This was one of my most relaxed and chill weekends.  As Luxembourg and Belgium weren’t on my “list” and I had nothing in particular I HAD to see there (I’d just heard good things about them) I got to just relax and enjoy these 2 beautiful medieval cities.

But first…..Thursday night, about 10 of us went to this awesome club down by the train station.  It was a Thursday night and there were hundreds of people there!  And it was a special hip-hop night so they were playing all the good stuff.  There was only one German song the whole time we were there, the rest was American rap (or Black Music, as they call it here…..weird huh?)   Anyway, I met this really hot German guy….and uh…..yeah, that’s all I’ll say about that….you can ask me if you want to hear the details. J

I traveled with Lindsay, Kara, and Scott.  We left for Luxembourg Friday morning and had a few mix-ups with the trains (you’d think we would have this down by now!) and got to Luxembourg City 2 hours later then we’d planned….around 4 in the afternoon.  We just walked around, exploring the city.  Luxembourg began as a fortress, then stuff was built up around it, and now it’s a very small country!  Anyway, there are still remains of a lot of the walls….which are huge!  We had a great dinner at a Mexican restaurant called Chi-Chis.  It was the first time I’ve had Mexican food while over here and it was surprisingly delicious!  And it was half-price margaritas since it was happy hour, so that was exciting!  Afterwards, we wandered some more, then headed back to the train station to catch our 8:50 train.  Again we had a mix-up with the trains, and ended up not getting to Bruges in Belgium until 1AM.  The buses had stopped running and it was a long walk to our hostel.  Luckily, we ended up meeting this very nice businessman on his way back from a trip who just happened to live by our hostel and was walking that way and would show us the way!  He gave us a great tour of Bruges along the way!

The next day, we just wandered around Bruges the whole time.  Bruges is a small, beautiful town with buildings that have amazing architecture….every house, every store, every building period….is beautiful!  There are also lots of canals and we took a nice canal tour later on.  We had waffles for all 3 meals…..they are so good!  Real Belgium waffles are nothing like they are in the States.  You can get sugar, chocolate syrup, fruit, ice cream, and more on it.  I had like 5 throughout the day.  That night, we went to a couple bars, trying out Bruges’ unique drinks.  I had peach beer (yeah, I know…weird….but it was so good!)  Sangria, a green apple Genever, and a pear Genever (they’re shots, but they’re so good, you can sip them with only a slight burn!)

The hostel we stayed in Friday and Saturday night was interesting…..we were in a room with like 10 other people and there was one tiny, dirty bathroom with 1 sink, shower, and toilet for like 25 people.  But hey, it’s good to experience all kinds.  There was a guy at the reception who had the most awesome and disgusting dreads I’ve ever seen….and he was white!

We left Sunday morning and had a long trip back, getting back just in time to take a quick shower before going to our thanksgiving dinner at Essig Haus (the restaurant we eat at every night).  5 people had their parents here visiting, so with the teachers and staff, we had like 75 people!  We had turkey with cranberry sauce, mashed potatoes and gravy, green beans, sweet potatoes, and corn, but no stuffing!  Stuffing’s my favorite so I was disappointed!  It was weird not having thanksgiving with all my relatives too!

When you all are eating your thanksgiving dinner, I’ll be on an overnight train from Stanraer to the Isle of Skye in Scotland!  I leave on Tuesday afternoon for my thanksgiving break trip to the UK and won’t be back until the next Wednesday.

So, you’ll hear from me sometime after that……have a wonderful thanksgiving!

I’m thankful for every day here.

Love,

Christina