February 07, 2009

Danish :)

I have mentioned before that there is a Danish girl going to school here, and I mentioned in the post about the potluck that I met her there. :) Here is what happened in a bit more detail:

Some girls walked in while I was in the kitchen with Ju and Pai (Kanchana and Chaowalit). My Scandinavian radar went off rather strongly. I knew it was her. So I asked a small group where they were from, and when she said, "Denmark", I said, "Oh, great!" I was hoping that she might ask, but no such luck.

So a minute later I worked up my courage to say, "Jeg skal hilse deg fra en venn fra Færøerne" She said something in Danish close enough to, "Oh, it's really good, you said it really well!" And then I said, "Takk!"

Then she became really excited and asked whether I spoke Danish, and I laughed and said, "No, I speak Norwegian", but then both of us just became more and more excited and talking about how I learned Norwegian and things like that... and all in Danish! There was hardly even a language barrier, things went so smoothly.

And afterwards Tom the Australian said, "Wow, Miranda, you didn't tell me you spoke Danish!" and Ju and Pai said that I was speaking like I was "From her country." Certainly I had felt happy and confident speaking it, moreso than when I speak Spanish, for example.

It was great. :) And we exchanged numbers and plan to get together soon. And, and, and, she told me that I sounded really Scandinavian... that obviously Norwegian wasn't my native language, but that I did the tones and such well enough that she might have guessed I was from Iceland or something. So that made me happy. :D And she said I spoke Danish better than any Norwegian or American she knows...

She is really nice, btw, a Journalism major and six years older than I am. XD All of the people I met that night were, but oh well...

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