Two Months!

This week was a very special week for me for several reasons.
1. Today (10-15-2009) makes two months since I arrived in Belgium! Not yet fluent, but comeing along quite nicely...
2. I spent the weekend in Liege.

For those who don't know, my mother also spent her senior year of high school in Belgium. Unlike me, however, she went with AFS and, accordingly, there are some differences between our exchange experiences. For example, she had only one family that she spent her year with. She ended up growing extremely close with her host parents and when they heard that I was in Belgium, we set up a date to get together. As it turns out, they now have a grandson, Benj, a few years older than me, living with them temporarily. Because "Mami" and "Papi" are in their eighties now, Benj and I spent the weekend together, going to the great spots in Liege.






This is the outside of the house that my mother spent her exchange year in and where I spent my weekend.

















This is me with Mami and Papi. This was taken in the kitchen where there is a chair in each corner. Sunday afternoon, we were all sitting in one of the chairs (Mami, Papi, Benj, and me) and talking. I was absent-mindedly looking around the kitchen and happened to look over at Papi. He had been looking at me, smiling. He said (in French, of course, but for the sake of the blog, I'll write in in English), "It's been twenty-five years since your mother sat in that same chair."

This is Benj, on the right, and his cousin (in a way, he's my cousin, too), Axel. I'm in the back of Axel's TINY car. He actually has a different one, and he was really excited to find out that I share the same one with my mom in the States-a Volkswagon Bug.

We took many buses this weekend going from place to place. This is Benj on one of them, sitting across from me.

This is at the top of "the stairs" in Liege. Benj and I counted as we climbed them and found that there are exactly 333.

Even further up "the stairs" there is another set of only about 15 where one can find a great view of Liege.

Benj in front of the view.

This is the view of the stairs from the ground.

In this picture it looks so nice out and you can even see the sun shining through parted clouds; it's funny, because just after we got down, off the stairs, I felt a few raindrops. Benj swore under his breath, and I said, surprised, "what's wrong? It's only rain..." But before he finished saying "oh no, this isn't good..." it downpoured. Still now, thinking back, I don't understand how it happend. How it could have possiby gone from a light sprinkle to a straight downpour in less than ten seconds. We ended up running to a near-by art museum. We didn't go in, but it was a nice cover from the rain before Axel came to pick us up.

I have spent many truely incredible weekends (all thanks to my spectacular host parents) since I have been here in Belgium. I have been to Brussels, to Bruges, to Paris, Holand, to both the seas, and so much more; but this weekend in Liege I finally found something special, a sense of extended family. I can't wait to visit again.

But my week wasn't over yet! The following Tuesday night, the family went out the Brussels to see District 9 in it's original version with French subtitles. This was incredibly nice of my family and I was so happy to see it! We all agreed that it was a fantastic movie, extremely well made, and satisfyingly unique. I advise everyone to see it who hasn't.

Looking forward to the rest of my stay in Belgium!