Getting around

Hello all! I've been dreading writing this post because I know it could potentially be super duper long, but I know if I don't do it now, I'll just have to write an even longer one next week. I'm mid-travels right now, and I'm going to summarize everything as best as I can with as few words as possible. (Well, you know me. I'll try.) And since I'm not at my own computer, I won't have any pictures in the entry. But once I'm back in Lure, I'll post a link to all my pictures for you all to enjoy. So don't fret.

May 2nd I returned from Germany and had a day full of stress and packing. Packing for what? This. I left Lure May 3rd around 6:15am. Spent pretty much all day on trains before arriving in Annemasse, France, a small city just over the Swiss border from Geneva. There, I was to meet Beth. Beth is the sister of Michelle, one of my best friends from home (whom I met at UWEC). She just finished a semester studying in London, and meeting up with me was the last thing for her before going back home to MN. We had a plan for where to meet. And we had a plan B and a plan C and a plan D. Well, before I even got to Annemasse, I received a text from Beth informing me that we'd now be on plan E, which was never a plan to begin with. I ended up finding our hotel on my own, which was easy enough. But then my job was to find Beth at some random bus stop in town. You see, someone at the airport where she arrived had told her there was a train strike that day and that instead of taking the train, she should take XYZ bus. So I told her to just stay where she was and I would find her. She was in Annemasse, somewhere. But I had never been there, so I didn't know my way. I asked multiple people alone the way if they knew where this high school was (which was apparently where Beth was waiting for me), and they all gave me different directions. Eventually I asked a woman who, after trying to explain, just said, "Hop in! I'll take you there!" And so she did. After a little walking and searching, I found Beth, and we were off to discover this tiny corner of Europe.

We even got a hotel room with THREE beds. It was huge, as far as European hotel rooms go.

The next morning we were off to Geneva, which was only a short train ride away. On the train, I was telling Beth some things about my experience as a language assistant, when suddenly this guy a few seats ahead turned around and said something like, "I'm sorry to interrupt, but the same thing happened to me and everyone I know." He was another language assistant from that part of France! Cool! So he came and chatted with us on the train and even for about 20 minutes once we got to Geneva.

In Geneva, we really didn't do a whole lot. We saw the jet d'eau, a huge fountain in Lake Geneva. It's like the one thing everyone can't miss when they go there. And I'm glad I took a picture when I did because later that night it got so windy that they turned it off! We watched a lot of swans that day, and we say this giant flower clock. I was excited to learn that it has the largest second hand on any clock in the world. Hm. Interesting.

The man at the tourist office kept speaking English to me, even though I persisted in French. Weird. I wanted to tell him I spent tons of money and the last ten years of my life trying to be good at French. And he basically just slapped me in my face.

Oh! And how could I forget? We played a giant game of checkers in a park! Apparently we weren't playing by the right rules, because the men watching us told us so. So we played twice, once with our rules and once with the official rules. Beth beat me with ours, but I won on the official round. :)

The next day we went to Evian, France, which is where Evian water comes from! It was sooooo gorgeous! We saw the water source and watched the locals come fill up tons of water bottles. I'm telling you, they take this Evian thing really seriously! Some guy came with probably 12 huge bottles he filled! We went on a boat ride, a nice walk, ate ice cream by the lake, and had crepes for dinner. Mmmm. Across the lake (13 km away if I remember correctly, but still in plain sight) was Lausanne, Switzerland. I thought that was kinda cool. On the boat ride were two little girls where were super obnoxious but were obviously best friends. They reminded me a lot of me and Katie when we were kids!

Next day we traveled through Lyon to Lille. It was a long travel day, so we just relaxed and didn't do much once we arrived. I had a croque monsieur for dinner, with, of course, a crepe for dessert.

And then we spent the next day in Brussels. Holy tourists! I mean really, I didn't enjoy it as much as I thought I would because it felt really touristy. But I saw some cool things, including the Pisser! It was waaaaay smaller than I was expecting. But whatev. When we first arrived, it took us FOREVER to find the center of town. No one seemed to know the directions of the place we were looking for, but it turned out to be the biggest tourist place. Weird. Beth and I had lunch as a cute little restaurant. I don't even remember what I had for lunch, but I definitely remember the Belgian waffle I had for dessert! Complete with chocolate. From Belgian. How exotic!

The next day was spent in Lille. It was rather eventful, considering it was a Sunday! We walked to the citadel of Lille, although it was closed. But we still got to walk around it, through a park, into (and almost immediately out of) a carnival, and through a zoo. And this is also where I drank the absolutely most refreshing beverage I think I've ever drunk. It was an apple flavored slushie thing, and was SO good. I felt like a kid. I just love a good slushie, and this one was beyond delicious. I got the biggest size possible. And it was worth every centime.

I walked on my own to the other end of the city to check out what appeared on the map to be a large glorious park. Not so much. I felt like I was walking through the ghettos of Lille, and the park was not enjoyable at all. I mean maybe if it had been sunnier I would have liked it better, but it was like, the most disappointing park I've ever visited. The fountains were off and empty and looked like they were rotting away. Barely any flowers. Just boring.

And that night was Beth's last European dinner (unless she had something nice in London on her last night by herself). So we went to a restaurant in the big center of town, and I had a croque madame. And guess what? It was DOUBLE madamed! That means there were TWO fired eggs on top! YUM!

That night, and I think the night before, too, we skyped with Michelle and enjoyed a relaxing night in the hotel.

The next morning we were off our separate ways! I spent a couple hours at a cafe in Den Haag before I met up with Ann. Ann is my second cousin (that is, my mom and her mom are cousins), and she lives in Noordwijkerhout, a cute little city in The Netherlands. She and Nick, her son (my second cousin once removed... I'm very proud that I know this) picked me up and brought me home. The three of us an Jan, Ann's husband, went to an Indian restaurant for dinner. And boy, the man running this place was great. They clearly are friends with him and know him quite well. He was a riot. And the food was great.

I'd only been in The Netherlands for a couple hours so far, and already I was feeling like English is normal. Everyone spoke English to me. And to each other. It was weird, but cool! I thought this wasn't supposed to happen until I got home! And so, this feels like home.

The next day I walked to the North Sea. By myself. And I spend the day on the beach. And don't ask me why, but I didn't bring my sunscreen. Bad idea (but not as bad as ideas in the past), but I've had my sunscreen with me everywhere I go since. Anyway, I spent the day collecting shells. I have big plans with my shells for later on in life. At one point this super cute little girl came up to me and wanted to put shells in my bottle and help me. And she was speaking Dutch and I was speaking English. Every time she put a shell in, I said, "Thank you!" And every time, she repeated back to me, "Thank you!" Ah! It was adorable. Her mom and dad spoke English though (of course!), which was normal for them and cool for me! And it's like, people here don't speak English just to be helpful. It's really normal for them to switch between the two languages. At least it seems so, from my experience.

Walking home (about an hour), I heard music coming from far far away, but it sounded like it was close. I kept thinking I was getting closer and closer to it. I kept thinking for sure I was about to pass its source. And I wasn't. I would walk and walk and walk and just not get closer! Eventually I thought to myself, "Wow, maybe this is a real-life move. Maybe this is just music being played for me to walk to, like it's a soundtrack to my trip." It was really catchy music with no words. Just a perfect beat to walk to. But eventually I passed it. It was at some tennis place. Music to play tennis to I guess.

The next day I went to Leiden, a city really close that has everything cute about Holland. The houses were SO adorable. They kind of reminded me of Sesame Street. Just perfectly aligned and cute. I mean I really don't know what else to say. I went inside a windmill and learned about how people used to live in them and work in them and all that. When I first arrived here, on the car ride home with Ann and Nick, Ann mentioned something about a windmill. I admitted that before coming here, I didn't even know that windmills were like, a thing, here in Holland. But yeah, they totally are. (All I knew about Holland was that Ann and her family live here!) After the windmill, I went on this little walking tour of the almshouses in Leiden. So basically there are these entrances on the street, just like the entrance to any other apartment, except when you walk in, it brings you through a hallway and into a courtyard. In the courtyard are doors to a bunch of apartments. Today, these apartments are lived in by normal people like you and me, but way back in the day, they were used mostly for old people who were poor... or something to that effect. People funded them for specific reasons, and all these old people would live together in this little courtyard. So anyway, I did this tour by myself. I had a little pamphlet with all the directions for where to walk, and it was basically this 2.5-hour hunt along the streets and canals of Leiden for the entrances to these almshouses. It was really cool, and it took me places I never would have even thought to walk! There were only two I didn't enter. One was locked, and the other I couldn't find whatsoever. I knew I was in the right place but just couldn't find the entrance. So I moved on.

Ask me what I had for dinner that night. Fries and ice cream. Yep. :)

Thursday I went to Amsterdam. First thing I did was a canal tour on a boat with a ton of strangers. But it was cool and took me into the city, so I got a feel for the city before actually venturing into it myself. Afterwards, I wandered through what I think was the red light district, but it really wasn't what I was expecting. I'm almost sure I was in the right place, but it was just not what I imagined. Anyway, I found myself in some square and took a small rest on a bench. There were three American girls approximately my age sitting behind me, talking. I thought I heard one of them say something about Minnesota. So I listened. Then one of them said something like, "Well, the city I'm from is like a perfect little city where the houses are all lined up perfectly with white fences like in Desperate Housewives." "Oh, what's it called?" on of the others asked. I listened even more carefully. There's no WAY he would say Maple Grove, because my Maple Grove isn't like that. "Maple Grove," she said. WHAT? Whoa! Seriously? I thought about not saying anything, but I had to. So I turned around, interrupted, and told her I'm also from Maple Grove. She even knew someone that I went to school with. They were three girls who had just finished studying in Copenhagen. Hm. Cool! So we chatted a bit and shared some thoughts about Amsterdam and then went on our ways.

Then I went to the Anne Frank house. Ann told me I could probably just walk by it and it would be enough. SO not true. I'm so glad I waited in line and went in. Now, for the rest of my life, when I hear the story of Anne Frank, I'll know in my head exactly what everything looked like. It was rather surreal to be there in the house, in her bedroom, looking at her things. There was a place on the wall where her dad kept track of her and her sister's heights during the time they were in hiding, and a map he used to mark the Nazi invasion points. It was just so... real.

The next day was a relaxing day at home. I went for a walk and met a strange/creepy guy who talked to me about Jesus for like 30 minutes while he sat there and rolled and smoked his own cigarette. And I sat there and breathed the smoke and he smoked in my face, but it was kind of interesting to hear what he had to say, regardless of whether or not I agreed with what he was saying. I ate lunch on that bench after he left, and walked around town a bit.

Saturday Ann and I went to watch Sophie, her daughter, at a horse riding lesson. I've known my whole life (well, as long as Ann's send out her yearly Christmas cards with stories of everyone's life) that Sophie rides horses. It was always just something I read about in the Christmas card, but it was cool to finally see it in real life! Then we went to this super cute touristy windmill village, where I saw windmills, cheese, clogs, and everything else Dutch. We went into two windmills, and it was fascinating! During my entire education, every time I read something in history class about sawmills, I never knew exactly what they were. I never cared or thought about it, but now I can say I really understand what a sawmill is. We watched it in action, sawing wood into long planks. It took about one hour to cut two meters of wood. Do you realize how slow that is? It was really slow. And on really windy days, people would work really late because they'd accomplish more. We watched it and watched it and watched it, and the faster the wind blew, the faster the wood was cut. Just really interesting.

And for dinner, I ate pig wrapped in pig. Pork chops wrapped in bacon. YUM. And the most delicious peas I've ever eaten. It was like my mom's creamed corn, only with peas instead of corn. And not made in the oven like on Thanksgiving.

Today we went to Jan's sister's house for her birthday, where I met a bunch of his family, who all look alike. And now I'm back home, Ann's making dinner, and Bas came over from The Hague. That's Ann's other son. Tomorrow I'll be off for my next grand adventure. Be really excited, because I have something huge up my sleeve. :D