New Hair, New Hat, New Tram, New Taste

In other news, I finally ate the infamous mussels in Brussels! My friend, Janie, and I were exploring Brussels and had both never had mussels before so we decided to share a bucket. They were weird looking, but pretty good. That same day I had my first Manneken Pis and Janneken Pis sightings. For some reason Belgians like statues of peeing children. There is also a peeing dog somewhere, Zenneken Pis. I’ll have to find him before I leave.

Mechthild, my host mom, knit me a lovely blue hat! I love it! And it goes well with my new hair cut I think. Yes, I got a Belgian haircut. I had been debating for a long time whether to do it or not. I was like I’ll just get a trim, but instead a got a whole new do! It’s much shorter, much less hair, much less tangliness, much less conditioner used, much less time spent brushing it (it only takes like 4 seconds as opposed to the previous 10 minutes). I think I like it.

Spring has arrived here. Over the last few days warmth has come and flowers have bloomed. I know it’s only going to get better! Also, throughout our time here, along the tram 44 line workers have been putting in a new tramline. Since the beginning of the poject we’ve had glimpses of the progress as we drive by to and from the city, work and class. It’s been interesting and, at times, frustrating because the tram would be slower in that area. But it’s exciting to see the finished product!

The tram today, however is not very exciting. There is what the call “heavy disturbances” because massive amount of people from all over Belgium met in the streets early this morning for a demonstation because the government (oh wait, we don't have one) wants to cut costs or something. Due to the people in the streets, pretty much all the buses weren’t working (which doesn’t really affect me) and many of the trams were much slower (this does affect me). So it took me a while longer to get to class but because I’m just SO dedicated I didn’t skip (and I didn't know it would be that bad. But mostly because I'm a good student).

It seems that at some point every night the two cats, Blair and Jerry, decide to get in a catfight. They growl and attack each other. Blair, always feeling the need to be superior, jumps on top of counters, chairs, anything he can find, so that he can be taller than Jerry and thus appear to have more power. There is never really a winner because before they can get too into it Mechthild shoos one of them into another room or outside. They get along at all other times of the day, though.

One of my classes has about 15 people in it. Of these 15 people, there are about 7 or 8 different nationalities, including German, French, American and Dutch, among others. It’s a class about language use, so it’s interesting to get perspectives from so many backgrounds.

I would also like to say that I am not the least punctual person in the household, believe it or not.

Paris, France

This song was stuck in my head a lot throughout the weekend because I think it’s the only song I know that’s about Paris…

Paris was amazing and cliché and just what I expected, yet so much more. Pretty much wherever you go you’ll find a tourist, people walk around with giant baguettes all the time, there’s plenty of people watching taking place, wine is their favorite and most popular drink, the Eiffel Tower is beautiful.

My friend, Kelly, and I ventured off by bus to Paris with high expectations! This city was definitely the most surreal of all my travels thus far. When we finally exited the metro and got our first glance at one of Paris’s masterpieces–the Arc de Triomphe, it hit us; we were in Paris! It was big a beautiful and I loved it right away. We took lots of pictures at the Arc, as we did with nearly everything we saw, and then realized we weren’t really sure why the Arc was built. I had brought along a handy book about Paris that my host mom had. We opened it up and read a paragraph about the Arc de Triomphe, felt much more knowledgeable, and decided we were now prepared to climb the steps to the top.

The climb was long and we were out of breath due to the drastic change in sea level (at least that’s what we blamed it on), but the view was worth it. This is where we had our first sighting of the Eiffel Tower.

When we got back down we decided to walk down the infamous Champs Elysees. Unfortunately, we realized that it would be more difficult than we thought. The Arc de Triomphe is located in the middle of this giant turn about where traffic never ceases and crosswalks don’t exist. We had followed a group of people through the traffic on the way over but going back across the road we were on our own. We ended up playing a little frogger and made it without being smashed.

We enjoyed a delicious sandwich at a random café and people watched for a little bit. We then set off in the direction the Eiffel Tower! Or so we thought… We decided that of all the things to find in Paris, the Eiffel Tower (ET) would be the easiest, for obvious reasons. This was our one chance to not look like a tourist with our maps out and our mouths open trying to figure out where we were and where we should go. We started walking and walking and walking and then after we had walked for quite some time without seeing the ET we decided it was time to stop trying to be someone we weren’t, embrace our true tourist self, and whip out a map. So we did, we had two, in fact. We assumed we were somewhere near the ET so we started looking for street signs somewhere along there. No luck. We then looked in another area where we were sure we had actually, accidentally wandered off to. No luck. After about a half hour of this confusion, I asked a man with a massive mustache, “Where are we?” (In French of course) and he pointed to the far north of the map- just the opposite place we needed to be. Fail. We couldn’t even find the ET on our own! From then on, the map became our best friend.

We took a metro to the ET and when we finally came upon it we were in awe. It was so big and so wonderful. The only thing we didn’t expect was that it was painted a flat brown color and we both had remembered the ET having a much nicer, brozeish color to it. But we weren’t complaining. We spent a good chunk of time in the area taking lots of pictures of each other and for other people because everyone wants an ET picture! We were pro photographers by the end of it all; we knew all the good angles. For some reason, some people just don’t understand that when we ask them to take a picture of us that we don’t mean just us. We mean mostly get that giant tower in the background and then get us in the bottom corner. But no, some people thought our shoes were the most important part of the picture. Luckily, not everyone thought this way.

Everywhere around the ET there were guys selling mini ET, flying things that light up, and little toy puppy dogs that walk around and bark. Typical ET souvenirs, of course. There were hoards of them, though! They were set up right next to each other, so I don’t really understand their logic. But oh well. The people trying to sell us stuff go rather annoying throughout our stay in Paris because they were at every tourist attraction, and so were we, and so we saw them a lot.

We then walked along the Seine River for a bit, were able to get pictures of the ET from another angle, and went to a contemporary art museum called Musee de Tokyo. It was very… interesting… We tried to interpret it all but I think we just didn’t fully understand it. We walked by the Grand Palace on our way to the metro to Kelly’s friend’s apartment where we stayed for the weekend.

I thought the apartment would be small. But small would’ve been much better than the size of this apartment. You walk in the door and there’s a little bathroom to your right. You go down this tiny hallway, oh, and the tiny hallways is also the kitchen with a sink, a stove top, two cupboards and a mini fridge. It's like 1/3 the size of my kitchen last semester. Then you enter the bedroom that has a single bed for her and her husband. The room is also the dining room, the office, the living room and whatever else. I was amazed. The location wasn’t even near anything touristy and yet it was still so tiny for the whopping price of 850 euro a month! Ridiculous! Kelly and I were curious as to where we would sleep, but they pulled out two mattresses from underneath the bed when the time came. So we all slept right in a row and nearly filled up the room.

Before bedtime though, Kelly and I went to the St. Michael area and ate dinner. There was a giant fountain in the area that was pretty. We had had our backpacks with us up to this point and it felt nice to not have the extra weight. We walked down a restaurant-filled street and a waiter offered us a free cocktail if we ate at his place, so we agreed and sat down. We ate cheese fondue (three kinds of cheese) and potatoes and played the guessing game, “Who’s the Tourist?” It was a fun and pretty easy game and the food was great. We walked around there for a bit longer and headed home for some rest, as we were getting up early to get to the Louvre right when it opened so we didn’t have to wait in line.

We were a little late because sleep was nice and we grabbed a couple baked goods along the way, but we still didn’t have to wait in line. We headed straight for the Mona Lisa, once we bought our ticket! She was nice. Small, protected by bulletproof glass, but nice. We didn’t really know what else we wanted to see and so we went to the starred items on our Louvre map and saw lots of things along the way. Lots of paintings, sculptures, items from long ago. I think things in museums seem to blend together after a while. But it was still a sweet museum! And massive, too! One of the cooler things was the Napoleon Apartments. It was set up like his house (was or was guessed to be) and it was beautiful and luxurious. The colors were rich, the decorations were refined, the wallpaper was cloth and the chandeliers were the biggest I’ve ever seen.

We spent nearly two hours in there and found that the hardest part was trying to get out of the Louvre! We walked around it and saw the glass pyramid and it felt surreal all over again. The pyramid has been in so many movies and it made me feel like I was, too. We then headed towards the Notre Dame via St. Germain Boulevard, which is supposed to be known for it’s cafés and people watching. It’s also supposedly the best place to spot a celebrity (that’s what my book said at least). We didn’t find one though. We stopped at a café and enjoyed our first croque madame, which is the Parisian way of doing a grilled cheese sandwich. It’s meat and cheese in the middle with melted cheese on top and a fried egg on top of that. I loved every bite. I made one for myself a couple days after I got home, too. Another thing I really liked about Paris was that they gave us a giant pitcher of water with every meal we had – for free! I’ve missed free water.

We left the café and headed for the Notre Dame. We followed our usual patter of lots of pictures and then sit in awe for a bit. The Notre Dame was cool, but I felt like the church in saw in Cologne, Germany was much more amazing. The only unique thing about the inside was the intricate and extensive stained glass throughout the cathedral. Otherwise it was just like any other European cathedral, which is still great. We got in line to head to the top to be with the gargoyles. There was a crepe stand nearby (how convenient) and so we got a hot crepe with Nutella on the inside. So delicious! My purse was feeling left out at first, but after a dollop of Nutella fell into it, it was much happier.

It started to get overcast and sprinkle and so we decided that it wouldn’t be the best day for a view from the top of something. Aside from the little bit of rain, we had pretty good weather. It wasn’t always sunny skies, but it was a good temperature and not too overcast. We stopped at a café for some hot chocolate, went home for a couple hours rest, grabbed a cheap bottle of wine and were off to visit the ET at nighttime!

The ET was great during the day, but it was amazing at night! It’s lit up with a golden glow and sparkles every hour on the hour. We thought we had taken a lot of pictures of attractions up to this point, but we went crazy here! We tried every setting on our camera and every angle we could think of. We saw it sparkle twice. I loved it.

After enjoying the radiance of the ET and the wine, we went to the Bastille area. We found a nice looking bar, grabbed a beer and sat down. We were there for a while watching this foursome interact and coming up with dialogue for them. Our version was probably more amusing than what they were actually talking about. We went home relatively early again in preparation for our final day in Paris.

Our first destination of the day was the Catacombs. They are these underground tunnels all throughout Paris. One section is closed off for this tour. Apparently, back in the day the cemetery in Paris filled up and they didn’t know what to do with the bodies. So naturally they took the bones and lined the walls of these underground tunnels with them. It was crazy and creepy but quite interesting. There were so many bones! It was unreal.

After that we went to an outdoor market with Kelly’s friend and husband. They had scarves (I bought one), fresh food, shoes, jewelry, art, random nick-knacks and lots of other things. We decided to buy three kinds of fresh cheese- goat, brei and something else, and a fresh baguette and head for Montmartre. We got there, and ate our delicious cheese and bread and then hung out there for a couple hours. There was a guy who was doing crazy juggling for like an hour! He was so amazing! After he finished Kelly and I went and told him he was really, really good. We chatted for a bit and he gave us his card. You should watch him by either Googleing him or going to his website: http://www.iya.fr/en/iya_traore.php

There was also a guy who was playing guitar and singing and so we sat, along with over 200 other people, and enjoyed his show for a while. Because there were so many people there, some guys decided to buy a couple 6-packs of Heineken and sell them to the crowd! So funny! We then saw the inside of the church briefly and walked down this street that had a bunch of artists working on and selling their art. It was so cute.

We took the metro back home (we became quite familiar with Paris’s metro system in the short time we were there) to grab our stuff and then went to the bus stop to head home. The weekend was wonderful but I was quickly forced back into reality when I got home as I had a test and a 3,000-word paper due along with many hours at the internship. All is peaceful for the moment as I’m outside enjoying the warmth of the sunshine and I head for Dublin tomorrow!

Incomparable

Tonight we had Chinese food from the place across the street. Let's just say it was no Chuong... 

Seeing the Sights

This past week was the dreaded mid-term week. It’s especially awful here because most of the classes consist of a mid-term, a large paper and a final exam. So you pretty much have to do well in everything. Hopefully the tests went well!

Mechthild and I took the afternoon on Friday to go to Leuven, the next town over, and walk around, eat crepes (mine had ice cream and chocolate sauce on it!) and get lost in the city (this part wasn’t planned into our day). The trams were on strike and so I wasn’t able to go into my internship. This time the metro announced that they were going to be on strike so we could be prepared. I think the fact that they announce when they will strike is kind of an oxymoron. The point of a strike is to kind of say that the workers have the power to be in control if they don’t change what the workers want. I think it’s meant to be unexpected and be a nuisance so they have no choice but to agree to your demands. The metro not running is a nuisance, but the fact that they alerted us prior to the strike makes it far less a nuisance because there is time to plan ahead. Also, they are allowed to strike, but only for one day. This, too, coincides with the whole oxymoronness of it all.

I finally made it to the Atomium! It’s one of Brussels main tourist sights. It is an impressive and unique structure. It’s way far away from anything else in Brussels and it’s pretty much the only thing out there worth seeing. My friend, Kelly and I went, took pictures, sat in the warmth of the restaurant and left. We can now check it off the list though.

We then went to the Museum of Music, which was really cool. You get headphones and when you step in front of an instrument in the museum then the music that it makes plays through the headphones. There were so many different kinds of instruments- most of which I have never seen before. They usually resembled something that I was familiar with, such as a guitar or a trumpet but there were so many different variations from different people groups and time periods. I was amazed at some of the instrumental creations! I don’t know how people came up with some of them! I realized how limited my knowledge of instruments is. When I think of instruments I usually think of the basics- the ones I’m familiar with, but there are so many other things that make music! All shapes and sizes and sounds. After my eyes were opened to the various types of instruments that I never knew existed I was briefly inspired to create a unique instrument of my own. That inspiration has faded now...

Mechthild is in Berlin for the week visiting a friend. We’re on our own! She cooked and froze a bunch of food so I think we’ll survive! 

Verbier, Switzerland

I skied in the Swiss Alps!!!! …In jeans… It was so amazing though! I’m really glad I was able to take that trip.  We flew into Geneva, Switzerland last Friday night and rented a car. Sam drove (in a manual car), Ryan worked the GPS (it was in German) and I sat in the back (with all the coats and such). We drove through the mountains and tunnels and were always in awe when we would unexpectedly come across a city’s lights in the valley.

We reached our hostel, which was an old bomb shelter in the early hours. There was nobody else there when we arrived so we were alone in the hostel for the first night, which was a bit creepy. There was also a distinct smell about the hostel that wasn’t exactly pleasing. But it was a bed to sleep in and we all wanted sleep! Sam unfortunately realized when we got there that he forgot to pack his sleeping bag. We found some sheets, hoped they were clean and fell asleep.

The next morning Ryan realized he forgot his gloves. I was feeling good about not forgetting anything too important at that point. We rented boots and skis (with Franks- the Switzerland currency) and walked a couple minutes down the rode to where a there was a gondola lift that took us to the top of the mountain! As we were putting boots/hats/gloves/etc. before getting on the gondola I realized that my gloves had fallen out of my boots at some point. So I ended up being in the same boat as Ryan- no gloves.

At the bottom when we looked up at the mountain we couldn’t see the top, partway through the ride up we were in fog, and once at the top we could see many mountain peaks, a line of clouds and the valley below. It was a beautiful sight! Unfortunately my camera died halfway through the first day, but I still got a lot of great pictures, as did Sam and Ryan.

Sam and Ryan are both great skiers! Before Verbier I hadn’t skied in a couple of years. My family and I have been to Montana and Colorado before on ski trips and so I figured that after a couple times down the mountain then I would be used to skiing again and be able to keep up with the guys. I was mistaken. The slopes seemed steeper and icier than what I remembered past slopes being like. I think that in places in America the slopes are groomed so that they’re mostly flat and even. In Verbier there was powder right next to a patch of icy snow right next to a bump of snow and so it was difficult for me to find a good rhythm of skiing. Sam and Ryan were doing great and I didn’t want to slow them down so I told them to go wherever they wanted to go and we picked a place to meet up later on.

The rest of that day I’m pretty sure I fell at least once every time I went down a slope. Fortunately none of my falls were painful nor did a break anything- bone or ski. I would usually just slide for a really long time until I stopped and then people would look at me and think, “Oh, she’s in jeans. That explains everything.” And they would help me get my skis back on and stand up and such. More people than I expected spoke English, which was good! Thanks to the amazingly nice weather I was never cold! Even though I fell multiple times and didn’t have gloves the sun and adrenaline kept me warm!

We were all exhausted after day one. We ate dinner at a nice restaurant in Verbier, which was tasty and went to bed fairly early and were up again the next morning for some more skiing. I stayed with the guys throughout day two. I was slower than them, and as the runs were all quite lengthy with many forks in the road, they had to wait for me at different points but it was fine I think. Many of the trails we were on were wide enough for twoish skiers and then it would just drop off on the side. I was always extra cautious on these trails for obvious reasons. There was one gondola lift that we took which held over 100 people! It was a little scary.

Our flight left for home at 6am on Sunday. We drove back to the airport Saturday night and attempted (and kind of succeeded) to sleep in our car for a few hours. We then hung out in the airport for a while longer and came home extremely exhausted, but it was well worth the exhaustion. 

Antwerp - Antwerpen

Congratulations, Belgium! You did it! You now hold the record for the longest time a country has gone without a government! Over 250 days… impressive. I’m glad I could be here to partake in this record-breaking extravaganza.

This past weekend I tagged along again with class to travel to another Belgian city, Antwerp. It’s just a short train ride away and it’s pretty cool! There are a lot of diamond stores there, and just stores in general! So some girls and I decided we’d head back there some day just to shop since Saturday was dedicated to museums and such.  We did the typical guided tour trek. Sometimes I forgot to listen to what the professor was saying. We walked around the city a lot, which was unfortunately very cold (unlike Iowa from what I hear! 60 degree weather? Unreal!). We went into some museums; saw some cool old paintings, books, statues and such. I ate frites and a kabob for lunch. We went into the church in Antwerp, too. It seems like every city has a huge church in the center of town. It makes it easy to find people if you get lost. Game plan: meet at the church!

One of the museums held the first two printing presses Gutenberg made as well as one of the first ever printed Bibles off of a Gutenberg printing press! Who knew Belgium had that? Not I! Antwerp is also the 2^nd largest seaport in Europe and the 4^th largest in the world! Belgium continues to surprise me. Speaking of surprising me! I just looked out the window and it’s snowing right now! Now that’s crazy. What odd weather the world is having this winter.

In Antwerp some girls and I were talking about the bells on bikes and we decided that the bell sound just doesn’t do the bikers’ rage justice. The cute, “ding-ding,” of a bell is more of a polite, “Hi, would it be okay if you moved over just a little bit so I could ride by? Please and thank you!” We think there should be an alternative bell sound; something like that of a semi truck so that bikers can express their road-rage a little better. It would send more of a, “Get out of my way or I’ll hit you!” type message. There could be different pitches for different ways the rider is feeling towards the people they are about to hit. Perhaps I’ll look further into this new bike bell invention. I’ll keep you posted.

Last weekend we also watched the movie, In Bruges. We were literally “In Bruges” the previous weekend! It was cool to see things in the movie we had just seen in real life! My host mom and I also finished the first season of 24. She purchased the second season online and it came today! Guess what we’re doing tonight…

Sunday I was also able to go to church for the first time! It was wonderful. I managed to find it after a tram, metro, bus ride there. It was small, maybe a 100-150 people, but very good. It was a two-hour long service. Those two hours consisted of worship, announcements, a time for people to share what God’s been doing in their life, coffee/tea break, something else and the message. During one song they sang the chorus in English, then Dutch and then French, which was pretty cool. Also, for the people who couldn't understand English, there were headsets that they could wear that would translate what people were saying! I also met two girls there who go to Vesalius, too! I hope to go back, but not this weekend because this weekend I’ll be skiing in the Swiss Alps! Woop!

I really like Belgian chocolate. I eat it a lot. The last couple of times at work my boss has had chocolate eggs. I usually have 1 or 2… or 5. I’m drinking hot tea and eating chocolate now actually. I drink a lot of hot tea, too. I’m afraid that when I return to America I’ll find my taste buds have adjusted to many things here and eating some foods at home (not my mom’s cooking though!) will be strange. I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to eat Hershey’s chocolate again. We’ll see.

I’ve taken note of a couple of other things that I’ve found interesting about Belgium.

1.     There are no squirrels here. At least I haven’t seen any.

2.     Cafés and restaurants have tables outside all year around. They have little heaters out there too. No matter what the weather, you’ll usually find a couple people sitting outside. The heaters don’t help that much. I still haven’t figured out why people choose to sit outside when they can sit inside, but I can’t argue that fresh air isn’t nice.

3.     Sandwiches here are eaten frequently. In America we create sumo-sandwiches that have as many things on it that can fit like 3 kinds of meat, 2 different cheeses, lettuce, tomato, avocado, mayonnaise, etc. But here, they have the most basic sandwiches. They are fine with just salami or just one type of cheese on their sandwich. I always find myself wanting more ingredients. However, I’ve found that a meat and cheese sandwich is quite delicious.

4.     Oftentimes with dinner we have this spinach-mashed potato combination dish thing that’s so good. It’s called stoemp. You pronounce it like Shtomp. I just like saying that word.

5.     PDA in Belgium is more normal and accepted than it is in America. It happens at every level from holding hands to a little make-out session in the middle of a metro station. Generally it’s not over-the-top, it’s just the cute stuff. 
6.   It's common to see people who are riding their bikes or children walking around in bright road-constructionesque jackets so that they can be easily seen by drivers.
7.   Round abouts on the roads are quite popular here.
8.   They don't usually have street signs on poles at the corner of every road here, but rather on the side of buildings that are on the corner of streets.
9.   There are menus outside most restaurants and cafes so that you can see what food/drink the place has to offer and at what price before ever entering the restaurant! It's nice!

Bruges - Brugge

I anticipated a long, busy day today! My plan was to go to class from 8:30 – 11:30 and then work from 12 – 4.  This has all changed since the tram/metro system decided to go on strike today! Oye! I waited for a while at the tram stop. I suspected a strike when no trams rode by in either direction for a while and when people would leave the tram stop to catch a bus or go home. But it wasn’t until a guy in a car driving by waved his hands and yelled at me that there was no tram today did I finally fully catch on.

Yesterday I received a wonderful Valentine’s Day package from my family! It was filled with homemade cookies, chocolates, Girl Scout cookies, mints and chai tea! What perfect timing. I realized that since I’ve been here I’ve communicated with people via blog, e-mail, cell phone (only to those in Belgium), Facebook (wall posts and messages), Skype (video and chat), letter, and now, package! I think I’ve covered just about every angle. Anyways, in case you’re wondering… Belgians do celebrate Valentine’s Day. I saw many young students carrying flowers with them on the tram ride home from school. I’m assuming they received them from people at school. Vesalius also gave the option to buy people flowers for Valentine’s Day. There were also chocolates in the shape of hearts and such and store windows displays dedicated to yesterday’s special day of love. Yes, America gets a little more hyped up about it, but then again, what doesn’t America go all out for? We (or they? I don’t know how to refer to America right now) tend to get a little out of hand with things such as Valentine’s Day sometimes.

I want to take a paragraph to let everyone know that my Valentine is in the process of growing a protest beard. Yes, he’s protesting my being away. The growth started when I left and he says he’s not shaving until I return. I’ve heard it referred to as “ferocious” and “glorious” among other things. Burrito gets caught in it sometimes.  That’s how you know it’s a real beard. I have been able to see it via Skype numerous times but I do feel as though I’m missing out on so much of its ferocity (ferociousness?) and gloriousness (glorocity?) as I’m not able to see it in real life. If you have a chance, you should check it out and provide an adjective you deem fitting.

This weekend I trotted off to Bruges, Belgium. By trotted I mean I took the train. My host mom uses this word a lot and I wanted to use it, too. There is a class offered at Vesalius that does day/weekend trips throughout the semester. I decided not to be in this class, but they allowed me to go with them on Saturday to Bruges! I think I’ll join them again this weekend in Antwerp, Belgium.

Bruges is an adorable city! Nearly every building had a Dutch front. It was quaint and peaceful, but still bustling with people. As we walked around we heard the clip clopping of horses hoofs as carriages rode through the cobblestone streets.  There were canals running through the city, too. They have cute chocolate shops all over. There is even a “lover’s bridge.”

We walked throughout most of the city, I think. We saw many a museum and painting, mostly paintings of Jesus and Mary. I saw a statue that Michelangelo himself made! I saw Jesus’ blood, too! Well… “Jesus’ blood.” In one of the churches this was a relic they had. People on pilgrimages apparently go to all the churches with relics. So I guess I’m partway through my pilgrimage. I signed a petition against animal testing or something. We climbed the Belfry clock tower (as seen in the movie In Bruges apparently) all the way to the top! The stairs were narrow and winding. If ever we came across people going the opposite direction as us we all had to get really skinny and hope nobody fell down the stairs. The view at the top was so amazing!

We barely caught the train on the way home! We had to run to get there in time and then we ended up on the wrong platform and had to run to the correct platform. We arrived at the top of the stairs for that platform just in time to hear the beeping sound the doors make when they are closing. Luckily there was one door still open and we all hopped inside just in time to drive away! Talk about a close call.

I arrived at home just in time for my host mom and I to go out for a late dinner. We went to this wonderful restaurant in the Grand Place where I enjoyed a delicious steak with a creamy white sauce served with, you’ll never guess, frites (fries)! I wouldn’t suspect a fancy meal to be served with fries, but Belgians are all about their frites and they have reason to be! Mechthild enjoyed some kidneys for dinner. I debated on whether or not I should get mussels as Belgium is known for their mussels but I eventually decided to try them another time. As we were sitting there, our neighbors ordered though mussels so I was able to see what they look like and how you eat them. After they left, new neighbors came and ordered brain and snails. So while we were sitting there we were able to see many unique meals. I don’t think I’ll ever try brain. Mussels, yes. Brain, no. I love trying new things, especially new foods; but I don’t think I could ever eat brain. We drank wine and tea/coffee and shared a crème brûlée, too. It was a lovely evening for us girls. We chatted and ate and walked around for a bit.

On my days off I find that I keep myself very busy. However, I somehow manage to do hardly any homework amidst all the business! I’m not even sure what I do all the daylong on my computer! This habit I’ve become so used to needs to change. I have my first test on Thursday and papers due soon! I hope/need to get some studying done today. The motivation is just sort of lacking. I think I’ll eat some chocolate instead.

It's Phil! This is an example of his beard via Skype from a couple weeks back.

Tram 44

We swipe our metro pass on the red thing

The entire group in Bruges

Nuns live here. It's a quite zone.

The horse and carriage coming down the street

An ambulance from a few years back

A really old book

This piece of art was in the hospital museum. I don't think I'd want him as my doctor.

Some of the tools they used in the past in hospitals

Yep, we sign petitions against animal testing

Belfry Clock Tower

Our tour guide (and their professor for the class) for the day. We always looked for the umbrella if we got lost.

Making our way to the top

View from above

We took lots of pictures while we were up there

They were kind of excited they made it

So were we

Curious as to what cities were in which direction? The curiosity can be put to rest. You now know.

And back down we go

Clock tower conquered. 

They were all eating Subway! I deemed it picture worthy.

I don't know what it's used for. I do know that it's really sweet.

Martine (our leader) would stop and chat to us at points throughout the day about what we've seen/seeing, what's next, important things to note, etc.

During the chats (that were more like lectures) people got a little distracted... they put on chap stick...

They looked at the pictures they've taken...

They made really serious faces...

These people were standing in a very nice and straight line. Nobody could figure out why.

A frite museum! We didn't go inside.

Jan Van Eyck. He's a famous artist. 

I thought this was rather ironic. This sign was in one of the churches.

She's kind of in awe.

We got a cool souvenir after looking at Jesus' blood

I find the bear to be quite amusing. Don't you?

Weird Tree Lane. Apparently it's not just Brussels that has these trees; it's all of Belgium!

Lover's Bridge. We got a little out of hand, but it's okay because we're Americans. That's what we do.

Michelangelo's Madonna and Child  

A pulpit

This is what happens at European bachelor parties...

Oh, yeah, there's the groom! He's the one whose rear end you have a nice view of

I wasn't sure what this was but it looked delicious! My guess? Fudge or some kind of chocolate log that you can slice up. 

They had dragon benches all over

We just made it on the train! Phew!