William Woods University Woods Around the World

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William Woods University Woods Around the World

Woods Around the World is a short-term cultural study/travel program at WWU. It is a part of the Center for Ethics and Global Studies.

Woods Around the World (WATW) is an academic program which offers both classroom learning about a place and culture and a trip to that place for a firsthand experience. Woods Around the World is a program of the Center for Ethics and Global Studies.

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05/15/2024

“Once a wise man to the ways of the world
Now I've traded those lessons for faith in a girl
Crossed the ocean, thousand years from my home
In this frozen old city of silver and stone

… Ships in the harbor and birds on the bluff
Don't move an inch when their anchor goes up
And the difference with me is I've fallen in love
Stockholm let me go home.”
Jason Isbell, “Stockholm”

Ah, yes. Stockholm and Scandinavia, we love you, but it’s time to go home. But not before we share some pictures from our trip to Estonia. We took the ferry from Helsinki to Tallinn and enjoyed a guided tour of the Estonian capital. Tallinn is just over 450,000 people and is located a few hundred miles from St. Petersburg, Russia. The Old Town is a walled city that is considered one of the best preserved medieval cities in Europe. Tallinn is also a city of the future, with a thriving tech sector (it’s the birthplace of Skype and Wise) and identified as one of the medium-sized cities of the future for Europe.

John Steinbeck once wrote that “people don’t take trips; trips take people.” This trip has taken us to the ends of the Nordic earth and we’ve learned a lot, laughed even more and made some memories to last a lifetime. Thanks for following our adventures!

05/14/2024

“If my shoes could walk to you,
I would be on my way
I would swim the Baltic Sea
And climb the mountain range

Oh, Helsinki, I was made for you
Oh, Helsinki, when you’re gone
I know I will wish you near.”
The National Parks, “Helsinki”

We arrived in another country yesterday, visiting the capital and port city of Finland. The population of Helsinki proper is estimated to be 630,000. A local guide gave us a bus and walking tour of the city. We visited Temppeliaukio Church, which opened up in 1969 and is also known as Church of the Rock or the Rock Church. Helsinki is a place to study architecture and this church makes for a good study. The church was the winning design of an architectural competition and was excavated out of granite and the round roof is made of copper strips that if laid out on end would stretch 13.6 miles.

Here are a few other interesting nuggets picked up around town:

According to our local guide, 25 percent of Helsinki residents own a boat.
Finlanders claim to drink more coffee than the rest of Europe. At 8 cups of coffee per day, every hour is coffee hour here.
The two main languages spoken here are Finnish and Swedish though most of the residents also speak English, which is favorable for us.
2.5K Euros a month annual income
1K average a month for an apartment
Hosted 1952 Olympics and is the smallest city to ever host the summer Olympic games.
Coldplay will play twice here this summer
Ed Sheeran played here last summer
Finland hosts of a wife-carrying contest where the winning couple is awarded the wife’s weight in beer.
Finland is the heavy metal capital of the world and has a Church of Heavy Metal in Kevara.
Finland is currently recognized as the happiest country in the world (based on research by the World Happiness Index) and Helsinki is considered one of the most livable cities in the world.
It is estimated that each resident of Helsinki is within 10 minutes of a park or trail.

05/13/2024

Sweden, oh, Sweden — so much to love. You’ve given us so many things like cinnamon buns and Spotify and Ikea and Abba and Avicii and zippers and Bluetooth and Stockholm Syndrome.

Let’s catch you up. While you were enjoying the stunning Northern Lights back home, we were enjoying Stockholm, Sweden where sunrise is early these days (4:16 AM this morning). Sweden has more islands than any other country on the planet with nearly 270,000. Stockholm itself is built on an archipelago of 14 islands and connected by 50 bridges.

We’ve done a lot in recent days with planned site visits and individual exploration.

- Toured the Stockholm City Hall where the Nobel Prize is given out in the Blue Hall each December. (The Peace Prize is given out is Oslo.)
- Visited the fascinating Vasa Museum which houses a fully recovered 17th century warship. The Vasa was built as the most powerful ship of its time and sank about twenty minutes into its maiden voyage. It was discovered in the 1950s and brought to surface in the 1960s.
- Toured the Old Town
- Traveled to Uppsala, Sweden’s fourth largest city and the coronation and burial site for Swedish monarchs. While there we visited the cathedral where famous Swedes are buried.
- Saw some rare and important manuscripts in the library of Uppsala University, which is the oldest university in Scandinavia, dating back to 1477. The collection includes the ancient Silver Bible, the oldest map of Sweden, student notes from Copernicus, a musical score sheet from Mozart, a first edition from Linnaeus, the father of taxonomy who reportedly said, “God created the world but Linnaeus organized it.”
- We celebrated fika together at the old countryside church of Uppsala. Fika (both a noun and a verb) is the Swedish word for taking a break with a simple pastry and a drink (coffee / cider).

What else did we do in our free time?

- Watched the EuroVision finals in a living room of fans from around the world, cheering for their nation’s participant and waving the national flag. (Nemo from Switzerland won, the first for Switzerland since 1988 when Celine Dion won - though she was from Canada.)
- Danced with holograms of the band Abba at the popular Abba museum
- Witnessed the changing of the guard, complete with a mounted band playing a medley of Avicii s songs.
- Visited the Avicii Experience museum, which highlights the music of Tim Bergling (aka Avicii) and mental health awareness.
- Feasted at a popular viking restaurant, which was hopping with live music, table pounding, rowdy patrons and the viking host shouting out which guests were arriving in the banquet hall.
- We also ate a few sweets. Sam and Sophia have made an impressive quest for Scandinavia’s best waffles. And you should know that the cinnamon bun (“Kanelbullen”) is Sweden’s national classic. They have a themed Cinnamon Bun Day on October 4 and Swedes eat an estimated 8.3 cinnamon buns on that day.

We are now in Finland after an overnight boat ride on a large cruise ship. The Woods crew absolutely crushed it at karaoke with our group singing songs from such luminaries as Shania Twain, Kacey Musgrave, Jimmy Buffet, Toby Keith, Walker Hayes and Dolly Parton.

05/10/2024

Woods Around the World travelers experience many firsts along the way. First time in a certain destination. First time on a plane or out of the country, perhaps. First time tasting a food or crossing the equator or trying out a particular activity. Well, after many years, hundreds of travelers, and thousands of miles, we have another first on our program. We have our first engagement! With their permission, we’re happy to announce that on this trip, Tyler proposed to recent Woods graduate, Anna. With the Norwegian fjords as the backdrop they surprised the rest of us and made this program unforgettable in another way. Congrats to Tyler and Anna! We wish you a lifetime of joy together!

05/09/2024

Today we had a free day to explore Denmark’s capital city. We arranged for a unique opportunity to learn about Copenhagen via a “Social Sailing” tour. This company has a mission to spread social interaction and they do this through a small boat tour that tells a story about a changing city, while sharing stories together on the boat. The company explains: “Good relationships keep us healthier and happier.” They cite a longitudinal study from Harvard where participants were asked over a lifetime what has kept them happy. One factor has stood out: the quality of relationships.

So we boarded a boat with two captains who took us in and out of the canals of Copenhagen and we had conversations about what we were seeing and about Danish culture in general: the length of the work week (37 hours), the social support structure, the amount of vacation time per year (7 weeks) and the price of consumer goods, housing and tax rates. We also looked at representative neighborhoods, toured an old fortification and discussed some of the trophies of Danish architecture (have you ever considered going to a POWER PLANT to ski, or exercise, or hang out with friends?).

After lunch in another one of their massive street food markets, we then visited Christiania, or what is known as Freetown to the local residents. Christiania is a counter-culture community that was originally founded in 1971 by squatters who wanted to live out their utopian vision of an alternative society. Less than a thousand residents call the semi-autonomous place home but visitors come to see the quirky businesses, artful buildings and shop at the flea market.

All in all, a great day to learn and explore the second rated “Most Livable City” in the world.

P.S. Our brave students also went for a nighttime swim in the cold canal waters just near the hotel.

05/08/2024

After an evening at the ship’s discoteque, we all must have thought to ourselves, “to sleep or not to sleep, that is the question.” But alas, we woke up early to see Kronborg Castle which was made famous as the setting for Shakespeare’s Hamlet. Somewhere in the middle of the night we crossed a border and left Norway to arrive in Denmark.

We are now in Copenhagen. It is classified as one of the world’s happiest and most livable cities. The population of the greater metropolitan area is nearly 1.4 million. Today we took a guided tour of the maritime city, visiting the colorful, historic harbor, the Rosenborg Castle, and the seat of Danish parliament. We paid a visit to the Royal family though they were not expecting us and were not there. But we did manage to take a look at their crown jewels. With any luck, we’ll bring back their bedazzled royal saddles and equestrian giddy up, which date back to the late 1500s. Hopefully the King and Queen will let us procure these fine objects for our equestrian department.

We also scratched a Disney itch with a visit to the Little Mermaid statue. Make a visit to Copenhagen and you’ll find yourself in a Hans Christian Andersen fairy tale who once said, “Life itself is the most wonderful fairy tale.”

Today’s weather report, sunny with a high of 59.
Lunch: Street food in central Copenhagen at one of their many hot dog stands.

05/07/2024

What a day in Oslo. This morning we visited the largest sculpture park in the world that displays the work of a single artist. The Vigeland Installation in Oslo features over 200 sculptures from Gustav Vigeland and showcases the cycle of human life in granite and bronze. It’s a powerful presentation of the human form in the web of our various relationships. Later, we visited Oslo’s City Hall where the Nobel Peace Prize is awarded annually. For our group, we awarded the Nobel Peace Prize to our very own Emma for having “done the most or the best work for fraternity between nations”. Her achievement consisted of making small Norwegian children laugh and permitting their merciless teasing while climbing the playground equipment at a mountain park high above Bergen.

Later we toured the National Gallery where we saw works from Edward Munch, including his iconic composition “The Scream” (1893), as well as Van Gogh and Rhodin. In another example of life imitating art, we even tried our hand at depicting Munch’s master work. Now we are on the North Sea headed to Copenhagen on an overnight ship. We’ll have dinner on the ship, test our dance moves in the disco room, enjoy live music and quiz games and look to spot the castle immortalized in Shakespeare’s “Hamlet”, just outside of Copenhagen.

05/06/2024

Today we flew to Oslo and upon arriving we visited the Fram Museum, which celebrates the history of polar exploration. The museum houses two of the most important ships connected to Norway’s polar history, including expeditions to reach the South Pole for the first time and to find a passageway through the Northwest Territory. We were able to tour “The Fram”, one of the best wooden ships ever built and also learn how Roald Amundsen and his men survived on their journey to the “last place on earth”. Later, we enjoyed a beach walk, made a visit to the city center of Oslo and had our first walking tour of the Oslo Opera House, a stunning architectural design that looks like an iceberg in marble. Dinner was a delectable tomato soup, with slow-braised chicken over a savory vegetable rice medley, followed by a mango sponge cake. Weather report: cloudy but dry with a high of 58

05/05/2024

There’s a saying here: “there’s no such thing as bad weather, only bad clothes.” We appreciate that sentiment but in our case, we have good clothes (if for no other reason than they finally arrived), and good weather, too. The locals keep reminding us of the latter. Apparently, three consecutive days of sunshine in these parts is news worthy . In the last 24 hours, all of us got something. Caroline got her luggage. Sophia won our Kentucky Derby drawing with her selection of Mystik Dan. And all of us shared a day together we won’t soon forget.

Today we explored the other worldly paradise of Norway’s fjord country. By bus and by boat, and on trains both modern and vintage, we passed through deep gorges and climbed up forested mountains adorned with waterfalls. The French poet Anatole France once wrote: “If the path be beautiful, let us not ask where it leads.” We may have felt that way today as the town names were hard to pronounce, and the beauty hard to describe.

05/04/2024

When we met our tour director Pawel (pronounced Powell), he told us he planned to wear Norway’s national costume to greet us at the airport. What did he have in mind? A raincoat. Bergen gets rain an estimated 268 days a year. In 2008, they had rain 183 days in a row! Fortunately, we haven’t had rain yet so the locals are happy and there’s a festive mood in the air as if it is a national holiday. One is reminded Mark Twain who once said: “We were good Presbyterian boys when the weather was doubtful; when it was fair, we did wander a little from the fold.” The locals are wandering to the harbor and the park and the trails to make the most of this beautiful weather.

While we didn’t get rain here in Bergen, we also didn’t get our luggage upon arrival. Most of us had to wait until the next day and we are still tracking one missing bag. Even so, spend enough time in the fish market and no one will even know you’re still wearing your airport clothes. Thanks to tracking devices a few of could even chart the progress and see our luggage somewhere over the North Sea on a later flight.

Story of the day: our guide told us he recently gave a city tour to a celebrity from America that we’d all know. The guy wanted to get his photograph next to a “Bossrom” sign he saw in the historic quarter of the city. The guide obliged but had to tell Bruce Springsteen that the word “bossrom” in the local dialect doesn’t mean “The Boss” but means “garbage room”. Bruce loved that even more and made sure his wife knew what they thought of him here.

All in all a great day touring the city with an evening dinner still ahead.

05/03/2024

Another year, another spring break pivot, and another ensuing adventure to make lemonade of lemons! Our next Woods Around the World programs will take us to some thrilling new destinations. Our first trip will visit Norway, Denmark, Sweden, Finland and Estonia. Four of these countries are consistently ranked among the happiest places on the earth according to the research of the World Happiness Report. This index examines such things as “GDP per capita, social support, healthy life expectancy, freedom, generosity, and corruption”. (Finland is currently ranked #1, Denmark #2, Sweden #4 and Norway #7).

I can tell we are already a bit happier, but for simpler reasons. We arrived safely from a long travel day, the skies are sunny and clear, and we are just a few hours from our welcome dinner and a good night’s sleep.

Worth the share: the airport in Amsterdam showcases an award-winning advertising campaign that encourages people to travel and venture boldly with each step a pep talk to “do your thing.”

03/01/2024

Mark Twain was right about a lot of things and certainly about this: “travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry and narrow-mindedness.” Twain knew that curious travel was an important part of personal growth and building a better society. His insight about why we travel is so important that we recently put his words on the wall of our global-themed classroom. We like that quote so much we even take it with us on the road.

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