The Traveling Otter: September 2014

Let me tell you a story.

A story filled with fails of such epic proportions your headdesks and facepalms will leave
you with concussions.

A story so stupid it's funny again.

A story that just HAD to happen to me.

Because why not.

But before I tell you I want you to know this happened because of one little mistake. It happened and it was annoying, but it was just one little mistake. It happens.

Don't judge the people or organization involved.

And don't judge me for how I write this. ;)

So I need to register here in Denmark.

I had asked several times about that in Germany and was told repetedly I had everything I needed. I arrived in Denmark and my host family had been given a form I needed to fill out and take to Vejle to hand in to the officials.

I filled it out and went to Vejle and was told that they couldn't accept that form from me.
Slightly disturbed by this I went on to call Aarhus statsfervalting (however you spell that...). They are in charge of this region so that's why I called them.

So once I FINALLY got hold of them they told me I had been falsely informed. Because I'm an American citizen I have to go talk to Danish Immigration Service.

Fun. :D

So I called them and I got this:

"If you want hjjhtfhgv press one. If you want jgfdtr press two." Etc.

There was nothing for my case except a three month volunteer residence grant.

At that moment I probably had an expression on that translated as:"WTF!?"

Then Jens wrote an email to AFS asking what went wrong and we quickly got an answer.

I had mistakenly been identified as a German citizen.

That meant I should have filled out a completly different form and gone to a completly different people to a completly different place.

:'D

So we got the correct form and called the police station in Vejle (which was where I was supposed to go) to find out only the police station in Horsens would accept the form, take my picture and my prints.

omigodihatebeaurocracy

Thursday I then took the day off to go to Horsens to finish this whole thing.

7:45 - I leave with the bike to go to the bus station in Ny Nörup.

8:05 - I get to the spot where I planned to lock my bike.

8:10 - I turn the corner to discover from the place I had locked my bike to Ny Nörup was a lot further than I remembered. My bus was supposed to leave at 8:36. FML.

Just turned the corner. Can't even see Ny Nörup.

Halfway point. Can see buildings in the distance. If you zoom in like crazy. :'D

8:30 - Exhausted, I arrive at the bus station in Ny Nörup.

9:00 - Arrive in Vejle.

9:00-10:45 - STUPID NORDISK BANK. I DON'T WANT TO TALK ABOUT IT. BUT THANK YOU BRITT. YOU'RE AWESOME. AND KIRSTIN.

10:56 - FINALLY get on a train to Horsens.

11:10-11:50 - Get lost in Horsens.

12:00 - Get help from a 7-Eleven employee. She gave me a map and directions. THANK YOU!

12:40 - Find police station.

13:00 - Leave police station feeling annoyed I had done all this for something that took ten minutes to do. (The other ten were looking around the building and waiting in line.)

13:00-13:50 - Celebrating that it's finally done by getting nachos and faxe kondi (danish sprite) while walking back to the train station.

14:38 - Arrived in Vejle and got on bus back to Ny Nörup.

14:50 - Realize I'm on the wrong bus and thank the bus driver to bits when he lets me off within Ny Nörup. Start walking to my bike. :'D

15:30 - Unlock my bike and start biking back to Randböldal.

Never. Again.

I basically spent eight hours traveling that to do something that took me ten minutes. :D

But it's done.

Finally.

I did have some fun on my way to Horsens and back. The 7-Eleven worker who helped me was sweet. So were the police station workers. And the bus driver who helped me when I made a mistake.

And the weather couldn't have been better. Maybe it could have been a little cooler, but still wonderful weather.

Now pictures I took along the way.

Took this the minute no one was watching. I still feel self-conscious about selfies a bit. ^^;

The tall building in the center is the police station.

The train station of Horsens.

Thank you train for getting me back in one piece! :D

Vejle Traffikcenter.

Took the bus 43 even though I should have taken the 143. :'D

A bit warm for the hike I did, but still lovely weather.

Flowers.

The place I locked my bike.

Now to switch to something completly different.

On tuesday I got to go horseback riding with Regitze and Hanne. Hanne is my contact person and Regitze also has an exchange student. Rakel from Iceland. :3

I was really excited, but got a little nervous when we rode out. I had a blast though. It was awesome and I'll get to go again soon. :D

Getting the horses ready. Actually they were icelandic ponies.

My horse Frigg.

Something else I had planned to do with Hanne and Rakel was to do spinning. On thursday. I almost forgot about it actually. Half an hour before it was supposed to start I remembered and scrambled to get ready. Jumped on my bike and biked out to Vandel to the place where it was supposed to take place. Hanne had to cancel though, but showed me around a little. Rakel couldn't either.

I went alone and holy cow I almost died. It was fun, but after the Horsens adventure and biking to Vandel I was tired.

I kept thinking that I'd quite at some point, but then I'd tell myself not to be a wimp and pull through.

Nearly died, but had fun and will do it again next week.

Then I biked home. :'D

Today we made crépes in the kindergarden. The kids called it pancakes, but it was crépes. It was really awesome because when our cook Mikael was having trouble making and serving the crépes I offered to help make them.

At first they were surprised I knew how, but when I explained I had helped at Weinachtsmärkte for school and at school events they were amused. So I made crépes for quite a long time with Mikael.

I had a lot of fun doing that. Even if I got smoke in my eyes and that was painful. Still fun. :D

Breakfast. P:

These two are like best friends forever. Literally.

Fooooood...

He had buried himself in the hay and the moment I wanted to take a picture of that he wanted out. >:(

A campfire we made. Don't worry we were careful.

Fire.

Apparently leaning against me is fun because some of the kids will do it all the time.

And they'll hide behind my legs too.

Why are my legs so popular to lean/hang on!?

My hard work making crépes paid off. I got four crépes of my own. That I made myself as well.

Nikolai (my coworker) saw me taking this picture and said there are flowers in Germany too. I know that dammit! These were just really pretty and the light was right!