Tying up loose ends!

It's hard to believe that 6 days from now I'll be Copenhagen bound!  Since my last post, the last few weeks of summer have flown by.  (& incase you were wondering, I didn't end up finishing all my food.  Got through most of the perishables, though!)

More importantly, a few days ago I found out where I'm living for the semester!  It's housing provided by the Danish Institute for Study Abroad (DIS!) and it's conveniently a five minute walk from classes.  I'm really excited about that, but also because it's located right in the center of Copenhagen- close to the University of Copenhagen, and also Tivoli Gardens.  Being right in the city and experiencing everything there was really important to me while studying abroad, so this should work out well!  Hopefully I'll find a good cafe to stop by in the mornings for coffee too (quite a necessity).  I'll be living with a roommate, and there are about 20 other people from our program in the building with us.  Along with my housing, I also found out that I'll be participating in the Danish Visiting Family program that DIS offers.  It's a really cool opportunity because even though I'm living with other American students, this program pairs me with a Danish couple who I can meet with occasionally and get to experience real life in Denmark.

(Now begins the part where I'll try to upload pictures.  Might fail miserably, so my apologies if I do!)

This is a picture of my building!

Another thing I'm excited about is that I'll be living really close to my friend Amy (hi Plooffers!) who is studying abroad in Copenhagen too!  According to GoogleMaps we're only a few blocks away.  For those of you who don't know Amy, aka Plooffers, aka White Chocolate Teardrops (waddup O-Team!), here she is:

Amy and I have been friends since freshman year at Stonehill.  We have the same birthday (April 5th, best day of the year), we're Psych majors, we were next door neighbors sophomore year and shared a wall, we're both Peer Mentors and are obsessed with orientation, AND we have the same freckle on our left hands.  Oh, and I guess we're pretty excited to study abroad too.  :)

As exciting as all of this news was, though, for the past few days I've been faced with a life or death situation-- I couldn't find a home for Monster, my pet fish at school.  My roommate from the school year Kathleen and I got him on my birthday back in April.  At that point I knew I was staying at school for the summer, so I could easily transport him from one side of campus to the other.  Morbid as this may be, I suppose I didn't have much faith in his life expectancy, and I never really considered what would happen when the time came to leave for Denmark.  Four months later, the little guy was still alive and well.  I searched tirelessly for a home for him, but I couldn't find anyone who a. wanted the (very minimal) responsibility of a fish or b. didn't think they would accidently kill the fish.  As my move out day drew closer, it was looking as though I would have to send him to meet his demise, which I could absolutely not bring myself to do!  Fortunately, just two days ago one of my friends from work agreed to take him and give him a good home.  She has a fish too, so he'll even have a tank neighbor!  This is Monster, Kathleen, and me shortly after his homecoming this past spring:

The adoption of my fish was the first of many loose ends that needed tying up.  Friday was my last day of work in the Admissions Office for the summer.  I've literally been there since May 14th (with a brief break for Summer Orientation and a short trip home), so it was crazy giving my very last campus tour for the summer.  I'll miss walking to work every morning with the best coworkers in the world, spending every day in gorgeous Donahue Hall, sitting in the "cupboard under the stairs," the Sporcle tournaments, Dunkin Donuts runs, and MAYBE even data entry... okay, maybe not so much with the data entry.  Here are a few of the most wonderful tour guides in the world:

Between packing my room at school, saying goodbye to my friends, and driving all the way home to Pennsylvania early this morning, I'm pretty exhausted, but also incredibly excited at the same time.  Tomorrow I get to see some of my family, and throughout the week I'll probably be running around seeing friends, making lots of lists, and picking up last minute things.  I'll find time to actually pack my suitcase eventually.... for now, I'm choosing to avoid this ridiculously daunting task.

ps: Get ready for a surprise on Tuesday!!