Monday, April 8, 2013

3 Months Left: House-hopping, LLN, and Namur!

Hello everyone!

I'm back at my house, and I leave for Amsterdam tomorrow (!!!!), so I figured now would be the perfect time to update. On Tuesday I went to Florennes to Mind's house, which is about a 50 minute bus ride away. Her host family is really nice and let me stay over at her house because my host mom had a bunch of work to do. We visited an abbey (Maredsous) where they specialize in beer and cheese. We also watched Disney movies and went shopping. Early Thursday morning I left with Mind and we parted ways in Namur. I went home to get ready to go to Callie's.

I got to Ottignies around 1pm. Callie and her host dad picked me up and I ate lunch and then we went to the store with her host mom. We bought stuff to restock her fridge, as well as ingredients to make fried rice. Callie's mom sent her fried rice seasoning packets, but I figured since I knew how to make it I'd just go ahead and do it. Callie and I don't really know too much about cooking, but we were still able to cook it without spilling too much. It turned out so much better than the fried rice I made for Chinese New Year and everyone liked it so that's a relief. After dinner, Callie and I stayed up watching hilarious videos.

The next day, Callie and I (mostly Callie) made pumpkin pie. Then we went to the mall in Louvain-La-Neuve and met up with Mie from Denmark and Keaton from Michigan. We drank coffee in a café, and I am officially awesome now because I totally guessed the wifi password to Manhattan-LLN coffee... it was manhattan, but still. Then we went back into the mall. We found root beer in America Today (the clothing store I would scoff at) and we had Mie try it. She said it tasted like hand cream, which is just blasphemous. Then Callie bought strawberries and we all ate them.... until we found one covered in fuzzy mold. That sorta killed the mood, which is saying a lot because strawberries are my favorite and I haven't had them since I've been here. Afterwards, we had dinner and we finally ate the pumpkin pie. It was so good, I should've taken a picture.







Before I left on Saturday, Callie's host family and I went to Carette, which is apparently the best ice cream store ever. I got a scoop of mocha ice cream between two round wafers. I have to say, it was pretty good. After that, Callie's family dropped me off at the train station and I went home. My host mom and sister went to a fundraiser dinner, but the places were 50 euro each, so I decided I'd save that money.

On Sunday, some of my extended host family came over and we all had raclette for lunch. On Monday I met with my liaison in Namur and we ate lunch, did some shopping, and then drank a beer. It was really nice to see her. She lives in Liège right now for university so I don't see her very often. Tonight I'm eating dinner with my host family and then I'm packing for Amsterdam! I'll be sure to take tons of pictures while I'm away. I'm taking the train at around 10:30 to meet up with Claire at Bruxelles-Nord and then we're taking the long bus ride. I'm so excited, even if it looks like it's going to rain the entire time we're there. I'm used to it now after being in Belgium anyway. I hope you guys have just a great of a week as I will!


À la semaine prochaine!


Nicole

1 comment:

  1. Hi Nicole. I just read your entire blog :)
    I'm Marie-Charlotte and I'm from Belgium, Braine-l'Alleud near to Waterloo. I'm an exchange student in the US for now. I just found your blog and I think that's amazing that some people want to discover this such tiny but lovely country.
    I'm glad you're having a blast there and I'm sure you'll enjoy your last 3 months! Time goes by so fast... I'm leaving Alabama on June 6th and I feel like I got out of the airplane yesterday!
    If you wanna talk or anything, add me on facebook : Marie-Charlotte Worme :)

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