London, Castles, Festivals and other things

Belgium so far has been...hectic, to say the least. We are always doing things, and when we aren't, I am sleeping. I have never slept as much as I sleep here in my life. Although, it is getting a little better (I didn't take a nap yesterday!).

Saturday morning at 3:15am, after going to bed after midnight and not getting any sleep, we got up and left for Chimay to take a bus to London. It was my first ever double decker experience, and very exciting! I decided they should bring them to the US because they are very practical, and much cheaper. London was beautiful, but it reminded me an awful lot of Paris. Everything was under construction or being repaired. There was literally work being done on every block. We had a tour in the bus and then wondered the streets for a few hours. Katie wanted her picture inside of an english phone booth and so our entire group of eleven stopped there for an hour or so and took a ton of pictures of just about every combination of people they could come up with (pictures to come soon!).

One of the rotarians in my club owns and lives in a castle (yes, a REAL castle). Last night they hosted a feast and play there which was, incredible. The food, not my favorite. A typical, as far as I've seen, belgian meal of a great selection of meats and a few sides. The belgians, as I've heard and now seen, love their beer. Just as our exchange coordinater handed us one he said, in his broken english, "Let me remind you of the rules, no driving, no drinking..." he started laughing and finished, "Actually I really just wanted to say that one. No driving, the rest, not our problem." They are, as I've discovered, very open here.

They weather has been pretty decent, until today. The village is adorable. Everyone literally knows everyone and their cousin. That is, if they aren't already their cousin. I swear there must be something like two families here because everyone seems to be related. I may not look different, but I sure stick out. I've found that meals really are a big thing here. Everyone seems to congregate around Mamy's (Grandma) house for lunch everyday. It is about a five minute walk, or maybe two by buggie, which my host mom uses to get around the village. I've had maybe five meals there, and it is always filled with new family members that I haven't met yet. The house is tiny, which makes it feel even more full at lunch time. The dining room takes about half the house and Mamy cooks and waits over everyone as we eat.

This weekend was the annual festival of Renlies. By night, the Salle de Fetes (party room) was an all night rave of all ages, and by day, there were carnival games and people. The main attraction was one of those fake Rodeo bulls that you try and stay on while it throws you off. I maybe would have tried, but I was wearing a skirt. There was also a horse drawn carriage tour of the town which was super cute. They raced antique cars around the village and when they passed, everyone would run out of their houses and wave. And of course the was frites (fries).

It is so different here, this morning when I got up, there was a man riding his horse down the road as normal means of transportation. My family have ten pet deer and there are also wild boar. My host dad, who is a hunter, has a head of one hanging above the computer which is kind of freaking me out. Last night one ran infront of the car and my host mom slammed on her breaks and still barely hit it. They also drive ridiculously fast. We've gone up to 160 km/hr (Katie says the speed limit in Canada is 110, and people stretch it maybe up to 130).

Anyways, I've got french lessons in half an hour. More to come soon.

-Clarissa

Je suis, finalement, en Belgique

I am finally here, and I love it. Our first flight out of Portland was delayed two hours because the freaking president who thinks he can just shut down the entire airport, was in Minneapolis. So Lizzy, Ian and I waited and finally got there just in time to miss our next flight to Amsterdam where we met up with two kids from California, Emily and Ernie. We were put on standbye for the last flight and barely made it on, arriving an hour late for our last flight to Brussels where we spent four hours waiting and hoping our families figured out what happened. On the long flight to Europe I sat by a girl from Germany who had been an exchange student two years ago and was coming back from visiting here family in the states. Well we arrived and surprise, surprise, they lost our luggage. I went home with my family and had an amazing dinner and then went to bed.

Today has been quite the busy day. I went to the Boulangerie with my host mom and got bread and Pain au Chocolat, c'est trés bien!! We drove around and looked at the tiny surrounding villages, got pictures taken for an ID, went to the bank, and then to the school to sign up for classes with the other exchange student, Kaitlyn (which we weren't able to do, don't ask me why, everything they said was jiberish to me). Then we went to Hilde's house (Kaitlyn's host mom) for coffee and chocolate. Chantal's (my host mom) daughter, Marie, and Hilde's daughter, Jade, are on exchange in the US and Mexico. They are good friends so it works out nicely.

So far, I really like Belgium. The little villages amaze me in how close they are to each other. It takes less than five minutes to go from town to town. My host brother, Maxime has a little "boogie" (like one of those cars they ride on the sand dunes) that we have been riding around in to get places. It is so cute. He is taking me on a tour tomorrow because it is supposed to be sunny. He drove me to Mamie's (Grandma) today on the little cobblestone streets in the village, Renlies. I swear there are maybe fifty people who live here. She is cute, we had a hard time communicating. Pretty much all of my host dad's (Philippe) family live here. His brother and wife came over after dinner for wine.

My host parents are so good to me, and they love that I speak a little french. I am so so glad that I do because otherwise I would be completely overwhelmed. This afternoon I took a nap and acually had a dream in french. It wasn't long, but it was very strange. I think my language skills are getting better already. Philippe's sister in law said I had a better accent than their previous student. It is strange though, being an exchange student. When they speak slowly and animate words I don't understand, it makes since, but when they speak to eachother, it sounds like a huge breath full of nonsense. I just sit there and act attentive. It is very tiring. I really don't think Americans speak that fast. My parents are so nice and patient. They are also extremely concerned with making me feel at home. They keep saying that if I don't like their food, that they will make something else. All of it so far has been wonderful and surprisingly, the meat doesn't bother me at all. It turns out that their daughter is vegitarian and they offered to make me tofu!

Well, I am off to bed. Pictures hopefully to come soon. I don't know how to do it on this computer but they are having someone come look at mine to try and get it online. Tomorrow will hopefully be more relaxing, and saturday mine and Kaitlyn's family are going to London!