A Cold, Rainy, Sick Day in Brussels

It's been awhile since I've last posted--I think about two weeks, so I'm going to remedy that fact today. I guess I'll talk about the trip I took two weekends ago (seems like a long time now) to Brussels, Belgium. Bianca, Johnny, Josh, and I were planning on taking day trips that weekend to Brussels, Bruges and Gent, and Luxembourg. We decided to head out Friday morning to Brussels. I started feeling under the weather that morning which wasn't helped by the fact that it was cold and rainy the day we traveled to Brussels. I manned up though and decided to go anyway.

A Brussels waffle up close and a Liege waffle in the background

Brussels, to me, seemed to have a more American city feel to it. This was probably because I saw more skyscrapers here than in any other city I've traveled to so far--including London. When we left the train station, the first thing we did was look for a place to eat some nice waffles and drink hot chocolate. Belgium is famous for its waffles and chocolate. We found a place relatively close to the train station and ate some of the most delicious waffles I've ever tasted. There were some Hispanic guys at the cafe with us too; I think they were Argentinian and I got to practice some of my Spanish with them. It didn't go so great. lol I write Spanish better than I can speak it.  

Part of the EU Headquarters

We got lost for a bit trying to find the tourist information office. We walked in circles for a while before finding the office in one of the huge buildings that lined the Grand Market square. I asked a lady at the info booth how to get to the European Union building because I really wanted to take a tour there. After getting directions, we decided to take a bus there. The bus driver didn't speak a word of English (they speak mainly French in Brussels) and I had to end up pointing to the place on the map we wanted to go. When we arrived at the European Union building, I thought it was pretty cool. It wasn't awe-inspiring but simply elegant and aesthetically pleasing in my opinion. Apparently on Fridays the EU does tours only at 10 am and it was already around 1 pm, so we didn't get to go inside. At least we have some good pictures of the outside!

One of the many waffle vans we saw while walking.

Instead of taking a bus back to where we were, we decided to explore by simply walking back. We took lots of pictures on the way and got to see several touristy spots. Apparently Belgium has a king and we got some great pictures of his palace. Once we got back to where we started, we shopped around a bit. We saw sooo many chocolate shops while we were there! It was also Valentine's Day weekend, so all the chocolate shops were decked out in red, pink, and white. There is a place called Agora which had over a 100 stores inside and we decided to check it out. It was pretty much a bazaar on the inside and we were heckled by Middle-Eastern, Indian, Pakistani men left and right. After our bizarre experience in the bazaar (I'm so witty tee hee), we decided to look for a place to grab a quick bite to eat. No one was really that hungry but we all agreed to a light meal. We found an alleyway that was lined with restaurants and decided to check it out. We experienced heckling in a new form. Apparently for 10-12 Euros, you could get a free drink, an appetizer, an entree, and dessert. All the restaurants were offering just about the same thing. I even got a business card from (what I'm sure is his real name) "Mr. Satisfaction" who offered us a wonderful deal that we had already heard about 5 times before we reached him. Fortunately, some of the hecklers realized we were just there to look around and didn't bother us, which made things a lot easier and we got out of that alley as quickly as we could. We settled on a sandwich place elsewhere that had a deal of a drink and sub for only 5-6 euros. This was our best option since none of us were really that hungry. 

After lunch we did some more walking. Johnny wanted to see the Atomium, which is basically a giant steel atom. We got lost several times trying to find it. We walked a lot that day but ended up taking lots of pictures so I guess it was worth it. We never did find the Atomium. By 4 I was exhausted and feeling very ill. The other three decided to call it a day as well and so we headed back. We hopped onto two different trams without paying the fare and rode them to a different train station. Totally beat walking back to the train station we arrived at. From there we took a train back to Maastricht. Thus ended our trip to Brussels.
 Saturday and Sunday I stayed in Maastricht to convalesce. It sucked but luckily my fever broke on Saturday, leaving me able to get some stuff done on Sunday. I'm so glad I decided to take a day trip instead of booking a hostel. I wouldn't have wanted to get sick in a hostel. That would have been awful and a waste of money.

Leaving Brussels for Maastricht

One Night and Day in Amsterdam

There's a saying: When in Dam, do as the damned. The city that puts Las Vegas to shame definitely lived up to the expectations that were placed on it.  I went to Amsterdam last weekend with several guys from our Maastricht group and two girls. We left Thursday around 6ish in order to catch the train. It's about a two hour trip. On the way, one of the girls lost her passport and credit card--talk about drama. Good thing she had money on her and her EuroRail. She wouldn't have been able to come back so easily.

When we arrived in Amsterdam, it was already dark.  We left the train station having no clue where we were going. We had to stop and ask for directions quite a few times and finally decided to have dinner at a nice pizza place that I forgot the name of. That night we nearly got run over several times by bicycles and most of the city smelled of weed. There was a coffeeshop on almost every corner! (exaggerated slightly) Amsterdam definitely is the weed capital of the world. A group of guys and I booked a hostel for our one night stay in Amsterdam. The hostel was called Youth Hostel Meeting Point, which sounds like a weird name for a hostel. The inside of the hostel was even more sketch. We were in a room that bedded about 18 other people. We met two guys while we were there, I shall refer to them as "G" and Nathan. G was from England and I believe he was Indian--maybe Pakistani. Nathan looked like he was from Spanish descent but also from England. We decided to check out the nightlife of Amsterdam and invited G and Nathan to come with us.

Inside Paridiso. It was packed!!

The first thing we did was try to catch up with some other guys who came before us. We spent most of the night trying to find them to no avail. We then decided to do some touring of our own. We saw the Red Light District--it was hard to miss, seeing as how our hostel was one street down from it. The Red Light District is more like a canal and several streets on either side of it. There was every type of girl imaginable on that street. Did you know that it only takes 50 Euros to have sex with one of the prostitutes? Disgusting. After the Red Light District, G said that he could lead us to the area where there was bound to be some clubs. In a nutshell, we got lost. Finally we took some taxis to a club called Paradisio, which was supposed to be one of the most popular clubs in Amsterdam. It was amazing. I've never been to a club that big before. The club was built inside an old church so the acoustics were great plus they had light shows going in time with the music. Great simply great. We must have left around 2:00 in the morning. I was really tired. I think I was falling asleep while dancing!

The tour guide, Michael

The next morning, the entire group of guys was together--minus G and Nathan, thankfully. We ate breakfast at a local restaurant that served really nice omelets. After breakfast, we partook in a free tour around the city of Amsterdam. The tour guide's name was Michael and he was originally from the Solomon Islands. He was hilarious and very informative. One of the things I learned is that the Netherlands government is trying to close down the Red Light District by buying up the windows that the women work in. Also, the government is making it such that foreigners will not be allowed to purchase weed.  Kind of ironic that the most liberal country in the world is trying to be a bit more conservative. I also learned that the first stock exchange was Dutch and saw the building where the Dutch East Indies Company did business. Some other interesting facts: Holland has a queen, Amsterdam is sometimes referred to as the Venice of the North, and the triple Xs do not have a naughty meaning. :) Also, Amsterdam was the only city where the citizens rose up against the Germans in defense of the Jews. That makes me think better of the city.

After the tour of the city, which took like three hours if you included the lunch break in between, some of the guys and I decided to tour the Anne Frank house. They wouldn't allow us to take pictures inside, but just to see the conditions that those people lived in, all packed in that small space, was worth it. I don't know if I could live in that place. I probably would have gotten claustrophobic. After seeing the Anne Frank house, we headed home and thus ended our trip to Amsterdam. I have to say, I was limping by the time we got on the train because of all the walking we did. My feet were so sore and I was glad to put them to rest for another two hours. To be honest, if I hadn't seen London first, I probably would have been more impressed with Amsterdam, but I certainly enjoyed my trip to the Devil's city. :)

One Week in Maastricht

Selexzy Bookstore

London was a blast but it was time to get back into the swing of things. For awhile I felt like I was on an extended vacation, but when we had orientation last Friday, I realized that all vacations must come to an end. Orientation was fun and I got to see where my classes would be held.  Maastricht University provided us with a free breakfast, and the info meeting was enlightening. I enjoyed hearing about the campus and I found myself liking it even more. There were somethings I didn't like though. Two of those things are that the campus buildings are spread across the city and there are no free gym facilities. Good thing I brought my P90X and have a bike. Last Friday we also visited the Selexyz Bookstore, which is one of the most famous bookstores in the world. It is built inside an old Dominican church and is simply amazing. On top of that, we ate at a really nice Dutch restaurant inside a shopping mall that had some great food.

On Saturday we toured the WWII memorial that the Dutch built to honor American soldiers who died attempting to free the Netherlands from the Germans. It was a very beautiful cemetery, but the wind chill made the trip less enjoyable. We also toured the city of Valkenburg, which is small quaint town about 6 miles from Maastricht. The reason why it is famous is because the Red Bull Crashed Ice 2011 would be held there and also there are catacombs that are the exact replica of the ones under Rome--without the dead bodies. We got to tour the catacombs which weren't that interesting. We each had a candle and I was tempted to burn the walls. The only fun part of the catacomb tour was that we were given the opportunity to go through a section of the catacombs without any light. Now that was fun. It was crazy to be robbed of your sense of sight and having to feel the walls. I never ever would want to go through those catacombs without any light, but apparently if you want to work as a tour guide there, you have to go through the catacombs without a light and make it out in under 2 hours!! That's insane. 

WWII Memorial Cemetery

Sunday was pretty uneventful. I wanted to go to a Catholic Church but was pretty unsuccessful because I woke up too late. So Sunday ended up being the day when I finished my laundry and started getting ready for my classes tomorrow. Of course it was my last day of my vacation so I treated it accordingly as well. ;) My first official day of school was this past Monday. I only have one class on Mondays and I didn't have a bike yet, so I walked to class with some other students. Good thing I have a bike now because walking to class takes about 15-20 minutes. Brief digression: Maastricht courses only run from M-TH, which means I have Fridays off every weekend! Awesome right? Now back on track: My first teacher was amazing and a little crazy. She had an interesting sense of humor and a very thick accent. The name of the class was International Relations. The great thing about Maastricht classes is that there can be a 15 minute coffee break, which is awesome because each class is about 2 hours long! Around 1:00 PM I got my bike and started touring Maastricht on my own. It was a little scary at first to be riding on lanes that ran between cars and buses but fortunately I had no accidents that day. I got lost a few times but overall it was a good way to explore the city.

Since they don't serve us lunch--only breakfast and dinner--I decided to eat at a local Dutch fast-food joint. There I had fries covered with some interesting sauce and horse meat and a chicken burger. That was my first time tasting horse meat. I don't know how I feel about it. It was delicious with the sauce though.

My chicken burger and fries with horse meat sauce. Yum

On Tuesdays I have two classes, International Management and French History. Back to back. Which sucks because my IM class is in the CES (study abroad) building and my French History class is in the Guesthouse (where I'm staying) and I only have 15 minutes to get from one place to the other. Fortunately my bike makes things a lot easier. I've mentioned my bike a few times--for a reason. I'm going to digress a little bit and tell you why bikes are so important: Most Dutch people bike everywhere. In fact, bikes have the right of way over pedestrians, which means it is very easy to get run over by a bike.  Luckily that hasn't happened yet but it has almost happened a few times. Now back to my original story. My IM teacher is 26 years old and looks like a student. In fact, I thought she was a student until she entered our class with the study abroad director from Maastricht University. She brought apple pie for the class, which was amazing, and told us that for the next few weeks, we would teach the class to each other. Talk about a game-changer. My group volunteered to go first, so on Thursday we had to present Chapter 1. After International Management came French History: Revolution/Napoleon. Dr. Longfellow, the program director, lectured this class. I found the subject interesting but I wasn't too keen about the lecture.

My Wednesday International Relations class got moved to Thursday meaning I had a whole day of nothing. Unfortunately I slept in, missing breakfast, which apparently is hot on Wednesdays. Normally we have cold breakfasts, so this was a bummer. My roommate and I decided to go shopping for some groceries because we can cook food in our dorm rooms. I bought some vlees (pork) chops and had a delicious, cheap lunch. Cooking our own meals saves us more money in the long run, especially since we are not provided lunch on weekdays or any meals on weekends. I spent my Wednesday relaxing and working with my group for IM because we were presenting tomorrow.

I had three classes total on Thursday because my IR class was temporarily switched to Thursday. I don't know how I made it through each class that day. Of course my IM class was fun--I got to teach. My French History class was a bore and by 12:45 I was ready to fall asleep, only to realize I had  to cook lunch and head to my IR class. Thursday's lecture was pretty interesting--when I wasn't falling asleep. We were talking about the framework in which to discuss International Relations, sounds fun right? Now you know why I was falling asleep. Good thing I had something to look forward to. Two hours after that class, I packed my bags and headed with some friends to Amsterdam. I'll save that story for another blog. :)