Brussels

After a hot shower and a two hour nap, I felt it was time to get out and explore the town. Well that and I was starving at this point, having not really eaten for about 7 hours. The hotel we booked was in a great location; right in the center of town with all of the shops and restaurants fillings each and every alley. I changed clothes so that hopefully the same vendors I passed earlier in a horrible state wouldn't recognize me again. In my short walk I was lucky to find a halal gyro shop around the corner. I began to finally feel a little bit more comfortable in this place. Someone I could talk to in a friendly tone and even a common language (my rudimentary Arabic) made a huge difference on my comfort level.

My friends joined me at the hotel after a few hours, and then we truly began our Brussels experience. Amazing fresh Belgium waffles with nutella, bananas, strawberries and whipped cream.......mmmm I’m getting hungry just thinking about it again :-) Next we made our way down a restaurant filled alley to find a reasonable restaurant to eat dinner at. This was the point where I felt like I truly was in Europe; every restaurant had one designated waiter out front trying to convince us they had the best and cheapest menu in the city. At first we didn't realize how aggressive the waiters were, until we realized we had sat down at a table before even realizing we didn't like the menu. Needless to say, being poor law students (yes, poor but traveling Europe :-P ) we didn't mind getting up and finding another place. Turns out it was for the better. A few restaurants later I ran into a waiter that had actually helped me and my suitcases out earlier. He was an Arab Muslim that looked at me, and instantly recognized me from my frazzeled state earlier that day. And I thought I had cleaned up :( He directed us into the restaurant across the street that had an amazing vegetarian menu and tons of seafood dishes. And the best part? The first round of drinks were on the house bc the waiters were happy to see a Muslim. He kept calling me sister, asking if everything was ok, where we were from and other stuff. Almost a bit much especially when I was refered to as princess... Never the less, from that day forth if anyone sees an Arab in a store or restaurant, guess who gets to do the talking.


Sunday started off a bit better. With only one day to see the city, an open bus tour seemed to be the best use of our time. What didn't help was that the moment we bought the ticket, it started pouring. From the inside of the bus we saw a few sites, but just had no idea what anything was. The bus had a voice recording but the channel that was supposed to be English was incomprehendable. O well, it was stupid fun anyways. Especially when it stopped raining and we attempted to stand on the second level and take pictures of anything "pretty". There was tons of "omg i almost fell off the bus", getting hit by tree branches, getting hit by huge rain drops falling off trees, and me almost getting my head taken off as the bus went under a bridge (twice). Manys thanks to kay and natalie who dragged me down onto the seat each time.

Post bus tour there was more street wandering, last minute waffle eating, and tons of Belgium chocolate buying. We wanted to get to the Hague by the early evening so we'd have time to settle into our rooms. I never realized how much easier it is traveling with luggage when you have company. The four of us made an amazing team as we relayed our luggage down the train station stairs. It would have been a perfect scene from Amazing race. Two people carried one suitcase down, one stay at the bottom while the other ran back up to help carry down another suitcase, all the while a fourth person stood watching the luggage up top. It's great being entertainment for the locals, but we didn't care. We thought we were awesome with the speed and efficiency we worked with, having no experience with this or anything of the sort. Too bad Amazing Race only takes couples. The four of us were awesome.

Anwys, so my 24 hr Brussels’ saga came to a close as we rode through the countryside to arrive in the Hague. And what a sad end to a fun day. We arrived at our housing, eh hem sorry, more like a dorm only to find it musty, dirty, and really dingy. I'm sorry, did I add how it was much further away from school than what they originally told us? Ok, fine so this wasn't really the program's fault. The organization they work with who provided the housing messed up, but come on! This was simply disgusting. Let me put it this way, we don't use our kitchen (the one on our floor anwys) because we found mice poop and pee in the cabinets around the common pots and pans that were for our use. And it smelled like something died in there. My bathroom? Smells like pee. We've cleaned the toilet a few times. No one sits on it still.

Needless to say, that was just the beginning of the crappyness of this "dorm". A lot of people had non existent pillows, NO ONE had towels (as promised), we moved furniture to find insane amounts of dust and grime, o and worst of all, NO INTERNET!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

We complained, but unfortunately it wasn't our program's fault. We still blame them. Telling us this was a "beach house" just because we're a block from the boardwalk. Whatever. It still didn't make up for the crappy accommodations. Especially when we're sitting here knowing that the London Program, Turkey Program, and Chile Programs are staying in HOTELS! Nice nice HOTELS. We even got stuck with crappy weather, so big woopdy do! a beach we CANT USE.

Good night. i guess....