things that are very danish

5. ridiculous testing situations

at cbs you can either have a twenty-minute oral exam, an essay, a four-hour open-book exam, or a four-hour closed-book exam. this constitutes one hundred percent of your grade. the scale is -3, 0, 2, 4, 7, 10, 12.

-3? why? no one can explain this phenomenon. the teachers can't even explain who would get this grade.

the four-hour exams are by far the most ridiculous. the open-book, four-hour exams mean that you don't have to study ever or go to class ever. just brush up on your slide-printing and glossary-referencing skills and you'll probably do quite well. just after typing that i checked my exam scores to make sure i didn't fail any. they're not posted yet.

my open-book exam was held in the valby badminton club. in their gym. it was outfitted with masses of desks and lines of power strips and there we sat. in a badminton club. for four freaking hours. people brought tons of food and one of our favorite activities here is to observe the foods that people choose to bring for four hours of torture. i opted for two peaches. i hear tell of a boy who brought a six-pack of beer in with him and drank the entire thing during the test. that would not fly at the university of southern california. the tests here are proctored by old danish people who volunteer their time, so they don't care what you do and don't really know how to answer your questions, like why i have to write my entire exam by hand on carbon paper through four layers but in the end only turn in the top two copies in separate sealed envelopes. i gave myself carpal tunnel pressing that hard for four hours. one old proctor man suggested that i could give the other two copies to my parents.

but you don't have to write it by hand - you may type your exam. if you bring your own printer. i thought that was a joke when someone first told me that and i laughed.

not a joke. people brought printers in boxes and set them up in the badminton club. can you imagine seeing someone sitting on the train with a printer on the way to his exam? good lord. i would piss myself laughing.