The First Crop of New People

I started learning Danish on Thursday - it's hard. The Italians are having trouble too - our mouths don't work right for this language. Although during the first day of the Denmark Today program, everyone was in a large lecture hall, they divided us into groups of about 10 people for instruction in Danish. I am the only American in my class, which I'm pretty happy about. I've met so many Americans already; I guess we gravitate towards one another. I want to meet more foreigners, so my class is just what I want. There are a couple Italians, a couple Dutch, a couple Spaniards, a couple Canadians, a Venezuelan, an Australian, a German, and a Czech. The other OU students in the program are stuck in classes with almost all Americans. I've made a special effort to meet Italians, and I think I've met all of them except one. The social opportunities around here are almost endless. There's a tiny bar next in the laundry building of my kollegium on Thursday nights, and I had a good time there this week. That's Else (Holland), Carla (Italy), and Eric (Michigan), then Joe (Michigan), Jennifer (OU), and Emily (OU).





There's a club that all the international students go to; it has free admission from Thursday to Saturday, and I'm going tonight. The Spaniards and the Italians hang out together, and that's the group I want to be a part of. I have had a good time with the Dutch, though; the girls from Holland seem more genuinely nice than those from Italy. Sometimes I wonder if the Italians girls are nice only to my face. But I guess time will tell. I hope to meet some Danes soon, but that's difficult right now because most of them are gone for the holiday.