On Thursday the entire DIS student population set off for the short study tour trips. The short study tour trips are in the field learning trips that are set up through each core class. My core class is Positive Psychology. Some of the other core classes include architecture, childhood development, memory and identity, environmental sustainability, etc. With our core class we also do our week long excursion to different destinations in Europe. That happens at the beginning of October.
I really didn't know what to expect of the trip. I only knew that it was going to be packed with activities, some cultural and some relating to psychology. On Thursday morning we loaded up onto the buses and drove four hours to Esbjerg, Denmark. Esbjerg is located on southwest side of the large island Jutland. To get to Jutland we had to pass over the 17 km bridge that connects Fyn (the island in between Copenhagen and Jutland). The ride took what felt like forever. When we arrived we went to a business school in Esbjerg where a program called the "Skills Project" is being incorporated. The "Skills Project" is a program implementing positive psychology to help troubled teens get back on track. It has a very high rate of success. We met with the 20 students who are in the 8 week program. It was amazing to hear their stories and their struggles as well as how they have over come them in the short time of being in the program. It is only a small program and is like a hidden secret within the business school (regular students there don't even know about it).
We then headed back onto the bus to go to Ribe (pronounced REE-be), a small medieval town about an hour and a half south of Esbjerg. The perfect word to describe Ribe is cozy. The houses are like little cottages and the streets are all cobblestone. It's a nice tourist attraction. But there isn't much night-life, so when we got there, there wasn't much to do. A few people and I stopped at a pizza place to grab dinner and then headed to the night watchmen activity. Night Watchmen were a type of policemen in the 1800's and earlier that patrolled the city and maintained the streets. Some of their responsibilities were to sing a song telling the children to go to bed as well as watch out for fires and floods. Now it's just a tour around Ribe with a man dressed in a costume. But it was sort of fun.
That night we stayed at the Ribe Byferie hostel. It was the most elaborate hostel I have ever seen, with two story rooms, a complete kitchen, living room, and television. It was the creme de la creme of hostels. Unfortunately I didn't get any good pictures of Ribe because it was rainy and dark.
