Our Christmas Adventures

Today was the first day of our Christmas adventure, and it started with a long travel day. I probably gave us a little bit too much leeway in getting to the airport, but I’d much rather spend time waiting at the airport than having to rush to get there. With so many legs of the journey just to get to the airport, I wasn't sure how long it would actually take. We ended up catching the 10:00 bus into Cambridge and getting the express train from there to London King's Cross. From there we went over to St. Pancras and caught another train towards Gatwick. From there we took a people-mover to the northern terminal to wait for our flight. All in all, it was fairly efficient and we ended up all checked in and ready to go by 1:30pm.

Luckily, it turns out that Gatwick airport is a pretty cool place to hang out. First: lunch. I’d only had coffee for breakfast so I was more than ready to grab something to eat. We checked out the terminal map and saw the usual airport fare—a deli, an Italian restaurant, and of course McDonald’s. Then we saw something in the corner of the map that caught our attention—Lebanese food! I wasn't even quite sure what Lebanese food entailed. Of course we had to try it!

On the way over we passed a neat tea house with a giant Tea-Rex vouching for the health benefits of tea. The Lebanese restaurant was located in the uppermost corner of the terminal, very easy to miss if you weren't looking for it. But judging by the number of occupied seats, we weren't the only ones who had made the effort. The restaurant was decorated with Lebanese décor like lamps and purses, and even oriental tea pots. I ordered some salmon with hummus and Scott got a lamb tagine. He also got some tea, I suspect mostly for the experience of pouring it from one of the beautiful silver pots.

After lunch we browsed the shops for a while until our gate was announced. When it was announced, we followed the crowd to it and I was excited to see that our plane was painted to look like a giant eagle! I didn't snap my own picture, but I did manage to find a promotional photo from British Airways to give you an idea of how awesome it is!

The boarding process was fairly uneventful except for the two young women who kept insisting that row number eleven should obviously be given priority over everyone else, despite the fact that the boarding crew told them over and over that they were boarding from the back of the plane and they could come up when their row was called. There were a few kerfuffles as the two women repeatedly hopped in front of the line every time a new row was called, only to be sent back by the crew. We were in row 15 so I didn't get to see them when their row was finally called, but I can image that they (and everyone else) was very happy about it. 

The plane was very full and it looked as if most of the people on it had tried to stuff as much as they could into their carry-on to avoid having to check it in. This caused some problems as there wasn't enough room in the overhead bins for everyone’s luggage and many people were forced to have theirs placed in the hold anyways. One young Spanish man, aged about 21 or so, tried to flirt his way into being allowed to keep his cabin luggage. As the stewardess was an English woman about 60 years old and very “down-to-business,” his technique did not work out very well. 

Eventually everyone got settled and we took off, only about 10 minutes later than expected. On the way, we were served (free!) drinks (even including the option of wine or beer), and (free!) sandwiches! Apparently this is standard treatment on British Airways but I was pretty excited about it nonetheless. After a smooth trip, we touched down in Barcelona about 10 minutes earlier than expected. I would probably have been happier about this if my cold hadn't been worsened by the flight and my ears hadn't popped so badly that I could only hear out of my right side and then only just.

Going through immigration in Europe is one of the rare times that I'm glad I don't have a European passport, because there is a separate line for all “other” passports and it tends to be infinitely shorter than the line for Europeans. There were only two people in front of us, so we got through before they even started the luggage belt. By the time we took a bathroom break, our bag was coming off the belt so we grabbed it and headed out towards… well we weren't quite sure yet. I knew the hotel was about 20 minutes away by car but that it would take about an hour by public transportation. I didn't know the cost of either option, so we decided to get some money from an ATM and then investigate further. 

We weren't the only ones with a similar idea, so we ended up waiting about 20 minutes to get to the ATM. We were a little confused about why it was taking so long because there had only been three people in front of us, but when we got up to it ourselves we realized what had been going on. In an attempt to create a “super-advanced, uber-safe” ATM, the creators had installed so many safeguards that it took forever even to get it to accept the card! And it was more than a little unnerving to see a giant camera in our face and watch our own every move on a life-sized video screen right in front of us (next to the two other screens with the instructions for using the ATM). Eventually we did manage to get some euros. I've never felt so accomplished. 

We headed outside, shedding layers as we did even in the dark of the night. We were definitely not in England anymore. The first thing we saw upon stepping outside was the airport bus that ran to the city center. It was cheaper than I thought and it was about to leave, so we hurried over and hopped on. After about a half hour ride, it dropped us off at Plaza España (the photo shows what it looks like at night - I did not take the photo but can't find information about who did). Getting out I accidentally dropped the suitcase on Scott’s (already injured) foot. After some choice words that drew the attention of some of the locals, we hobbled over to the Metro station. 

Then it was on to the challenge of deciding which ticket to buy. We thought about just getting one for the trip to the hotel and figuring out the rest of our weekend later, but saw that there were great savings for buying multiples at once. But you had to know which zones you were going to travel to. Well, no problem—we knew which attractions we were going to see so that should be easy to figure out. Except that among the 5 different maps we managed to find around the station, there were none that listed the zones. In the end, we just got a 4-day pass for all the zones. It may have been more expensive than we needed, but I guess I can rest in the fact that the ticket itself was much prettier than the shorter tickets—excellent for my scrapbook. 

We (and by we, I mean Scott) struggled to get the large suitcase down the stairs and onto the train. We had to make a transfer with—you guessed it—lots of stairs! When we finally got to our destination, there were oddly some stairs going down which led to a long tunnel, at the end of which were stairs going up. And then some more stairs. By the time we had gotten to the top, Scott had sworn off stairs for the rest of the trip. He forgot to swear off cobblestones, though, and got to endure them for the 8 blocks or so to the hotel. At least we got to pass by a pretty color-changing building on the way! Though we only had to go up one floor to get to reception, there was no question that we were taking the elevator.

By this time, my cold and lack of hearing had gotten the better of me, and I just wanted to be done with it all. We were so close—all we had to do was check in. This was made more difficult by the fact that I couldn't hear the desk clerk but I just kept nodding and agreeing. I don’t think I signed up for anything I didn't mean to—guess we’ll find out when I check the credit card bill later! Finally, everything was all set up (I think), and the clerk handed us our keys. All I had to do was sign and we could be off. Except it was right at this time that my body decided it was totally done and it needed to give me a stronger hint. My nose started to bleed and I needed a tissue, NOW. It must have been quite entertaining to see me sign my name while looking straight up at the ceiling, practically throw the paper at the clerk, and make a mad dash off to the restroom still without lowering my head. 

Luckily I made it just in time and managed to stop the bleeding fairly quickly. I emerged from the bathroom to see Scott with an expression of concern and bemuse on his face, patiently guarding our luggage and waiting for me to return with the room keys. Finally—for real this time—we got on the elevator and headed to our room on the 5th floor. We were too tired to go out in search of food so we got a couple of snacks from the vending machine to stave off our appetite until morning, and then promptly fell asleep. 

Off to Sea...

The beginning of our honeymoon was actually quite hectic, not really how most people imagine their honeymoons will start out! First, we woke up on our first day off of work at 8:00 am. Given that normally we (or at least Scott) wakes up at 7:00, this was a slight improvement but still not quite the perfect way to start your first day off. Our flight to Rome wasn't scheduled to leave until nearly 4:00 pm, but we live a little bit out of the way. So we got up early in time to catch the 9:00 bus into Cambridge where we walked to the train station. There, we found out that there was some sort of interruption with the train service and that all the trains to central London were delayed! Luckily, we only had to wait about 20 minutes before we hopped onto the train that was supposed to leave an hour ago. Apparently the existence of said train was not well publicized because for all of the rush-hour traffic and people waiting around inside the station, we managed to get an entire car all to ourselves! We took the opportunity to grab an hour-long nap before arriving at King's Cross in London.

From King's Cross we walked over to the Underground station to wait for our next mode of transport: the Tube. This was a bit more crowded than the train had been, but we still managed to get ourselves and all our luggage onto the train. And I only tripped two people up during the whole journey! From there we thought we were home-free to Heathrow Airport, but it turns out that we had gotten on the train destined for terminal 5. We needed the train to terminal 4. Once again, we hopped off the train to wait for another. I don't remember the name of the station, but it was a shared outdoor platform. Two more trains passed before the correct one came by. At this point I would like to thank Aunt Jenn for knitting me some a very warm headband and scarf--I had packed them in my suitcase "just in case" and this was just the case I was glad I did! I was only partially frozen by the time we got back on the train.

Another 20 minute journey and we were finally at the station for Heathrow terminal 4. ...and of course there was what seemed like another few miles of walking to reach the actual terminal itself (luckily for us there were awesome moving sidewalks. Sadly, this is apparently an advanced life skill that most people have not quite mastered and we ended up in a bit of a tangled mess when the people in front of us fell over trying to get off). After some de-tangling and profuse apologies (we are in England after all), we finally reached the ticket counter. We checked in, got our tickets, and checked our luggage. Not only were our first two bags allowed through FREE, the desk agent offered to check all of our hand luggage for free as well! Triple bonus points for Alitalia Airlines right there!

Even after all the difficulties in arriving to our initial destination, we still got to the airport before they even opened the security line for our gate! We took advantage of the extra time to practice fitting in with Italian culture--we ordered coffee and sat on the terrace to people-watch. More bonus points to Caffe Nero for giving us free gourmet chocolates with our drinks! This must be an airport special, because I don't recall that ever happening at other Caffe Neros that I've visited. Whatever the reason, I'm not complaining!

Just as we finished off our coffee and chocolates, it was time to go through security. Just dump your bags on the conveyor and go--we didn't have to take off our sweatshirts or shoes, and we didn't have to account for all our tiny bottles of eyedrops and chapstick. Oh how I love flying between non-U.S. destinations! I was "randomly chosen" to have my bag searched, but even that was accompanied by apologies, and took all of about 20 seconds. 

With all of the hassle of actually getting to the airport, we hadn't eaten very much all day. After a quick review of the various duty-free shops in the terminal we settled on a takeaway sandwich shop for our lunch. I had a salmon salad, thereby unknowingly starting a tradition that would last the rest of the trip. Scott had a chicken sandwich and curry (surprise, surprise!). After lunch we took our bathroom breaks, brought strap for Scott's duffle bag (which had gone missing at some point on our journey), and headed over to our gate.

Boarding was really efficient, despite the Italians' apparent dislike for queueing. Instead, everyone seemed to stand around in random groups and get into line at the very last second. Interestingly, there weren't many arguments or struggles when people "cut" the line. Only a few confused-looking Americans (ourselves included). But we all did manage to get on the plane in what was probably the most civil boarding process I have ever experienced. We were seating in an exit row next to an Italian girl who wasn't really interested in talking. That was fine by me; after our day, I wasn't really interested in talking either!

The plane ride was pretty relaxing until some large man in a big hurry to get to the toilet ran down the aisle, knocking Scott's soda off his table and all over his lap. The person behind him thought that this was the most hilarious thing he had ever witness and laughed uncontrollably for about ten minutes. He continued to chuckly to himself for the remainder of the flight. At least the plane had been cold when we boarded so Scott had not yet taken off all his layers by the time the incident occurred. He simply hung his shirt up to dry, which happened remarkably quickly in the dry air of the airplane!

The rest of the flight was uneventful and we even landed a few minutes early! We were the first ones in line to go through non-EU passport control. I think it was the first time I've gotten through without actually saying anything at all--he just took our passports and stamped the first open page he could find. We went through customs, navigated the barage of taxistas peddling their service, and found our way out to the shuttle buses. We got there just in time--just as we set down our luggage, the bus arrived! We had contemplated walking to the hotel--it was only about half a mile away--but decided on the bus just to be safe. After being on the bus about 15 minutes and realizing how convoluted the streets to the hotel were, we were very glad we chose that option!

When we first walked in to the lobby of the hotel, I thought there was a crime or something! There were about a dozen police officers in full gear hanging around, while luggage strewn all over the place. Turns out it was just a cop convention. With very specific room requests. It took them over half an hour to check in, and then we finally managed to check in to our room. There were plenty of amenties at the hotel, but by this time it was nearly 11:00 pm and we were exhausted. We bought a bag of popcorn for a late snack/dinner, but never ended up eating it. Once we got to the room, we barely managed to get our pajamas on before falling asleep!

Hi. Again.

It's been a while hasn't it?  So much has happened in the last few months, I don't even know where to begin!  Um... so I'm going to go the high-school note-taking route and make bullet points.  I'm still undecided as to whether I should go back and try to write about each event individually.  I wish I had kept up with this better while everything was happening, because I really would like to remember all the emotions in fresh detail.  But oh, well... anyways, here's what's happened since May, in no particular order:

• We went back to the States for a cross-country trip.  We traveled through Wisconsin, Minnesota, South Dakota, Wyoming, Colorado, New Mexico, and Texas.  Highlights of the trip included Mount Rushmore, the Spam Museum, and the Corn Palace.
• I spent some time in Texas waiting for my visa to the U.K. While there I got to stay with my awesome bosses and learn even more awesome things about the Little Aussie Bakery.  I'm so excited to try out all the new things that John and Rita taught me while I was there.
• Contrary to what it seems here, I've actually learned quite a bit about blogging!  I just tend to concentrate my efforts on this blog (getting paid to do it is an excellent motivator).
• I finally got my U.K. visa!
• I got married.
• We bought a car.

Well, that just about covers it.  I may or may not write more in-depth posts about each of those events.  Depends on how stir-crazy I start to go now that I'm back in the U.K. and looking for a "day job."  After a few false starts, I've realized that a resume is not the same thing as a C.V., and that may be why I haven't gotten many calls back from the jobs I've applied to.  Whoops.  Guess I should work on fixing that now, too.

More Rain in Brussels

Once we got over the smell of my wet shoes, we finally managed to get into bed and start to drift off to sleep.  We were just about in dreamland when we were abruptly woken up by shouts in the hallway.  At first we thought that there must be some sort of emergency or at least a big inter-familial fight going on, but when we looked out to investigate it turns out that it was just a happy get-together.  Apparently all the rest of the rooms on our floor had been reserved by one large family whose idea of expressing their love for one another is slamming doors and yelling until 2 a.m.  At least they were well coordinated; every time we would go out to try to ask them to be quiet, they were conveniently hidden inside a room and actually being quite noiseless.

Needless to say, by the time we finally did fall asleep, we were a bit sour on our neighbors.  It didn't help that they all got up around 6 a.m. to start the routine of banging and yelling all over again.  We tried to sleep through it, but finally just gave in and decided to head to breakfast.  Of course, guess who we found in the breakfast room!  Yes, our lovely neighbors!  Turns out they were so busy making lots of noise that none of them had time to shower--they all smelled horrible!  I guess this is what we get for staying at cheap hotels--it does seem to be a recurring theme, doesn't it?

Once the noisy family managed to organize themselves out the door (lots of screaming required for the task, of course), we realized how nice the hotel and breakfast were.  For the price, we really didn't expect much of the breakfast, but it was really diverse!  They even had an espresso machine, of which I took full advantage.  Of course, being in a culturally French area, there was plenty of bread and various spread to go on top.  Don't forget the Nutella!  We enjoyed the rest of our breakfast in silence, enjoying the nice sunny view out the window and hoping that today might be more pleasant on the weather front than yesterday.

The weather had other plans, however, because by the time we got out the door, it was gloomy and raining.  At least we remembered our umbrellas this time!  We didn't have much of a plan other than to explore the city, so we headed back towards the main square.  When we arrived we saw a large group all staring wide-mouthed at one of the buildings.  We closed in to investigate what was so interesting about this particular building, and discovered that these people were part of a free English-language tour of the city.  We were half an hour late to the start, but joined in anyway.

Because we missed the beginning of the tour, I missed the guide's name.  The group was so large (and seemed to grow progressively along the route), that I never even managed to get close enough to him to ask, either!  But he was a great guide!  He is originally from Scotland, but has already lived in eight different European countries, working as a tour guide in all of them.  He is really passionate about history and culture, and even studied law at University.  His education and enthusiasm really showed through on the tour, and I even dare say that it was the most entertaining (not to mention informative) tours I've ever been on!  He somehow managed to get a group of more than 40 people to follow him around in heavy rain for almost four hours--that is no mean feat!

Here are some highlights from the tour:

A typical Brussels street corner.  The top graffiti is encouraged and sponsored by the local government.  The second, the Space Invader, is created by an anonymous street artist who travels the world putting similar pieces on famous landmarks (Great Wall of China, anyone?).  No one knows anything about him, expect they suspect that his is from Paris based on the high concentration of Space Invaders there.  The white street sign is the "modern" name of the street, usually after famous people or events.  The blue sign is the "traditional" name of the street.  Because Brussels started as a market town, most of the streets are named after the goods that were sold there.  This is Brewers' Street.  All street signs are written in both French (top) and Dutch (bottom).

This bronze statue is the pride and joy of Brussels--"Manneken Pis."  Yes, that means "Little Pee Man" in Dutch. It was originally placed around 1618, but has been stolen repeatedly (eight times) since then.  The current statue is a reproduction created in 1965 after the most recent heist.  The city is so proud of this guy that they actually have on staff a full-time costume designer whose sole job is to create outfits for Manneken Pis to wear.  He has a new one every few days.  Apparently today is his "au naturale" day.  There is so much more history to this little guy than I can fit here, so go check out his Wiki for more fun facts!

This is the interior of the Église Notre Dame du Bon Secours in downtown Brussels.  The church itself isn't very grand as far as European churches go, but I liked the juxtaposition of the symbols of Islam, Judaism, and Christianity all in the same place.  Wonder what would happen if we tried this in the States?

There are murals of cartoon characters all over the city; in fact, the government has sponsored most of them and you can even get special tourist maps that lead you to all of them.  This one is located at the entrance to the traditionally gay neighborhood of Brussels.  It was quite controversial when it was first painted in 1992.  The blond figure on the right is Broussaille, a character from a popular comic magazine, "Spirou."  The work was originally titled simple "Broussaille and his friend."  However, there was an outcry because it was unclear whether the black-haired person was male or female.  To combat this, the city had the mural redone, adding more feminine features to the bust and butt, and adding an earring.  To clear up any remaining confusion, the work was retitled "Broussaille and his girlfriend, Catherine."

This is actually the oldest church in Brussels.  It was originally built in the twelfth century, and is called "St, Nicholas Church," after the patron saint of traders.  It has obviously been remodeled a few times since then, but some of the original features are still visible on the interior.  There is even a cannonball fired by the French in 1695 still lodged in one of the pillars!

This is the view at the end of the tour, overlooking the city of Brussels.  It's beautiful even in the rain!

Unfortunately, because we had just hopped on the tour without any planning (or going to the bank), by the time it finished we realized that we didn't have any cash on us.  I know, I know; I did said it was a free tour, but the guide was so awesome that we really thought he deserved some sort of tip!  While everyone else was paying and saying their good-byes, we looked around for an ATM, but to no avail.  Instead, we vowed that we would track him down again some time before the week was through to give him his tip.

The tour ended near another important square.  I can't remember the name, but it should probably have been called "Gourmet Square" based on all the different types of food offered by the various restaurants there.  It was after 3:00 by now and despite our large breakfast, we were hungry!  We decided to try some local fare, and headed into a Belgian cafe for a quick lunch and reprieve from the rain.  The main attraction of the cafe was its "authentic" Belgian waffles, so of course we had to try one of those (covered in Belgian chocolate, no less!).  As much as we would have loved to eat only desserts all day, we were good an also ordered a curry sandwich to share.  They were both super delicious, although after the night that we had I have to say my favorite part of the meal was the big mugs of espresso we had to complement it (complete with EU sugar packets, in case we forgot where we were).

We did our best to delay our departure from the cafe and back into the rain, but eventually we ran out of excuses to stay.  We decided it might be a good idea to try to find an indoor activity, at least until the rain slowed a bit.  We remembered passing by a museum yesterday, and although we weren't entirely clear on what was inside the museum, knew that it was nearby and that it was open late.  That seemed a good enough reason as any to go, so we did.

DaVinci's Tank.

Belgian Stock Market.
All of it.

It turns out that it wasn't actually a museum per se, but the Stock Market building.  Belgium used to have their own stock market, but it was bought out by the NYSE a few years ago.  Since then, most of the building has been unnecessary for market activities and has been used for cultural purpose instead.  Right now, most of the building houses an exhibit called "DaVinci: The Genius."  The great part about this exhibit is that it is mainly a display of actual models built based on DaVinci's ideas.  There is even an entire room full of contraptions that you can experiment with yourself!  Sadly, the tank was not among the "touchable" objects, but it was still neat to see all of DaVinci's ideas actually created.  Some of them had even been tested, like a giant, pyramid-shaped parachute.  Based on modern knowledge, it doesn't seem like it should work.  But a professional skydiver was brave enough to build it (using only materials and techniques available during DaVinci's time), and to test it by jumping out of a hot air balloon.  Luckily for the skydiver, DaVinci was a smart cookie and the parachute worked.

We wandered around the museum for over three hours, only managing to pry ourselves away when we began to get hungry again.  By now, the sky had cleared and it was actually dry outside.  We decided to take advantage of the relatively nice weather to have a meal outdoors.  Even so, we chose a restaurant that offered covered seating and outdoors heaters.  The restaurant was a bit pricey, but they had decent daily specials, so we ordered those.  I finally got to try some moules frites (something I'd seen with Mom in France but never got around to trying), and some Belgian beer.  Both were very good (despite the reputation of Belgian beers).  Scott had the less exotic spaghetti bolognese, but also got to try some Belgian beer.

We were still a little hungry after dinner, so we headed over to the chocolate shops to see if we could find a little treat to fill us up.  By the time we had checked out all the shops, we didn't need to buy a treat anymore--they had all given us so many samples we could hardly think about food anymore.  Nonetheless, we did buy a bag of assorted chocolates, just in case we got hungry later.

It started to downpour again on the way home, but we did fare better than yesterday with our umbrellas this time.  Until we stood too close to a corner and got splashed as a car turned the corner, that is.  At least by now I had discovered the versatility of our hair dryer!

Blow Drying Brussels

Once again, we have a week off from school--I love the British school system!  We get breaks just about every 6 weeks, and good ones, too!  None of this long weekend stuff; we always get at least a week, if not two, off!  I even did my best to be organized, and started to research and book a trip a full month before the actual break (last time I think we finally ended up choosing a destination about three days before departures).

We decided that we should be far enough into spring by the end of May that it would be safe to venture to one of the more "northern" countries without turning into human icicles.  We debated between France, Holland, Belgium and Germany for our trip.  Belgium turned out to be the winner, mostly because the train tickets to there were much cheaper than anywhere else.  We knew absolutely nothing about Belgium, but we figured we could learn about it as we went.

By the time break rolled around, the forecast for the week (both in England and Belgium) was rain.  The whole week.  While I appreciated this in England (I was worried my garden would die while we were gone), I wasn't too excited about the prospect of an entire rainy vacation.  But what can you do?  We crossed our fingers, hoped for the best, and began our journey.

The Eurostar train wasn't scheduled to leave until almost 11:00 a.m., but we still had to catch the bus and the Capital Connect train just to get to St. Pancras in London.  To be on the safe side, we caught the 7:30 bus from just outside our house.  It was only a few minutes late (ok, it didn't arrive until almost 8:00, but that's pretty good for the buses around here).  Luckily, the traffic must have been good or the driver must have really been gunning it because we still made it to the train station in time to catch the express train into London.  We arrived at Kings Cross right around 9:30 a.m.

Luckily, St. Pancras is just across the street, so we didn't have to navigate the city too much.  There was a bit of a line at check-in, but we found that no one was particularly interested in using the automated machines, so we took advantage and grabbed our tickets from one in less than five minutes.  With nothing else to do but wait, we headed through security (so much easier than going through at the airport), and into the waiting lounge.

blearyeyedfather.blogspot.com

It was still earlier than the time I normally wake up, so the first thing we did was make a beeline straight for the coffeeshop.  I ordered the largest, sugary-est drink I could find.  It was delicious.  The lounge was crowded with families with young children.  We wondered what was in Belgium that attracted so many families, but then we heard the announcement for boarding of the train to EuroDisney.  The lounge was clear of children in about 5 minutes.  We enjoyed watching the way different children rode the escalator--you can tell so much about their personality based solely on their methods!  Some kids cling to their parents or older siblings, while others try to weave their way through the crowd to get to the top first.  One kid was even trying to ride up by sitting on the moving handrail!

Only a few minutes after the departure of the Disney train, we were called to board ours.  I don't know if there is some secret to booking the tickets, but so far every time I've booked online we end up at a four-seater table.  Since there are only ever two of us, we always end up sharing with other people.  So far it hasn't been too bad, and we even met a really interesting guy on the way back from France.  This time, we sat across from another young couple.

They were content to ignore us, and that suited us just fine since we were mostly just interested in sleeping.  It's probably a good thing we didn't end up talking, because we probably would have ended up in a fight. They were discussing their next career moves, and the girl explained that she wanted to go back to school to become a teacher.  "Yea," she said, "I'll probably get bored of it really soon, and I don't really like children all that much, but the holidays are awesome!  I don't really have to like it, because I'll get 16 paid weeks off per year."  Yep, those are definitely the kind of people who should go into teaching.

www.servitir.co.uk

We managed to successfully ignore the rest of our table-partners' conversation and had a pretty uneventful ride through the Chunnel and across the French countryside (all of which Scott missed because he was sleeping like a rock).  We arrived in Belgium right on time, around 2:30.  We were happily surprised to see that not only was it not raining, it was actually fairly sunny and warm!  After a longer-than-expected trek to our hotel, we got settled in and decided to head out an explore a bit in the nice weather.  Of course we didn't think of bringing umbrellas!

The hotel was just about two miles from the city center, and we enjoyed strolling through some interesting neighborhoods on the way.  Unlike other cities that have segregated cultural areas, in Brussels it seems that all the cultures thrive right next to each other.  In the same block we passed by a Pakistani tea house, a Spanish grocery, a Brazilian clothing store, a Moroccan bakery, and a Filipino dry goods store.  And of course all the signs were in French and Dutch.

By around 4:00 we could tell that we were getting into the "touristy" part of town, as evidenced by the throngs of confused people huddled around the windows of the chocolate shops.  It was just about this time that the weather decided that it was about time to fulfill the forecast and start raining.  It wasn't too bad at first, so we continued our walk, enjoying the ornate architecture in the downtown area.  We even found the main square, the Grand Place.  Our timing couldn't have been more perfect, because just as we walked out to the center of the square, it started to downpour.  We looked for an escape, and ran into the first restaurant we could find.

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We already knew that the food was probably going to be overpriced based on the fact that we were in the main square.  But we were seated on the third floor with a great view of the entire square, and the waiter spoke English fairly well.  There was a slight mixup when Scott tried to order sausages and somehow ended up with some roast meat, but whatever it was that he got was delicious so it didn't really matter.  I got some salmon, which was a little overcooked, but the vegetables were excellent so that (kind of) made up for it.  We were mostly just glad to get out of the rain!  The large pitcher of wine also made us appreciate the food probably more than it deserved.

Of course, being in Belgium, we were also served french fries in a cone.  Yep, they should actually be called "Belgian fries," because they weren't invented in France after all!  They got their name from American GIs who just assumed that they were in France because everyone around them was speaking French.  Silly assumption, right?  I must say, the Belgians really do know how to do fries! Apparently they use a special technique whereby they slow fry the potatoes in warm oil before flash-frying them in hot oil to finish them off.  Definitely worth a try!

We did our best to eat slowly and wait for the rain to pass, but by 5:30 we were starting to get tired.  We ventured outside but soon realized that there was no way we were going to make it the two miles to the hotel without getting soaking wet.  We bought a really beautiful souvenir umbrella from one of the shops, with scenes of Brussels on it.  Unfortunately, the umbrella is no longer with us, as Scott left it behind at customs on the way home.  Oh, well, it was nice while it lasted!  Kind of.  We still ended up being pretty soaked by the time we got to our destination, especially my shoes.

Expecting to do a lot of walking, I'd only packed my tennis shoes.  They're great for tennis and other athletic activities, because they're built to "breathe" really well.  Unfortunately, the hundreds of little holes and the mesh do not make them very good for the rain.  They were probably five pounds heavier each when we got back up to the hotel room!  I knew I didn't really have any options other than to wear them wet or figure out a creative way to dry them, so I set about searching for a method.  My first instinct was to just place them on the heaters, but unfortunately, the hotel had already turned the heat off for the season.  I couldn't very well let them sit outside, because it was still raining.

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I ended up finding the in-room hairdryer and drying the shoes with that.  It took a good half hour or more before they started to dry up.  I was glad I'd found a way to have dry feet the next day, but let me tell you, if you're ever wondering what might make it on the list of "ten worst smells in the world," hot, blow-dried shoes will probably make it to the top of the list!

Wedding Ring!

I'm very excited today--we went to London to pick up the wedding ring that we had custom-made by artist/ jeweler H. deCohen at Covent Garden!  I really want to start wearing it now, but I'm going to do my best (which is probably still quite a bit below average) to be patient and wait for the wedding.  It is now safely stashed away until the wedding, and I'm not going to post any pictures until then--guess we'll all learn to be patient together!  I'll give you a few teasers, just to keep you interested--It's made of 18 carat white gold, and round diamonds.  The artist described the pattern as a "flowing river," and I agree with assessment.  I think it's perfect, and I can't wait to wear it permanently!

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Now, it's time to find a ring for Scott.  We're going to have a bit of a challenge there--his ring finger is the one he injured doing karate a couple years ago.  He now has a large screw embedded forever right into his knuckle.  This means that any ring that fits around the knuckle has to be about three sizes larger than the actual size that would fit his finger.  We'd welcome any suggestions as to how to get around this slight problem!

Good Intentions

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I never thought that I would quote Ke$ha in, well, anything, but her words are actually quite appropriate for this moment: "It can bum you out when your intentions aren't, like, translated properly." In her case, Ke$ha is lamenting the fact that she has been portrayed as "pop's party girl" instead of being recognized for her artistic talents.  I can't say I would know any of her music were I to hear it, so I have no comment on her musical abilities, but I definitely feel her pain about intentions gone bad.

For example, my intention to blog about all of my travels, and even just day-to-day life in my new home.  In my head, it sounds like a great idea, and not even that difficult to carry out!  What could be easier than relaying events that happened to you just a few days before (with a few embellishments, perhaps)?  I mean, isn't that what office gossip is all about?  Should be easy as pie.  Unfortunately, I am neither a great fan of pie (except Grandma's) nor office gossip. Oh, but did you hear what Mr. Smith did last weekend?!

Just kidding.  I'm almost 99% sure that there isn't even a Mr. Smith at the school.  Although I'm really horrible with names, so I could be mistaken about that, too!  Anyways, I guess the point of this post is to let you know that I'm still here and I really do intend to write about my travels.  But please bear with me if my intentions aren't "like, translated properly."