International smugglers

I honestly feel like I went on this trip so long ago!!! It’s only been a week or so that I’ve been back though, so I don’t know why it feels that way. Honestly, these recaps are kinda boring to write so I considered not even writing this, but I actually facetimed with my grandparents and aunt tonight and they said that they know that in a few years I’ll love to have this as documentation of what I did. Soooo, this is for future Q$.

So, we woke up super early in Hamburg in order to catch our train! Everything went perfectly,

ON THE FERRY

except the fact that we sat in someone’s reserved seat… on accident. But it was super chill, the guy didn’t care because it wasn’t a full train, so he sat at the table just diagonal from  us. BUT. He would sit so he was facing us? SO BOTH ANNA AND I KEPT MAKING AWKWARD EYE CONTACT WITH HIM!!!!!!! No joke. It was super uncomfortable. lol. But also on the train, I was just listening to my awesome playlist (no bias) and Anna was sleeping or something, and then these 2 huge guys walk up to us. They whip out their German customs badge and I automatically start internally freaking out that we’re going to get arrested. Surprise: we didn’t get arrested. But, they asked us all these questions to see if we were smuggling stuff (I watch COPS, I know how this works..) into Denmark or whatever. The only thing we were trying to smuggle was our day old pizza (which the customs agent definitely noticed and asked about), but we were all set to go! Until the Danish police came aboard…

HAHAH just kidding, nothing at all happened. They looked at our passports and smiled and moved on. BUT! The people in front of us were like 2 middle aged men and a little boy from Afghanistan (I was eavesdropping tehe). The little boy didn’t have any documentation!! And the police were like, “Well you can’t make it to Norway and go through Sweden without any documentation.” The Afghan men were like, oh well he’s my relative, etc! And the Danish police, I SWEAR I WITNESSED THIS, they just shrugged and were like, okay it’s fine. HAHAHA it must’ve been above their paygrade or something because they did NOT care. TBH these guys could’ve been who knows what. Whatever, Anna and I were internationally smuggling our pizza and that’s all I cared about.

The cool thing about the train was that our train actually went onto a ferry! And we got to hang out on a ferry in the Baltic sea for like 45 minutes (both to Copenhagen and back). It was soooo cool. Literally and figuratively. Ferry boats are kinda a big deal for Grey’s Anatomy fans soooo. Yeah enough said. 

Then, we made it to Copenhagen!!! We found our AirBNB and it’s a cute little apartment pretty close to the train station. It was so adorable except the fact it wasn’t cleaned very well?? I’m kinda weird about my bed being clean and stuff so I was really grossed out by it but hey, whatever. College, amirite? Anna and I went exploring after we threw our stuff on the ground and charged our phones! We mainly just walked around and went to the row of shops. I swear that I would spend all my money shopping if I could. We also went to the colorful houses that Copenhagen is known for? I don’t know the technical word for it, but that was that. We were waiting for our friends Lauren and Grace, who were coming from Switzerland! They missed their train that morning (tehe) but they finally made it! It was SO GREAT to finally see people we knew after spending so long being surrounded by strangers. It was a breath of fresh air, that’s for sure!!

Side note: My Hunter rain boots, I think I’ve had for 3 years, got a hole or something in them just from wearing them. Which is totally fine, except I’m kinda OCD about things breaking. So naturally, I told my mom there was a hole, and I even said I wouldn’t bother them until I got back to the States! But, my impatience got the best of me. I hired my girl Grace to borrow Lauren’s lighter she bought in Hamburg and try to melt my rubber boots together. It worked. Kinda. They came apart again. But, we did get the apartment to smell like burning rubber!! Don’t try this at home, kids.

So that night, in the US, was the third and last presidential debate! I was super bummed to miss it because I’m really invested in politics. Like really. Just ask my roommates from last year. So because of the time zone thing, we obviously slept through it! But that morning as we were all getting ready for our day, the entire group listened to the debate and had political discussions! And no one ended up getting mad or crying! 🙂 Success. To be honest, I can’t wait for this election to be over so I can stop seeing everyone’s political views all over Facebook. It’s pretty annoying, especially when I’m facebook friends with people whose opinions I don’t agree with. WHATEVER. Rant over. But yeah! It was a great way to start the morning. 🙂 We had some major plans that day!!

Frederiksborg Castle

We started off going to Frederiksborg castle just outside Copenhagen! It was so beautiful inside and we had the most awesome tour guide I’ve ever had, Louise. She had a slight British accent even though she was Danish hahaha. So precious. And she’d slide in these really funny sassy jokes that were pretty much undetectable unless you were listening. She was so fab. I really like Northern European architecture. I think I like it more than French Baroque (aka Versailles). It’s just SO CLASSY!

There were a few people in the group who wanted to go see THE Little Mermaid Statue. So we did that! And it was super crowded & the statue was seriously so small. Like way smaller than I thought it would be. And everyone kept calling it “den lil haf-rue” because that’s apparently how we think it’s pronounced in Danish. BAHAH. I was mostly the photographer because it wasn’t the thing I was super into. Don’t get me wrong, I love the Little Mermaid, but to be honest, I didn’t know this statue existed until Grace told me we were going.

The Little Mermaid

Lauren really wanted to see this round tower! So after visiting the Christus statue and getting lost a few times, we made our way over there. It cost like 3 euros, which I’m always down for, and then we started climbing (or walking)… and climbing… and climbing… Seriously we were going in so many circles I thought I was going to get sick. The uphill incline just WOULD NOT STOP. By the time we made it to the top, I was sweating and out of breath and yeah… but the view was BREATHTAKING. Seeing Copenhagen and the port was absolutely beautiful. But what I was most excited for that day was…. TIVOLI’S!

Tivoli’s is an amusement park in the middle of the city!! And it was decorated all Halloween-y so naturally we HAD to go. Honestly, probably one of my favorite nights of my entire study abroad. We just went on so many rides! And I really tried to get over my fear of heights. I didn’t really because everytime I would get on a really high ride, I’d start crying. Not just crying, SOBBING. Whatever, I did it. That’s what matters. When I was on this one ride, I was sitting across from Anna and Lauren and I was sitting next to Grace. Basically as soon as it started, I started sobbing. Grace was having a grand ole time and Lauren and Anna were laughing so hard I think at the fact that Grace and I were COMPLETE opposites. They were so nice though because they’d always check on me after rides to make sure I was alive and functioning. I swear I love roller coasters, I just don’t do well with heights!!! Anyways, we got to Tivoli’s at 7pm and stayed until it closed at 11pm. We were riding roller coasters until the dadgum place closed down! And I didn’t lose my shoes (I was scared my boots would come flying off on a roller coaster… which would be very bad). It didn’t happen though. We went home and I’m pretty sure Lauren and I watched an episode of American Horror Story. It’s awesome because Lauren and I watch all the same tv shows so it’s PERFECT.

View from the Round Tower

A lil IKEA exploration

The next day… we got to do… what I WANTED TO DO! I have this thing where I want to go to as many countries as possible. Seriously, maximize the time I have to travel everywhere. Malmö, Sweden is a short train ride away so naturally I had to go. So everyone and I went to Malmö. Guess what we did… What’s Swedish, every girl’s dream house, a big blue and yellow building… you guessed it. We went to Sweden and went to IKEA. Honestly, it was probably one of my top 10 afternoons just because I thought it was so hilarious. (Don’t worry Mom and Dad, we also went to an old church, so we basically did do sight-seeing). But anyways, we ate our lunch in the IKEA cafeteria and I got served by some guy from KANSAS! WHAT. It was cool talking to a fellow “State-r” that’s literally what he called me and I had no idea what that meant until someone explained it to me. My defense is that I was running low on sleep. I tried some really yummy Swedish drink that I forgot the name for, by some nice random Swedish lady’s recommendation. We explored IKEA for a few hours, mentally pinteresting everything I want in my future house, and then we headed out. We stopped at this church in the city for a total of about 2 minutes and then peaced the mess out. Sweden. Been there. Done that. (jk I’d totally go again if I ever got the chance).

Lauren wanted to go to a modern art museum so we went to the Louisiana modern art museum! It was pretty cool, although I feel bad because I was kinda #done with museums at that point so I wasn’t the most patient. I was also hangry. Annndddd, I’m not a huge fan of modern art. But it’s cool, I’m glad we went because I know Lauren was really looking forward to it!! And it’s just cool to say you’ve been to a whole ton of museums. That was our last night so we all just grabbed pizza at this little pizzeria around the corner from the apartment, and started watching funny comedians that Lauren knows about on youtube. Lauren’s a comedian at BYU for HumorU so we take her recommendations pretty seriously. Let me just say, her recommendations do not disappoint.

The next morning we left to go back to Paris! After 15 hours of traveling, we finally made it back! Safe and sound. A little stressed but in Paris, nonetheless. I think all my friends and family can now breathe a little easier knowing that I’m not off frolicking around Europe and I’m actually at home and accounted for. HAHA. But basically, yes. That was probably one of the best experiences of my life thus far! I learned to not get mad when someone steals the covers, local transportation is the way to go when visiting a new city, and always… ALWAYS. Make reservations for trains when you’re traveling on a Saturday. (that’s where we got stressed out). I learned all that and plenty more, but I don’t want to write everything out hahaha 🙂 Until my next adventure!