Week 12

Holy cow, 12 weeks! That's almost 3 months in Denmark. Crazy! This week was pretty low key. We went to our first Danish class, and over the weekend did a bit of relaxing and had friends from Australia join us for dinner. 

This week actually delivered the weather we were expecting before we moved here. The forecast called for seven days of rain with highs hitting the low-70s, and they were close to correct with a few days only threatening at rain. Until now, we have been amazingly spoiled with the weather. Every person we have talked to has ensured us that this is not a typical summer for Denmark and that we have totally lucked out with weather. Lucky or not, we have relished it. On average, the temperatures since our arrival have been in the high-70s to low-80s with a few days touching the 90s. In our opinion, it has been nearly perfect weather, until this week that is. But even this week, although we did get quite a bit of precipitation, but there were really only a few days when it was overcast all day. When the sun did make its appearance, it really made itself known! Almost every day this week were either radiant rainbows or striking sunsets. 

Tuesday: Rainbow after the gym at dinner time.

Another view of the double rainbow Tuesday night 

Wednesday: rainbow before language class

Thursday: serene sunset before bed

Friday: striking sunset - one of the most stunning yet. 

After nearly 3 months here we are starting to get into a routine. This includes gym nights and relaxing nights, and new this week, Danish nights. This week we started our Wednesday night language class. It lasts for about 3 or 3.5 hours each week. Our initial impression is that this is going to be a very challenging language to learn to speak. There are several sounds in the Danish language that we, as English-speakers, have never made and have no idea how to go about making. Additionally, a large portion of the letters are silent or have a barely audible sound. If you are like Heather, you cannot really hear them even if the same word is repeated over and over and over. Nick is having less challenges with the written language, as it shares many of the same (or similar) words with German. Luckily, the grammar seems like it will be much simpler than German, and in several cases, simpler than English too. 

We have heard it is also difficult to learn because as soon as Danes hears you speak, they know Danish is NOT your native tongue and almost always automatically switch to English. The laughter that arises from your attempt at speaking is also not so encouraging. In our class, there are four other students all of whom are au pairs. They seem to be getting along with the language much easier than us. Our guess is that this is because 1, they have children to learn it from and 2, they have to speak it as the children don't know English yet. We'll get there though. Hopefully, by the end of our stay, we will be fairly fluent.  

Aside from language classes, the rest of the week was fairly routine. Over the weekend we decided to stay in town and relax. After being gone two weekends in a row, and with our trip to Croatia scheduled for the following week, we decided we needed to hang out at home and just enjoy it. On Saturday, we had a nice relaxing morning on the balcony sipping coffee and in the afternoon we took a trip into Odense to do a bit of grocery shopping. Sunday, before preparing for dinner at our place with some friends from Australia, we went for a walk with Bella. Although there was a drizzling rain, Heather and Bella took Nick along one of their favorite jogging routes through the castle grounds and along some forested trails. On our way back to the apartment, we stopped quickly at the bakery to pick up bread and pastries for dinner. By the time we got back to the apartment, it was raining quite hard. Luckily, the bread and sweeties did not get soggy and we did not melt. We spent the rest of the afternoon preparing for guests. Nick grilled two tender pork loins marinated in a delicious nectarine chutney he concocted, and Heather prepared some caprese and bruchetta for an appetizer and a roasted potato and vegetable dish to compliment the pork. We had a great time with our friends and enjoyed sharing our expat experiences and love for Pearl Jam with each other. The evening was topped off by the most vivid rainbow of the week. 

Stunning rainbow to end the weekend

Monday was overcast and a good day for taking it easy. Nick was under the weather and stayed home in bed the majority of the day. Heather's big accomplishment was getting a massage in the morning and baking chocolate chip cookies in the afternoon. Ah, retired life is good...