But today actually turned out to be quite good. I started off the day by going to the city hall and getting my Belgian ID all taken care of. Then I came home and cried and wrote that blog post. But THEN after I ate lunch, I finally met someone my age!! Her name is Laureline and I will be going to school with her. I guess she was a really good friend of the daughter of my host family. And we had a lot of fun! We road our bikes around the village and the neighboring villages, which was extremely difficult because there are tons of hills around here. And I'm not talking about easy, nice, push-your-thighs-a-little hills. I'm talking huge, steep, kill-your-thighs-a-lot hills. And for anyone back home, from Parma, these hills are comparative to the Pleasant Valley Hill. Killer. But great at the same time! Then once we got back to the house we decided to make crepes. So we got back on our bikes and road to the next village over to this adorable little corner shop and picked up milk (lait), eggs (oeufs), and whipped cream (I dunno...). Can I just share with you once more how weird I think it is that they don't refrigerate milk or eggs? I just cannot get used to that... Room temperature milk... Blech. Anyways, we went back to the house and made legit crepes. And then ate them with sugar and whipped cream. Delicious :) Then we played some tennis, and I am not horribly terrible at tennis like most athletic things, so it was fun! Then we just hung around the house, I met her sister and her mother, and eventually her father too. We talked about fashion and Belgium vs. the States and such, compared cameras, etc. It was so great to meet someone else my age. She spoke some English and I spoke some French and we got along well :) It was exactly what I needed!
Another observation of Belgian culture: People here are much more concerned about health than in the States (well duh). Everyone talks about it! Everything is either good for this, so you should do/eat lots of it, or bad for that, so you should not do/eat lots of it. And it shows! The majority of people here look fantastic! People are healthy looking. The majority of young Belgian men that I see are tall and super thin, and the girls are all thin and beautiful also. People don't really look "old" and you can tell that people take care of themselves. It's really refreshing.
Another observation: Belgians love American brands. They are all obsessed with Abercrombie & Fitch. I guess it is because there is only ONE store in all of Europe, and it's in London. So the big thing for Europeans when they come to the States is to shop at Abercrombie & Fitch. Which I personally find very strange, but I guess that is because I am used to the brand, and seeing it everywhere. Plus I don't like it much... But that's just me.
I didn't eat anything interesting today except the crepes... Oh but just a side note, they have Special K here, and my host mom took me grocery shopping with her and asked if I wanted any specific cereal. So I picked up Special K with Red Berries because I really like that cereal. And I poured myself a bowl this morning and realized, European Special K with Red Berries has raspberries and strawberries and cherries in it, rather than just strawberries!!! Way to be cheap, America... Just saying :)
WHAT? Belgian Special K is so much more balling than US Special K! I am so jealous and totally want a box!
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