Last week I was lucky enough to be apart of a yearly tradition here in Copenhagen called "J-Dag."  This day is very important in Copenhagen and marks the beginning of the Christmas season.  J-Dag, means Jule Day or Christmas day.  I was mistaken in thinking they created the J-Day holiday just for me...JOSH DAY.  J-Dag is actually a commercial holiday to celebrate the release of Tuborg's Christmas beer.  It was crazy night.  The city was decorated in lights and there was a special feeling around.  The Danes truly love Christmas time and begin their celebrations early.  Denmark is mainly a Lutheran country, so the majority of people do celebrate Christmas here.

        I don't think I knew what I was getting myself into when I headed out for J-Dag.  I feel like every single Dane was crowding the streets of Copenhagen awaiting the Tuborg Christmas trucks to come barreling down the street.  The official release time was at 8:59 at the majority of the bars around town and after this the trucks hopped around the city all night.  All of the bars/pubs/cafes in Copenhagen had fake snow machines which spewed little foam bits into the air.  Also, some places even trucked in real snow to put on the streets to celebrate the day.  Whenever a Tuborg truck was in sight people would run over to greet it with open arms.  I followed the crowd unknowingly and found out that at each stop the back of the truck opens up and Tuborg elves emerge singing carols and dancing.  It was a really fun atmosphere.  Then the elves would run into pubs and cafes and distribute free beers to the crowd.  They also gave away funny furry hats and stickers.  I followed trucks with some friends to a few stops around the city.  It was a blast and I stayed out late forcing me to take the night bus home.  A word of advice to students planning to study abroad in Denmark: DON'T FALL ASLEEP ON THE NIGHT BUS! Ha ha.  It actually wasn't too bad, but somehow I nodded off and woke up at the last stop of my bus, bummer!  I ended up taking a brisk walk about 3 Km that night, but it was worth it to experience an event like J-Dag.  Tivoli also just reopened for the Christmas season and I am looking forward to going there again to see all the lights and maybe make some purchases in the Christmas markets.

        Also, this week was my friend Tiffany's 21st birthday.  Tiff is also a SLU student and also a chemistry major.  She had several kids over to her house for dinner.  It was  lot of fun and I got to see another part of the city... well, suburbs.  Tiff lives an hour outside the city so we took the train out there.  It was really neat to see how some other SLU students are living and fun to celebrate with her and her host family. 

        Lastly, this week my core class had group presentations.  We had to focus on things we learned during our academic visits during our London Study Tour.  The group projects were presented at night and we were encouraged to be fun and entertaining.  My group decided to do our presentation like the game-show Eggheads, which we saw being filmed at the BBC.  We used this format to ask both the professors and the rest of the class questions to see who the true "eggheads" were.  I was not really looking forward to the night... I mean who looks forward to doing presentations.  Yet, it ended up being about 3 hours of laughs.  One group rapped about the Internet revolutionizing communications, another group did a skit pretending we were at the Oxford Union again, and everyone found a creative way to present there information.  It was probably the most fun I have ever had with group presentations.

       It looks like there will be some more traveling on the horizon for me.  Not 3 weeks of intense travel like last time, but I will be going to Oslo (Norway) this coming weekend.  There is an overnight cruise that you can take from Copenhagen to Oslo and the ship is packed with fun stuff to do.  It was highly recommended by some of my friends and I am greatly looking forward to it.  Check in next week for info on the Oslo cruise.

**This is just a cool sign right in the center of Copenhagen.  It is about a block from school in a square called Radhuspladsen.  I don't know if you can read it well, but the sign says, "Replace fear of the unknown with curiosity."  What a great saying and a great approach to studying abroad!**