Som I måske kunne høre til sidst, er jeg gået hen og blevet finkulturel... flame away :)

SPRING BREAK In Daytona Beach, Florida

 I just came back from one of the greatest trips in my life! This concept of Spring Break is amazing - especially when you go somewhere warm :) So, this post is probably going to be a bit long - even though it's just a summary...

It all started Saturday morning at 7 AM. Lotte, Eduardo, Hugo and me met up to walk down to the bus. We had to take it to Philadelphia. In Philly we then had to take the train to get to the airport.Then we had to fly to Atlanta and then to Daytona Beach, Florida :D

Atlantic City

Last weekend was absolutely crazy! Friday night I was hanging out with Päivi, Hugo and Päivi's roommate, Natalie watching the Olympic semifinal in ice hockey between Finland and USA. During the game Natalie tells us that she is going to a concert in Atlantic City (Las Vegas, only on the east coast and smaller) on Saturday and then she asks if any of us wants to join her. Me and Hugo looked at each other for 5 seconds before deciding that that was a great idea!

Let's Go, Huskies

It's been a while since my last post but that's because I've been busy doing nothing = not much to write about. One thing happened though. Last Saturday, Hugo, Päivi and me went to see the basketball team play their last home game. I think that's why there were a lot more people to this game than the first one we saw.

During the game we were down by more than 10 points a couple of times but we made it back and won the game by 6-8 points. So, it was all good and hopefully they will win the last two games = we go to the play offs and thereby we get more home games :) Who knows, maybe they will have a baby race in one of the breaks if that happens...

The cheerleaders also had even improved their skills since the last time...








Other than that we have to find out what to do for Spring Break which starts in less than two weeks!

Peace out,
Razz

New York, New York

Hi folks!

Last weekend I went on a road trip to the city that never sleeps with 6 other international students. We were Lotte (Denmark), Päivi (Finland), Sam (England), Eduardo (Mexico), Hugo (France), Thomas (Belgium) and good old Razzle Dazzle! We left Friday at noon and were home again Sunday at 8pm.

It finally happened!

Sooner or later it was bound to happen... I have maxed out my credit card which means I have spent more than $4,000 the past 30 days - oh mama! It doesn't make it any better that I'm going to New York for the weekend! I still have money in my account, don't get me wrong :P So I just hope that my back up card still works as it is only a Visa Electron. Otherwise, I would have to use the card I have connected to my poker account - but I don't want to touch my bank roll before I absolutely have to.

So far the plans for the weekend is to go to the Empire State Building and to go to see the NY Islanders against Tampa Bay Lightning (ice hockey). I can't wait to see the game since there's a Danish guy, Frans Nielsen, playing for the Islanders. Other than that I think the must sees are Central Park and Ground Zero.

Snowmageddon in Bloomsburg :)

Finally we have serious amounts of snow in Bloom. It started during the night and continued all through the day, so now we have around 40cm of snow! School was closed today so I slept in. When I woke up, me, Lain, Spencer, Eric and Tim (my new roommates) went to Monty's for some good old fashioned breakfast.

I had a cheese steak with french fries and a soda. It tasted great but I didn't feel too good about myself after eating that sort of food for breakfast... So, this was the beginning of what turned out to be a really good but unhealthy day! After breakfast we went to play in the snow. Lain put on his skis and the rest of us shared a tray we found. I'm almost certain that I will catch a cold after spending an hour in the snow... but it was fun!

Later, some of us international students had planned a surprise party for a French girl, Sonia. From 5pm to 10.30pm I didn't do nothing but eat. At first there were loads of different cakes. Then we had some taco shells and after that we ordered pizza. So really, apart from maybe half a liter of water, I have really lived like a true American today.

 Maybe I should spend a couple of hours in the Rec Center tomorrow?

Oh well, see ya!

P.S. This is what Bloomsburg looks like after almost 24 hours of continuous snow:

 

  

Eduardo and Hugo on the way to the surprise party

  

 

Nye roommates :)

Yiiihaarr! Så er jeg endelig flyttet over i min nye lejlighed, og ny lejlighed er jo lig med nye roommates. Jeg har virkelig ondt af de to andre fra min gamle lejlighed, som i den grad har trukket nitten i forhold til at bo med stjerneidioten Keith! Men der er jo ikke så meget, jeg kan gøre ved det...

Men en af mine nye roommates, Lain, tog godt imod mig i dag. Han virker til at være rigtig flink, så hvis resten er ligesom ham, ser det rigtig godt ud. Derudover føles den nye lejlighed meget mere som et hjem. Der er en rigtig fælles stue med sofaer og fjernsyn, og så er der rent faktisk gryder og pander, så man kan lave lidt mad - hvis man har lyst :P Jeg skal nok tage nogle billeder af lejligheden lidt senere. Hvem ved, måske det endda bliver til en video-rundvisning med mit nye kamera!

Har leget lidt indretningsarkitekt, nu jeg lige fik chancen for at pakke alle mine ting ud igen. Så her er lige et billede af hvordan der ser ud nu.

Men bare lige for at understrege hvad det var jeg kom fra:

 

Har ikke lige taget billeder af toilettet eller resten af lejligheden, da jeg var ret bange for, at linsen på mit fine nye kamera ville tage skade! Forresten, til dem der ikke har bemærket det endnu, så er det ikke alle billeder, jeg smider ind på selve bloggen. Men ude i højre side ligger der et galleri, I kan klikke på for at se alle mine billeder.

Det var vist det for nu...

Super Bowl XLIV

Jeg er lige kommet hjem fra den fedeste super bowl fest ever. Mig og Hugo havde først tænkt os at se den på Harry's (en af de få barer i Bloom), men pludselig tikkede der en besked ind på Hugos mobil. Indholdet af denne var en invitation til at se kampen i et frat house (Tror det hedder Kappa Sigma). Det sagde vi selvfølgelig ja til. Da vi kom var der spandevis af chicken wings og drikkevarer. Selvom selve huset vel meget pænt sagt var lidt af et "fixer-upper", så var der alt hvad vi skulle bruge. Et big-ass tv, store sofaer og masser af chicken wings!

Alle pånær én holdt med Saints. Så et stykke hen i kampen var den enkelte Colts-fan ret højt på strå, men han kom hurtigt ned igen, da Saints først scorede og derefter interceptede bolden og afgjorde kampen :) Btw. hvor var det sindssygt, at Saints vælger et onside kick på så "dårligt" et tidspunkt i kampen. Hugo kendte ikke så meget til NFL i forvejen, så havde faktisk fortalt ham, at Colts spiller perfekt fodbold, mens Saints spiller smukt fodbold. Synes det onside kick illustrerede min pointe ret godt. Men go Saints! De havde virkelig fortjent det i år - nu når Vikings ikke havde chancen for at nappe det flotte Vince Lombardi trofæ!


Lige en lille sidebemærkning... Jeg har fået lov til at flytte ud af min nuværende lejlighed og lidt længere op ad gaden. Jeg kunne dog ikke få det ledige værelse i Hugos lejlighed af en eller anden mærkelig grund. Men jeg er bare glad for at komme væk fra stjerneidioten Keith og alle hans højtråbende venner (Har ikke noget imod at folk har det sjovt, men når de render rundt og råber og skriger kl. lort om natten en ganske almindelig onsdag, så synes jeg måske liiiige de presser den - og de er ikke ligefrem typerne man har lyst til at sige STFU til enemand ;). Så nu håber jeg bare mine nye roommates er flinke og at jeg ikke har trukket nitten endnu engang. Jeg har dog skrevet med en af dem over facebook, og han virker til at være cool nok...

That's it for now. Good night and go Saints!!!
Rasmus

Snowmageddon and first exam

Wuhuu! Finally some snow in Bloomsburg. We only have about 5cm of snow right now, so we have only been strafed by what Barack Obama calls the "Snowmaggedon" - the worst snowstorm to hit Washington DC for several years.  I think they have gotten about 75cm overnight...

In fact, Thomas, Eduardo and two other girls were supposed to have gone to DC this weekend. They had rented the car and all but they didn't want to risk it driving down there right now. So instead they went to Boston today.

The car they have rented is a white Chrysler PT Cruiser. It still has that new car smell to it :) So we took it to Walmart last night. I don't think I would ever like to own one of those but as a rent-a-car it was simply amazing! I certainly wouldn't mind driving that car all the way to Miami for spring break in March!


I also had my first exam yesterday in Sociology. It was a 25 question multiple choice exam. We did it electronically, so we could see the final score immediately after we had completed the exam. We had an hour to do it but I was done after about 15 mins - I even managed to check my answers three times in that time. So after 15 mins I got the result: 24 correct answers out of 25... I wonder which one was wrong :)

After the exam I went down to the post office to pick up my new camera. I bought it for 200$ and free shipping on Amazon.com. It was already at a discount but at Walmart, I found the exact same camera for 170$ :( But I really can't do nothing about it, so now I'm just waiting for my memory card to arrive on Monday...

Oh well, take it easy out there!
Rasmus

Bingo Night

I'm just doing a bit of catch-up here because I waited so long to get this blog started.

So, last Friday, Lotte and Thomas talked me into going to a bingo night along with some of Lotte's roommates. At first I did not want to go because I really don't feel that old yet! But since I had nothing else to do, I figured "What the heck... this MIGHT be fun". So we went all out and payed 25 cents pr. plate. I, obviously, got the maximum allowed, the gambler that I am :) So I had to manage six plates at a time.

The first game was worth 15$ for a row. So, there I was - sitting with 200 Americans going crazy over 15$. Maybe it's just because I normally play poker for 10-20 times that amount that it seemed strange to me. The next game was worth 20$. The game after that was then again worth 15$. So the prize kept changing along with the requirements for bingo. Sometimes you had to make a "T", others a circle around the edge etc. After about an hour I got a headache from staring at my plates because the announcer just drew numbers waaay to fast!

However, I woke up for the final game. 94$ for a full plate. I came close - I was only missing one number on two of my plates but some idiot won it before me!

But I guess I have to admit that I had good time... just don't tell anybody! :)


Midnight Pizza
After Bingo was over, Lotte and her roommates went home. Me and Thomas stayed for midnight pizza. This is a great concept! Free pizza and soda. This is really as good as it gets over here since the campus is dry (= NO ALCOHOL!). Anyway, Thomas and me got to talk to a couple of guys and it turned out that they all worked for the Community Center which, among other things, handles room transfers. So, I told them about my problems with Keith and they said that they would see if they could pull some strings.

That was Friday. Today it's Thursday and I did not get any response from them. So, I figured that I would just go talk to the boss-lady, Kim, who helped Glenn move up to Kozloff. I think I might have hit the jackpot, because she said "How soon can you move?" :D She told me that she would get the vice boss-man to call me tomorrow or today to arrange for my transfer...

Saturday
On Saturday, Lotte, Eduardo (Mexican), Thomas, Hugo and me went to Harry's. Harry's is a classical American bar with the brown wooden bar and all that stuff. We came just in time for happy hour, so drinks and Budweisers were only $3 (Vodka shots was $1). Thomas and Lotte went home around midnight but Eduardo asked if Hugo and me wanted to go to a birthday party he was invited to. Beforehand, Eduardo had drawn a map of where we had to go. Our moderately drunken eyes could not figure out the last part of the map, so we asked some random guys that we met if they knew were it was. At the same moment the Drunk Bus came by.

This is another good thing about Bloomsburg since there is no cabs. The Drunk Bus is an old yellow school bus that goes on Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays until 02.30. You just get on, tell the bus driver where you need to go and he takes you there for free :D

So, we got on and gave him the address. 45 minutes and a lot of loops around campus later we were there. He dropped us off 100m from where we had gotten on the bus... but he was right. It was a very cool party, though. It was almost like in the movies with red cups and scary punch from a big ass container.

Today, Hugo asked me if I wanted to go to a frat (fraternity) party. If it wasn't because I have my first exam tomorrow, I would definitely go check that out. So, I hope some of you guys back home are glad that I'm actually giving my school a little bit of thought ;)


I think that was it for now... take care
Rasmus

College basketball

Maybe I should do this post in English...

Anyways, me and Hugo went to a basketball game tonight between the Bloomsburg Huskies and Mansfield. It was pretty funny although the crowd seemed rather dead at times. The Huskies were up 8 points or so going into the 2nd period. However, in the end they trailed Mansfield 68-66 and with 0.3 seconds to go we got two penalty shots. The first one was good but the second bounced off the rim and we therefore lost by one point. Actually me and Hugo didn't know that the game was over since we thought it would last four periods... but in college basket they only play 2x20mins.

During one of the time-outs, I recorded a little video on my phone. Compared to Denmark, the cheerleaders are supertalents! Unfortunately, I did not record in another time-out when the pyramid collapsed... They just need a little more practice ;)





P.S I just ordered a new camera today :)

Bloomsburg - den første tid

Hej Alle

Efter flere opfordringer har jeg endelig fået lavet denne blog. Jeg håber på at have tid til at opdatere den jævnligt. Smid endelig et par kommentarer engang i mellem! Jeg har efterhånden været her i Bloomsburg i lidt over to uger, og indtil videre har det været super.

Rejsen
Rejsen herover gik fint for mit vedkommende - Lotte blev lidt skidtmads i flyet, men det gik da :) Vi landede efter en lang rejse i JFK Airport i New York torsdag aften (14. jan). Vi havde arrangeret transport fra NY til Bloomsburg fredag morgen fra Newark Airport, der ligger ca. 40km fra JFK. Så vi havde booket et hotelværelse i Queens. Det var ret nice til prisen.

Fredag morgen tog vi så en taxa fra Queens til Newark - dette indebar en lille tur tværs over Manhattan :D Her er lige et par grovkornede billeder. Lotte tog dem mens vi sad i kø over en af de store broer. Regner i øvrigt med at få chancen for at tage nogle lidt bedre billeder på et senere tidspunkt.

I Newark skulle vi hentes sammen med et par andre udvekslingsstuderende. Efter en del kaos fandt vi alle hinanden. Kaosset bestod i, at vi bare havde fået at vide, at vi skulle være ved terminal C kl. 12 middag. Nu er terminal C en ret stor bygning med drop off/pick up i tre etager. Mig og Lotte løb ind i en belgier ved navn Thomas. Vi gik så helt tilfældigvis ud på den nederste etage. Lige da vi kom ud af døren så vi en mini-van med et skilt i ruden. Vi fik også selskab af en mexicaner, Andrea, men vi manglede stadig den sidste mand, inden vi kunne køre mod Bloomsburg 3 timer væk.

For at gøre en lang historie kort, så kørte vi rundt og rundt fra etage til etage i en halv times tid for at finde den sidste mand - en englænder ved navn Sam (Som i øvrigt har været tenniscoach for Gordon Ramseys og David Beckhams børn - nice). Vi fandt ham dog til sidst.

De første dage
Fredag eftermiddag havde vi så alle fået udleveret vores ID-kort, som også fungerer som nøglekort og betalingskort. Vi blev kørt op til vores lejligheder, men da vi kom, så vi, at er der kun var en seng, et skab, et skrivebord og en stol på værelset. Så Dr. Sharma, præsident for det internationale kontor, tilbød at køre os ud til Walmart for at købe sengetøj, mad, service osv. Det var en sjov oplevelse, men det sjoveste var nu, da vi kom ud på parkeringspladsen igen.

Den blå bil på billedet var hoppet ud af gear, trillet tværs over parkeringspladsen og smadret ind i vores bil. Så vi fik hilst på både politi og den 16-årige ejer af bilen - som ikke havde hørt at han var blevet kaldt over højtalerne flere gange, da han sad og græd fordi hans kæreste lige havde dumpet ham... talk about having a bad day! Men vi fik da købt det vi skulle.

Weekenden gik med et par ret ligegyldige informationsmøder.



Mount Olympus
Selve campus er delt op i Lower og Upper Campus. Lower Campus er der hvor alt undervisningen foregår. Det er også her de fleste dining faciliteter og administrative bygninger ligger. Derudover er der også en masse kollegier. Upper Campus ligger oppe på et lille bjerg. Deroppe ligger stadion, opvisningshal, baseball, tennis osv. Derudover er det også her de bedste lejligheder ligger. Jeg bor på Upper Campus i et område, der hedder Mount Olympus. Her har jeg mit eget værelse i en 6-mands lejlighed (nr. 2 "hoveddør" på billedet).

Det er nu meget rart, men væggene er meget tynde, så man kan faktisk næsten høre hvad hinanden tænker! Til at starte med var vi fem i lejligheden - to nedenunder og tre ovenpå (plads til 4 ovenpå). De to nedenunder er meget flinke, men de siger ikke så meget. De to ovenpå sammen med mig er to ekstremer. Den ene, Glenn, er rigtig cool. Den anden, Keith, er en komplet idiot! Ham og hans venner er ikke ligefrem guds bedste børn, og de larmede helt vildt den første uges tid. Det er dog blevet en smule bedre. Desværre for mig valgte Glenn at flytte op til nogle kammerater i sidste uge. Men jeg møder ham stadig tit på skolen, og det første han spørger mig om hver gang er "So when are you moving out?" Og jeg arbejder skam også på sagen... Jeg er nemlig blevet gode venner med en franskmand, Hugo, som bor lidt længere oppe af gaden. Hos ham står der et værelse tomt, så det håber jeg meget på at kunne blivet flyttet over i!


Problemer med fag
Efter den første weekend med intro, startede timerne først om tirsdagen. Mandag var Martin Luther King Jr. day, så der havde vi fri. Fra tirsdag til fredag var der "add/drop week", hvilket vil sige, at hvis man ville skifte fag, så skulle det gøres i den uge.
Jeg skal have fem fag herovre, men jeg havde kun fået fire på plads hjemme fra. Herovre kører de med forskellige levels af fag. Level 100, 200, 300 og 400. På forhånd vidste jeg, at jeg enten skulle tage fem level 200 eller ét level 100, ét level 300 og tre level 200. Der gik ret meget kaos i det, for jeg kunne ikke få noget level 300 fag. Enten var fagene fyldt, eller også havde jeg ikke de rette kvalifikationer til at tage dem. Så jeg blev nødt til at droppe det level 100 fag, jeg havde fået på plads inden. Nu manglede jeg altså to level 200 fag. Igen var problemet at mange af fagene allerede var fyldt, men onsdag troede jeg endelig, jeg havde fået det på plads. Nu skulle fagene bare godkendes af ASB. FAIL! Ét af dem ville de ikke godkende, så jeg skulle finde et andet. Det gjorde jeg så torsdag og fik det skam også godkendt.

Så nu har jeg følgende fag:
1. Intercultural Communication
2. PR: Theory and Practice
3. Online Journalism
4. Principles of Sociology
5. Principles of Management

Jeg har den samme professor til PR og Online Journalism. Han hedder Richard Ganahl, men vi kalder ham bare DrG :) Han er vildt sej! Han er en rigtig medie-mand, og han elsker sin nye iPhone. Han sagde, at sådan en skulle vi anskaffe os - han ville endda skrive en seddel til vores forældre om at de skal købe en til os :) Sociology er også ret spændende indtil videre. Det samme er Intercultural Comm - her har vi allerede set "Hotel Rwanda", og idag gik vi i gang med "Bend it Like Beckham".

Management burde egentlig være spændende, men vores lærer er bare så kedelig, at man tror det er løgn! (Se evt. hvad tidligere studerende har at sige om ham her) Jeg lagde faktisk mærke til, at der var en, der sad og sov i mandags...

Mit skema ser sådan her ud:

Mandag:
12-12.50 Sociology
15-16.15 Intercultural Comm
18-21 Management
Tirsdag:
9.30-10.45 PR
11-12.15 Online Journalism
Onsdag:
12-12.50 Sociology
15-16.15 Intercultural Comm
Torsdag:
9.30-10.45 PR
11-12.15 Online Journalism
Fredag:
12-12.50 Sociology


Jeg tror det var det for denne gang. Til sidst vil jeg bare lige sige, at jeg er positivt overrasket over mig selv! Jeg har kun spist på McDonald's én gang siden jeg kom!

Håber I har det godt derhjemme!