Weekly Observation

Qui-Shawn Tran
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You’re from California?!

I’ve always wanted to go there! How is LA? Do you like living there? What is there to do? Are people really happy there? What about your politics? I heard….

I love meeting new people from the neighboring apartment rooms in my building. 

In the cafe’s & bakeries where I attempt to try all the danishes (they call them pastries) I can, I find myself asking more questions than ever before in my life. And the questions I have are at the essence the same questions being asked of me!

One of the reasons that Denmark sparked my curiosity was that it’s been ranked the “happiest country in the world” many times over. Now being here, and trying to meet the locals and get a grasp on what makes them different than where I grew up, I see a couple of things that may help! 

Danes have an active culture, and since I’m here for the last couple weeks of summer, I see hundreds of people biking at every intersection. I see young students like me jumping into the sea, off of the long spiraling piers that have been built for hundreds of people to gather around the water. I see many walking wanderers taking the metro, walking to and from everything.

This could definitely be a part of what makes them happier. But at the same time, they have oppositional forces at work against them too!

Locals around my age, when I ask them about how they feel, more often than not find themselves in a place where they’d like to be ambitious in a career–or say traveling the world–but the culture of contentedness (basically, “I am happy with what I have right now”) can sometimes shame them into not following their actual passions.

This is just what I’ve been told!

And to make sense of it, I think that there’s a perverse type of pressure put on Danish people when they’ve been ranked the happiest. Because what if you aren’t happy? Then does that admission of unhappiness bring you guilt or shame or dishonor? 

It’s reductive to say all Danes are happier than all Americans, and inaccurate to say that Americans are more ambitious than Danes.

But each statement holds some truth, in that our societies prioritize our values differently. 

Denmark has high taxes to cover welfare costs, meaning a baseline is created for the standard of living for most folks, and that allows them to be more content with their lives.

America has role models who, invariably are the most influential, the most rich, the most powerful people. We grin and approve when students and kids want to be ambitious or chase a big dream. 

In Denmark, there are politicians and students riding the same bike lanes. There’s a more equal leveled, egalitarian vibe to how the society operates. Whether this is better or worse overall for a whole society isn’t for me to decide,

But I’m sure glad I’m getting to see both sides. 

Because I plan, from both of these cultures, to take the best & leave the rest.

Thanks for reading,

Qui-Shawn Tran 😀

polser
Qui-Shawn Tran
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My 8 day whirlwind

since I’ve arrived in Copenhagen at Kastrup airport have been cherishable, humorous, thrilling, confusing, and tiring all in different ways. To commemorate this, here are 15 things I did in my first week here.

  1. Louisiana Museum – Me and two friends I met that day – Dung and Julian from Germany – took a beautiful train to Humlebaek to see a lovely art gallery, literature festival, and architecture that will forever have a place in my heart! The Museum actually has many lawns, and, while it was raining, you could see the coast literally a baseball throw away.
  2. Swimming in the Humlebaek harbor while it was raining – and no, i didn’t even plan to swim that day! I just arrived and saw a tranquil gray coast with light blue waters and I decided to strip + swim. There were lots of seaweeds inside that terrified me when I ran into them, not seeing because I was swimming for distance. Then I just stood in the water and enjoyed. Less salty than the US beaches, I might add.
  3. Ate pølser on the street. Sausages, basically like hotdogs with a whole array of ketchup, mustard, fried onions, pickles, and mayo. It costs 47 dkk which is 6.21 USD. Yum.
  4. Danced on a rooftop birthday party which I crashed 1 hour in. The french dude whose birthday it was, was very happy to see me and we did a jig where everyone skips around and locks elbows before switching partners!
  5. Got invited to a private sailors club to tour a bout and then made friends with a sailor who wants to take me to Greenland! And yes, for free!
  6. Meditated in a garden – actually a cemetery. Which in Copenhagen, is quite common for me to see in the city.
  7. I landed in Pride week – And joined a huge parade of buses and organizations and students at Copenhagen University to parade the downtown streets
  8. Walked & watched the sunrise in my first 24 hours here.
  9. Made a friend on the metro when I was filming with my camera – she sat down, bubbly and excited to talk!
  10. Began a money tracker at the end of every day to #adult better.
  11. Ate Licorice ice cream (which is, i’m told, distinctly Scandinavian)
  12. Listened to Ocean Vuong, a Vietnamese poet and writer, give a reading and talk about his ideas about how storytelling has many forms. I got inspired to think about plot and conflict and tension between people in stories in a different way.
  13. Went shopping – bought a yoga mat from FLYING TIGER (just wanted to note the funny name), notebooks from MUJI (I am so glad that they have this here, lol), and groceries from NETTO (i live a 2 minute walk from a grocery store, #score)
  14. Watched anime at 3:00am because insomnia. Demon Slayer btw.
  15. Introduced myself to my apartment neighbors by saying hi and giving out hi-chew

 

Qui-Shawn Tran
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My last meal

Was in a dim sum restaurant, that was busy and serving tasty siu mai–pork and shrimp dumplings–just like I remembered every single time I’ve ever been there as a kid. My family lovingly calls the place “the upstairs”

My sister Alexis and my Auntie Diana, 7th oldest aunt of the 10 total siblings of my mom, took me to eat after I decided that it was what I would love the most as a final memory of family and culture of 626, as I take a now 15 hour long flight (layover included) to Denmark!

I have anxiety when I go into LAX, because it feels like I am just a cog in the machine. 

Stand here. 

Walk. 

Passport. 

Proceed to Gate 157. 

Sit. 

Stand. 

Board.

And after all of those things, the long long flight to a place I’ve never been before.

But I think that my own anxiety has lessened from solo travel adventures I’ve had before, like going to Florida to spend time in a beach house with my uncles and aunts… Or like the 21 day road trip I planned from LA to Washington and back, crossing the entirety of SoCal, NorCal and the Pacific Northwest with 3 other friends I met on the internet.

It’s just always a new thrill whenever I go out to travel. 

And of course I’m excited for the new,, and I anticipate, and visualize the foods I’ll eat, and the people I’ll meet…

But there’s always the quiet moment of reflection I have before I really take flight. 

Perhaps it’s the drive to the airport where I finally think of what’s actually ahead of me. Or the 3 hours I wait in the terminal gate, passing my time by talking with strangers and writing. And sometimes, it’s in the journal entries I make before I say goodbye to my family, who is always with me up until the moment I really have to step out the door on my own.

Those moments of reflection and preparation are the real beginnings of the trip.

I know them as butterflies in my stomach when I am about to perform on stage.

Like 10 days ago, on August 4th, when I gave a keynote speech and poetry workshop for Stanford’s Youth Leadership Conference. The online event’s theme of believing in change, empowerment, and leadership is something I try to live out every day.

And for a whole week leading up to the 45 minute speech, I had lost my voice.

There were butterflies, alright, but there were fears even bigger. 

Questioning myself about “how am I going to do this if I can’t even string together two sentences?”

And “do I really think that I can share my message and gracefully manage this unexpected challenge?”

Well, it all came down to that morning.

I tuned into the zoom, and did vocal warmups in the morning.

I was feeling better, and beforehand, I took a 15 minute timer to write down what I wanted to say to the students…

Short sentences like 

“Be silly.”

“Perform and smile a lot”

“Encourage dialogue”

And after I had a whole page of ideas and tidbits of what I wanted to say, I took on the 45 minutes of time and molded it into the most fun and engaging zoom meeting I could.

By the end, I felt like I had fulfilled my goals. And my anxieties were settled because I finally had the time to take action on it, and I didn’t have to wait around for the time to come.

I feel the same way now. 

The time has come for my flight, and now it’s just a matter of getting down to do it.

My goals are squarely written down in my journal, and have been exchanged in countless conversations with my family, and now, I get to go and live it.

See you soon, Copenhagen!

Terminal B, Gate 157,

Flight AY02

Qui-Shawn Tran
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I sat down

on the concrete staircase leading to my home of 11 months, crying, as I stared into the dark hazy purple sky.

I lived in one place, the San Gabriel Valley, for 18 years of my life…

Until I didn’t.

My first apartment, 25 minutes off UCSD’s campus in Tierrasanta, has become such a fond place for me! It’s a quiet suburb in San Diego, but I’ve silently worked on my goals and piecing my life together in so many ways here.

First came learning to really cook for myself, then the dishes. & laundry & bills & roommates & commuting to school.

But also more things that are passions of mine too–creating videos, writing & performing poetry, reading 30+ (fiction/biography/leadership) books, & hosting dinner parties.

I don’t know exactly, when I started calling San Diego home, but this small corner of my room where I’m writing this from has definitely been a good place to me.

And when I leave to Copenhagen for 4 months, and I return in January of 2023, it’ll be a new year in a new place, again.

I won’t be renewing the lease here, and I suppose that means quite a bit to be because i’ll have to learn how to adapt and adjust in a new place, all over again.

But in life, isn’t that part of the adventure of it all?

I called my friend Alex today, and when he heard I was going abroad, he recommended I travel all around Europe. Now, it’s my first time going to Europe, and also living on my own there as well, so I’m already in for so many new things, but I also am ready to see what more is out there.

I plan to go to places like Germany for Oktoberfest, Vienna because Billy Joel made a song about it, Scotland because my roommate Andrew studied abroad there, London for the sake of it, Paris for the cobblestone walkways, and basically anywhere I can buy a train ticket to and stay a couple nights in a cheap hostel.

Which brings me to accommodations!

When I get to Copenhagen, the capital city of Denmark on the Eastern coast of the country, I’ll be staying in a dormitory studio (1bed 1bath) called Engvej–literally meaning Meadow Row. It’s on the island of Amager, which hosts a big section of Copenhagen. 

Within walking distance is the beach, and within biking distance is my campus for the faculty of Humanities.

For my packing, I’m planning to travel with 3 things–a carry on luggage for clothes, a backpack for my school stuff + weekend travels, and a camera bag to get some more detailed and finer images and videos of the entire place!

For the most part, in the city, I imagine that I’ll be walking to farmers markets, making friends in the dorms to go eat out or cook together, and jumping into bodies of water–the dams, the beaches, the canals!

I hope I find home again, in the abstract belonging type of way, but also in the comforts of new friends and the familiar business of life that I’ll get to while abroad.

But also, I’m not in a rush to settle into life and find a routine–because I’m traveling and going to soak up as much experience I can!

 

Thanks for reading,

Qui-Shawn Tran

P.S.

I think I might do Study Abroad livestreams here & there on my Instagram. If you want to follow along so you’re up to date, here ya go – https://www.instagram.com/quishawntran/?hl=en



Qui-Shawn Tran
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In 2 Weeks

I leave to Study Abroad in Copenhagen, Denmark.

I’ll be taking the 6:50pm flight from LAX to Heathrow London, then a connecting flight from Heathrow into Kastrup airport, which is right inside the heart of Copenhagen.

Until a couple months ago, I didn’t really even know the geography of where i’d be studying abroad, so it’d be cruel for me to go any further without providing a description!

If you search it up on google maps, you’ll see Copenhagen as a small coastal country on the east side of Denmark.

It is directly below Sweden and Norway, and it’s part of the Scandinavian countries–which generally denotes Norway Sweden and Denmark.

But it’s also part of a grouping called Nordic.

Nordic countries include Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway, and Sweden.

And they include the nordic myths and legends, from which we have inherited Thor and Loki, in our modern day MCU watching American Hollywood culture.

The danish flag is a bright red, looks almost like a brighter hue of crimson to me, and it has a Nordic cross, of which many of the countries above share the same design.

If you told a preschooler to draw the flag, just imagine two parallel lines hotdog style right down the center row, then two lines hamburger style, but slightly more to the left than center.

Voila. Now color outside of the lines with red, then erase the pencil markings for your very own flag.

I have the question asked to me very many times, so i’d like to list out a couple reasons why did i choose to study abroad, and to do it in Denmark?

In no particular order,

Since coming to UC San Diego, I have been meeting international friends, going to study abroad events, and curiously listening to books, stories, and friends who have experience of traveling or even living abroad. This has driven me to want to try it and come up with my own stories!
In the summer after I graduated high school, I had a growing reading habit, and to satisfy it, I went to a thrift store near my highschool. I bought “The Little Book of Hygge” pronounced roughly “hoo-ga”, and was fascinated by how danish culture, at least in Copenhagen, is presented as a happy place to live, a walkable city (in contrast to LA, which is uses freeways and highways and car road religiously for transport), and as a place where hygge–the description of simple comforts like family and food and friends–flourished.
I want to make friends worldwide so in the future, when I go backpacking and traveling, I can hit them up and stay on their couches. How’s that for being resourceful?

I have many, many more reasons for wanting to study abroad, including hosting dinner parties and talent shows among new friends, but I am limiting my weekly observations to 15 minutes of writing time total in order to have my eyes on the prize–the actual experience of living abroad.

And no, I do not know the danish language.

Yet.

Thanks for joining me on this first observation!

PS. (post script)

The language is called “the danish language”

The people are called “Danes” as in “Americans” or “Danish” like “American”

And the national treasure from them, as far as I am concerned, are Royal Dansk, danish butter cookies. Look them up. For some reason, my asian grandparents always had this at their homes when I came over for celebrations as a kid.

Coincidence? I think not.

PPS.

Thank you to everyone who donated to my California to Copenhagen GoFundMe.

http://bit.ly/quishawnabroad

Any financial support is much appreciated.

And keeps this newsletter ad free–for the 5 people reading it. 😉