One of my favorite past times is to explore old posts from Downeast Thunder Farm. It’s a cross between a diary, a project board, and a photo album. I can watch Hannah grow and change on these pages. It only makes sense to chronicle her time in Denmark. Maybe she’ll even write some of the future posts (hint, hint).

Hannah just finished week one of her study abroad adventure in Denmark. The trip was surprisingly smooth – a drive to Boston and flights to London and then Copenhagen the next day.

She has settled in with her host family in Hillerød, 32km outside of Copenhagen – about an hour commute to school each way. It took her a few days to fully sort out the bus and train. Other than a bit of jetlag, she seems to have hit her stride and is eager to dive into a regular routine of classes.

The daily updates have been most entertaining. The setting of a security alarm in a store. Catching the wrong bus. Mistaking some evening joggers as a possible pagan cult 😂 (* see details at end of post). Ending up at a strip club when trying to find a shop called “naked” for shampoo. Stumbling across the changing of the guard. The visit to the Lego store (possibly the highlight so far!).

In the coming weeks she will explore Denmark as well as Prague, Vienna, and Normandy.

* And for those of you who will ask. After her first solo day traveling into Copenhagen, she called and said something like this, “Mom, it was really dark, and there was this circle of people in the street holding lights and, well, they were doing ‘the wave.’ It creeped me out, so I turned onto a different street to avoid them. What were they doing? Was it some kind of cult thing?” Later, she told me, upon sharing this with her host parents they said, “I wonder if they might have been joggers stretching before their run?” Apparently, it all made sense then.