Last Day Europe

    So, yesterday was Sunday and my last full day in Europe. Quite sad..... I woke up and had breakfast at the hotel and then went into the city for awhile. The only things I wanted to do were to see the Eiffel Tower and Notre Dame again. I went to the Eiffel Tower first. It was a really beautiful, warm, sunny day and there were a lot of people there. I had lunch at there. I bought lunch from a little street vendor and went to sit near one of the main pillars of the tower. After I finished lunch, I went to walk around the park areas around the tower for awhile and enjoyed watching life go on around town. I then made my way to the Notre Dame Cathedral. Apparently this year happens to be the 850th year since its construction. I wanted to go inside, but the lines to get in were extremely long. So I ended up just staying outside and taking a few pictures. Once done with the Notre Dame, I decided to go back to the hotel to make sure everything was in line for today. All in all, yesterday was a very relaxed day and a great way to end a great five weeks. And today, i woke up early to go to the airport, where I am now, waiting at the gate for my plane. Last time I was here at Charles de Gaulle Airport, I didn't have the best of experiences, so I wanted to allot the right amount of time to manage the airport. I ended up vastly overestimating the amount of time I needed, so I have over two hours to just sit before I can board. But that's fine with me. Anyways, that brings us up to now. Unfortunately I do believe this will have to be the last post for this trip, but I had an amazing time in France and can't wait to come back. I do apologize for the shortness of this post though, I only have 15 minutes of free wifi here at the airport............

Some Photos:

A Final Weekend in Paris

      So, to begin with, yesterday, I woke up early to go to the train station with some of the people also leaving by train. I ended up getting there at around 9:30 and my train wasn't until 1, so I was at the train station for about 3 and a half hours. I didn't mind that because I was with friends for most of the time and it was nice to see them off. My train was the last of ours to leave, so I was able to goodbye to everyone that I had gone to the station with. While waiting for the train, I was thinking of all the great people I had met and the fun times I had in Lille. I most certainly will be returning to Lille and I hope to see my friends often when I return to America. The train to Paris was only an hour, so that was nice. The hotel I reserved a room at is located right next to the airport, so that will be convenient on Monday when I fly home. When I finally got to the hotel and settled in, it was around 4:30. I was rather tired and I wasn't sure how long it would take to get into the city, so I decided to just relax at the hotel and make sure all my stuff was in line for Monday. That was probably a good idea because it took me two hours getting into the city this morning and one and a half hours getting back. After I had finished getting everything in line last night, I watched some of Wimbledon and realized that's going on right now and I'm just right across the Channel from it. This morning, I got up and intended to meet some of my N.C. State friends who are here Paris for the weekend too, but I greatly underestimated the amount of time it would take to get into Paris and couldn't meet up with them. So I ended just spending the day on my own. Apparently I had to pay either with my credit card or with coins to buy the train ticket into the city and the machine wouldn't take my card and I didn't have enough coins, so that held me up a while. I started out at Sacré-Cœur and walked around for a while. I wanted to buy a painting because I didn't get one the first time there, but the prices seemed to have gone up quite a bit. So I left and went back to the Hard Rock Cafe and bought another shirt and a hoodie. After the Hard Rock Cafe, I went to the area of Paris that the N.C. State group had stayed when we were there back in May. It was sentimental. I had a crêpe at the same little street vendor I went to back in May. After walking around for a while there, I ended up getting enough money out of my bank account to buy a painting from Montmartre and went and bought one. Once I had gotten the painting, it was getting a little late and knowing how long it took me to get into the city, I thought it would be a good idea to head on back to the hotel. It only took me an hour and a half getting back. Once back at the hotel, it was around 7:30, so I just relaxed for a while. And that brings us up to now. Today was a very sentimental, yet good, day. Tomorrow, I'll go back into the city for awhile. I just want to see the Eiffel Tour and Notre Dame again and I'll be good. And on Monday, I fly home.

Last Night in Lille

   So, tonight is my last night in Lille. I teared up a little. I've grown to like Lille very much. It is a very beautiful city. Being the last week in Lille, we had our final exams in our classes. The French exam was on Tuesday and the European Politics exam was on yesterday. Both exams went well for the most part. There were the things I knew and did not know, so it was as it was. I did well anyways. On Tuesday, we, the N.C. State group, had our last group dinner together. It was the best dinner we had on the trip in my opinion. Cheese fondue with various meats, bread, and vegetables as the main course and chocolate fondue with various fruits and marshmellows for dessert. The restaurant was a very typical French restaurant. I liked it a lot. It was nice thing to have after the French exam in the morning, which I had been slightly worried about. On Wednesday, we had the European Politics exam. I easily passed it on the French system. I'm not exactly sure how that correlates to the American system, but all the professors were saying not to worry about it. Later that night, the whole European Summer Program group at the University had a final dinner together at this really fancy restaurant near the Grand Place. That, too, was probably the best dinner the ESP group had. Obviously not as good as the N.C. State group dinner Tuesday night, but it still was really good. Afterwards, I went back to the dorm to pack and get ready to leave. It's been really sad having to get to leave. I've had a lot of fun here in Lille and have met a lot of really cool people. Today, we had our French class in the morning. We reviewed our tests we took on Tuesday. There were parts of it that could have been better, but I passed it with a good grade and it was fine otherwise. After reviewing the test, we did listening exercises by listening to music and watching clips from movies. After class, we had our last lunch in the university dinning halls. The food may have been not the best, but I'm going to miss it too. After lunch, we had a closing ceremony in the university were we got our little diploma things and said goodbye to everybody at the university. One of the interns working for the European Summer Program made a video of pictures he took during the month. It was a really good video and made me tear up a little. Afterwards, I went to the student housing office to turn in my university student card and finalize all the moving out stuff. Once that was over with, I went back to the dorm to get all the packing finished. I went to hang out with some of my friends I've made here in Lille. We played ping pong at the dorm and walked around the area one last time. Those that remained in Lille tonight (a lot of people have been having to leave today after the closing ceremony) went to have dinner at a restaurant near the Grand Place again. It was sad because it was the last of us remaining in Lille and the last dinner we'd be having in Lille together. I had some sort of sausage dish. It was a very Flemish dish and quite good (Lille is the capitol of the historical region of Flanders and is in what is known as French Flanders). When we finished dinner, we said our final goodbyes and two of my friends and I made our ways back to the dorm for the night. And, that brings us up to now. It's been really fun these past five weeks in France and I wish I could stay longer. I will be glad to get back home, but it won't be fun leaving France. In the morning, I leave for Paris for the weekend and I'll be flying out on Monday. I'll take some photos of Paris again.

Nationalfeierdag in the Capital City of Luxembourg

    So, on Saturday I woke up around 7 in the morning to make it to the train station. I was under the impression that I had to register at the station for my trip, which I would have had to do no later than 30 minutes before the train departed from what I had understood. But, I didn't have to register apparently, so I ended up getting to the station much earlier than I needed to. I was fine with that though. I was also under the impression, though, that trains in Western Europe would be on time. Apparently that's not so either. The train to Brussels pulled into station at 9:37 when it was supposed to leave the station at 9:30, so I was kind of nervous I had somehow missed it. Fortunately that wasn't so and the train was only seven minutes behind time. On the train, I ended up sitting in 1st class for awhile. It was a rather cool train car. It reminded me a lot of the train from the Harry Potter movies that took Harry to Hogwarts. It was an old-styled car with wooden frames and all and personal sections for each group. I got kicked out of the section though by the guy checking the tickets. So I went to the equally cool, more modern double-decker car and sat up on the second deck. I had really good views of the countryside from the seat I had. The ride from Brussels to Luxembourg was about three and a half hours, so I ended up sleeping part of the way. When I got to Luxembourg, the rather cheap hotel I had reserved a room in was located directly across the street from the station. That was convenient, but it was a somewhat long walk to the city center. Sunday was Luxembourg's national holdiday and the city was going to have a lot of celebrations on Saturday too. Fortunately I had gotten to the city before any of the official events for the national holiday had started, so I got to see the city some while they were still setting up for the city. I liked the city a lot. I has a quaint, rather youthful and lively feel to it. The first official event to start the celebrations was the changing of the guard at the Grand Ducal Palace. Luxembourg happens to be the sole remaining Grand Duchy in the world, so that's cool. And, the current Grand Duke of Luxembourg is the nephew of the current King of Belgium, so that's also cool. The changing of the guards was at 4 in the afternoon and I made sure to get there early to get a good spot. I actually didn't get to see the entire ceremony, because military's marching band blocked most of my view when they marched in. I found that to be rather ironic. But it was cool there to see it happen. After that, the next official event wasn't actually until 10 that night with the parade through the town. So I had a bout 5 and a half hours of exploring the city. The part of the city I was at is divided between two main districts, the Central District and the Gare (train station in French) district, which are separated by a gigantic ravine. The Central District is where the old historical city center and the Grand Ducal Palace are. The hotel was in the Gare District. During that 5 and a half hours, I stayed mostly in the Central District. After awhile, after I saw most of the stuff in the immediate area that wasn't too much of a hike to go see, I went back to the Grand Ducal Palace and hung out there for about 2 hours until the parade. Apparently, spending hours in front of the Grand Ducal Palace waiting to see the Grand Duke and Duchess is a popular thing to do, because by no means was I the only person doing that. It was actually kind of cool to see the crowd that was waiting out front to see how the Palace is run. I got to see the Grand Duke and Duchess being escorted into the Palace, which was cool because of all the pomp and circumstance, yet quite apparent lack of visible security, of it all.  Later in the evening, before the parade, the Grand Duke and Duchess were to make a public appearance walking from the palace to the large square next to the palace where the parade was to end. No one new when they were to appear, so it kinda became a game for the crowd that was waiting for them. During the hour before they appeared, the police, military, and security forces were constantly coming and going from the palace, so each time the main door to the palace would open, everybody would get their hopes up that it would be the Grand Duke and Duchess. When they finally appeared, it was really cool and a surprisingly gratifying experience. I was among the first row of people along the security lines, and the Grand Duke and Duchess actually came within about 5 feet of me. I waved to the guy and he looked at me, smiled, and waved back. I wanted to say something, but there was a rather intimidating member of the military standing right next to me with a rather impressive rifle, too, so I didn't want to do anything alarming. Once the Luxembourgish Royal Family were seated for the parade, the parade started. I think the parade took longer than it was supposed to last, because it was supposed to end at 11:30 but didn't end until after midnight. That also meant that the fireworks show had to be delayed until after midnight, too, because the fireworks show was supposed to be the last of the main events to happen on Saturday. I tried to get a good spot for the fireworks, but apparently Luxembourg has no sense of crowd management, so I found myself in more than one really awkward situations while trying to maneuver through the crowd to find a spot. I did eventually find a good spot and was able to see most of the fireworks, which were quite impressive. After the fireworks, I made my way back to the hotel for the night. On Sunday morning, I went back into the city center to watch the shooting of the 101 cannons. That was a really amazing event too. There also was another parade that started at 12, but I had to miss it because I had to go back to the hotel, check out, and get to the train station. All in all, I really enjoyed Luxembourg and definitely want to go back. On the train back to Lille, I met this cool Australian girl and we talked for awhile while we were on the train. She had just graduated from college and her parents were letting her independently travel. She had already been travelling through Africa and Europe for the past 3 months by the time we met and was not going back home to Australia until Christmas. It was fun talking to her about our experiences travelling and telling each other what our homes were like. It was interesting because neither one of us knew it was going to be Luxembourg's national holiday when we decided we wanted to go to the country, so we entertained ourselves with the stories of what we did while celebrating Luxembourg's national holiday while in Luxembourg. It's fun being a traveler meeting other travelers on trains in Europe. Back in Lille, I bought some baguettes on the way back to the dorm. At the dorm, I worked on some homework and relaxed for a while. Today in French, we worked on stuff as usual and began to prepare for the final exams. We also had a discussion on science, medicine, and how the human life expectancy is predicted to increase. So that was an interesting conversation. We yet again did not have our afternoon elective class, so I went to study for the French exam. with one of the Memphis people that is in my French class. The program people put on a special French dinner thing where we had a wine and cheese tasting. I enjoyed that a lot because I like French food a lot. Afterwards, I went back to study for a little longer. And, that now brings us up to now. So that's been my weekend. I had a really great time in Luxembourg.

Some photos of Luxembourg:

A somewhat bad picture of the Grand Duke and Duchess, but a picture of them nonetheless. The Grand Duchess in the pink on the left and the Grand Duke in the suit on the right.

Bruxelles et la Vie

      So Tuesday was the usual stuff with classes, not much going on. Things went well and I spent the day after classes working on the video for a while and then I went to the local laundromat place to wash pants. We had to leave for Brussels at 8 on Wednesday morning, so I didn't do much Tuesday after dinner. On Wednesday, we made our to Brussels. It was a two hour bus ride, so that was cramped, tiring, and boring. But, we got to Brussels nonetheless, and early, too, if I remember correctly. We got of the bus near one of the main train stations, I think, and we walked to the main square of the city. The main square of Brussels is really quite beautiful. The architecture of the buildings is rather astonishing. It's kinda strange for me to think, though, that that trip to Brussels wasn't my first time there and that I already knew what to expect in regards to what all was in the city. But, I was still really excited to be there though. When we got there, we had about  two hours in the town to do whatever we wanted. The first thing I did was go with some of the Memphis people to see the Mannekin Pis statue. It's statue of a young naked boy urinating into a well. Very strange and somewhat of an awkward statue, but it's a very famous statue. There's also a lot of really good Belgian Waffle places near the statue, so we had waffles there at the statue. After our waffles, we proceeded to leisurely stroll around the downtown area of the city. I wanted to find the Hard Rock Cafe in Brussels to buy the shirts I needed to get. The restaurant is right in the main square of the city right next to the Town Hall, which would normally be a not-so-great place for a Hard Rock Cafe because of its conspicuous modernness. However, they restaurant did a really fantastic job at making it as inconspicuous as possible and it actually took me longer than I would have liked to fine it. But I found it nonetheless. I didn't buy any shirts right when I found it because I still had a lot of time left to walk around. We walked around the area first just to see what the area was like and then went back to places that looked really cool. The first place we went to was a chocolate shop called Neuhaus. It is an absolutely amazing chocolate place and apparently one of the few places that the Belgian Monarchy has deemed worthy enough to be a chocolate store that supplies the Belgian Monarchy with chocolate. I bought candied fruits and a dark chocolate spread from the place. After leaving that place, we casually made our ways to a well-known tavern that has maintained its original building in its original form since it opened in the mid-1800's. We had a beer there known as "gueuze" which apparently is a popular type of Belgian beer. It was quite good in opinion, though I could taste the bitterness more than I would have liked. I don't like bitter beers. I left the group though because I wanted to go back to the Hard Rock Cafe to buy shirts. I got there and spent about 30 minutes trying to decide what to get. I got t-shirt with "Bruxelles" on it, which is the French name for Brussels and a cool collared shirt with the English name of the city on it. It's also interesting for me to think that I'm starting to buy my Hard Rock Cafe shirts in foreign languages. During the time we had been walking around, it had started rain really heavily. The rain was the kind with the gigantic raindrops that are like water bombs. I was wearing a white shirt, so I ran into the nearest tourist shop and bought a cheap umbrella because I left the one I brought in Lille. That umbrella was a weapon. The metal used for the umbrella was very thin and very sharp, and I ended up cutting my finger really badly when I opened the umbrella up. It didn't hurt much because it was a very quick and fine cut, but it was rather deep and my finger start to bleed a lot. So, without anything to stop the bleeding, I put my finger in my mouth and just walked around with my finger in my mouth until I could find something to use to stop the bleeding. We were supposed to meet up in the Main Square to make our ways by bus to the main European Union buildings for lunch, but there was strike going on by the taxi drivers and they were apparently blocking the roads and our buses were blocked. So, we ended up having to take the metro to go to the E.U. buildings. It's also interesting for me think of how many European metro systems I've been on. It was apparently a really novel thing for a lot of the people on the trip because we don't use the metro in Lille much and it was their first time having to use the metro in Europe. I like using metros. But, anyways, we got to lunch about 30 minutes late. I was kind of expecting an actual restaurant but it was more of a cafeteria. Oh well. We were also supposed to see the main room of the E.U. building we were in where the E.U. representatives vote on stuff, but apparently there were cracks in the ceiling of that room and they were worried it might collapse, so that room was closed. So instead, the Hungarian E.U. representative gave us an introduction the E.U. place. It was interesting but I had already learned of what he had been talking about in the European Politics class I've been taking. I wanted to tell him I had gone to Budapest last summer, but I ended up not. When we left the E.U., we left Brussels and made our ways back to Lille. It was really fun getting to see Brussels for a second time. I remembered a lot from the first time I went there, which was way back in the 9th grade. It's also interesting for me to think of how many times I've been Europe......... Anyways, back in Lille I had dinner with some of the State people at this little pizza shop across the street from the University. From the outside, it didn't look too appealing, but it actually has really good pizza. The cheese is amazing. So that was Wednesday. Yesterday, we had French class as usual. We talked about nuclear energy. We had no elective class yesterday, so after lunch, I went back to the dorm for awhile. I then worked on the video project thing with my group. We finished, so that was a relief. I then went to a small, local cafe across the canal from the zoo for a meeting with the assistant director of our State group and some other State people for French speaking practice. That was fun and I've feel like it's very beneficial to just talk in French. After that, I went back to the dorm for a while. For dinner, I went with some of the Memphis people to another dorm and we made hamburgers, fries, and some really fancy dessert that involved peaches, chocolate sauce, and melted ice cream. It was a really fun time relaxing and hanging out with the group. The other State kids missed out. There was also some French people there too (one of which, ironically and somewhat awkwardly, was the daughter of the professor of my French class). It was fun getting to talk to them about French-American relations. After dinner, I went back to the dorm and worked on class work. And that was Thursday. Today in French we a small quiz that went well enough. We worked on grammar and other language related things, as we normally do in French class. We again did not have our elective classes today. So after lunch, I went over to the main train station to get my tickets to go to Luxembourg tomorrow. I did it all in French, so that was fun and exciting. After that, I went back to that laundromat place to wash my non-pant-related-articles-of-clothing. It took a while, but I won't have to wash clothes again until I get back to America. It's not interesting for me to think that I only have 10 days left in Europe. But, I'll just make the best of it and have as much fun these last 10 days as I can. I'm going to miss the Memphis people when I leave. I'm glad though that my sister is dating a guy with connections in Memphis. Gives me more of a reason to go to Memphis to visit my Memphis friends. But, anyways, that's today. Tomorrow I leave for Luxembourg. The train leaves at 9:30, so I'll be getting to the station at around 8:30. I'll be getting into Luxembourg City around 1:45 in the afternoon. I'm really excited to go to Luxembourg this weekend because it's the country's national holiday. But, anyways, that's all for now.

Some photos of Bruxelles:

 The Mannekin Pis

La Piscine and the Weekend

            So last week ended on a good note. Classes on Thursday and Friday were as usual and nothing much exciting happened. On Thursday, there was a strike with the train system here in France, so our professor for the elective I'm in had to cancel class because he commutes from Paris every day just to teach our class. That's about an hour train ride one way. Kinda surprised he does it. I'm glad he does though because he's a really good professor. He's not afraid to state his opinions though, but doesn't let them skew his teaching. The guy is apparently a big-time lawyer in Paris that has worked on many cases in France and the European Union. So I didn't have class on Thursday because of the strike and that was nice. Fortunately the strike only lasted one day, so we were able to have class on Friday. After class on Friday, most of the people from the N.C. State group went to Amsterdam over the weekend. I opted to not go with them to Amsterdam (I would have rather seen the museums and major historical sites of the city.....), so I was in Lille on my own Friday afternoon. I went with a small group of the students on the same program in Lille to a museum called "La Piscine" in a small suburb of Lille that has apparently the reputation of being the poorest town in France. "La Piscine" in French means "pool" and the the museum is housed in a renovated pool that the town had built in the Thirties but couldn't afford to maintain. It was a surprisingly cool museum that I really enjoyed. It was humorously quaint. It had a lot of really cool art from not-so-famous artists depicting a lot of city/industrial/modern art. I approve of this museum. Once I got back to Lille and not really wanting to spend the weekend all alone, I went out with some of the people from the group that comes from the wonderful University of Memphis (I'm indirectly a U of M fan, I guess, because my sister's dating a guy that has connections with the place). We had dinner at this really nice Italian restaurant. I had a pizza. Not very French, but I like Italian culture just as much as French culture, especially when it's in France. After dinner, we walked around for a while and went to this little bakery place for dessert where I got a caramel tart. We hung out at their dorms for the rest of the night. It was really nice getting to meet some of the U of M people. They're really cool people. On Saturday, I slept in and just enjoyed the day relaxing around the town. I didn't really do much on Saturday. I met up with the Memphis people again later in the day (not all of the people I met are from Memphis, actually, one is from Nashville and another is from Cleveland, but to make it easier, they're the Memphis people because the group from Memphis is the second largest group in the program). We went to one of the local grocery stores where we bought stuff for dinner. We went to one of the dorms where we made some sort of chicken alfredo pasta dish that turned out really good. So Italian food two nights in a row. I cooked the chicken. I had a lot of fun cooking the chicken. After we ate dinner, we just hung out in the dorm kitchen for several hours talking about random stuff. Disney was a popular subject. Yesterday I didn't do anything fun or exciting. I just worked on class work and spent most of the day just walking around the town. I was going to go to the Sunday Market, but I managed to get lost and not find it..... Today, classes went fine. We talked about violence in our French class today. Quentin Tarantino was brought up quite often. I actually like his movies but would agree that they can be rather violent at times. My elective class got out early today, which was nice. Before dinner, I had to start working a video project thing for the Intercultural Communications class thing that we had at the beginning of the program. The point of the video is to share how we've dealt with other cultures. I'm working on it with four other people. In the group for this project, we have me from Raleigh, North Carolina, a Japanese-American girl from the University of Memphis, an Indian guy from Bangalore, India, a Chinese girl from Hong Kong, and a Chinese-Canadian girl from the University of Alberta in Edmonton. It's kinda fun getting to know people from different cultures. After we worked on the video for a while, the whole group had a dinner thing at the University dinning hall. We had Flemish Belgian style food. It was decent. After dinner, I went back to the dorm and that brings us up to now. That's been the past few days here in Lille. On Wednesday, we're going to Brussels. We're going to be rather busy, so it's a good thing that the Hard Rock Cafe in Brussels is right in the main city square where we're be spending enough time that I can easily run in and get a couple of shirts. But anyways, that will be Wednesday. For now, that's all.

Some Photos of the pool museum: