28.01.11

It’s a bright and sunny day here in Brussels which is a rarity. The downside? It’s -1 degrees Celcius. (Which is a balmy 30 degrees Fahrenheit, for those keeping track.)

I kind of broke stride last night and went out on my own to meet up with the CouchSurfing group that’s native to Brussels. I was nervous about it at first because I literally knew no one, of course, but it turned out to be a great decision. I stayed for several hours at the cafe just talking with random people that are part of the community. The group is for anyone who lives in Brussels and includes both Belgians and internationals which is pretty indicative of the city itself. CouchSurfing as a community builder seems to be a wonderful thing and I’m excited to try it out for the first time. It was also nice to meet people who aren’t students studying here because at Vesalius I only seem to meet American students which is cool but….you know, not the point. I’m planning a trip to Paris in the near future and searching for someplace to stay via the website, so fingers crossed that it all works out.

I’m getting more comfortable with the city every day and it’s no big deal for me to walk alone anymore because I’m not scared I’ll get lost. I can’t say I know it by heart or anything, but I’m getting the feel of it, I think. The more you walk around, the more familiar you become. If you just rode the metro everywhere, I don’t think you would really know anything about how the streets actually connected and ran. the great thing about being downtown though is that you really are within walking distance of everything. There’s never any need to take a cab, because as long as you stay in the circle of downtown, you’re only about a 20 minute walk from home which is nothing. You just have to get in the walking mindset, really, which is admittedly hard sometimes. It wouldn’t be so hard if it weren’t so cold though!

At first, it seemed like I was going to drown in essays for this semester, but actually I’m…not. I have 2 for IES, and 1 for History of Economic Thought and 1 for Comparative Politics. I have the subject for all 4 already, so if I just write them sooner rather than later, it won’t be a big deal at all. I actually already got my presentation for IES out of the way(why you should always sign up first) and I have my presentation for CP next week or so. I tried to get the earliest deadlines so I wouldn’t have them all scrunched up toward the end of the semester when I won’t want to do anything. No point in putting them off if you can get them out of the way.

23.01.11

Last night, Elana and I went out to try to go a really popular dance club, but we didn’t get there in time for the cheap cover fee, so we decided to just bar hop around downtown instead. We ended up having a surprisingly great night at this one bar where the norm is to dance on the tables and drink beer out of glasses as big as your head. It was a lot of fun, of course, and we ended up staying there until around 2:30 am before walking back to the hostel and grabbing some frites along the way.

To be honest, we were quite due for a bit of fun because the night before turned out so poorly. We had actually planned on bar hopping on Friday and met up at Kultuurkaffee with some boys from Vesalius and were downtown when everything sort of unraveled. We tried to go to this one bar but it was too full and the bouncer wouldn’t let us in, so one of us suggested a different bar to the group, but one of the boys ‘refused to take bar advice from a tourist’. Strike one. Then another boy was talking to Annie about feminism and such, then said she must be a Women’s Studies major because she was so into feminism. I mean, are you serious? Strike two. Finally, the group decided to head to Zebra, then one of the other boys threw over his shoulder that we girls should ‘stop being such bitches and just come along’. Strike three.

We turned around on the spot and walked back to our hostel. I have to say though, that’s really been my first truly negative experience here. I couldn’t believe the things that were coming out of these boys’ mouths. Drunk or not, that level of rudeness is disgusting. We definitely won’t be hanging out with that bunch again. I’m not sure if it’s a cultural difference or just plain disrespectfulness, but either way it was a very off-putting experience with some local boys who started out the evening seeming very cool and nice. To be balanced though, one of the boys guilty of sniping at us was definitely American and seems like the type to be rude to others because it’s ‘cool’.

Also, a lesson learned from Friday night: high heels just won’t work in this city. Please take a moment to be sad with me. I spent the whole night taking my heels on and off because of the uneven cobble stone streets and paths and it is just not worth it. Plus it tears up your shoes like mad. So unfortunate.

I did find a beer that I quite like the other night. A British ex-pat ordered it for me and it’s a French beer with a citrus twist called Desperados. It’s quite good, at least for me because the citrus masks the heavy flavor of beer that I really don’t like. Its got a pretty bottle too, if that counts for anything. ;-) Hoegaarden beer isn’t so bad either, I guess, but I’m still in the ‘wine is better’ camp. Beer, however, is much cheaper. People here drink beer like it’s water. Actually, one of the quirks of the city is that the bars are often open long before any of the shops. Not sure how I feel about that yet.

 

20.01.11

This past weekend, the group of us went to Bruges! It was beautiful and a wonderful day, but not much to write about to be honest. I uploaded lots of pictures and added some of the history factoids I remembered from the tour to the captions. It’s a great old town with lots of quaint places and stories.

Today I went to the Royal Museum for Central Africa which I’d been looking forward to for quite a while. I studied King Leopold II and the Congo intensively my senior year of high school, so to finally make it to his famed museum was a great achievement. I think the museum is a beautiful place, trying very hard to present an even-keeled viewpoint on the Congo, but not necessarily achieving that. There are certain shadows a bit too long for them to step out of right now.

It’s a huge place though, with the front showrooms full of the more primitive and older exhibits that showcase ceremonial masks and tools. As you explore deeper into the museum you can see the slow progression of technology as well as the progression of the country of Congo. It was a bit of a challenge because a great deal of the exhibits were in French, but I think I managed to understand most of it because it was also very simple French because of all the kids that come through. In the back corner of this huge palace, though, they have a HUGE exhibit of taxidermy animals. It’s incredibly extensive, although not all of them are done very well, I have to say. Adjacent to that they also have a huge reptile room and then a bug room as well, so it’s pretty awesome. I had originally planned only 2 hours there, but I ended up staying 3 or 4.

Otherwise, I think that my French is slowly coming back to me as more situations arise where I really think about the word I need. I’m going to be starting French classes on February 1st and I passed into 1.2, so fingers crossed that it will continue to improve exponentially from there. I feel very disoriented and frankly at a disadvantage when I’m surrounded by two languages that I can’t understand, so really diving back into French will help with that. The Dutch can’t be helped, I’m afraid, but Jean-Marie gave us all a ‘useful words & phrases’ book for Dutch, so I carry it with me in case of emergency if my English/French mixture doesn’t cut it.

I had my first class at Vesalius yesterday…it was a bit of a disaster honestly. It had about 45 people in it, which is huge to me, and it was a very tiny room meant for max 30 people probably. The professor was inexperienced and unorganized, so it was really difficult. I’m hoping my other class tomorrow will be much better because I just haven’t been that impressed with Vesalius yet. On the other hand, our course at IES looks awesome and very hard. I have the first in-class presentation this coming Wednesday, so I’m a bit nervous about that. Also – there are crazy amounts of essays that we’re all supposed to be writing. Every five minutes, someone else assigns 3,000 words to us. It’s crazy. I can’t keep track anymore.

I got the internship at the consulting firm which is the place I liked the best of my interviews. The other place didn’t seem like a good fit for me and I think the interviewer thought so as well. I’ll start that on February 7th and complete 150 hours or so. It’s a bit more on the communications side than the IR/Poli side, but to be honest, all of the internships offered were like that. I really do like the people at this firm though, so I think it will be a good experience regardless of the work I’ll be doing.

That’s all for now except the best times to reach me on Skype are in your afternoon. 1-4pm in the afternoon is 8-11pm for me and I’m usually online for at least some of that time, so talk to you soon!

13.01.11

Bonjour!

I’m sorry it took so long to get this first entry up, but it’s been a whirlwind since I arrived with barely any breaks. I got here Monday morning early and hit the ground running with a very prompt group tour of Brussels. I had my first beer within hours of arriving and it was paid for by our hosting university. That’s how it’s done here, apparently, and I like it.

The city is lovely by sunlight, but unfortunately the weather has been pretty dismal for the past two days. The sunshine on Monday was a false start, to say the least. I woke up on Tuesday to a dark, rainy city and that’s been the norm ever since. It’s hard to navigate in the rain because I really don’t want to stay outside, but Brussels is truly a walking city so that’s the way it’s going to be. Of course, because it’s such a walking city, my feet are killing me after continuous tours and adventures in the city for the past few days. I think it’s the uneven cobblestone that’s the worst on your feet, but unfortunately, it’s unavoidable here.

The language barrier has been hard, but most people here are very accommodating and understanding if you at least begin with ‘Pardon, parlez-vous anglais?’ One of my main challanges is to remember to say that. It’s very hard not to launch straight into English when you need directions or help with something. People here often need to adjust to the language for a minute before they can understand you as well, because English is often their second or third language. I’ve only had one bad experience myself with negative reactions to English, but one of the other girls had a bit of ordeal with a sales clerk in a cell phone store who was rude to her from the moment he discovered she was American. It’s unfortunate that because of our nationality people think that we are clueless or rude when really we’re trying to adjust to a new city just as anyone else would.

My one major problem had been that there has been absolutely no time to settle in yet. Tonight is really my first ‘free’ night and I’m so exhausted from the constant circus of the last few days that I want to sleep more than anything else. I can’t sleep for another few hours though or I’ll make my jetlag even worse. Some of the others have already started going out every night and all I can say is that I envy their energy. I feel like I’ll collapse in the pub if I tried to trek too far. I know that the feeling will wear off soon and I can join in, which is encouraging.

I had my two interviews for internships today as well. My first one was quite the disaster because Vesalius, the college we’re studying at, had given me the wrong address which I didn’t discover until about 20 minutes before my interview. Of course, I wandered the streets of Brussels, lost and distressed, until I found an info center that let me use their phone to call the place and the woman there gave me the right address which was actually just down the street from the address Vesalius gave, thankfully. I ended up being 5 minutes late and trying to pull myself together after spending the last 20 minutes or so freaking out about missing my first real appointment in the city. But I made it and the interview went as well as can be expected, I was a bit scattered, all things considered. My second interview went off without a hitch thankfully and I quite enjoyed it actually. I really liked the atmosphere and the two employees who interviewed me were great.

I’ll find out which internship I received later next week and then I believe I’ll start pretty soon afterwards. Other than that, I’ll be taking two classes at Vesalius College and one class with the Institute of European Studies.

I’m traveling to Bruges this Saturday, so I’ll probably write again after I get back. :)