Happy Easter!
Happy Easter!
Today is my first day of Spring Break that I am home in Lille. I will leave Wednesday morning to go to Aachen with Hillary, but until then I have a lot of work to do. I have to study for E.U. Foreign Policy because I am very nervous about the exam, which I’ll take the week after break ends. I also have to write a paper for Les Musulmans en Grande Bretagne and have to study for other tests as well, but they’re not coming up quite so soon.
So for now, since I have some free time, or rather time I could spend doing work, I’ll tell you about break so far . . .
Thursday:
I think my presentation on The Islamist went quite well, certainly better than I’d hoped. I was so nervous though, and I continued to be jittery even afterwards. This was because I went to sleep late and really just couldn’t sleep. Amy let me practice my presentation with her in the middle of the night. Overall the professor kept me at the front of the classroom for at least 45 minutes, although I always lose track of time when I’m in front of the class and I answered his questions well. I think it was pretty obvious that I did the reading and the background research on the author and political groups mentioned in the book.
Then I went straight to Carrefour to buy juice, given that I had nothing to drink except for tea. This was good foresight because of course I come back from my travels on a Sunday when grocery stores and restaurants are closed. Sunday is certainly Lame Day. I walked right in, grabbed my carton of grape-raspberry-cranberry juice worth 1.05 euros and ended up in line behind the guy who spent 337.90 euros on groceries. Someone was clearly having an elaborate Easter Party and it took 15 minutes for him to clear the line. Such is my life.
Afterwards I walked over to the international train station Lille Europe to meet Amy and pick up my ticket to Brussels later that day and to check up on a ticket I had already purchased. It arrived with my name on it even though it was for Josh and I wanted to make sure he could still used it, but they said that the name was not important. Just checking. Amy bought her tickets to Lyon, where she is now and she went to class and I went back home, hoping to clean up and take a nap. I did the cleaning part for sure, but that nap never happened because my crazy landlady and our maid came. It was a routine weekly visit by which our house gets cleaned, but apparently there was a serious problem with our heating so they came into my room where I was hiding behind a locked door. They spent a while there and left 45 minutes before my train was scheduled to leave even though I kept indicating that I was exhausted and had a train to catch. I was seriously shaking at this point, and it didn’t stop until dinner.
So I rushed to get everything together and I tried on a sweater because I had only worn it once before and I wanted to make sure it still fit appropriately, which it did. Now here’s the big mistake: I somehow managed to miss putting the sweater in my bag and merely put it on the kitchen table. So I literally forgot to pack my outfit for Friday. This is the first time this has happened, so what a great first impression to make, wearing the same clothes 2 days in a row. But don’t worry, I packed underwear and 2 pairs of socks, which I didn’t even need because I was wearing my red Mary Janes.
I then met Josh and his parents at Gare du Midi in Brussels where they tried a gaufre for the first time. It’s a very important thing to do if you’re in Belgium for the first, third, or twelfth time. We then dropped my stuff off at Josh’s apartment and then went to find a restaurant that Josh’s program director Michelangelo recommended. It was really delicious, but once again I don’t get why European portions are so gigantic. I couldn’t even put a dent in my delicious chicken waterzooie even though I refrained from eating bread to save room. Although please note that I did eat some vegetables including and limited to broccoli and carrots. Parents, if you’re reading this please note that essentially Josh’s parents covered this whole trip for me. I merely paid for half of my tickets there and back. Therefore à thank you notes.
I could not sleep that night at all, despite how tired I was. This resulted in me having a hard time getting up the next morning.
Friday/early Saturday:
As some Belgian boys said, Brugge is more of a museum than a town. We were there on Good Friday, so church exploring was slightly more difficult. We walked through it, saw old buildings and such, but I didn’t find it more impressive than other Belgian or Dutch towns, actually. In fact, I didn’t get a full-on medieval feel from it. We left early and went to Gent, which is a hidden treasure. It’s a legit city and has a lot to see and we had dinner there. I didn’t bring my camera, so I don’t have my own pictures from either city. Although 3 high school students in Gent gave us the cutest impromptu tour of the city. It ended up being quite rainy, which has been a frequent problem over the past week in the region. This includes all over France, the Netherlands, Belgium, and I imagine the surrounding countries as well. The weather has truly been miserable and much colder than usual, 30’s and 40’s.
I just do not get want prompts Eurolines to say that the 22:45 direct bus from Brussels to Lille arrives at midnight considering it has never been close and we always make a long, unnecessary expected stop. There is no reason the bus ride should be that long, but we arrived at 00:37, meaning I had most definitely missed the last metro, which should come around 00:28. So then it was a 15-minute walk for me to Hillary’s apartment where I would stay for a few hours. We woke up at 5 and I took the metro home at 5:50. At 6:15 I finally got to take a shower, but had to leave at 7:00 to get to the bus to take us to Disneyland Paris. Now you can see why I’m so exhausted and why this day off is so necessary.
Today is my first day of Spring Break that I am home in Lille. I will leave Wednesday morning to go to Aachen with Hillary, but until then I have a lot of work to do. I have to study for E.U. Foreign Policy because I am very nervous about the exam, which I’ll take the week after break ends. I also have to write a paper for Les Musulmans en Grande Bretagne and have to study for other tests as well, but they’re not coming up quite so soon.
So for now, since I have some free time, or rather time I could spend doing work, I’ll tell you about break so far . . .
Thursday:
I think my presentation on The Islamist went quite well, certainly better than I’d hoped. I was so nervous though, and I continued to be jittery even afterwards. This was because I went to sleep late and really just couldn’t sleep. Amy let me practice my presentation with her in the middle of the night. Overall the professor kept me at the front of the classroom for at least 45 minutes, although I always lose track of time when I’m in front of the class and I answered his questions well. I think it was pretty obvious that I did the reading and the background research on the author and political groups mentioned in the book.
Then I went straight to Carrefour to buy juice, given that I had nothing to drink except for tea. This was good foresight because of course I come back from my travels on a Sunday when grocery stores and restaurants are closed. Sunday is certainly Lame Day. I walked right in, grabbed my carton of grape-raspberry-cranberry juice worth 1.05 euros and ended up in line behind the guy who spent 337.90 euros on groceries. Someone was clearly having an elaborate Easter Party and it took 15 minutes for him to clear the line. Such is my life.
Afterwards I walked over to the international train station Lille Europe to meet Amy and pick up my ticket to Brussels later that day and to check up on a ticket I had already purchased. It arrived with my name on it even though it was for Josh and I wanted to make sure he could still used it, but they said that the name was not important. Just checking. Amy bought her tickets to Lyon, where she is now and she went to class and I went back home, hoping to clean up and take a nap. I did the cleaning part for sure, but that nap never happened because my crazy landlady and our maid came. It was a routine weekly visit by which our house gets cleaned, but apparently there was a serious problem with our heating so they came into my room where I was hiding behind a locked door. They spent a while there and left 45 minutes before my train was scheduled to leave even though I kept indicating that I was exhausted and had a train to catch. I was seriously shaking at this point, and it didn’t stop until dinner.
So I rushed to get everything together and I tried on a sweater because I had only worn it once before and I wanted to make sure it still fit appropriately, which it did. Now here’s the big mistake: I somehow managed to miss putting the sweater in my bag and merely put it on the kitchen table. So I literally forgot to pack my outfit for Friday. This is the first time this has happened, so what a great first impression to make, wearing the same clothes 2 days in a row. But don’t worry, I packed underwear and 2 pairs of socks, which I didn’t even need because I was wearing my red Mary Janes.
I then met Josh and his parents at Gare du Midi in Brussels where they tried a gaufre for the first time. It’s a very important thing to do if you’re in Belgium for the first, third, or twelfth time. We then dropped my stuff off at Josh’s apartment and then went to find a restaurant that Josh’s program director Michelangelo recommended. It was really delicious, but once again I don’t get why European portions are so gigantic. I couldn’t even put a dent in my delicious chicken waterzooie even though I refrained from eating bread to save room. Although please note that I did eat some vegetables including and limited to broccoli and carrots. Parents, if you’re reading this please note that essentially Josh’s parents covered this whole trip for me. I merely paid for half of my tickets there and back. Therefore à thank you notes.
I could not sleep that night at all, despite how tired I was. This resulted in me having a hard time getting up the next morning.
Friday/early Saturday:
As some Belgian boys said, Brugge is more of a museum than a town. We were there on Good Friday, so church exploring was slightly more difficult. We walked through it, saw old buildings and such, but I didn’t find it more impressive than other Belgian or Dutch towns, actually. In fact, I didn’t get a full-on medieval feel from it. We left early and went to Gent, which is a hidden treasure. It’s a legit city and has a lot to see and we had dinner there. I didn’t bring my camera, so I don’t have my own pictures from either city. Although 3 high school students in Gent gave us the cutest impromptu tour of the city. It ended up being quite rainy, which has been a frequent problem over the past week in the region. This includes all over France, the Netherlands, Belgium, and I imagine the surrounding countries as well. The weather has truly been miserable and much colder than usual, 30’s and 40’s.
I just do not get want prompts Eurolines to say that the 22:45 direct bus from Brussels to Lille arrives at midnight considering it has never been close and we always make a long, unnecessary expected stop. There is no reason the bus ride should be that long, but we arrived at 00:37, meaning I had most definitely missed the last metro, which should come around 00:28. So then it was a 15-minute walk for me to Hillary’s apartment where I would stay for a few hours. We woke up at 5 and I took the metro home at 5:50. At 6:15 I finally got to take a shower, but had to leave at 7:00 to get to the bus to take us to Disneyland Paris. Now you can see why I’m so exhausted and why this day off is so necessary.