Allez Standard!

Today I had the day off because Madame Gallo was not there, and as you all know by now, I only have class with Madame Gallo on Wednesdays. So I took the opportunity to go visit my host brother in Namur. We spent the day together and it was pretty rockin. We took a walk through a park there that reminds me kind of a really small scaled down version of Central Park, listened to music, watched a movie, etc. It was really nice out today, so that was a plus. The only downside is that getting to Namur sucks because whether I take two trains or a bus and a train, it still takes a good hour and a half to get there from Hannut. Blech. But, plus side, I did run into Karine and Damien on my way to catch my train home. We got all caught up. It was cool to Damien after so many months of living in different houses.

I was unable to post yesterday because I got home too late. I stayed home from school yesterday because I was just exhausted and woke up not feeling well at all. So I spent the entire morning sleeping and by the time everyone got home from school, I was doing much better and by dinner time, I was able to eat with the family. At dinner, we started talking about the recent soccer matches and our team in Liège, the Standard. Turned out that there was a match that night and even though there were no tickets left for the stadium, we could go to Liège at the Place St. Lambert (where I spend most of my Liège time anyways) and there would be a screen set up for people to watch the game. So in the spirit of spontaneity, my host dad and Manon and I decided to join my host uncle and cousin for the game. We headed out around 8 15pm and got to Liège by 8 45, all clad in red to support the Standard. It was really cool actually. There were TONS of people there (we heard later on the radio something about 45,000 whaaaaat) all dressed in red, screaming, yelling and drinking beer (of course, Belgium). It wasn't easy to see the screen because of the crowd, but we eventually managed to battle our way through it and find a spot to stand. Once we scored, it was absolutely nuts. There were firecrackers going off and red lights everywhere and people jumping all over the place. But, I'm sorry to say, by the end of the hour and a half match and the three-minute overtime, the other team from Genk had managed to score and beat the Standard. Everyone was pretty disappointed. But it was, nonetheless, cool to see and I'm so glad I got to go!

I must bid everyone good night now, as I actually have to go to school tomorrow. Bonne nuit !

6 Months... And They Flew By

Today is my six month anniversary in Belgium!!! Can you believe it? I've been here for six whole months... I've been blogging for six months. You've been reading and following my journey for six months!! It's crazy in my head. I can't believe I've actually kept up with this blog for this long... I have to say, that alone I am proud of!

So Wednesday we had that big dinner for my host mom for her birthday. The Lebanese food went over great! The spinach pies turned out perfectly, and were probably the best ones I've made in a long time. They were a huge hit and were gone by the next evening. For the main course, we had a sort of lamb stew with a medley of different vegetables and a rice pilaf. The food was excellent, and my host mom was blown away. She absolutely loved it! For dessert, we had a lemon and passionfruit sorbets.

Yesterday, however, I stayed home from school. If you read my blog Wednesday, you know how shaken I was and how stressful the day was for me. And it took it's toll and when I woke up Thursday morning, I couldn't really bring myself to move. After a half hour of attempting to pull myself out of bed, I realized it was a fruitless effort and resigned to the fact that my body needed sleep. So I was awake for a total of 10 hours yesterday, in which I spent time with the host family, ate, and watched movies (Fried Green Tomatoes and Mrs. Doubtfire).

Today, I went to school as usual, to discover that Madame Gallo was absent today. Which meant that I had two hours free before lunch. So what did I do with those two hours? In the spirit of spontaneity, and with the influence of Mikayla, I bit the bullet and got my hair cut. It's short... Like a good six or seven inches than it was before. The bangs are too short and I don't much care for them, but they will grow out quickly and I'm happy with the actual cut. Plus, it wasn't too expensive, so I'm satisfied with that. And the bangs will be fine by next weekend; they grow fast. After lunch, I had a huge math test that I'm not very confident that I did well on... You see, I missed one hour a week with the class with Père Boly, and that really took it's toll on my math. So try as I might, it was very hard to keep up, especially with it being in French and all. Then I went to the gym for the first time this week, ate dinner, and discussed my parents arrival and stay with my host dad, who is being so incredibly helpful with all the planning. It's great to have someone letting me know about all the options that are out there. It's gonna be hard to fit it all in, but I'm confident that we can do it!

I don't know how it's possible, but I'm exhausted. I blame the Belgian weather, i.e. Lack of sunshine.

Bonne nuit !