I'm still in a foreign country, an ocean away from my school, family and friends. But suddenly it's starting to feel like I'm home. I still don't know how to ride the bus here and I get shouted at in Danish on a regular basis, but I feel like I belong in this little country of mine.
I suppose it's not really that surprising; once you've spent two months in a country, you're bound to grow attached to it. You make friends, settle into a routine and lose the wide-eyed wonder you had when you arrived. I just never expected it to happen to me.
When I first got to Denmark, I wasn't excited to be here. As good as long-term traveling seemed when I applied to get into the program, the closer my departure date came, the more it seemed like an awful idea.
I already had a home away from home in Athens and didn't need another one. I had just found my niche at college, and I was going to spoil everything by going to Denmark, of all the places in the world. Never had Ohio University seemed so appealing as when I was about to be 6,000 miles away from it.
Being abroad was everything I'd feared it would be in the beginning. I didn't know anyone, kept getting lost and was completely overwhelmed by the whole experience. It makes for a good story looking back on it, but my first week abroad was wretched from start to finish.
Everyone had told me I would get used to it, that Denmark would just take some adjusting to. I didn't believe it, but now halfway into my semester abroad, I seem to have proven them right.
Things about the country still make me want to tear my hair out at times, but I've carved out a little place for myself here in Denmark. Despite still not being able to speak Danish at all, I'm assimilating myself into the culture here.
Part of the reason I'm noticing this is that I just came back to Denmark after spending two weeks wandering my way through England and Ireland. I spent my first two days walking around marveling at how different everything was. I didn't have to decipher anything; all the signs were in English! Nobody was going to run me down with their bicycle!
It was glorious to be away from Denmark, to be in a fast-paced city instead of a quaint town with strange traditions and a bizarre language. I was as much of a foreigner there as I had been for the past two months, but it didn't seem to matter as much.
After a few days, though, I was tired of traveling. Exploring a foreign country by yourself is exhausting and, though I hadn't been expecting it, I found myself missing Denmark. Not just the friends I made here, but the country itself.
I wanted to be back riding my bike on cobblestone streets, and trying to pronounce Danish words in class. I missed being in a place where there weren't any hills in the distance, where a freak rain storm will come out of nowhere and deluge the whole town in ten minutes.
England and Ireland were beautiful, but they weren't Denmark.
By the time I got back here yesterday afternoon, I was more than ready to be back. As soon as my plane touched down, I could tell that I was back. It was pouring rain, and I accidentally got on the wrong bus, which meant spending half an hour huddled in a rainy bus station in the middle of nowhere.
When I finally did get on the bus, we went past fields full of cattle and what appeared to be some sort of Scandinavian yak. I didn't really peg Northern Europe as the land of yaks, but apparently I was wrong.
But by this time, nothing in Denmark can really surprise me. It's an incredibly random, silly place, but I love it anyway. I'm not Danish by any stretch of the imagination, but I think I might belong here a bit anyway.
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Catie Coleman
