I love going home...and it isn't because of the Danish food.

Not that I am disliking everything I eat, but it takes time to get used to open faced sandwiches and broccoli salads.

Living with a host family is a bit of a gamble.
You're allowing an institution, in my case DIS, to decide what kind of family would be willing to put up with you for 4 months.
And when you're applying you can't mention the things that make your own family want to trade you in for an exchange student...
You can't tell them ahead of time that you snore really loudly, because that would rule out any light sleepers.
You don't tell them how there are many days that watching television on the sofa underneath of a warm blanket is exponentially more appealing then leading an active lifestyle in the real world, because nobody wants to host a student that is unbelievably lazy.
You might not mention that you tend to be a little kind of very unbelievably messy, because it is something that you can force yourself to change, and what family wants another mess to worry about?
You don't mention that your knowledge of politics, international affairs, and controversial topics is pathetically minimal...well really just because that's embarrassing. A liberal arts student should be knowledgeable beyond the campus gossip and the length of Kim Kardashian's marriage (which, in all honesty, is equally, if not more, embarrassing).
You simply can't sell yourself that way.
So you write painstakingly charming tidbits about yourself.
But you can't be too charming either, because then it crosses the line into dating profile. And that runs the risk of no host family, or single-father-looking-for-love host family.

And despite all of these not-so-hypothetical situations, you find yourself placed with a family.
And you find yourself happy as a-girl-who-learned-that-she-can-eat-double-cheeseburgers-occasionally-without-angry-intestines

Bjørn, Piam, Nicolai, and Louise are my Danish family.
They are always talking.
They enjoy each other's company.
And they love to love life.
And I think they are wonderful.
With Danish names like that, who wouldn't be fantastic?

They love to speak English and are subsequently excited about playing 'In a Pickle' (an American game that revolves around the size of nouns) with me. [I assume their excitement from Piam's running into my bedroom while I unpacked to excitedly ask me about a pile of words she didn't understand exactly]. 

My subpar gift giving skills actually did me right. 

Dinners include foods I'm not used to and lively bantering conversations.
We laughed when Nicolai tried to call Piam using Siri and it informed that she 'didn't know who his mother was.'
We laughed at Piam's enthusiastic description of her distaste for her boss.
We laughed when I, in my jet lagged state struggled to successfully articulate the differences between 'ball' 'bald' 'bold' and 'bowl.'
We laughed when Bjørn tried to tell me that the Danish word for 'sledding' is 'sledding'. He told me this in Danish.

I'm learning to understand Danish without actually understanding Danish.
I'm excited about family dinners aplenty and game nights that end in a lot of English translations.
And I just count my lucky stars that I didn't write all of those hypothetically true tidbits about myself in my housing application.

11:20pm Denmark
5:20pm USA