During my brief semester in one of the biggest bicycling countries in Europe, I was terrified of biking. Well, that's actually an exaggeration; I've ridden a bike before, but that was in 3rd grade during Bike Ed classes, and I haven't ridden one yet. Seeing all of the bikes rush past me on the sidewalk during the first two weeks of studying abroad constantly reminded me that I was missing something key to the Danish experience. And so, I threw myself out of the comfort zone once again and called up the two closest friends I had made so far in the city, thanks to the orientation: a Brazilian named Ed and a Singaporean named Hui. It so happened that they were in the same situation as me, and I was fortunate enough to find a Red Cross training program for new bicyclists which ran every Saturday afternoon. It was intimidating at first, but I found other people just like me, sometimes older and sometimes younger, who were also practicing. Many of them came to Denmark for work and were still trying to get their visa. Some brought their children, and others were university students. In fact, I met one who was taking a masters program in business administration at the University of Copenhagen.
For me, learning how to properly bike again was embarrassing at first, but I did not feel judged at all! This was around the third week of my arrival. After, the three of us decided to go to Reffen, one of the most famous street food markets in the city, seeing as we had nothing to do for that evening. The commute was fairly long, maybe about thirty minutes each way by metro and bus, but it was one of my most memorable days in Copenhagen. Before we arrived at Reffen, we also came across the Happiness Museum, a museum dedicated to sharing thought experiments and interesting facts about measures of happiness in the world; I remember entering a room filled with thousands of handwritten sticky notes, all of which contained notes of thanks and well wishes from anonymous visitors. I could see why Danes ranked one of the happiest people in the world, and I felt a sense of peace overcome me. To be honest, it felt like a dream; the sky was finally clear, the air was comfortably brisk, and when we arrived at Reffen, we were surprised to see that it was already bustling with people at 4:00pm. We each got ourselves ristet pølse, or Danish hotdogs--each of which included a mini Danish flag on top which we kept as souvenirs. I also decided to get myself a stout beer at a local brewery called Mikkeller for the true Danish experience. The marketplace was located near a dock, and there so happened to be public foldable chairs that overlooked the Nyhavn river. Everything was quiet but distant chatter of the other patrons and the lapping of the water right next to us. As we sat there chatting about our experiences so far in Denmark for a solid three hours, it felt like the golden hour lasted for a third of that time until we watched the sun set. For the first time, I felt like I belonged. For the first time, I truly felt like I could get used to this whole study abroad thing.
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Matthew Calulot
Aloha! I am a fourth-year Marketing and International Business student currently studying at Copenhagen Business School in Denmark. I have never been to Europe before, which is exactly why I wanted to study abroad as a student from Hawai'i. Archives
January 2023
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