Week 2

Stormie, Brenna, and I arrived at the Hotel Transit Loft in Berlin on Monday at
1:30 a.m. and awoke the same morning at 4:00 to pack up to head to
Copenhagen. After arriving in Copenhagen, we were able to have some time for
shopping and napping for a few hours before commencing our tour of the
Taastrup Campus and the University Hospital for Large Animals and the tour of
the Frederiksberg Campus and the University Hospital for Companion Animals.
Both facilities were amazing - especially the small animal hospital. I have not had
much personal experience in small animal practices or hospitals, but this one
seemed to be state-of-the-art. I was highly impressed. The joint dinner that night
at Cafe Vaeksthuset (the old greenhouse) was fun. I enjoyed meeting all of the
hosts and the atmosphere of the greenhouse was great, but I was not a huge fan
of the food. This was no fault of the chefs, I just do not like fish or veal; therefore,
I opted for the vegetarian option which I thought would be a salad. Instead, the
chef brought out half of an eggplant, to which I recently discovered I am allergic. I
did not want to cause any more trouble, so I just ate the carrots, potatoes, and
mushrooms that had come with my eggplant. The vegetables and the chocolate
cake (similar to a brownie) were quite delicious. Stormie and I had the same
hosts, Pipaluk and Thorkil, who were so much fun to get to know. After dinner,
they took us on a short driving tour of Copenhagen in their Fiat. When we
arrived at their apartment, we met their two Chihuahuas, Phoebe and Kaylee,
who were definitely the sweetest and most adorable Chihuahuas I have ever met.
I went on a walk with Pipaluk and the dogs around the block that night before
going to bed. We talked about school, her dogs, where she comes from in
Greenland, and even religion; she is a great girl and is very easy to talk to. She
even let Stormie and me try some salted licorice before we went to bed. It was
not too bad!

On Tuesday, Stormie and I caught a ride to Faxe Dyrehospital with a veterinarian
who recently started working there named Malene. We were both exhausted
from the lack of sleep on Sunday and Monday nights, and we both fell asleep on
the one hour and fifteen minute ride to the hospital. It was embarrassing.
Anyhow, once we arrived at the hospital, we were refreshed from our little naps
and went straight to work. This hospital was quite large. It had both small and
large animal facilities that were state-of-the-art, along with an administration
building in which there was an area for all employees to prepare their lunches
and keep their belongings locked in locker rooms. The practice was owned by
three veterinarians, and it employed around 18 veterinarians and 20 nurses total.
The most unique aspect of the practice was that almost all of the veterinarians
working there had a specialty of some kind. In the small animal hospital, we met
three orthopedic specialists, one dental specialist, one imaging specialist, one
internal medicine specialist, and one chiropractor. Stormie and I only spent one
morning in the large animal medicine hospital, but we were able to meet a equine
lameness specialist and an equine internal medicine specialist as well. A bovine
veterinarian had already left for her farm calls by the time we arrived at the
equine hospital, so we were unfortunately not able to experience bovine
medicine there. Stormie and I are both more interested in large animals than
small, but we thoroughly enjoyed our time spent at the small animal hospital in
Faxe. Stormie was able to scrub in on an arthroscopy and a patellar luxation
while I assisted with various other cases. I helped clean the surgical equipment,
sat in on a couple of consultations, helped with a CT scan, and restrained dogs
for radiographs. In the equine hospital, I worked with the lameness specialist
discussing one horse's lameness and limb radiographs. Stormie and I also assisted
the equine internal medicine specialist with a horse that had been coughing. He
let me give the sedation and assist with endoscopy, a trach wash, and a
bronchoalveolar lavage. All of the veterinarians and nurses worked great with the
animals and were more than happy to explain things to us and make us feel
welcome. One of the orthopedists even had Stormie and me over to his house
for a barbecue on Wednesday night. We truly enjoyed our experience at Faxe
Dyrehospital, and we wish we could have spent more time there.

Thursday was our tour of Copenhagen and trip to Tivoli!! Tivoli was definitely
the highlight of the day. We had SO much fun; I just wish we had more time to
ride all of the rides! The tour of Copenhagen was fine, but I wish we had made it
to the harbor where the Little Mermaid sits and the royal family lives. Thankfully,
Pipaluk was nice enough to take Stormie and me on our own personal tour of
Copenhagen. It was awesome! She called herself a "Royalist" and knew lots
about the royal family and about the history of Copenhagen. The dinner at
Madklubben that night tasted great, and we had a wonderful time talking with
both our hosts and our classmates' hosts. Altogether, our stay in Denmark was
fantastic. We learned a great deal and had lots of fun in Faxe Dyrehospital, and
we had a great time with our classmates and our hosts at the social gatherings.

Stormie, Brenna, and I spent our second free weekend in Vienna, Austria. We
stayed in the Art Hotel, which was really nice! We had only booked a room with
a king sized bed, but they gave us a loft that was almost like a condominium. It
had two separate bedrooms (one with a king sized bed and one with a queen), a
living area, a refrigerator, a large bathroom, and a private 7th floor balcony! We
were so happy with the accommodations, we almost did not want to leave the
room! On Saturday, we had booked a tour of the Danube River Valley and a river
cruise. Although it rained on and off, the cruise was nice and relaxing. The river
valley was absolutely gorgeous. After the cruise portion of the tour, we ate lunch
in Melk, where we sat with a couple from Ireland. We told them about our
program, and they thought it sounded great... but they suggested that next year's
group should visit Ireland. After talking to them about the beautiful countryside
and the wonderful opportunities for veterinarians, a trip to Ireland is definitely on
my bucket list. After lunch we toured the Abbey of Melk, the library, the church,
and the gardens. Everything was absolutely gorgeous. Sunday was spent leisurely
wandering around Vienna. We found Cafe Denel, suggested by Dr. Wasser, and
had a nice lunch followed by some souvenir shopping and some relaxing in our
hotel lobby before hopping the night train back to Berlin.