March 3, 2008

(Just a warning, this is going to be a long post)

I got back yesterday from a week of traveling with the program. We were in Brussels from Sunday 2/24 to Weds 2/27 and Paris from Weds 2/27 to Sunday 3/2.

We'll start with Brussels:
We got there on Sunday after a long day of traveling and walked about twenty mins from the train station to the hotel. We were a little nervous because we had all heard mixed reviews of the city and the walk from the train station to the hotel looked like we were walking through Queens. We got to the hotel and headed out to explore the city.

Well, we were wrong about the city. It was awesome. A few of us headed out to explore, and somehow found ourselves sitting at an outdoor cafe drinkin Hoegardden (a great beer) on tap. After some more walking, we picked up some bottles of wine for the night and went back to the hotel to drink and chill for a while. We ended up gettin a bit drunk and feasting on real Belgian waffles and fries for dinner.

Monday we woke up and headed to the European Commission, a division of the European Union. We had a few really interesting lectures and then were free for the afternoon. We headed out to explore further and found the Grand Place, the main square. It was unbelievably stunning and we were all taken back by it. Then we went back to nap in the hotel and get ready for the night. That night we met up with Kellen's friend who happened to be there with his study abroad program and a group of 10 of us got dinner in this small alley with great deals on three course meals with the famous mussels from brussels. After, we headed to this amazing bar called Delerium Cafe with over 2000 beers available. Needless to say, it was a good night.

Tuesday we woke up early and were quite unhappy and a bit hungover, but headed out to the Free University of Brussels for a day of lectures. The lectures were horrible and boring, and the rain and wind outside only added to the unhappiness. Finally, around 5pm we finished up school stuff, and headed back to the hotel. There we crashed for a bit, and then met back up with Kellen's friend and grabbed dinner at a great Vietnamese place. Then, it was back to Delerium cafe for a crazy night where nearly the two entire study abroad programs were present. From there we headed to a really smoky tiny Irish bar with a small dance floor and danced until like 2:30am. We left, and had to drag Greta home cause she was a bit drunk hahah but it was all fun.

Weds we woke up quite tired and eventually headed out to the train station. We got into Paris around 4 and crashed for a bit. Then we got up and me, Chris, Greta, and Kellen headed out to explore. Our hotel was in the Sacre Coeur area, not a great area. We headed up to the church (Sacre Coeur), which is on the top of a hill that overlooks the whole city. We grabbed dinner in a really cute French cafe and then decided we had to go see the Eiffel Tower. After a bit of confusion on the Metro and a long walk down by the river, we finally found it and it was well worth the walk. At about 11pm we went back to the hotel and crashed.

On Thursday, we woke up early and went to a meeting at UNESCO (United Nations Education, Social, and Cultural Organization) where a guy talked to us about the Education policies and efforts of UNESCO. At about 11am we finished up and Chris, Kellen, Greta, Kat, Steph and I headed out to explore. We went to a cafe and grabbed some crepes for lunch and then went to Notre Dame. It was really impressive, but really crowded because it was rainy and ugly outside. From there Kat, Kellen, Chris, and I decided to go to the Pompidou, the modern art museum, and walked around for a few hours. After feeling fully confused by most of the art, we met back up with Steph and Greta and decided to go the Catacombs (the old old Paris buried underneath the streets). After about an hour ride on the metro, we arrived to find out that they are closed for renovation. So we went back to the hotel and chilled. We drank a bit and finally headed out around 9:30pm to the Latin Quarter for some dinner. After dinner we met up with a few of Stephs friends and went to a small bar for a few hours. Wasn't super exciting but fairly chill.

Friday morning we woke up early again, and had a few people speak to us on French foreign policy. The first speaker was everything stereotypical about French people, very arrogant and responded to every questions with "France is amazing and doing everything amazing" more or less. The second speaker spoke to us about the attempt to create a Mediterranean Union for economic and cooperative help which was fairly interesting.
After the lectures, we grabbed lunch over by the Louvre and I had my first croquette monsieur (ham and cheese toasted, its a French specialty). Then we headed into the Louvre which was, of course, amazing. It is unbelievably huge and I probably could have spent about 5 days looking at everything in it. But we saw the obligatory Mona Lisa and Winged Victory, and walked around for a few hours. After we grabbed some desert crepes and went back to the hotel.
That night, nobody really wanted to go out, but me, Greta, Kat, and Steph went to meet up with Steph's friends at a bar. Here we got some pitchers of beer and taught some French guys how to play beer pong (and then thoroughly beat them). Steph got pretty drunk and inaugurated the trip with the first vomit on the Metro (it was pretty gross haha).

Saturday morning was a bit rough, but we woke up around 9 and decided to head out to Versailles. Me, Chris, Kat, Kellen, and Ava all went and bought our train tickets and Palace tickets together, which proved to save a lot of time in the end. I wish I could even begin to describe the place. It was easily the coolest man-made thing I have ever seen. To even imagine that somebody spent the time and money to build a place like that is absurd. I'll post links to the pictures, because words really cannot do it justice.
Saturday night was Leah's 21st birthday so we all went to this cool bar called the Lizard Lounge and drank for a while. In typical American 21st style, Leah got drunk and puked on the streets of Paris, ahhh what a birthday story haha.

Sunday morning we woke up late, nearly missed the train back home, but caught it at nearly the last minute. We got back around 5pm. The week was great. Not only did we see a ton of stuff, but it was nice to get really close with a small group of people. It was hard to do everything as a large group, so we were forced to hang out with smaller groups. I really can't describe everything I saw and hopefully my pictures will do justice to the amazing this I saw. Brussels was awesome and way underrated, and Paris was - well, Paris!