Belgian waffle hunt

          Yesterday, I went to Brussels with a different group of girls, on a mission to get some authentic Belgian waffles. Go to Belgium, eat Belgian waffles- simple in theory, right? Unfortunately there were some mishaps. At our stop in Brussels, the train doors were open for a grand total of 45 seconds, during which the guy blocking my way out (He was a European backpacker who has clearly not been choosing hostels with showers… we later dubbed him Sir Smelly) took his sweet time getting his backpack down from the luggage rack. When he was finally done, Amy and Aislinn were off the train, and Alana and I were inching behind Sir Smelly towards the doors, which tragically closed when we were five feet away from them, sending us to the next train stop 10 minutes away, against our will and separated from the other two. We made the most of it though, and eventually got back to the right station- little did we know, Amy and Aislinn had taken a train to follow us; we probably crossed paths inside trains at some point.  We ventured out of the station and wandered the streets in eerie silence- it didn’t feel like Europe at all right outside the station, it felt like downtown Houston after the apocalypse.

TALL, shiny office buildings + complete silence + spooky clouds...

          The only people we encountered for quite a while were some women (actually I’m pretty sure one was in fact a man...) in short, tight dresses, and heavy makeup, working the street corners. You would think 11:15 on a Sunday morning is not the opportune time for this kind of business…hmm. It was strange. Alana said we should give them the benefit of the doubt, because they might be waiting for a bus to take them to the Lord’s house for Sunday church service. And maybe they were.

Gorgeous churches are a recurring theme so far.

         

See?

          After 45 minutes of wandering aimlessly without a map, asking the few other people we saw (by the way, almost NOTHING is open here on Sundays… whoops) where we could find an open waffle place (in French, yay!), we made it to the pretty part of Brussels- the Grande Place, I think.  We finally stopped at an adorable cafe after making sure they served waffles.  We sat outdoors with a great view and fully enjoyed our authentic Belgian waffles- complete with fruit, which makes them a nutritious meal, right? :)

The view from our table.

Waffle success!!!

 After that, we just walked around and took it all in, taking lots of pictures.  The Grand Place is beautiful, and there are lots of boutiques, pretty hotels, and little overpriced chocolate shops surrounding it. 

The beautiful Grand Place-  I think this is a museum.

Brussels town hall, also in the Grand Place

A hotel and restaurant- I liked all the flowers.

          We even saw a begging dog- I don't mean the way Karli and Dixie beg for food, I mean with an actual tip jar, he was adorable!  The strange thing was that he didn't have a human near him that I could see; he or she must have been hiding.  Nevertheless, this seemed to be a creative, and very effective begging strategy. 

He has to be very well trained!  Precious.

          After a little while, Alana and I decided that, though Brussels was seemingly trying to make nice with us (a bit too late), it was time to head back.  I feel like I didn't really see all that I should have, but we were so frustrated and ready to get home.  I guess I'll just have to go back there sometime during my stay here- luckily it's only an hour and a half away.  On our train from Liege to Maastricht, we ran into tons of Baylor people, so we all took a bus back to the guest house to avoid walking in the freezing rain.  Again... I just can't believe it can be this icky and cold in AUGUST!
           Today, I slept in a bit, got some groceries, and have mostly just been working on homework and group projects.  Tomorrow starts week two of classes, and though I am very excited to be back in the classroom after what feels like a very long break (I am loving this whole four day weekend thing...), I'm even more excited about the fact that there are less than four days until I go to Paris!  I can't wait!

Amsterdam!

          For my first weekend of travel, I didn't want to venture too far away from Amsterdam, and most people seemed to feel the same way. Plus, there are so many cool places close to Maastricht! I left early Friday morning to go with a group of girls to Amsterdam for the day- it's about a 2.5-hour train ride. We were all so tired that we slept on the way. It was drizzling and FREEZING once we got to Amsterdam- I can't believe it is like this already in August, it makes me scared about being here in November. I am, like most Louisiana/Houston natives, a huge baby about cold weather. But, Amsterdam was beautiful despite the gloomy skies. We had an encounter with this pigeon whisperer/ Dutch Dumbledore wannabe, ate lunch, and then wandered around the canals- I love the water and the style of architecture!

Pigeon Wizard- I think he is casting a spell on the poor things.

One of many canals!

Cute canal houses

          We walked through a flower market then waited to get into the Anne Frank house. It took about an hour, but was so worth it if you put it into this perspective- we wait an hour for roller coasters all the time, and this wait was to get a perspective of how this brave, now world-famous girl actually lived during those awful years. I read her diary a long time ago and don't remember many details, but the hiding place was a lot larger than I had imagined- multiple bedrooms and bathrooms and a kitchen/living room, all hidden behind a bookcase. I got chills when I saw that the posters and news clipping she glued to the walls of her bedroom were still there.

With Anne Frank's statue outside her house

          After the Anne Frank house, we just wandered around some for the rest of the afternoon and saw pretty churches, a mall that could easily be mistaken for a palace, and just a tiny bit of the red light district which is both fascinating and disheartening.

Can you believe this is the local mall?!

Inside of the mall... America needs to try harder.

          We headed back to the train station, stopping for some yummy pizza on the way. One thing I knew about Amsterdam but still wasn’t prepared for: there is marijuana EVERYWHERE! You can smell it from the street and it reeks so badly! I find it funny that they call the places where you are allowed to buy and smoke it “coffee shops” even though I doubt they actually sell much coffee. So, if you are in Amsterdam and want a latte, go to a “café”, not a “coffee shop”! :) After some minor train confusion, we made it back to Maastricht.

          On Saturday, we went back to Amsterdam (we just didn’t want to spend the night there). It was gloomy and chilly again, but I was better prepared for it. We had lunch and went to the Rijksmuseum, which was really cool.

Rijksmuseum- they are doing construction/remodeling on part of it.

          My favorite thing was seeing Dutch paintings of Amsterdam from the 1600’s, and realizing that the houses along the canals in the painting have hardly changed since then. Next was the Van Gogh museum- very cool! Starry Night was not there but we saw several others of his famous paintings, and even a few Monets and Cezannes, which made me happy because although I don’t know much about art, I do love the French impressionists. We wandered around some more and though it may not seem like we did much, we were exhausted, so we headed back and got into Maastricht just in time to see the sun setting.

Wonderful day, wonderful sunset.

Loving Maastricht!

Hello from Maastricht this time!  As noted above, I love it here so far.  My flight went well, despite the fact that I just could not fall asleep no matter what, and we landed around 8 in the morning Amsterdam time- which is 1 in the morning Houston time! Literally my very first glimpse of this country from the plane window after we finally got through the thick clouds was a windmill- but not a traditional one, a very modern one in the middle of the ocean... strange. Going through customs and baggage claim was quicker and easier than I expected, then we all headed out into the rainy morning to meet our buses. It was a two and a half hour ride from Amsterdam to Maastricht and it was BEAUTIFUL- the Dutch countryside is full of fields that are irrigated with canals and populated with some of the happiest looking cows I've ever seen. Well, that may be my imagination, but I sure would be happy to live in such a pretty place. And of course, there were also plenty of windmills. The bus driver was apologizing for the traffic and saying it was because we were on the biggest highway in the Netherlands, but really it was nothing compared to Houston or even Waco, and the highway was comparable to Highway 6 between Houston and Waco, so I thought that was funny. The ride seemed to go quickly, and we stopped at this "rest stop" to get lunch, and it was gorgeous! It was like a gas station and convenience store, with a Burger King, but there was also a cafeteria attached a sunroom with a large tree in the middle of it, so we all sat down to relax and eat our omlettes, soups, and sandwiches and marvel at the fact that the American lifestyle is so rushed that nothing like this exists. We drove for a while after lunch, then arrived in Maastricht and unloaded everything at our dorm, called the Guest House- really it is in a separate wing of what seems to be a hospital, so that has been interesting. The room is decently sized and sunny, and has a little kitchen area, so that's nice!

Our room!

                                                                  
My roommate's name is Brittany, and I think we will become great roommates and friends. After we unpacked, we went on a "short" (15 minute) walk to the grocery store and other shops- it's actually set up like a mall which is cool. Here, you have to bag your own groceries and weigh your own produce. I was too exhausted to think about what I needed so I didn't get anything for now, but I'll probably be back there soon. Then, a group of us went out to dinner at Nora's, a pizza place. They had a student special and we weren't quite sure what it was because it was in Dutch but it included fries and a drink all for only 5 euros so we all just went for it because we were feeling adventurous, and also, we are learning to save euros wherever we can. :) It turned out to be a kebab (still unsure about what kind of meat it contained...) and it was alright but not my favorite. Then some people went out exploring, but I went back to the room with another group because I was so tired! The bed isn't fancy but seemed very comfortable after a long day and a half of traveling!

The walk home was so pretty!

We got to start day two a little bit later than we normally will. I went with Brittany and some other people to a bakery and had a delicious raisin... bun? I'm not really sure what you'd call it but it was yummy. Then we had orientation at Maastricht University. The University is really neat, because it's spread out in unique buildings throughout the old part of the city. The auditorium we were in seemed to have once been a church, which is very likely because apparently there are so many churches here and so few people that go to church, so the old church buildings are converted for other uses.

Inside a UM bulding

After the orientation we had pie and coffee, then a short tour of another UM building, then lunch very soon afterward- I like their priorities here, dessert before lunch :) We had a break after lunch before we were to meet up for a city tour, so we returned to the Guest House to get our Eurail passes to be validated later.  We cut it a little too close on time though, and had to jog back to the UM building.  However, it all became worth it when a car full of Dutch guys pulled up next to us in their dainty little European car and asked us a question in Dutch. We just kept jogging and yelled "Sorry, we don't speak Dutch!" and they got all upset and drove off and yelled "Sorry? Jehkks!" I'm assuming he meant "jerks"? At any rate, we thought it was hilarious and proceeded to call each other "jehkks" for the rest of the afternoon.

We made it just in time to catch up with the tour group before they turned around a corner to start the tour, success!!! Our guide was a sweet, older Dutch lady who spoke very good, if quiet, English, and was SO informative about everything we saw! It blows me away that this city has such a rich history compared to everywhere I've ever been and lived- Maastricht is the oldest city in the Netherlands! The guide kept talking about things that are still here from when the city was founded by Romans, which is pretty amazing to me.

Buildings this pretty are fairly typical here... it's wonderful.

A mill and little waterfall... and I found a lion! <>

Entrance to the UM library

The ancient city walls

Flowers in the windowbox AND heart shaped widows... the Dutch are adorable!

We saw more beautiful churches, and even a church that has been turned into the coolest bookstore ever.

Tower of the Red Church.

The church/bookstore, possibly my favorite place so far.

The tour ended on the bridge over the river Maas, which seems to connect the old, historical part of Maastricht, with the newer, but still beautiful part that contains all the shopping centers and lots of restaurants.

The river Maas

Along the river

The train station is right by the bridge, so Aislinn, Amy and I went to validate our Eurail passes, exchange money, and you know, make a quick stop in Belgium :) We took a train from Maastricht to Liege, Belgium, because that is the closest station with an international service counter where we could reserve tickets to go to Paris next weekend. It was really cool, because even though it is only thirty minutes away, EVERYONE there speaks French, while no one in Maastricht seems to- everyone here speaks Dutch. So, I got to use my French earlier than I expected to (HAD to, actually- the man only spoke a couple of English words). We got the tickets and came back to Maastricht, where we realized we weren't sure how to get back to the Guest House. Luckily, we pointed out enough silly things on the tour that we were able to retrace our steps- things like a light up neon Elvis sign in a window that said "To-night?". Haha. I'm just thankful we made it back.

During the scavenger hunt/ memory game/ walk home

After a looong day of walking, we just called it a day and went to our rooms to rest up for our first day of classes.

It's Wednesday afternoon here, so I'm almost finished with my first day of classes- more about them later, this is already so long! For now I will just say that I love them, and that Dr. Baker and Dr. Abell (my professors) are some of the most interesting people I've ever met and I am so excited to learn from them!

lotts of love from Maastricht,
Allison

Hi from Houston, one last time

Hi, and thanks for stopping by my blog!  I never thought I would say that because I’m not really a blogging kind of person, and I’m not the best writer and definitely not the best photographer, but I thought this would be the best way to share travel stories and photos from my semester abroad with friends and family who are interested.   At 3:40 PM today, I will be leaving Houston on a really big plane headed for Amsterdam... and I can’t believe it!  I’ve been dreaming about and planning for this for almost a year, so it’s crazy that the day is finally here.  Of course I’m a little nervous (okay, fine- a LOT nervous) because I’ve got travel jitters combined with first day of school jitters combined with making new friends jitters.  So, all of that makes for one jittery girl!  But at the same time, I’m completely excited, because I know this will be such a wonderful adventure.   For about the next two months I’m going to be studying in Maastricht, which is at the southern tip of the Netherlands.  Only two months?!  Yes!  One of the great things about this study abroad program is that classes only last until the end of October, and then we will get three weeks of independent travel around Europe before we all come back to the US as a group right before Thanksgiving.  Also, classes are only three days a week, which leaves four days each week during the first two months for MORE travel around Europe.  It won’t be easy though- it’s a pre-med trip and I am taking 15 hours of upper level biology and medicine-related classes, so there will be tons of information packed into our short class time.  The Baylor professors going with us like to say that we work hard and play hard.  I can’t wait! 

I’m up early this morning in hopes that I’ll be tired enough to sleep on the plane… we’ll see about that.  My wonderful Nana and Aunt Kee Kee and cousins Cooper and Sarah Grace came from Louisiana to see me for the weekend and help with my preparations, and they have indeed been SUCH a huge help!  Kee Kee taught me how to pack super efficiently, and seriously, you should see my suitcase.  It has vacuum bags involved.  And my new backpack… oh my goodness, it’s huge.  I feel like I could use it to go on a two-week hike through a forest in the Rockies and be perfectly comfortable and well fed.  And who knows, maybe eventually I will.  But both bags have (hopefully…) everything I’ll need, and are under 50 pounds, yay!  Thanks, Kee Kee!  And thanks Nana, for all the “oh, I just need these three more things, and then I’m REALLY done” trips to Target and Katy Mills.   So last night we had a huge family dinner with all of my grandparents, plus Kee Kee, Cooper and Sarah Grace in attendance, complete with a huge cake- my last thing I will get to bake for quite a while (if you know me, you know that’s a big deal for me… I will miss baking so much!).  I felt so special to get such a grand farewell!  After everyone heads back to Louisiana this morning, I’ll finish up a few last things, then ride out to the airport with Mom, Dad, and Nick.  We may even stop for one last delicious tex-mex meal on the way, because that’s one thing I’ll miss about Texas!  And then I will be off to Amsterdam, and then by bus to Maastricht- I’ll talk to y’all when I get there!