Christmas, Paris, and another month gone

I skipped out on my normal monthiversary post, so here it is a little late, four months down!!

The Grand Place in Brussels at Christmas

Normally, for a post such as this, I would give a broader summary of some of the things I've been up to in the past month, but this time's a little different. In part, because I actually don't remember where this last month started and the previous one ended, so I don't know where to draw the line, and also, because I have grander stories to tell. I'll start off with a little summary, just to keep the world back home informed. A few weeks ago, 2-3 I think, I took my "first semester" final exams. As obliged by my Rotary district here in Belgium, I only took four. In fact, due to a strike of the train system, I have yet to take the written portion of my Spanish exam, but that will come in January. Along with Spanish, I took the exam for my extracurricular French course, which I attend twice a week, the math exam, and, I know it sounds lame, but English as well. I have a few motives for my taking the easy way out there: 1) because of my French course, I miss two mornings of school a week, leaving me with less than adequate, and at times zero, knowledge for the exams in the other subjects, 2) I actually am learning things in English class, such as translations and extra verb tenses, and 3) it was the easy way out, and I am, most simply put, lazy. Anyway. I passed all of my classes this period, even Chemistry which I didn't do so well at last term, and will be returning to school soon to hopefully continue in this way. Enough about school. More exciting things are left to be told.

PARIS!!!
That's right. I went to Paris.This past week I went with my host father and brother to my host

Christmas Eve mass

grandparents' house in France. They live in a small town just about an hour out of Paris so it was easy to take the train into the city. Our first day, we visited the Louvre, where we saw the Mona Lisa, a ton of Greek and Roman statues, some sarcophagi, and a mummy. We also say Notre Dame, at least from the outside, and l'Arc de Triomphe. From the Arc, we walked down the Champs d'Elysee through a large Christmas Market to a huge Ferris Wheel at the end of the avenue. By the time we finished walking, it was dark, so the whole street was lit up with Christmas decorations. It was quite something. The next day, we went to Montmartre, and saw a great view of Paris from above, and the Musee Grevin, which is the Parisian version of Madame Tussauds. We took a bunch of selfies and such. Wednesday, Christmas Eve, we went to Versailles. It. Was. Huge. Nearly every ceiling had an extremely detailed mural, and carved statues in each corner. There was gold leaf on every gate, fence, and in almost every room. The beds were so high off the ground that one would either have to high jump, or climb a stepladder, just to go to sleep. It was the definition of opulence. That night, we went to Christmas mass in an old, huge cathedral. It was all in French, but it was

View of Paris at night, from above
(from the Eiffel Tower)

remarkably quite similar to the Christmas masses I've attended in the past: singing, praying, sitting, standing, even some of the lines were familiar, though in French. On Christmas Day, we stayed at home. In the morning we opened a few gifts, and we spent the rest of the day lounging around, eating treats, and all those good things. I also Skyped with my family in the evening, a great end to a great Christmas. On Friday, we went to the Musee d'Orsay, and I spent most of the time there in the impressionist exhibit seeing a bunch of Monet's, and in the Van Gogh room, where I mastered the art of sneaky picture taking. Then we headed to the Eiffel Tower, where we met my second, now current, host family. We went all the way to the very top and saw some amazing views. Plus, by the time we got all the way up, and started coming down, it was dark. The tower was all lit up, and so was the whole city. It was pretty much stunning. Saturday was our last day, so after packing up and

one last delicious French breakfast, we set off back to Belgium. We had just about crossed the border when it began to snow. This provided for several days of nice views out the window, it's starting to melt, but hopefully the nice views will continue. Upon my return from my neighboring country, I switched to my second host family. It's a very different environment than what I'm used to, as out of the five family members, four are girls. I'm quickly adjusting to the new house and family.

Anyway, I hope you have all been having a wonderful holiday season so far, and that it continues to be so. Hopefully I will be checking in soon with more fun stories to tell. As always, thanks for reading, and I hope you keep on doing so. Byeeeeee.

Thanksgiving, Snow, and Saint Nicolas

Thanksgiving Belgian style

'Tis the season, eh? I certainly have kept busy with all sorts of holiday happenings over the past week or so. Last Sunday, I went to Brussels to celebrate Thanksgiving with several of my American

Pumpkin pie made for me by
my host family

exchange student friends, plus one Australian and one Canadian. It was a bit of a struggle to find fresh cranberries over here, but with my host mom's help, find them we did. The meal was a great success, over all. We had turkey, stuffing, cranberry sauce, mashed potatoes, mac and cheese, this really weird but delicious pumpkin
dish, apple pie, caramel tart, and we made some spiced cider, and yeesh my mouth is watering just remembering all of it. It was perfect.

The only photo I managed to take
before it all melted

Over here in Fleurus, Belgique, we received our first snowfall this week. Sadly, it has, in fact, melted already, and the rain has returned. It was beautiful while it lasted, and the best part was the reaction of all the exchange students from the Southern Hemisphere. They took photos and videos and rolled around and generally acted like small children. It was adorable. Anyway, that was the snow. I hope it
come backs soon.

You know what else is great about the holidays here? Saint Nicolas. Last night, December the 5th, jolly old Saint Nick came to Belgium. This tradition is a lovely part of the season here. I opened my door this morning to find a mandarin outside my door, and looked down the hallway to see a trail of chocolate coins and more mandarins that led all the way downstairs and into the kitchen. It only got better from there. As you can see, the kitchen table was full of more goodies, from chocolate to specaloos to little gifts for each person. I received a cook book full of chocolate recipes and a lovely

The haul.

Saint Nicolas a été ici!!

new scarf. I am no the proud owner of my very first cook book, which just happens to be in French, cause I'm that cool. Another thing that made it into my pile of treasure was particularly exciting for me, and my immediate family will understand why right away, but I'll do some explaining for the rest of you. As many of you know, my father's parents come from Holland, or the Netherlands (which happens to be right next to Belgium). That being said, every
year going back as far as I can remember, each kid in my family has received a large chocolate in the shape of the first letter of their name in their stocking on Christmas. These "chocolate letters" as we've come to call them, also come from Holland, hence the tradition. Anyway, along with all of the other lovely chocolates and treats on the table thi
s morning, I found a chocolate A. There was a J for my host brother, Julien, and an S for my host step-dad, Serge, as well. Needless to say, I was extremely excited. Even though I hadn't really thought that far ahead, I know that I would have missed my chocolate letter a lot come Christmas. It was also fun to share with my host family that we do the same thing in my family, connections between my two different lives are so fun to find.

Well then. I have to go do some studying now, as here in Belgium, we have our exams before Christmas instead of in January like back in Wenatchee. Luckily, since, 1) this scholastic year doesn't actually matter for me, and 2) the rules of Rotary are very kind, I am only obliged to take four exams. I have chosen to take English (that's not as lame as it sounds, I've actually been learning things in my class, plus I don't want my English grammar to fall by the wayside while I'm here), Spanish, math, and I'm taking the exam for my introductory French class for foreigners. They shouldn't be too hard, but I feel that some work might be necessary nonetheless.

That's all folks! See you soon with hopefully some more fun stories to tell!