So, Nathan, one of the editors of my college newspaper, asked me to write an article for Scene International this week, here it is.
As anyone who’s ever tried to study abroad at Creighton will say – it’s not easy. One has to attend a meeting, decide where to go, apply at Creighton, apply to the program, apply for a passport and visa, and find plane tickets and more. But of course, despite the stress, it’s worth it.
My study abroad journey began last March with the general meeting that every Creighton student who is interested in studying abroad has to attend. After that, deciding where to go with which program was a difficult task. I eventually decided on Brussels, Belgium with ISA.
Some study abroad programs seem to plop the students in the middle of a foreign country with almost no guidance. I preferred ISA’s approach - airport pickup, cultural excursions throughout Brussels and Belgium and a very involved resident director, all for about the same price as I pay for a semester at Creighton.
More people seem to be interested about the choice of Brussels. I think that is mostly because nobody knows anything about Brussels. It is the headquarters of NATO and the European Union, it is an officially bilingual city (French and Dutch), not to mention the chocolate, waffles, fries, mussels and beer. Belgium is also centrally located in Western Europe; Brussels is less than two hours away from Paris, London and Amsterdam.
I find something new here everyday, but the city is actually quite small. It is a marriage between old and new with the Grand Place alongside skyscrapers. The Grand Place is my favorite place in Brussels. It is a large square in the middle of downtown lined with a multitude of beautiful old buildings. Some of the buildings were originally built in the 1400s, some are gilded, Karl Marx used to hold meetings in one of the buildings. If one does a picture search for “Brussels” the first results will undoubtedly be the Grand Place.
After the Grand Place, pictures of the Atomium will come up. The Atomium was built for the 1958 World Fair, it is a model of an iron molecule magnified 165 billion times set on its corner, best of all there are things to see inside many of the atoms. The Atomium is another one of my favorite landmarks. It is so unique and sets Brussels apart from other European cities.
Interspersed throughout the city are ruins from the 1200s. I’ll be walking along and suddenly come across a tower from the old wall that used to enclose the city or a glass roof a little taller than me that reveals ruins twenty feet below. Brussels has growing and changing since the 13th century and there is evidence of that everywhere.
The Manneken Pis sets my love of Brussels in stone. It is a statue of a small child peeing into a basin. The story goes that before battle, soldiers put their infant king in a basket up in a tree for good luck and during the combat he started peeing on the enemies. The Manneken Pis has had many costumes over the years which are on display in the Museum of Brussels in the Grand Place. He has become a symbol of Brussels and Belgium.
I cannot forget the food either, chocolate, gaufres (waffles), frites (fries, not actually French but Belgian) and of course beer. I still need to have moules (mussels). I have been here for nearly three weeks and I still have more to see just in Brussels – Mini Europe, exactly what it sounds like, miniatures of famous European landmarks, Waterloo, the site of the battle where Napolean was finally defeated and a number of museums, including the comic strip museum. Then again, large comic strip murals are painted on the sides of many buildings, just another reason why I love Brussels.
voila!
-Lauren :)
p.s. - could someone at Creighton grap me a copy of this week's paper please? thanks
Thursday, January 29, 2009
Friday, January 23, 2009
Parakeets
Today was very rainy and windy, which seems to be pretty common weather here. It didn't spoil my plans though. I went to Waterstone's, the English book store in Brussels, to buy my textbooks. For some reason they don't sell Vesalius textbooks at the VUB (Vrije Universiteit Brussel - Dutch counterpart to Vesalius whose buildings we use) bookstore. After that I picked up my quest for boots and I was right by shopping alley, there's a mall (I didn't know they had those in Europe) and a giant department stores plus lots of other shops down the street, many of them shoe stores having major blowout sales. (It's not actually called shopping alley, I just made that up.) I managed to find a pair! Originally 120€ on sale for 70% off...36€, heck yes! Then I wandered around for a bit before getting a cheap umbrella because mine broke, being chatted up by a girl against the Iranian fundamentalist government, and getting a gaufre (waffle) mmmm. My host family's granddaughter is over, she's 9 months old and ADORABLE. Also, Thea is sick :(
So, a few years ago, maybe more than a few I'm not sure, someone's cat got out (Marika says it was my host family's cat), snuck into a neighbor's house and freed a couple parakeets while maybe eating some as well. Turns out there was at least one male and one female because they've mass produced and now there are hundreds of lime green parakeets living in the park down the street. They sit in the same two trees every night. I'm not sure why they don't migrate somewhere warmer and I wonder what they eat. I'll try to take a picture where you can tell what kind of birds they are.
-Lauren :)
So, a few years ago, maybe more than a few I'm not sure, someone's cat got out (Marika says it was my host family's cat), snuck into a neighbor's house and freed a couple parakeets while maybe eating some as well. Turns out there was at least one male and one female because they've mass produced and now there are hundreds of lime green parakeets living in the park down the street. They sit in the same two trees every night. I'm not sure why they don't migrate somewhere warmer and I wonder what they eat. I'll try to take a picture where you can tell what kind of birds they are.
-Lauren :)
My House
Rather than tell you my activities from the past few days, I'm going to tell you about my house and host family.
As I mentioned earlier, houses here go up instead of out, so...you walk in the door and Paul's office is to the right, then you go up a flight of stairs and the living room, dining room and kitchen are through the doors on the right, up another flight of stairs is the full bathroom and WC (water chamber) i.e. tiny room with a toilet in it, up another flight is Paul's and Thea's bedroom and another mysterious door, up another 2 flgihts are Allison's and Paul's and Thea's daughter Marika's room and up the last 2 flights are my and Maren's rooms. It's a bit of a workout to get to my room and going to the bathroom in the middle of the night is treacherous, because it's really dark, the stairs are narrow and the bathroom's a ways away. It's very cold in my room a lot of the time, I use my fancy blanket. Thank goodness I brought slippers.
Paul and Thea are the nicest people ever maybe. They're both retired, Paul used to be sailor in the Carribbean and Americas and Thea was a nurse for 5 years and then she opened a toy store. They're having old friends over for dinner, a woman Thea nursed with whose husband was also a sailor. I was thinking how nobody's a sailor at home and that seems like an odd profession to me, but then I remembered I live in the midwest thousands of miles from any ocean. Besides being nice, they're also adorable which could have something to do with the fact they're Dutch, probably. Their daughter Marika just moved back in right before we arrived, apparently she's almost 30 but you'd never guess that. I also have a host dog, Cleo, a fox terrier. She's a tiny white dog with brown spots and a long snout and she's adorable. They got her when she was 3 from a breeder who was going to use her for breeding but then she was 3 cm too tall, the crazy world of dog shows and breeding. She's the most well trained dog, whenever Thea says "Cleo en the maat" she goes to her bed. Thea always says "she has to listen." My dog would NEVER do that. Fun fact about fox terriers that Thea told us: back in the day when fox hunting was a big thing, the hounds would chase the foxes into their holes, then the hunters would bring out the fox terriers to dig them out using their long snouts. Cleo may be the happiest dog ever, her tail is constantly wagging and it moves her whole tiny body.
Another thing near and dear to my heart as we all know is FOOD. Paul and Thea are amazing cooks, they haven't made the same thing twice since we've been here and everything they've made has been delicious (except endive, but that wasn't their fault it was just a gross vegetable). I don't know what I'm going to do when I go back to eating at Creighton. Dear parents, when you retire I expect delicious food every time I visit, the bar has been set and you must rise to it.
Well, now I'm hungry and since I'm still in pajamas I should probably get ready for the day.
-Lauren :)
As I mentioned earlier, houses here go up instead of out, so...you walk in the door and Paul's office is to the right, then you go up a flight of stairs and the living room, dining room and kitchen are through the doors on the right, up another flight of stairs is the full bathroom and WC (water chamber) i.e. tiny room with a toilet in it, up another flight is Paul's and Thea's bedroom and another mysterious door, up another 2 flgihts are Allison's and Paul's and Thea's daughter Marika's room and up the last 2 flights are my and Maren's rooms. It's a bit of a workout to get to my room and going to the bathroom in the middle of the night is treacherous, because it's really dark, the stairs are narrow and the bathroom's a ways away. It's very cold in my room a lot of the time, I use my fancy blanket. Thank goodness I brought slippers.
Paul and Thea are the nicest people ever maybe. They're both retired, Paul used to be sailor in the Carribbean and Americas and Thea was a nurse for 5 years and then she opened a toy store. They're having old friends over for dinner, a woman Thea nursed with whose husband was also a sailor. I was thinking how nobody's a sailor at home and that seems like an odd profession to me, but then I remembered I live in the midwest thousands of miles from any ocean. Besides being nice, they're also adorable which could have something to do with the fact they're Dutch, probably. Their daughter Marika just moved back in right before we arrived, apparently she's almost 30 but you'd never guess that. I also have a host dog, Cleo, a fox terrier. She's a tiny white dog with brown spots and a long snout and she's adorable. They got her when she was 3 from a breeder who was going to use her for breeding but then she was 3 cm too tall, the crazy world of dog shows and breeding. She's the most well trained dog, whenever Thea says "Cleo en the maat" she goes to her bed. Thea always says "she has to listen." My dog would NEVER do that. Fun fact about fox terriers that Thea told us: back in the day when fox hunting was a big thing, the hounds would chase the foxes into their holes, then the hunters would bring out the fox terriers to dig them out using their long snouts. Cleo may be the happiest dog ever, her tail is constantly wagging and it moves her whole tiny body.
Another thing near and dear to my heart as we all know is FOOD. Paul and Thea are amazing cooks, they haven't made the same thing twice since we've been here and everything they've made has been delicious (except endive, but that wasn't their fault it was just a gross vegetable). I don't know what I'm going to do when I go back to eating at Creighton. Dear parents, when you retire I expect delicious food every time I visit, the bar has been set and you must rise to it.
Well, now I'm hungry and since I'm still in pajamas I should probably get ready for the day.
-Lauren :)
Tuesday, January 20, 2009
I Want Boots!
I forgot to mention in my last post that Lauren Madsen is here (a girl I went to high school with for those that don't know). I haven't seen her in 2.5 years and she's here, but I'm pretty sure she doesn't remember me since I looked right at her and she looked at me and there was no recognition on her part, which is fine with me since we never talked in high school, we just had classes together. It would be one of those awkward reunions where nobody knows what to say and they just stand around and laugh awkwardly, eeeeewwwwwww.
On to new things...today was my first day of class. My first class was at 11:30 and I was very early, so don't worry. History of the Middle East, the only class that helps me graduate on time and it's going to be intense. I have a 12-15 page paper due and another 6-8 page paper, and I have to print out 2 copies of everything and it costs money, grr. I'm going to try my best not to start the night before though, I have other assignments involving making outlines and thesis statements and bibliographies for this paper though, so if I do start the night before it shouldn't be horrendous. We'll see...
After that I had Elementary Dutch I, or at least I was supposed to. No teacher ever showed up (it did say "to be announced" on the schedule) and nobody knew anything about the class, plus there were only four of us there...I might switch to French, I probably will, it would be more useful since the city is 95% French speaking. At least that gave me free time to eat, because I was hungry. All the sandwich fillings here are spreads, like they put some chicken or tuna and some sauce in a blender and substitute that for sandwich meat. It tastes fine though.
Next was Lobbying in the EU. We had some difficulties locating the classroom, the prof didn't even know where it was. Eventually we found the room, or at least a room, a tiny room with no windows (it's like Sibley all over again). No big deal, the class seems really interesting, 10% of our grade has to do with talking to the prof on facebook and there's no textbook, which I'm all for.
After class we watched the inauguration, when they say the whole world's watching they mean it, it was on all the major channels here. My host family was saying how American politics affect them in Belgium, but Belgian politics don't affect anybody outside of Belgium and from the sounds of it they're pretty messy. I never really thought that the "world" was watching these things, why should anybody else care? Apparently they do.
Every girl (of course not actually but it seems like) in this city has boots! It's really making me want a pair, and there are shoe stores every 10 feet downtown, I've never seen so many shoe stores in my life. I got a scarf, now I need boots, decently priced boots, and I'll have to find some way to stuff them into my suitcase.
I'm finding that I don't have anything to do at night. That will probably change once I start having homework to do, but for now it's pretty boring. Perhaps I'll catch up on some TV, thank goodness for surfthechannel!
-Lauren :)
On to new things...today was my first day of class. My first class was at 11:30 and I was very early, so don't worry. History of the Middle East, the only class that helps me graduate on time and it's going to be intense. I have a 12-15 page paper due and another 6-8 page paper, and I have to print out 2 copies of everything and it costs money, grr. I'm going to try my best not to start the night before though, I have other assignments involving making outlines and thesis statements and bibliographies for this paper though, so if I do start the night before it shouldn't be horrendous. We'll see...
After that I had Elementary Dutch I, or at least I was supposed to. No teacher ever showed up (it did say "to be announced" on the schedule) and nobody knew anything about the class, plus there were only four of us there...I might switch to French, I probably will, it would be more useful since the city is 95% French speaking. At least that gave me free time to eat, because I was hungry. All the sandwich fillings here are spreads, like they put some chicken or tuna and some sauce in a blender and substitute that for sandwich meat. It tastes fine though.
Next was Lobbying in the EU. We had some difficulties locating the classroom, the prof didn't even know where it was. Eventually we found the room, or at least a room, a tiny room with no windows (it's like Sibley all over again). No big deal, the class seems really interesting, 10% of our grade has to do with talking to the prof on facebook and there's no textbook, which I'm all for.
After class we watched the inauguration, when they say the whole world's watching they mean it, it was on all the major channels here. My host family was saying how American politics affect them in Belgium, but Belgian politics don't affect anybody outside of Belgium and from the sounds of it they're pretty messy. I never really thought that the "world" was watching these things, why should anybody else care? Apparently they do.
Every girl (of course not actually but it seems like) in this city has boots! It's really making me want a pair, and there are shoe stores every 10 feet downtown, I've never seen so many shoe stores in my life. I got a scarf, now I need boots, decently priced boots, and I'll have to find some way to stuff them into my suitcase.
I'm finding that I don't have anything to do at night. That will probably change once I start having homework to do, but for now it's pretty boring. Perhaps I'll catch up on some TV, thank goodness for surfthechannel!
-Lauren :)
Sunday, January 18, 2009
I Finally Had a Waffle! (and it was DELICIOUS)
So it's been a while, let's see...
Wednesday was orientation at the school. We had a tour of campus and I'm pretty sure I'm going to get lost on my first day of class because all the buildings are spread out, not like Creighton where they're all in a row. Apparently the classes will switch from one building to another on different days of the week...we'll see how it goes. Allison and I met some new friends too, Rachel, from Dallas who goes to SLU, Regina from Chicago and Kreesta born in Texas lives in Colorado goes to school in Hawaii. Sabine has adopted them into out ISA group, I'm glad because they're all the only person in their programs so it's good we found eachother. After orientation we went to the super market by school and I got my toiletries and then we went to Sunshine cafe, good hot chocolate.
Wednesday night the VSG (Vesalius Student Government) hosted a bar "tour", or a get on the metro and go to Delirium tour. Delirium is a bar with over 2,000 kinds of beer (at least that's what they tell me). We sat in the upstairs part which only has 20some, but that was more than enough for one night. I had two beers, Snake Dog, which tasted like the bitter white part of a grapefruit, eh, and Delirium Tremens, voted Best Beer of 1998, it was pretty good. This legal consumption thing is pretty exciting, it's not going to be fun waiting for my birthday when I go back home. Anyways, two beers is plenty for any one time.
Thursday I had a day off. So I slept in, took my time, and then went for a walk because it was the first sunny day since I've been here. That was nice, I love walks. That night we went to Sabine's because it was her birthday, it was nice.
Friday there was more orientation at school, I had to register for my classes and do computer orientation. But first we had to get monthly rail passes, we had to wait 2.5 hours for them, blah, but I never have to do that again, we just renew them each month from now on. Registration went well, apparently they want study abroad kids to register for 5 classes, but I only wanted to take four. My advisor was like "eh, that's fine, I'm on tenure anyways" so I have what I wanted. I only have class on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday and I'm taking Elementary Dutch I, Lobbying in the EU, History of the Middle East and European Modernism and the Avant-garde and I already know two girls in the class. History of the Middle East is the only class I need to transfer back and I almost didn't get it, thank goodness the instructor decided to just let everybody in even though the class was full. Computer orientation was a bust, they told us to bring our laptops but that was useless and the network was not working so we didn't even accomplish what we were supposed to at all and I have to do it later on my own. After all that we went to the Museum of Musical Instruments which Sabine has been trying to get us to for awhile. It was really cool, especially since I'm a band geek. That night VSG hosted another bar event, but the bar was awful, overly crowded and loud and I got way over charged for my drink which is not cool...sigh. At least we met Chi from China, she's living here with her parents, they lived by DC for a few years too. I think Americans are the only people who don't go live in other countries for a few years, and maybe Canadians.
Saturday we had the tour of Brussels led my Madame Delsemme. It started out nice and warm, but then got cold and rainy. It didn't bother me though, I'm so enchanted by this city, Europe is amazing. However, there was this obnoxious kid who just kept making all these comments that made me want to kick him in the shins. If you don't want to be here, why come? Go back to America.
Allison, Regina and Rachel had to be on the tour for a class, but Kreesta, Chi and I left early to go have lunch during which I had my first waffle! SO delicious, I can see why they don't eat them for breakfast here, they're much more dessert-like, mmmmmmmm. My new housemate also arrived Saturday morning...she's already revealed that she's been proposed to twice and that she wrote a sex column for her college newspaper, she also had some feminist book in her backpack and loves men, a LOT, she even brought a stash of condoms. I'm a little afraid, but I might go to London with her now because she knows people to stay with and that saves me money...I'm a bit wary. Anyways...after lunch, Kreesta and Chi went home and I stayed downtown to look around a bit. I decided to go to the Grand Place so I wouldn't be lost and then decided to go to the Museum of Brussels because it's in one of the buildings in the Grand Place, can't get lost in there. They had these laminated sheets in some of the rooms in French, Dutch, German and English, so I could learn all about Brussels. They had sheets about the Maison du Roi and Town Hall and guides for the models of Brussels in the 17th century and in the 13th century, or some time close to those. There isn't much left from either century because of the Bombardment of 1695, I don't know who did the bombarding, but they were destructive. As I was learning about Brussels during these time periods, the tour group walked in the room, I felt like a geek, some people go to museums for class, I go for fun, oh well. After we finished looking at the Manneken Pis costumes, my favorite part of the museum, we found a cafe to sit in for a while since we had dinner plans for 7:30 and it was maybe 5:30. Then we had a fun time trying to read this map and find the restaurant we were supposed to go to, instead we ended up finding Sabine and Dallin and then Becky and ended up right back where we started. We still had a while before dinner, so we went to a pub and Sabine bought us drinks, mine was half beer, half hard cider and black currant and it was tasty. Then on to dinner at a nice and not too expensive Italian restaurant which was pretty good. Afterwards we stopped by the Grand Place, it is amazing afterall, and headed home.
Today I slept in, my favorite thing to do. Allison wanted to do laundry so we did that and got some frites while waiting, mmmm. Allison is an Eagles fan so she wanted to see the game tonight. She found an American bar that was supposed to be playing it, but it was not where it was supposed to be. We looked for a while, no sign of an American bar anywhere. It probably shut down because apparently it was awful. After that I suggested going back to the pub we went to last night, and after going the wrong way on the metro for a while, we got there and lo and behold they were playing the game! Allison was very excited. So it was a nice ending to the night.
Tomorrow is officially the first day of classes, but I don't have any classes on Mondays or Fridays (heck yes). I do have a lunch date with Kreesta and Allison though. Maybe I'll get my computer stuff done after that.
I suppose this post is long enough for now, maybe I'll do another one on my day off tomorrow. Also, if you have skype, let me know because I have nobody to skype with and that's no fun.
Good night
-Lauren :)
Wednesday was orientation at the school. We had a tour of campus and I'm pretty sure I'm going to get lost on my first day of class because all the buildings are spread out, not like Creighton where they're all in a row. Apparently the classes will switch from one building to another on different days of the week...we'll see how it goes. Allison and I met some new friends too, Rachel, from Dallas who goes to SLU, Regina from Chicago and Kreesta born in Texas lives in Colorado goes to school in Hawaii. Sabine has adopted them into out ISA group, I'm glad because they're all the only person in their programs so it's good we found eachother. After orientation we went to the super market by school and I got my toiletries and then we went to Sunshine cafe, good hot chocolate.
Wednesday night the VSG (Vesalius Student Government) hosted a bar "tour", or a get on the metro and go to Delirium tour. Delirium is a bar with over 2,000 kinds of beer (at least that's what they tell me). We sat in the upstairs part which only has 20some, but that was more than enough for one night. I had two beers, Snake Dog, which tasted like the bitter white part of a grapefruit, eh, and Delirium Tremens, voted Best Beer of 1998, it was pretty good. This legal consumption thing is pretty exciting, it's not going to be fun waiting for my birthday when I go back home. Anyways, two beers is plenty for any one time.
Thursday I had a day off. So I slept in, took my time, and then went for a walk because it was the first sunny day since I've been here. That was nice, I love walks. That night we went to Sabine's because it was her birthday, it was nice.
Friday there was more orientation at school, I had to register for my classes and do computer orientation. But first we had to get monthly rail passes, we had to wait 2.5 hours for them, blah, but I never have to do that again, we just renew them each month from now on. Registration went well, apparently they want study abroad kids to register for 5 classes, but I only wanted to take four. My advisor was like "eh, that's fine, I'm on tenure anyways" so I have what I wanted. I only have class on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday and I'm taking Elementary Dutch I, Lobbying in the EU, History of the Middle East and European Modernism and the Avant-garde and I already know two girls in the class. History of the Middle East is the only class I need to transfer back and I almost didn't get it, thank goodness the instructor decided to just let everybody in even though the class was full. Computer orientation was a bust, they told us to bring our laptops but that was useless and the network was not working so we didn't even accomplish what we were supposed to at all and I have to do it later on my own. After all that we went to the Museum of Musical Instruments which Sabine has been trying to get us to for awhile. It was really cool, especially since I'm a band geek. That night VSG hosted another bar event, but the bar was awful, overly crowded and loud and I got way over charged for my drink which is not cool...sigh. At least we met Chi from China, she's living here with her parents, they lived by DC for a few years too. I think Americans are the only people who don't go live in other countries for a few years, and maybe Canadians.
Saturday we had the tour of Brussels led my Madame Delsemme. It started out nice and warm, but then got cold and rainy. It didn't bother me though, I'm so enchanted by this city, Europe is amazing. However, there was this obnoxious kid who just kept making all these comments that made me want to kick him in the shins. If you don't want to be here, why come? Go back to America.
Allison, Regina and Rachel had to be on the tour for a class, but Kreesta, Chi and I left early to go have lunch during which I had my first waffle! SO delicious, I can see why they don't eat them for breakfast here, they're much more dessert-like, mmmmmmmm. My new housemate also arrived Saturday morning...she's already revealed that she's been proposed to twice and that she wrote a sex column for her college newspaper, she also had some feminist book in her backpack and loves men, a LOT, she even brought a stash of condoms. I'm a little afraid, but I might go to London with her now because she knows people to stay with and that saves me money...I'm a bit wary. Anyways...after lunch, Kreesta and Chi went home and I stayed downtown to look around a bit. I decided to go to the Grand Place so I wouldn't be lost and then decided to go to the Museum of Brussels because it's in one of the buildings in the Grand Place, can't get lost in there. They had these laminated sheets in some of the rooms in French, Dutch, German and English, so I could learn all about Brussels. They had sheets about the Maison du Roi and Town Hall and guides for the models of Brussels in the 17th century and in the 13th century, or some time close to those. There isn't much left from either century because of the Bombardment of 1695, I don't know who did the bombarding, but they were destructive. As I was learning about Brussels during these time periods, the tour group walked in the room, I felt like a geek, some people go to museums for class, I go for fun, oh well. After we finished looking at the Manneken Pis costumes, my favorite part of the museum, we found a cafe to sit in for a while since we had dinner plans for 7:30 and it was maybe 5:30. Then we had a fun time trying to read this map and find the restaurant we were supposed to go to, instead we ended up finding Sabine and Dallin and then Becky and ended up right back where we started. We still had a while before dinner, so we went to a pub and Sabine bought us drinks, mine was half beer, half hard cider and black currant and it was tasty. Then on to dinner at a nice and not too expensive Italian restaurant which was pretty good. Afterwards we stopped by the Grand Place, it is amazing afterall, and headed home.
Today I slept in, my favorite thing to do. Allison wanted to do laundry so we did that and got some frites while waiting, mmmm. Allison is an Eagles fan so she wanted to see the game tonight. She found an American bar that was supposed to be playing it, but it was not where it was supposed to be. We looked for a while, no sign of an American bar anywhere. It probably shut down because apparently it was awful. After that I suggested going back to the pub we went to last night, and after going the wrong way on the metro for a while, we got there and lo and behold they were playing the game! Allison was very excited. So it was a nice ending to the night.
Tomorrow is officially the first day of classes, but I don't have any classes on Mondays or Fridays (heck yes). I do have a lunch date with Kreesta and Allison though. Maybe I'll get my computer stuff done after that.
I suppose this post is long enough for now, maybe I'll do another one on my day off tomorrow. Also, if you have skype, let me know because I have nobody to skype with and that's no fun.
Good night
-Lauren :)
Tuesday, January 13, 2009
Day 3
Sorry about my lack-lustre titles, I'm not that creative, maybe I'll come up with better ones in the future...we'll see.
Anyways...we didn't do much today. We had ISA orientation and lunch at Sabine's house, then went to the Atomium and had dinner at Sabine's house again with my host parents. Orientation wasn't all that official, nothing really has been which is nice. Lunch was mostly cheese and bread, with some tomatoes and brown shrimp and porscuito (which I LOVE) and then Sabine made waterzooi, a creamy chicken and vegetable kinda stew, for dinner which was very good, mmmm. I've been super excited to see the Atomium for a while, it was built for the 1958 World Fair and is some metal crystalline molecule magnified 165 billion times. It's a perfect cube and sits on one of its corners. It kinda reminded me of the St. Louis arch on the inside, or the MN history museum, might disappoint some people but I liked it. We also had audio guides, which were kinda like phones. There were pictures with numbers on them, you typed the number in the guide and then it started talking to you. Thus far, Sabine has paid for everything, I haven't spent a euro yet and that's definitely a good thing because I have limited funds.
Besides daily activities, here are some things I've learned: ISA can't have an excursion to Amsterdam anymore because there was a fatal accident involving drugs (apparently somebody jumped/fell out of a window?). To operate the shower at my house, I turn a knob and press a button and then the water runs for 30 seconds (that's what my host mom said, but it feels like less than that) it's warm water, but then you stand in the cold and lather up. That's probably good for me though, if the water ran continuously I would waste all the hot water and that would be bad. Public transportation is WONDERFUL and should be used everywhere, seriously. The houses go up, not back or out, my room's on the fourth floor, and they're COLD! or at least this house is, probably because it's old. My bed is very firm, and there's just a comforter on top, but that's nice and warm. I have not adjusted to the time change yet, I lied in bed trying to sleep for a lloooonnnggg time this morning, boo, hopefully I adjust so I can get some SLEEP!
Orientation for school starts tomorrow and classes start on Monday. I keep forgetting that I have to go to school while I'm here. I'm only going to take 12 credits though and if everything works out only have classes on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday. The commute to school is about 45 minutes, I'm used to 10-15 minutes, so I'll have to adjust to that.
I have to go to a convenience store or supermarket and get some toiletries soon, and I want to go to a bar, dangit! A pub tour is planned into my school orientation though, so I guess I won't have to wait too long.
But now it's time for bed, it's almost midnight here afterall and I have to be outta here by 8:45 tomorrow and that's early for me. We'll see how good I am at keeping this up once classes start...good night!
Lauren :)
Anyways...we didn't do much today. We had ISA orientation and lunch at Sabine's house, then went to the Atomium and had dinner at Sabine's house again with my host parents. Orientation wasn't all that official, nothing really has been which is nice. Lunch was mostly cheese and bread, with some tomatoes and brown shrimp and porscuito (which I LOVE) and then Sabine made waterzooi, a creamy chicken and vegetable kinda stew, for dinner which was very good, mmmm. I've been super excited to see the Atomium for a while, it was built for the 1958 World Fair and is some metal crystalline molecule magnified 165 billion times. It's a perfect cube and sits on one of its corners. It kinda reminded me of the St. Louis arch on the inside, or the MN history museum, might disappoint some people but I liked it. We also had audio guides, which were kinda like phones. There were pictures with numbers on them, you typed the number in the guide and then it started talking to you. Thus far, Sabine has paid for everything, I haven't spent a euro yet and that's definitely a good thing because I have limited funds.
Besides daily activities, here are some things I've learned: ISA can't have an excursion to Amsterdam anymore because there was a fatal accident involving drugs (apparently somebody jumped/fell out of a window?). To operate the shower at my house, I turn a knob and press a button and then the water runs for 30 seconds (that's what my host mom said, but it feels like less than that) it's warm water, but then you stand in the cold and lather up. That's probably good for me though, if the water ran continuously I would waste all the hot water and that would be bad. Public transportation is WONDERFUL and should be used everywhere, seriously. The houses go up, not back or out, my room's on the fourth floor, and they're COLD! or at least this house is, probably because it's old. My bed is very firm, and there's just a comforter on top, but that's nice and warm. I have not adjusted to the time change yet, I lied in bed trying to sleep for a lloooonnnggg time this morning, boo, hopefully I adjust so I can get some SLEEP!
Orientation for school starts tomorrow and classes start on Monday. I keep forgetting that I have to go to school while I'm here. I'm only going to take 12 credits though and if everything works out only have classes on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday. The commute to school is about 45 minutes, I'm used to 10-15 minutes, so I'll have to adjust to that.
I have to go to a convenience store or supermarket and get some toiletries soon, and I want to go to a bar, dangit! A pub tour is planned into my school orientation though, so I guess I won't have to wait too long.
But now it's time for bed, it's almost midnight here afterall and I have to be outta here by 8:45 tomorrow and that's early for me. We'll see how good I am at keeping this up once classes start...good night!
Lauren :)
Day 2
Much less stressful today, I didn't get out of bed until after 1 (it's me after all) and then we had a little walking tour of brussels, we being me, my housemate allison, the boy dallin, the girl who was here first semester too becky (she's from Nebraska) and the Resident Director Sabine. Allison and I were late, oops, gotta work on that, but we took the train without any difficulty. We saw the Grand Place and Manneken Pis (exactly what it sounds like) and then just walked around to different shops. I tried to take a lot of pictures, but it's not my forte. I'll put them up when I have more. We were done with that around 6. Then I talked with my housemate allison.
She's from south New Jersey (which is apparently much better than north New Jersey) and goes to Rowan University. Her grandfather built her house which has a huge yard and she works at a restaurant at home. She speaks some French and wants to travel just as much as I do which is good. She's also a vegetarian and has an older sister and a younger brother and used to be blonde and is allergic to jewelry that's not platinum or gold...yeah...that was most of what I learned.
My luggage arrived too! So now I'm mostly unpacked. I got a phone as well, a cheap one that was probably new in '04 (a long time ago in technology land), which I'm planning to use in case I get lost...a distinct possibility, or if I need to call someone in Belgium, or for crazy emergencies which hopefully won't happen.
Tomorrow we're going to the Resident Director Sabine's house in the morning for ISA orientation. I'm not sure what that will entail but I suppose I'll find out.
Well, it's almost 1 a.m. here, so I should probably go to bed, seeing as I have to get up in the morning.
Lauren :)
She's from south New Jersey (which is apparently much better than north New Jersey) and goes to Rowan University. Her grandfather built her house which has a huge yard and she works at a restaurant at home. She speaks some French and wants to travel just as much as I do which is good. She's also a vegetarian and has an older sister and a younger brother and used to be blonde and is allergic to jewelry that's not platinum or gold...yeah...that was most of what I learned.
My luggage arrived too! So now I'm mostly unpacked. I got a phone as well, a cheap one that was probably new in '04 (a long time ago in technology land), which I'm planning to use in case I get lost...a distinct possibility, or if I need to call someone in Belgium, or for crazy emergencies which hopefully won't happen.
Tomorrow we're going to the Resident Director Sabine's house in the morning for ISA orientation. I'm not sure what that will entail but I suppose I'll find out.
Well, it's almost 1 a.m. here, so I should probably go to bed, seeing as I have to get up in the morning.
Lauren :)
Sunday, January 11, 2009
In Brussels (finally)!
Yes, I made it here alive and well...but it was difficult...
I now officially hate Detroit, it's a stupid city - the crime rate is super high, the football team is the worst in history, the american car industry is tanking AND they mess up flights (just ask Lindsay). Anyways...my flight from home was supposed to leave around 5, but the plane was late from DETROIT and then there was something wrong with some valve...idk, but the flight ended up taking off an hour and a half late. So then I get to DETROIT where I'm supposed to catch my connecting flight to Amsterdam, but I was too late (and it really sucked because I could see the plane sitting outside...sigh) so then I got transfered onto a delayed flight to Paris which was pretty much leaving immediately. Bright side - I got a window seat and I wasn't going to have one on the other flight, and they fed me twice (which was good since it was about 10pmCST and I hadn't eaten since maybe noonCST) and I got my own little TV thingy in the back of the headrest in front of me, the perks of an international flight. I watched Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist (ehh) and The Duchess (not a feel-good kinda movie, but still good overall). However, I couldn't sleep at all and I think the world's least happy baby was on board, which didn't help...so then I was in Paris.
I knew I had to call the ISA resident director because she was supposed to be picking me up, in Brussles, around 12:55pm(Belgium-time) and it was about 12:50pm when I arrived in Paris. I was now supposed to be in Brussels at 6:15pm, after flying from Paris to Amsterdam, then to Brussels (which, if you look at a map, is kinda ridiculous). Well, there are not a lot of payphones in that particular parisian airport (I hear there's more than one) and I walked all the way down to customs, asked where there were phones and ended up right back where I started, with a lot of carry-on stuff of course because it's me. Well, after figuring out how to make that phone call (harder than you'd think) I was feeling a little better. I'd thought about just taking the train from Paris to Brussels, but then I would have had to find the train, and I can't read French. Then I walked all the way back to that customs area and had to get a new boarding pass and go through security again, not so bad, but I was feeling frazzled. Apparently I barely made the plane because the sign said last call and they told me I was the last person to board....ooohhh well...so then I was in Amsterdam.
I was really exhausted by this point, but I knew what I had to do so it wasn't so bad. I had a long-ish waiting period before my next flight, and it involved more nudity than one would think (in the airport art...and at one point I turned around and there was a little boy with his pants down). Since it was a joke of a flight (as in really really short) we had to ride this tram out to the plane and board it charter-style, kinda cool, but I was super tired and it was cold. I slept through 90% of the flight...then I was in Brussels.
I don't think they could make the walk to baggage claim more maze-like. I went down an escalator, and up another one and went somewhere else...idk, it was a long walk. I knew that baggage claim was going to be a bust, even though all these boarding-pass-giving-customer-service people kept talking about my bags like they were going to be there. I wasn't that bummed about it, I'd known it would be the case since DETROIT, it's just annoying. Then I had to go tell another customer-service person (the non-boarding-pass-giving kinda) about my bags. Also, my flight from Amsterdam was late getting in and I had that poor ISA woman waiting for me...I felt bad. No more planes for a while, please.
So, I started at about 2:30pmCST and ended at about 1pmCST which makes a grand total of 22.5hrs in airports/planes, gross. My host family is very nice though and I have enough clothes in my carry-on to last at least a few days. I'm super tired now though, so I'm going to sleep.
Lauren :)
fun fact - blogspot's homepage is in dutch here
I now officially hate Detroit, it's a stupid city - the crime rate is super high, the football team is the worst in history, the american car industry is tanking AND they mess up flights (just ask Lindsay). Anyways...my flight from home was supposed to leave around 5, but the plane was late from DETROIT and then there was something wrong with some valve...idk, but the flight ended up taking off an hour and a half late. So then I get to DETROIT where I'm supposed to catch my connecting flight to Amsterdam, but I was too late (and it really sucked because I could see the plane sitting outside...sigh) so then I got transfered onto a delayed flight to Paris which was pretty much leaving immediately. Bright side - I got a window seat and I wasn't going to have one on the other flight, and they fed me twice (which was good since it was about 10pmCST and I hadn't eaten since maybe noonCST) and I got my own little TV thingy in the back of the headrest in front of me, the perks of an international flight. I watched Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist (ehh) and The Duchess (not a feel-good kinda movie, but still good overall). However, I couldn't sleep at all and I think the world's least happy baby was on board, which didn't help...so then I was in Paris.
I knew I had to call the ISA resident director because she was supposed to be picking me up, in Brussles, around 12:55pm(Belgium-time) and it was about 12:50pm when I arrived in Paris. I was now supposed to be in Brussels at 6:15pm, after flying from Paris to Amsterdam, then to Brussels (which, if you look at a map, is kinda ridiculous). Well, there are not a lot of payphones in that particular parisian airport (I hear there's more than one) and I walked all the way down to customs, asked where there were phones and ended up right back where I started, with a lot of carry-on stuff of course because it's me. Well, after figuring out how to make that phone call (harder than you'd think) I was feeling a little better. I'd thought about just taking the train from Paris to Brussels, but then I would have had to find the train, and I can't read French. Then I walked all the way back to that customs area and had to get a new boarding pass and go through security again, not so bad, but I was feeling frazzled. Apparently I barely made the plane because the sign said last call and they told me I was the last person to board....ooohhh well...so then I was in Amsterdam.
I was really exhausted by this point, but I knew what I had to do so it wasn't so bad. I had a long-ish waiting period before my next flight, and it involved more nudity than one would think (in the airport art...and at one point I turned around and there was a little boy with his pants down). Since it was a joke of a flight (as in really really short) we had to ride this tram out to the plane and board it charter-style, kinda cool, but I was super tired and it was cold. I slept through 90% of the flight...then I was in Brussels.
I don't think they could make the walk to baggage claim more maze-like. I went down an escalator, and up another one and went somewhere else...idk, it was a long walk. I knew that baggage claim was going to be a bust, even though all these boarding-pass-giving-customer-service people kept talking about my bags like they were going to be there. I wasn't that bummed about it, I'd known it would be the case since DETROIT, it's just annoying. Then I had to go tell another customer-service person (the non-boarding-pass-giving kinda) about my bags. Also, my flight from Amsterdam was late getting in and I had that poor ISA woman waiting for me...I felt bad. No more planes for a while, please.
So, I started at about 2:30pmCST and ended at about 1pmCST which makes a grand total of 22.5hrs in airports/planes, gross. My host family is very nice though and I have enough clothes in my carry-on to last at least a few days. I'm super tired now though, so I'm going to sleep.
Lauren :)
fun fact - blogspot's homepage is in dutch here
Monday, January 5, 2009
VISA!
my visa FINALLY arrived!!!!! thank GOD! which means that i'm really going to belgium! in less than a week...and i haven't started packing...it's been a busy weekend though, i've been out of town
i have two coffee cups and wild rice for my host family, i think i might get them a calendar as well...any other ideas?
i'm sure my next update will be from EUROPE! hopefully all my flights are on time...
Lauren :)
i have two coffee cups and wild rice for my host family, i think i might get them a calendar as well...any other ideas?
i'm sure my next update will be from EUROPE! hopefully all my flights are on time...
Lauren :)
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