Off to Africa!

Hello everyone! I apologize for not blogging for almost a week, but we got back to Brussels and had a LOT to take care of before our mission trip to Africa. I promise I will tell you all about 4th of July weekend in Brussels and our Africa trip in a few weeks when we get back! And I hope everyone stateside had a wonderful holiday weekend! :)

So here's our itinerary: today (July 7th), we fly to London and meet up with our team. They've already been traveling for 18 hours as I write this while we're still packing in our apartment, so I am sure they're exhausted! We fly to Nairobi tonight at 8:00 pm London time (3:00 pm EST) and we arrive in Nairobi at 6:00 am Kenya time! Pray we get some sleep on this flight! We then transfer to a smaller airport where we fly to Mfangano Island! We'll be on various islands in Lake Victoria for 9 days, then we spend 3 days in Nairobi visiting churches/hospitals, then we return to London on the evening of July 19th. We arrive in London on July 20th at 6:00 am.

Brent and I are spending the night in London on July 20th because July 21st is a Belgian holiday - so we're excited to spend 2 days exploring London! When we return to Brussels, we only have to spend 10 more days in our corporate housing apartment and then we finally get to move in and start to really settle in here.

Expect a long blog post in about 2 weeks! :) Please pray for us and our mission team over the next 2 weeks - I am SO incredibly excited Brent finally gets to experience Africa and the amazing work God is doing on Mfangano Island!

Until later.....

Amsterdam!

Last Friday afternoon, when Brent got off of work, we headed up to Amsterdam for the weekend! Amsterdam is about an hour drive north of Breda. We stayed at a hotel called the Moevenpick Hotel, which I scored a great price for off of Priceline – and it was a very nice hotel! It was about 2 kilometers from the city center (Dam Square) but that was an easy 20-minute walk – and we walk everywhere! On the drive up, we did spot a few windmills, but I didn’t have time to take any pictures. Other than that, it was a fairly uneventful drive…just very flat and green. We arrived in Amsterdam around 18:00, parked our car outside the city (Amsterdam is not very car-friendly) and took the tram to our hotel. We quickly checked in and headed out to meet some friends for dinner! I have a friend from high school (Jonathan) who has lived in Amsterdam for 2.5 years and then another friend (Erin) who was traveling through Europe for one of her grad school classes. We were all on swim team together at Norcross High School. I hadn’t seen these friends in years, but Jonathan and his wife Jennifer were so welcoming and it was great to see Erin as well! Jonathan and Jennifer also patiently answered all of our random questions about living in Europe. :-)

On Friday night, the 5 of us went to dinner at an Indonesian restaurant (Puri Mas) and enjoyed what is called a rijsttafel. A rijsttafel is a Dutch word that means “rice table” and it is an elaborate meal adapted by the Dutch from an Indonesian feast. A rijsttafel consists of many side dishes served in small portions, accompanied by rice prepared in a few different ways. Since Brent and I love Indonesian food, we were in food heaven.  It’s a great meal to enjoy with a group and the food was so flavorful! We also tried a few beers that I was never a fan of in the USA (Heineken, Guinness) but Jonathan and Jennifer insisted beer tastes fresher here in Europe – we were both pleasantly surprised. Beer really does taste different over here! After dinner, we headed over to Leidseplein (Leiden Square) to catch the end of a World Cup game and just hang out. It was so fun to catch up with old friends and enjoy Amsterdam together – what a great evening!

Brent and I decided to walk back to our hotel from Leidseplein because Brent had never been to Amsterdam before. I told him he needed to experience Amsterdam at night because it’s crazy! We headed back to Dam Square, split another beer, and then wandered over to the Red Light District. The Red Light District was full of guys, tourists, and gawkers like us. :-) It’s always entertaining to walk around the Red Light District in Amsterdam. At night, Amsterdam really has a very distinct smell to it – Brent is convinced we probably were high just walking around for an hour…I think he’s crazy. Anyhow, Amsterdam is a very cool city at night – the people watching is amazing, it is always crowded, and it’s just a really neat city.

Saturday morning we slept in – Brent had a long week at work and I always love to sleep – and then we headed out on foot to explore the city some more. I was super excited because the sun was shining and it was warm! I even got to wear a sundress. We walked over to the floating flower market (Bloemenmarkt), although it’s really not floating – just happens to be on a canal. I love all of the canals in Amsterdam! It’s a very pretty city when the sun is out and everyone is boating out on the canals! We wandered around the flower market, enjoyed some great sandwiches for lunch, walked around the shopping streets, and then went back to the hotel to change. We wandered around the city for about 4 hours, which was really fun! We hung out at the hotel for about an hour, and then headed back out for dinner and to watch the USA vs. Ghana game! We ate dinner at a restaurant called Sushi Me. Sushi is different in Europe, but it’s still good. In fact, it’s probably healthier because it’s essentially just fish and rice – no high-calorie spicy mayo sauce, no crunchies, and no cream cheese. Now don’t get me wrong, I’d do anything for a Pink Roll from RK Sushi in San Diego right now, but we have to make do with what is offered over here. ;-) Dinner was actually quite good and definitely gave us our sushi fix.

After dinner, we wandered over to a bar called Coco’s Outback Pub to watch the USA game with my friends. The bar was packed out with Americans! I was surprised how many people showed up – and a bit jealous too since we haven’t made many friends in Brussels yet. Granted, we’ve spent more time in the Netherlands than in Belgium, so that could be why. Oddly enough, a guy that Brent had talked to on the phone while still job-hunting in the USA is friends with Jonathan, so Brent got to meet this guy he had talked to forever ago while looking for a job. Small world! This guy was very happy that Brent had found a job with PWC as he also works for PWC. The way Brent found his job was through major networking – he talked to about 8-9 people overall, each one giving him a different name/number of someone in Europe to call until Brent eventually talked to a girl who was leaving her job and said she would give Brent’s resume to her boss. Lo and behold, that is how Brent got his job in Belgium. He was extremely persistent and whenever he talked to anyone in Europe, each person almost always said, “Oh, you should try this person, maybe they know of a job opening!” Anyways, the guy in Amsterdam was near the beginning of the chain of people Brent talked to and he was a very nice guy. Ok, so back to the game! It was really fun to watch the game with such a large group of Americans! Even though the USA lost, we had a really good time talking to everyone and meeting new people – watching the World Cup in Europe is a really cool experience.

While at the bar, we met a really cool couple that is friends with Jonathan and Jennifer and after the game, they invited us out on their boat for a bit to ride around the canals. It was super cool of them to invite us when they had so many other friends there! So the 6 of us headed out on their boat. It was so beautiful being out on the canals at night in Amsterdam – and so cool seeing the city from that perspective! We went all over the city; it was a very pretty night with a full moon, the water was like glass, and there were even swans out! We really liked just talking with friends, cruising around, and looking up at all of the people out in Amsterdam. Afterwards we thanked Jonathan and Jennifer for such a wonderful time in Amsterdam and assured them we’d be back. We really had a great experience because of them and their friends! Brent and I walked back to the hotel again after the boat ride – it was a really nice night and it was a fun walk. I think we walked like 15 kilometers on Saturday, so it was nice to finally get back to the hotel and sleep!

Sunday morning, we headed out for more exploring, but this time we had more of a plan. We ate breakfast/lunch at a place called Pancake Bakery. The Pancake Bakery boasts more than 75 different kinds of pancakes and omelets. We got there right after they opened at 12:00, so luckily we only had to wait a few minutes to be seated. This restaurant gets pretty packed out! The pancakes are more like crepes, but they were delicious. I had a pancake with ham, cheese, and pineapple in it; Brent had a pancake with bacon and apple. They had yummy maple syrup jugs on the table too – which obviously didn’t taste good on mine, but it was great on Brent’s! I highly recommend the pancake bakery if you’re ever in Amsterdam! After lunch, we wandered around the city some more and we went on a canal boat tour at 15:00. The canal tour was really cool and we got to go all over Amsterdam. I took tons of pictures, see column on right. I loved seeing the city from the water – Amsterdam has a lot of old churches, crooked houses from the canals, and there are flowers and bicycles everywhere. Everyone has a bike here and it’s basically the only way to get around. I wish more cities were like that – I have really enjoyed not having a car in Europe! After the boat tour, we went to the Anne Frank house. I think this was my 3rd trip to the Anne Frank house, but I always love it and Brent had never been. It’s just fascinating and so sad that she spent all of that time cooped up in that house and then died a month before the liberation. The Anne Frank house is the only museum we went to in Amsterdam, but it is my favorite. We spent about an hour touring the house/museum and by then it was about 17:30, so we headed back to the hotel to get our bags. We dropped our bags at our car and then took the tram back into the city to eat dinner before heading back to Breda. We ate at an Argentinean restaurant (there are tons of Argentinean restaurants in Amsterdam!), took the tram back to the car, and headed back to Breda. We had a really great weekend in Amsterdam – it was so fun walking all over the city, shopping, going out on boats on the canals, spending time with friends, trying new restaurants, and just hanging out in the sunny weather. When you all come visit us in Brussels, we’ll take you to Amsterdam – it’s only about 2 hours by train. :-)

So now it’s Wednesday and we’re in Breda. Monday was fairly uneventful, I hung out at the hotel most of the day, caught up on emailing, and did some preparing for our Africa mission trip next week! Tuesday, I had to rent a bike to go into town to do laundry, which was not so fun. The laundry made the bike heavy and then I had to sit there and wait for the laundry, which was kind of boring. Plus trying to figure out how to actually do the laundry was interesting because the instructions were in Dutch. I think Brent and I are both very ready to get back to Brussels in 2 days. We have a lot to do this weekend to get ready for our Africa trip – we leave one week from today!

I can’t believe we’ve already been living in Europe for a month – time sure does fly!

June 24th!

In honor of June 24th (which is a day to celebrate!), I want to thank all of you for your never-ending prayers, support, love, and encouragement one year ago today. I would not have made it through last summer without you all and Brent definitely needed those prayers. I have to specifically thank Chris & Kelly Reynolds for sitting with me at the hospital that day – I am not sure I would have stayed sane without them by my side – I love you guys! Looking back, I can say I have started to see why God planned it all out like that - our wedding day was perfect and it wasn't 100° outside. :-) Plus what Brent and I went through made us so much stronger as a couple - and we really sought out our dream to live in Europe...and here we are! So thank you for loving us and being there for us on June 24th, 2009 – and might I add I am very glad it’s 2010 and last summer is behind us!

Now on to 2010 and our current adventures!

There hasn’t been too much excitement in Breda. Brent is currently working with a client which is a big American fashion corporation – without saying their name, I'll just say they own a few big brands, one being a large clothing company with well-know underwear/bra ads. He informed me yesterday there are very racy pictures all over the office of half-naked men and women…very large pictures too, like floor to ceiling. It sounds like an interesting work environment. He is working somewhat long hours, but he’s usually back to the hotel by 19:30, so that’s good.

On Tuesday evening, we had to drive back down to Brussels to finalize our apartment plans. We did finally pick out an apartment! We can afford it, but it is slightly out of our original price range, so click on the ads on my blog please...I think I get like 0.50¢ for click. ;-) The reality is I will need to find some sort of job and work at least once/week, which is fine because I will be bored in a few more weeks anyway. So far I have posted ads for babysitting and pet sitting – I have no idea how to go about getting a nursing job here. Since I do not speak French or Dutch, my job opportunities are quite limited. We do however love the apartment we picked out! It’s in a great location – there is a metro stop right out the front door of the apartment building and it’s only about 5 kilometers from Brent’s office. It also comes with an oven, dishwasher, washing machine (no dryers here, only clotheslines), parking spot, small storage cellar, and cool view of Montgomery circle. We’ll be on the 2nd floor (which they call the 1st floor as the ground floor is zero.) The walls are all painted yellow, so it makes Brussels seem a bit brighter as well. The deciding factor for the apartment is that we can walk everywhere due to the great location and it really is a beautiful apartment. I wish it was about €200/month cheaper, but we had to make a decision and the apartments that were cheaper were a bit…cramped. We’re happy with our decision and we’re very confident God will provide me with some sort of odd job to make up the difference. If not, rest assured we’re still in excellent shape with our budget – Brent’s a finance nerd after all! I think it’s also important to mention that as we were standing outside the building taking a picture of the exterior of the building, we noticed there’s a cardiology group in the ground floor of our building – there are 3 cardiologists with offices directly below our apartment. Who knows if any of them will end up being Brent’s cardiologist, but it is still kind of ironic. I’ve certainly never lived in an apartment with a large medical office on the ground floor!

So Tuesday night, we headed back up to Breda. I have spent a lot of time the past few days emailing back and forth with our apartment agent and still tying up loose ends in the USA. Whenever Brent gets home and asks me what I’ve done all day, I always wonder where my days go. I feel like there are always things to be done though – important things like watching the Bachelorette online. ;-) Although, I do sleep until 9:00 – and while I occasional feel lazy, I spent 3.5 years in San Diego getting up at 5:30 – so I figure it’s ok for now as I’m just catching up on years of lost sleep. :-) We have found that in the Netherlands, there are a lot more TV options – there’s the Discovery channel, National Geographic, and Animal Planet in English (with Dutch subtitles) in addition to BBC channels. There are about 6 English-speaking channels here! Sometimes I think it’s nice not having the TV on all the time, other times we’re bored and enjoy watching an old episode of the Deadliest Catch or Monkey Island. It’s truly amazing what you’ll watch on TV when your options are so limited. If only Netflix would get with the program and stream movies online outside of the USA!

So today we are celebrating the fact that Brent is one-year post heart surgery by going out to dinner. Tomorrow after Brent finishes work, we are headed up to Amsterdam for the weekend and we will be meeting up with some of my swim team friends from high school as well! One friend lives there, the other is visiting. I am so excited to go to Amsterdam – and it’s only an hour drive from Breda too! So in honor of June 24th (or whatever day you are reading this), I hope you all celebrate life and remember to always thank God for your health…and maybe throw in a prayer that God will continue to watch over Brent’s heart for many, many years to come! ;-)

Rotterdam, back to Brussels, and now Breda!

Last Monday, we headed up to Rotterdam (in the Netherlands) for a few days. Rotterdam is about 150 kilometers north of Brussels and is the largest port in Europe! Rotterdam was a very cool city, and walking along the water really reminded me of San Diego – except it was only like 50°F. Brent had some big business meetings/trainings in Rotterdam with a lot of tax partners from the USA, all over Europe, and Africa. I think it was kind of a big deal he was invited because he is a manager and everyone else there was a partner. His boss wanted him to network and meet people.

We wandered around Rotterdam Monday night and finally decided on dinner at an Italian place. We stayed at a very nice Novotel about 4 km outside of the city center, so we had to take the very expensive metro (€4.90 roundtrip) into the city. We only then learned parking is much easier in Rotterdam than most cities in Europe so we wished we had driven. Parking in most cities in Europe is near impossible – we’ve had a few frustrating nights driving around looking for parking and cursing ourselves for not taking the metro! Tuesday was not very exciting, so not much to say about Tuesday. Brent had business meetings all day and a big dinner at night, so he was gone all day. I spent the day hanging around the hotel, catching up on some TV online, and finishing up a few things we never took care of before we left the USA. I ate dinner at the hotel – it was neat because the hotel restaurant had these little cubby tables where you could listen to a headset and watch TV while you eat dinner – they must get a lot of solo travelers.

Wednesday I set off on foot to go explore Rotterdam. It was about a 4 km (2.4 mile) walk into the city center, but it was a very beautiful walk along the water! When there was no wind and I could feel the warm sun, I thought for a second I was in San Diego walking along the harbor. As much as we wanted to move to Europe, I think we both miss San Diego a lot. Don’t get me wrong, traveling all over Europe is so amazing – but San Diego is our home, where we met, where we both spent our post-college years, and we left some close friends behind.  So feeling like I was back in San Diego for a second while walking in Rotterdam was bittersweet. Ok, back to reality. So I walked down to the main part of the city, ate a delicious sandwich, and then headed back to the hotel to wait for Brent so I could show him the beautiful views of the city. Walking 5 miles/day is tiring – but good for weight loss! I need some better shoes though. The problem is, in the USA, I felt completely comfortable running errands in exercise shorts/pants, a t-shirt, and tennis shoes. In Europe, you can’t wear your exercise or comfy clothes out anywhere without getting weird looks. I know I’m clearly not Belgian and everyone knows it anyway, but I still don’t want to stick out – so tennis shoes are a huge no-no. Walking 5 miles in flats or sandals is not always fun.

When Brent returned from work on Wednesday, we headed back out to Rotterdam, this time via car. We took some pictures (see column on right), admired the city, and decided on dinner at a Mexican restaurant. We miss Mexican food and sushi. You can find “Mexican” food and sushi here, but we have yet to find anything similar to what they’re serving in the states.  Brent ordered a burrito and it had some sort of minced meat, zucchini, baby corn, and carrots inside of it. It was kind of like a weird stew wrapped up like a burrito. When he gave me a bite of it and I saw the baby corn sticking out, I realized we probably shouldn’t get our hopes too high about Mexican food in northern Europe. ;-)  After dinner, we walked back to the car, discovered a parking ticket (it’s impossible to know where to park and how much or when you need to pay if you can’t read Dutch!), and headed back to Brussels. The drive from Brussels to Rotterdam is very flat and green, much like the Midwest USA.

Thursday was pretty low-key, I did some grocery shopping, got a Belgian cell phone number (yay!), and did a few other errands. Brent worked. :-)We’re still apartment hunting, so I spend a lot of time looking for apartments. I do have to say though, there are certain items that I can find in grocery stores here that I will be bringing back to the USA. A can of Thai green curry sauce for €1.00 = awesome. Such an easy meal, just add chicken and veggies! And it’s way better than my homemade curry sauces. Another item is the pre-made but not yet baked baguettes - you can keep them for like a month, pull them out of your pantry, bake one for 6-8 minutes, and voila, fresh baguette! Yum! On Thursday evening, Brent and I went out for a walk to see the locations of some of the apartments we had been looking at and see what was in the area. We discovered an area near the Georges-Henri metro stop that we really liked – lots of cool cafes, bars, and restaurants. The Georges-Henri metro stop is about half a kilometer from where we want to live, by Montgomery Circle. We really like the Montgomery Circle area. We left for our walk at like 21:30 – and the sun was still shining bright, which is very confusing for your body. We ended up walking 5 miles – but this time in tennis shoes, phew!  When we got home close to 23:00, it was finally dark…normal people don’t walk that late at night, but everyone was still out and about. Again, I’m dreading the short winter days!

Friday was apartment-hunting appointments, round 2. The agent that PWC assigned us (her name is Annekien) made appointments for me from 11:00-19:00. I spent 8 long hours looking at apartments, all by myself. But let’s start with Friday morning! Brent and I are going to Africa on a mission trip in about 2 weeks. We did not get yellow fever vaccines in the USA because the vaccine plus a doctor’s visit was about $200 each, and we had to pay for part of our mission trip, so we try to save money wherever possible related to the trip. While we were still in the USA, I suggested to Brent that we not pay $400.00 and wait to see how much yellow fever vaccines cost in Belgium. Since I am a nurse and Brent is a life-long patient, we are very impressed with the healthcare in Belgium. We did not have an appointment at the clinic we went to, so we got there early, expecting to wait a few hours because that is what we are used to in the USA. We waited about 15 minutes. Sweet! We then spoke with a very nice Belgian doctor who very thoroughly went over travel precautions with us for where we will be in Africa, asked us a few questions, and then handed us over to the nurse for our vaccine. We were in and out of the clinic within 1 hour, with no appointment. Here is the best part – the yellow fever vaccine was €16.00 ($20.00) each. We saved $360.00 by waiting to get our vaccines in Belgium and the whole process was so simple! Brent and I were like in a happy state of shock about how amazing healthcare is here. I couldn’t stop talking about it all day. I think the reason government-run healthcare works so well in Belgium is because it is a small country, but boy do I wish the USA could get it together like this! When we told the doctor and nurse how much a yellow fever vaccine + consult was in the USA, I am sure they thought we were lying. I promise you they did not believe us that it was so expensive. Anyways, we were very happy campers after our clinic trip!

Ok, on to “House Hunters International”, Weinberg Belgian edition, part 2. If any of you have seen that show on HGTV, I can guarantee you it’s impossible to pick a house out in one day in a foreign country, and with only 3 options. I think they really look at like 15 and only show the top 3. Things are so different here – we definitely have to make some trade-offs. I won’t bore you with the details of all of the apartments I saw, but instead give you some highlights. I saw one apartment with a guest room included on the ground floor…no idea why, but this particular apartment had a separate bedroom included in the price on the ground floor. Unfortunately it was on a very busy street and was in like a 110-year-old building. The apartment was beautiful, but I already lived in an old house in a loud area – it was cool, but I want something a little more modern now. Another apartment I saw had a small balcony, and when I opened the door to look at what I thought was a storage closet in the balcony, I discovered a toilet. Yes people, there was a small, fully functional extra toilet outside on the balcony. I have no idea why it was there, neither did the real estate agent, but man I wish I had taken a picture! One of the other apartments I saw was also very nice, but the outside of the building looked like a hospital. Overall on Friday, I again walked 5+ miles in my flats, but did have some success in the apartment search. I found one apartment I liked, but we’ll get to that later.

The most exciting thing that happened on Friday is my lunch and our dinner. In case you can’t tell, Brent and I are foodies. We love to try new things, I love to cook, we’re very adventurous eaters, and we love food. Who doesn’t? :-) On Friday for lunch, I wandered into a place that I believe was called Food Concept, near Georges-Henri metro, also where I was looking at apartments. It was just a simple sandwich/deli type restaurant, but it was a great find. Ok realistically, it was probably like every other sandwich/deli shop in Brussels, but it was the first one I found. I know you are picturing a Subway type place, so stop that image and instead imagine a cute little café that serves cheap French food. I enjoyed a delicious smoked-salmon Panini that came with a small side-salad for €4.50. Oh and by the way, Belgians don’t tip – for anything. Not having to tip is amazing. When you see prices for a meal, you add that up and that’s what you pay. When you see a price for a haircut, that’s the whole price. In our minds, it makes things cheaper, but we all know the service charge is already included in the price. I just like it better that way. Ok, back to the sandwich. It was delicious and the perfect amount of food. I didn’t feel stuffed or groggy, I felt healthy and happy. :-) I also realize part of the reason I thought this sandwich place was amazing is because I love smoked salmon. I LOVE that smoked salmon is available everywhere here, prepared in so many different ways, and so cheap. I cannot wait to take Brent back to Food Concept for lunch sometime!

For dinner on Friday, we went to a place in the same area where I had lunch and near where we had walked to on Thursday night. I had read about an Italian restaurant called Mare E Monti (which means Sea & Mountains in Italian) so we decided to try it out. It was fantastic! It is definitely our current favorite restaurant in Brussels – which I am sure will change, but we certainly were excited on Friday night. After dinner, we enjoyed a delicious crepe topped with chocolate and cherry ice cream, headed home, and called it a night. We did mention on the way back to our apartment though that we would love to curl up on the couch and watch a good movie. Instead we watched BBC. Yay for British news.

So Saturday was June 19th, which was a somewhat significant day for us. June 19th, 2009 was when Brent went in for a routine cardiology appointment (which was 7 weeks before our original wedding date of August 9th) and found out he needed another heart surgery. Not only did he need another heart surgery last summer, but he was also extremely lucky to have that cardiology appointment in June. His appointment was originally scheduled for August, so we scheduled the appointment earlier rather than later since we were getting married in August. His actual heart surgery was June 24th, but I will always remember June 19th because Dr. Johnson put his arm around me and pointed out to me on the ECHO exactly what was wrong...and he knew our lives would be forever changed. I still sometimes feel robbed of our last summer in San Diego, but at the same time, God gave us this amazing opportunity to live in Europe and thank God Brent went to the doctor when he did. I’ll never forget June 19th – I remember it like it was yesterday! I also have a happy memory of the day though, because we went to the San Diego county fair that night with our awesome friends Chris & Kelly Reynolds and Aaron & Melissa Betschel. I can’t imagine spending that night any other way than with amazing friends at the SD fair. Those 2 couples really were a lifesaver that day – we love you guys!

Saturday, we got up and continued the apartment search. We looked at one more apartment and really liked it. I had found one on Friday afternoon that I liked, and then we both liked the apartment on Saturday. They are only about half a kilometer apart, one near Montgomery Circle (Friday apt), one directly on Montgomery Circle (Saturday apt.) There are little things about both of them I like and it’s very hard to make a decision. One has a great location and the metro stop is outside the front door of the apartment building, the other has a better layout, is quieter, and has nice views. They both have their positives and negatives. We have arranged to re-visit the apartments on Tuesday evening, so we will make a decision then. Picking out a place to live for 2 years is tough! And we’re not exactly looking forward to driving back down to Brussels tomorrow from Breda.

Saturday afternoon, we went shopping and ran into Brent’s boss at the mall. I asked her and her husband their opinion about the apartments, which was helpful. After the mall, we went to a bunch of furniture and electronic type stores to start figuring out how we’re going to decorate/furnish our apartment. We had originally planned on renting a furnished apartment, but after looking at a few furnished apartments, we realized that was definitely not going to happen. We checked out beds, couches, washers, curtains, etc. It was nice to figure out which stores sell what – and of course Ikea will still be our #1 place for the majority of our apartment furnishings.

Saturday evening, Brent took me to a delicious restaurant he had been to for a work lunch. I had an amazing filet with béarnaise sauce, salad, and fries for just €16.00. We also enjoyed an amazing smoked salmon appetizer – yum! Brent and I have found that food here is slightly cheaper than what we were used to in San Diego – and much better quality. Also, everything comes with fries, which is probably not the healthiest, but Belgian fries are delicious! We drove around for a bit on Saturday evening because we had nothing else to do, and called it a night.

Sunday we got up, packed, and headed off to Breda. Breda is in the Netherlands, right on the border of Belgium and the Netherlands. Brent is working on a client up here for the next 2 weeks, so we’re staying at another Novotel. We are headed to Amsterdam this weekend though, which will be fun! On the way to Breda, we stopped in Antwerp to check it out. Antwerp is only about 30 minutes from Brussels and is beautiful! There is an American food store in Antwerp, so we of course stopped there. We bought a few things – low-calorie salad dressing, some Goldfish, cornbread mix, and instant oatmeal. Most things we eat we can find in grocery stores and markets in Brussels, but for things like salad dressing, we like to eat the low-cal stuff and sometimes we have no idea what we’re buying because it’s in French or Dutch. It’s nice to know where the American food store is and what they sell, but I doubt we’ll make tons of trips to Antwerp just to buy food there.

We wandered around Antwerp for a bit and walked in a beautiful old church called Cathedral of Our Lady. It is a beautiful church – about 650 years old. Remember I love old churches and cathedrals. :-) We didn’t spend tons of time in Antwerp, because we kind of wanted to get to Breda and get settled in, and Antwerp is so close to Brussels. We did of course enjoy a snack of frites and one delicious chocolate each in the main square. After Antwerp, we headed off towards Breda and had yet another adventure. Brent’s company provides him with a car and a gas card. You can only use the gas card at Shell stations in Belgium. The client Brent is working with this week is actually about 25 km from Breda, but there are apparently no hotels/restaurants there, so his boss recommended we stay in Breda. Since Brent is going to be driving so much this week and we’re going to Amsterdam this weekend, we needed to start the week off with a full tank of gas – and remember the gas has to come from Belgian Shell stations. I had found a Shell gas station somewhat close to the border from Shell’s website. So we drove about 15 minutes off the freeway to the address, and discovered it was not a Shell, but some other random gas station. We were a little frustrated, but we had to get gas, so we found another Shell about 20 kilometers away in our GPS. After about 20 minutes of again driving out of the way, we found the Shell station. Well, Brent’s gas card wouldn’t work and eventually the attendant wandered over and told us they don’t take Shell credit cards at that gas station. By now, we were very frustrated because we had no idea where we were in Belgium, nor how far out of the way we had gone. We found yet another Shell station in our GPS and headed off. After another 20 minutes, we finally had success and Brent filled up the car. At least now we know where the closest Shell station is to the border of the Netherlands, but yesterday we were a bit frustrated and tired. :-) Luckily after we got gas, it only took us about 40 minutes to get to Breda. Also, in driving around small towns in Belgium, we passed a lot of farms with massive cows. I mean, I am convinced they give their cows growth hormones or something. Brent thinks they were a different type or breed of cow – all I know is they were huge and I didn’t get a chance to take any pictures. Look for pictures in the future though, of the giant Belgian cows!

Last night (Sunday), we settled into our hotel, drove into the main city center of Breda, and ate dinner. We had these massive burgers – they had bacon, an egg, cucumbers, cheese, pickles, lettuce, tomato, and onions on them. It was a massive burger – it’s 15:00 on Monday and I’m still not hungry! Breda is actually a very cute little Dutch town – there are tons of restaurants, bars, and cafes. It should be fun to explore this town for the next 2 weeks! It’s a bit cold here, which I am still getting used to. Gone are sundresses and shorts in the summer – we wear jeans, sweaters, and scarves in Belgium and the Netherlands in June. It’s a far cry from San Diego sunshine! I did not realize how cold and gray northern Europe is – it is definitely taking some getting used to, but in 2 short weeks, we’ll be burning up in Africa anyways. I have to think maybe it will warm up some in the later summer months too.

Ok, off to explore Breda!

Our first full week in Brussels!

What a week!

It all started on Monday, when I decided I wanted to make Mexican food for dinner. I believe in an earlier post I mentioned I should be ok finding all of the ingredients I normally cook with in the USA here in Belgium. I had some slight problems this week! We went to Cora on Monday night (Cora is like a Super-Target) and found all of the ingredients I needed...except refried beans. I found Mexican rice, flour tortillas, salsa, tortilla chips...everything but beans! They even had baked beans! Belgians don't eat a lot of refried beans I guess. I was extremely frustrated - we love Mexican food and I didn't know what else to cook for dinner because we have no oven...and beans are kind of a staple ingredient if you're making bean & cheese burritos. We eventually decided on take-out Chinese food (yum!) and I vowed to find refried beans the next day. Nothing else exciting really happened on Monday. It was raining, so I hung out at our apartment most of the day. Really, the main thing I remember is how angry I was I couldn't find refried beans! Silly huh?

On Tuesday, I set out to find the elusive refried beans...and get some exercise. I walked 4 miles and went to 3 different grocery stores. In the third grocery store, I found them! They cost €2.75 a can, but I was ecstatic. I made my purchase and headed home. We have already started a list of things for me to bring back from the USA when I am there in October...I might need to bring back some big suitcases! ;-) Eventually Brent got home from work Tuesday night and we enjoyed some delicious Mexican food. We have discovered a Dutch-speaking TV station (VIJF TV) that airs English-speaking movies every night around 9:00 pm. It is great! They are all totally romantic comedies, so not so great for Brent, but when it's your only option, you'll watch anything. :-) Later on Tuesday night, when Brent crawled into bed, I saw his back and immediately asked him if he'd had chicken pox! We'd been leaving our windows open at night because we have no AC, and apparently we'd been getting eaten alive by mosquitoes. I had some bites on my legs, but didn't realize how bad it was. Brent looked at my back, which was also covered, and next thing I knew, I was up googling "bed bugs" at 1:00 am because I had no idea what was going on. Luckily we do not have bed bugs, just mosquitoes! Brent emailed his incredibly nice boss Janet and asked where we could buy a cheap fan, and by Wednesday morning, she had offered to let us borrow one. Phew!

Wednesday was apartment-hunting day! Our agent's name is Annekien - and I have no idea how to pronounce her name. She is not really a real estate agent, but she works for a "settling in" company for expats - she's kind of like the middleman. She had found 13 properties for us to look at, which was exhausting! We had given her our budget and criteria a week prior and we were anxious to see what she had found. I had looked at the addresses of all of the properties on Tuesday night and already decided only about 5 were really in areas we wanted to live, so that was unfortunate. We tried to go into Wednesday with an open mind though. In Belgium, the typical lease is a 9-year lease. Obviously we will not be here for 9 years, but that is the type of lease we will sign anyway and then we will most likely have to pay a fine (or rather PWC will reimburse us) for only staying for 2 years - it's weird to us, but that's how it works in Belgium. So we have to really like where we live - we will be there for 2 years, no matter what! Anyhow - our day started early and was long! The first 2 properties we went to, I had already ruled out due to location. But once we saw them, I really ruled them out! They were both on the 4th floor of buildings with no elevators. I am sure I would be in better shape walking up so many stairs every day, but it would also get annoying fast. Plus the thought of carrying groceries and such up so many stairs every day doesn't seem fun - or what if you forget something in your house - you have to run all the way back up the stairs! Also, the first 2 apartments were "loft-style", so the bedroom was on the "second floor." This would potentially be ok if there were actual stairs - instead they have extremely steep stairs that are like ladders. If I got up in the middle of the night, I'd probably fall down. Needless to say, we were a bit discouraged.

The rest of the morning, we saw the following: an apartment with a toilet with no door in the middle of the living room (the toilets are always in separate rooms here, not actually in the bathroom), numerous apartments with no ovens, an apartment with a bedroom up in a loft like you'd have in college (you climb up a ladder and can't sit up in bed, the bed is like a foot from the ceiling), and some very tiny apartments. We also heard Annekien say once "Your colleagues might tell you this is an unsafe area, but plenty of people enjoy living here!" Brent and I just looked at each other like "is she seriously going to show us an apartment in this area!?" At this point, we were extremely discouraged. We re-grouped with Annekien at lunch and told her we had to have an oven, no apartments under 60 square meters (roughly 650 sq ft), no "loft-style" apartments, and a few other things. One apartment she showed us was cool, except there was no separate bedroom - the bed was just kind of sitting next to the couch with a short wall in between. At lunch, we also clarified for her our exact budget - it seems she was looking at apartments that were actually a little lower than our range - and trust me, we could tell. :-)

After lunch, Annekien canceled some appointments since the apartments were clearly never going to work for us, and then she took us to a grocery store to show us around a bit - which was WAY more helpful than apartment hunting! We told her about our mosquito problem and she told us about these things you can plug into the wall that emit some sort of smell that deters mosquitoes. We didn't really believe her since there is no such thing in the southern USA - which is like the mosquito capital of the world! Sure enough, we walked in, she asked where they were in French, and then she showed us how to use them. I haven't seen a mosquito since...I have NO idea why the USA doesn't have these plug-in devices - or do they and I am just not aware of them? It looks kind of like a Glade plug-in. We've been living in San Diego the past 5 years, so we haven't had to worry about mosquitoes. Annekien also showed us the different types of milk, cheese, butter, and types of beer - all of the staples of course. I have found some of the beers here are very tasty – they are all fruity of course. There’s a cherry beer called “Kriek” that is delicious!

After our grocery store trip, we saw a few more apartments and called it a day. The last apartment we looked at was amazing - it was a penthouse on the 8th floor of a building. The elevator essentially opened up into the apartment and it had 2 huge terraces that were bigger than our entire house in San Diego! We fell in love with the terraces - beautiful views of Brussels - and so cool! There was one terrace off of the bedroom and one off of the living area. The only problem was that the kitchen and living room were tiny - and we just don't think we can make it work. :-( We were pretty bummed though - what a beautiful penthouse! It even included a parking spot, which most apartments don't. Good thing we got a mini-Cooper!

We decided to go to Ikea after apartment hunting on Wednesday night to see exactly how much we would spend on furniture. Luckily, we're going to be ok! It's weird to feel at home in an Ikea, (which is a Swedish furniture store chain) in Belgium...but it was just like the Ikea in San Diego! :-) Wednesday was a very exhausting day, so we were excited to head home and relax afterwards! Thursday & Friday, I spent a lot of time online doing my own apartment hunting. Annekien had told us to look at a few websites and pick out apartments that we thought were interesting. I also spent some time on Skype calling back to the USA to get things straightened out.

On Friday, I went to a luncheon hosted by a member of the American Women's Club of Brussels (AWCB). I learned the AWCB is one of the largest clubs belonging to the Federation of American Women's Clubs Overseas (FAWCO). It's like a massive sorority of women living overseas with different chapters. The women were all very kind, but I was by far the youngest woman there, by at least 25 years. They assured me there were younger members though, so I can’t wait to meet some of them! :-) It was nice to speak English for a few hours though and the woman answered a ton of my questions. They also told me all about the clubhouse – the AWCB owns a big, beautiful house in Brussels where they have tons of activities – a myriad of classes, social lunches, fun activities, volunteer projects, etc. It’s their sorority house. ;-) Anyways, I will probably join the AWCB because it’s a great way to meet people and socialize with other Americans when we want to. I truly did have a good time at lunch and met some nice women.

Friday night was sushi and World Cup football night! I scouted out a few sushi restaurants in Brussels, and we picked one called Wasabi Sushi Lounge. The sushi here is nothing like in the USA. It’s fairly basic – no crazy rolls with multiple types of fish, sauces, and toppings. We really miss American sushi – especially our 2 favorite sushi restaurants in San Diego – RK Café and Harney Sushi. We ordered a few rolls and some miso soup and still enjoyed it though! Our rolls were basically just rice and one type of fish, occasionally there was cucumber inside or there was some avocado or salmon on top. I will keep looking though – we will find the best sushi in this city! The fish was pretty fresh though – and as always, the beer was cheap. In addition, the World Cup is on every TV in Europe, so we got to watch the game during dinner.

After dinner, we met up with some of Brent’s friends from work (John and Simi) to watch the France vs. Uruguay game. John and Simi are a super cool couple! They moved away from the USA about 5 years ago – they spent 3 years in Amsterdam, 1.5 years in Dubai, and they have been in Brussels about 3 months. We enjoyed hanging out with them, asking them questions about life here, and hearing about their experiences. It’s always great to make new friends. We headed home on Friday well after midnight and Brent fell asleep on the couch watching “Miami Vice” in French.

Saturday was fairly uneventful…rainy as usual here. I’m doing ok with the rain so far, but at times I definitely miss sunny, beautiful San Diego! Last weekend we had found a suit that fit Brent so well and was a great price, so we went back and purchased it Saturday. We also wandered around the mall some more, tried a Quick burger (Europe’s version of McDonalds), spent some time at H&M, and talked to a few mobile companies about my cell phone. We are probably going to wait to buy a cell phone and plan for me until we get our apartment. In Belgium, a cell phone plan is usually included (and much cheaper) with your Cable & Internet, so it’s worth it to wait. I may even be able to get an iPhone – woo hoo! We also walked to Cora on Saturday – remember when I walked there last week and it took me an hour? On Saturday it took us about 10 minutes to walk there – live and learn I guess. Saturday night, we watched the USA vs. England game at a crowded sports bar near the city center – people here are fanatical about football! We had a late dinner of Thai food – yum! The only other people in the restaurant were a large party of French-speaking people who were having a great time – they kept speaking to us in French (they were a tad bit drunk) – but then when I told them we didn’t speak much French, they laughed and carried on. It was actually quite entertaining – and when we left, they wished us a good night. I can’t wait until my French improves!

So today is Sunday and our 9 month wedding anniversary! :-) We did not go to church this morning – we’re still looking for a church home. I think next Sunday we will try to attend an English-speaking church and see what we think. We did however go to the Gare du Midi market, which was awesome! This particular market takes place every Sunday at the huge Gare Du Midi train station in Brussels. The market is rumored to be the biggest in Europe, and I can assure you it was massive. There were stalls there selling everything imaginable – fresh fruit, clothing, meat & fish, kitchen utensils, shoes, pastries, flowers, leather goods, spices, electronics, pickled vegetables, CD’s, cheeses, dishes, sausages, etc! We had so much fun wandering around for hours – and the food prices were fantastic! Since we’re going to Rotterdam this week, we didn’t buy much food, but we did buy a cool paper towel stand that looks like a bicycle – check out the picture of it in the column on the right. I know we’ll definitely be spending more time at the Marche du Midi! I can’t wait until we have our own apartment and we can go back and buy some flowers and plants – and I think I might buy quite a few of our groceries there – much cheaper than the grocery stores!

After spending a few hours at the market, we decided to wander back to a different metro and see more of the city.  We passed some gorgeous churches, parks, museums, and fun parts of the city along the way. We stepped in a church called Notre Dame de la Chapelle. Construction began on this church in 1210 – so needless to say, it’s quite old! It was beautiful too – I love old churches and cathedrals! I am not a huge museum person, but I love architecture, especially churches and cathedrals. It’s just so neat to think about how many people have worshipped God in old churches over the years – and I think churches are just amazing! We also worked through the Parc de Bruxelles, which is the largest urban public park in the center of Brussels. The park is surrounded by the Royal Palace of Brussels, the Belgian parliament, and the American embassy. It’s funny because when we were walking, I asked Brent if he knew where the American embassy was, and he said he had no idea and we should look it up. Well, when we got home, I read about how the American embassy borders the Parc du Bruxelles – we were literally right next to it while we were discussing it, but we still don’t know which building it is. We eventually took the metro back to our apartment and have just been hanging out and doing laundry ever since.

Tomorrow we head to Rotterdam until Wednesday – Brent’s got meetings all day Tuesday & Wednesday with partners from his tax group from all over the world! People are flying in to Rotterdam from as far as South Africa, the USA, and Turkey – so it’s a very important few days. Brent is excited he was invited and to meet some very important people from PWC. Work is still going really well for him – sometimes I forget that’s why we’re here because we’ve just been having so much fun so far. :-) I’m excited to explore Rotterdam this week! Until next time…