Met the new Fam...hopefully they aren't sick now!

So as it turns out, sickness does in fact follow me. Who knew you could catch the flu while abroad...basically starting as soon as I stepped off the plane. I guess "living the life of riley" (as Dad would say...if it is in fact, "riley") has really caught up to me. I thought I may had just a cold and sore/achy from all the walking, but it was really just the flu, which I left practically untreated, until now. My fever finally broke after not being able to sleep last night (up until at least 4:30 AM to wake up for a 9 AM Field Study!). Anyways, I bought some mystery Danish medicines that the pharmacist recommended and they definitely helped my fever. Now I am just using sudafed for my ear ache and dayquil/nyquil.

I feel guilty now for not treating myself, since I'm now worried I may have gotten my visiting Danish family sick :(...who I met this past weekend!!! There is Dad, Claus, who I had been in contact with and speaks fluent English, Helle (pronounced Hell-ah, I believe), who is pretty good, Isabella (12) and Oliver (6). Oliver does not speak any English and Isabella is just learning. They are such a tall family--not what I was envisioning, since they had brown hair, but still very Danish :) After a fiasco at the train station with trying to find the intercity train, the right spor (aka track), etc. I finally arrived. Claus picked me up at the Roskilde station, which is about 15 minutes from their house. Normally I would go to one much closer, but do to construction this was my only option.

As we driving to their house in Tølløse, a small "suburb" slash country town outside of Copenhagen. Their family has 3 cats, many bunnies, a new very cute puppy Aslac (which I can hardly believe I say it is cute since it's a small brown terrier...but it is so adorable!), and I believe some guinea pigs? They're family is very children oriented--the entire backyard is dedicated to their kids. They had a TV in practically every room in the house, which was unexpected (seemed like a more American trend, or so I thought). The house itself seemed more simple on the outside, but beautiful on the inside, very modern, simplistic--a light wood, white walls, silver accessories. Very trendy. Claus and I talked for awhile and I had the grand tour of the house. It is considered large for a Danish house (had 3 floors), but probably average for an American idea of a house--an interesting difference I noted.

Finally it came time for dinner, and we had burgers and fries. They thought I would be missing some good old American food and apparently Oliver loves burgers. It was exciting though because basically I made the french fries--peeled the potatoes with Oliver, cut them into fry shapes, oiled them, put them on a pan, and let Claus salt them because I was worried I would overdo it...love that salty food! After dinner we all watched TV; they wanted to show me a TV show they really liked which was like a combination of Survivor and Fear Factor, but unfortunately due to the Denmark-Portugal soccer game it was not on. Instead we watched Coyote Ugly, as a family. Not a movie you would expect to be make international fame...At first I thought they kept it on because it was American and English, but I asked if they had seen it before (since Oliver was watching too, not the most appropriate I would have thought) and said yes, so it was an experience! Haha, but it was nice of them to have us all hang out.

After the movie I went to bed in their basement on this semi-pullout couch, it was perfectly decent and I was able to sleep in order to get back on an early train into Copenhagen. I needed to be back by 9, which meant I had a 7:45 train to catch.  I needed to be back early for an Ikea trip.

To be continued...