My Host Family!

MY HOST FAMILY!

Yes! I am VERY lame for not writing about my host family and my house when I first got here.. but better late than never, eh? (I actually have been thinking about it for a while I just haven't done it yet! hah..) SO! Here goes!

In my family I have 4 host brothers: Frederik (8), Jonathan (10), Nikolai (14), and Mathias (18). Mathias lives with another family and Nikolai is going to an Efterskole (like a boarding school that I wrote about a couple months ago) and only comes home on the weekends. So at home, it's me, Frederik, Jonathan, my host mom Maria, and my host dad Anders. Anders works with construction and Maria has been in training to get her taxi drivers license (she passed the test yesterday and we are all SO proud of her!) Anddd I'm not sure if I've told you, but Bjarke is Maria's older brother.. so he is my "host uncle" in a sense, which makes Solvej my "host aunt"!

OK! SO! My house: I took pictures a week ago.. so here they are!

We will start with my room.. (my room is actually cleaner now.. don't worry!)

then the upstairs bathroom is right down the hall.. and so is Nikolai's room.

If you go downstairs there's the front door..

and this is the downstairs..

(the kitchen.. bet that was hard to guess!)

where we eat

and our living room!

AND! Our house from the front and back..

kyla's farvel fest!

HOLA!










(Jonathan, Kyla & Frederik)


What a weekend! Saturday night was Kyla's farvel fest (goodbye party)! I'll get to that.. but i have a funny story about friday:
Kyla and I were at Bjarke and Solvej's hanging out and Kyla kept getting texts (SMS) from this Australian girl, a friend of Kyla's, Alycia. She was saying "when are you going to pick me up?" and kyla kept saying "why is she so worried about it.. the party is tomorrow!" and then Alycia said "i've been at the train station for 2 hours!" HAHAHAH.. she came on the wrong day!! Ahhh it was so funny! So we ran to the station to pick her up and then went back to Bjarke and Solvej's for a while and then back to my house to sleep. haha but GOD it was so funny! We will never let her forget it.. we tease her all the time. It's great..



(Solvej and Maria, who worked SO hard!)








(the dinner and my host dad, Anders)









Anyway! SATURDAY we went for a walk for the Spejder (boy scouts) and then we spent most of the day setting up for the dinner.. Solvej made Lasagna! ahhhh ahhhh (the sounds of angels singing..) it's the best! i swear! SO!
(Alycia and her danish boyfriend Mikkel)

(kyla and her host sister Mie)

After the dinner, which was fantastic, we went to the train station and picked up a ton of exchange students. And then the party started! It was so much fun! And I think Kyla had a really good time too :) SO ANYWAY! I have tons of pictures.. enjoy!

(I think this pic is
hilarious.. Jonathan & Rebeca)

(Rebeca giving Kyla a kiss!)

(Me and Pablo!)




(Adriana, my host brothers, another little boy, and Rebeca)





(Veronica from Chile, Quentin from France and me!)

SUNDAY MORNING we woke up and had breakfast. Also, we changed the clocks back an hour. After breakie a lot of people left and the few fortunate (like me) got to clean! And after EVERYONE was gone... Maria and I went home and relaxed for an hour or so.

THEN! There is this Circus in town and the boys, Jonathan and Frederik, really wanted to go. So Maria and I took them. I pretty much just wanted to see the Elephants.. but the juggling was also really cool. And 2 hours later, we got home and I crashed for 2 hours. I was SO tired!

So that's my weekend! Pretty exciting! And then this Saturday, Solvej, Bjarke, Kyla and me are driving 10 hours to the Czech Republic!! Kyla and I are so excited!! We can't wait! but i better go! I hope I can get another blog in before we leave!
love francine

the stipper dinner

(Gammam from Thailand and Francesca from Italy)








(Spejder Husen- the scout house)

Hej guys!

Last night we had a stipper dinner! Stipper is a Danish nickname given to exchange students. Instead of calling us udveksle studenter, they call us stipper (it's just easier). But we had a dinner for all the exchange students on Fyn, and their families if they wanted to come. It was so much fun! I was so happy to see all my pals! I haven't seen most of them for over 2 weeks.. and some of them 3 weeks. So it was great catching up! We had it a the spejder husen (boy-scout house) behind my house..so it was funny that everyone came to my town and right next door.. haha.. (Peep, Daiki and Gonzalo)

(Kyla and Rebeca from Venezuela)

(haha I think this picture is funny.. it's Solvej and another AFS volunteer)

And then Kyla slept over at my house and today we're just chilling.. getting ready for her Goodbye Party tomorrow. We made Snickerdoodles too! (cinnamon cookies that are like a gift from heaven: I swear.) God it's been so long! They're just not the same though.. it's kind of sad. But the people here LOVE them.. haha. They just haven't tried them like when I make them at home though... haha
But ANYWAY! I better dash! I hope everything's good at home! Miss you guys! love francine

(my host mom Maria! I love this picture!)

(Anders my host dad, Jonathan (10) pronounced yonatan, and Frederik (8) which i'm not even going to explain how to pronounce because it's too hard.. haha) I love this pic! Frederik is so funny.. hah

Packages!

Hey!!

I just wanted to say thanks! My mom, my Grandma, and my friend Merryn (AUS) all sent me packages in the last 2 days and I wanted to say "TAK!" It's so nice to get mail! haha.. But really, who DOESN'T like getting mail? crazy people.. I have been trying to send postcards and letters out to you guys! I have been picking postcards up everywhere I go! It's so much fun! But a lot of people have been asking me my mailing address! haha.. I wrote it in an earlier blog but here it is again:

Svendborgvej 85

5750 Ringe

Denmark

don't forget to send me yours too!

Well not too much else that's new! We started school up again today and it was so good to see everyone! And then... we finished at 11.30 today! It was great! Our last class was cancelled.. so I came home and then my host mom, Maria, and I went out to find a raincoat for me! It's so funny! because it rains quite often here and I didn't bring a raincoat when I came (i forgot mine mom.. ) and I have been SOOOOOO lucky! I think it's rained on me like 3 times.. that's it! But then i was thinking.. "hmmm my luck isn't going to last much longer.. i've almost been here 3 months (ahhh insane!)" so Maria and I went to like 5 clothing stores looking for a cute, cheap raincoat. No luck.. They were all like 600 kr ($120 plus) and ugly. And we're like "hmmm let's go to Netto to buy some crunchy peanut butter for Maria" (she doesn't like creamy peanut butter) and KABOOM! A cute, cheap, black raincoat.. 100 kr ($20) CHA CHING! haha so that's my day! fabulous!

but now i'm going to go to bed.. i'm tired! And I know there has to be at least ONE picture for this blog so this is a picture of my street (Svendborgvej) last Tuesday!

ok! thanks for listening to my ranting.. haha..

godnat (goodnight) love, francine

visiting Andrea

(Århus)






Hey Guys!

So this week we're off from school for our Autumn holiday and I went to visit my friend Andrea from Italy up in Silkeborg in Jutland. And it was very fun! So good to see him again! I haven't seen him since the orientation camp in the beginning of August. So anyway.. wednesday we went for a walk in the woods around where Andrea lives.. in Virklund/Silkeborg area. These forests are amazing! The trees are SO tall and it's just SO pretty! I swear.. if the stories didn't say Robin Hood was from England I swear he would be from Denmark! :) annnnnnd then we went to Århus with his host parents and we walked around a little bit.. but we spent 2 hours in this art museum. It was cool.. but i wanted to see more of the city. Bjarke says "don't worry! you'll see it!" haha..



(Silkeborg)



Annnnd then on Thursday we just hung out.. went to Silkeborg to see the town but pretty much just watched movies and hung out. And on Friday Andrea took me and another exchange student, Jose from Mexico, to Himmelbjerget. Himmelbjerget is the tallest point in Denmark.. a mountain haha.. It's like 147 meters (about 161 yards) haha.. compare that to Mt. McKinley which is 6,194 meters (about 6,674 yards) hah! For those of you who don't know much about Mt. McKinley like my pals here in Denmark you should check it out at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mt._McKinleywiki/Mt._McKinley And it's really funny because the direct translation of Himmelbjerget is Sky Mountain. It's a big joke here in Denmark.. But there is a really good view from the top! I thought that was worth the bike there! haha..

So ok! After sky mountain we went home and made food for the exchange student party Andrea had. That was pretty fun! It was cool meeting other AFSers and Rotary kids from a different region. And we played games and ate food from different countries.. it was great!

Ok! This morning i woke up and Bjarke and Kyla came and picked me up! It was so nice! I was going to take the train but Bjarke had to have his car fixed or something close to where i was.. and said "What will you do for me if I pick you up?" soooo i'm assuming that I have to pay him back somehow.. G-R-E-A-T. haha.. but now i'm going to go grab something to eat!

hej hej!

love francine

Exploring Copenhagen!

Hej!

Ahhhh! Bjarke took me and Kyla (Kyla and I.. there kyla!) to København (Copenhagen) yesterday! It was so much fun! We walked around and took tons of good pictures! And saw lots and anyway.. i had so much fun!! So I will show you on a map what we saw! And how we got to København from Ringe.. We crossed a bridge from Fyn (Funen in english) to Sjæland (Zealand in english). This bridge is really two bridges that stops on the island of Sprogø. From Sprogø to Sjæland is the 2nd longest bridge in the world (used to be the first until Japan built a longer one).

So.. in København Bjarke had to go to work and so Kyla and I got a map from the Information center and walked from the town square (the center of Copenhagen) out to the Little Mermaid: about 6-7 kilometers (about 4 miles).

We walked down the walking street with all the shops.. (i bought a few postcards) and we went through Kongens Nytorv and bought fransk hotdogs.. (i'm currently looking up the name for them and am having no success.. i'll get back to you about that) And Kyla tells me that in the winter there is an ice rink/ring at Kongens Nytorv. Then we walked down Nyhavn. You probably know Nyhavn because it's very famous! Check out the picture.. And then we walked out to the Queen's palace and Frederik's church. We go to see part of the changing of the guards too! And then we went and looked in Frederik's church which was SO beautiful! Only downer of the day was that we left Kyla's camera in the church and when we went back for it someone had stolen it.. That sucked. But after the church we saw another fountain and then went to see the Little Mermaid, where we met Bjarke again. And then we went back to Ringe. (about a 1.5-2 hour drive) (the fountain in front of the Queen's palace and Frederik's church)

(Frederik's church)

So that was Monday! I hope you like the pictures! Today I am catching a ride with my host mom Maria's friend Peter up to Skanderborg near Århus to visit my friend Andrea from Italy until Saturday, so I won't have any new blogs until then! I hope everyone at home is doing good! I miss you! A big hug from DK! francine

Me and the Little Mermaid!