Spencer's Semester Abroad: January 2012

If you’re interested in gaining bad weight quickly, make sure you go to Brussels. Between the chocolate and the waffles, this place is just terrible for your body. Seriously though, I think I gained like 10 pounds.

January 25^th

After Chris and I spent last weekend in Greece, our entire program had to travel to Brussels, Belgium to take part in the second part of our European Study Tour. Because Belgium is so close to the UK, we actually took the Eurostar, which is an international train. We actually left from King’s Cross Station (where platform 9 ¾ is in Harry Potter), which is only one tube stop away from my apartment. Apparently, there is a cart that is attached to Platform 9 & 3/4, so i'm going to have to return and take pictures. The train passed through France until, after 2 hours or so, we arrived in Belgium.

Once we arrived at our hotel, I was instantly relieved. It was a million times better than the one I “stayed” at in Greece. We went to our rooms, put our stuff down, and then went exploring the city in search of lunch. After eating in a pub, I stopped at a waffle stand and tried my first chocolate covered Belgium Waffle. It was so good; I ended up eating 7 over the course of three days. It probably would have been more if the stands were open a little later. Luckily, my friends studying abroad in Paris were with us, because they translated for pretty much everyone we talked to the rest of the trip. Because I didn't really speak French, I just kept making noises and pretending like I could.

After lunch, we changed into our suits and went to go tour the European Parliament (where the European Union is). We heard a few guest speakers, and then we had the night free to walk around the city. A few of us decided to pregame and catch up with some of our friends on other study abroad trips (Madrid, Milan, and Paris). We left the hotel to get dinner and headed to an area that had food from all over the world. As we roamed the streets, we stumbled upon Grand Place, which is right in the city center. It has really cool historical buildings and is an awesome place to see at night.

January 26^th

Today, we had to wake up early for a full day of guest speakers and information sessions. We went to different European institutions to get different viewpoints of the Euro-crisis, European Union, and other controversial topics occurring at the moment. These information sessions and speakers were used as further preparation for our mock parliament, which was meant to take place the next day. The speakers throughout the trip included ones from France, Germany, Turkey, Croatia, Hungary, the UK, Netherlands, and Sweden. When the day concluded at 5pm, we had a few hours off to get dinner. Chris, Teddy, and I all went to a Turkish Kebab restaurant to grab some food. I’ve never had a Kebab (they spelled it Kebap) before. It ended up being really good. After dinner, we walked back to our hotel, where we had to meet in a group and prepare a presentation for the next day. Unfortunately, this meant that we had to do some work and couldn’t really go out that night.

January 27^th

After hearing a few more guest speakers, each group had to present its findings and policies in front of the other members in our program. This pretty much took up the entire morning. After lunch, we then walked to the Croatian representatives offices to hear their opinions and the formal process that Croatia had to encounter in order to enter into the European Union, which they are expected to do next year. My friend Teddy and I ran over to another waffle stand and ate them as we walked. Since these waffles were covered in chocolate, they dripped all over the place. When you go to eat it, you can't help but get it all over your face. Dressed in suits, Teddy and I walked leaning forward with our asses back so as to not drip all over our dress clothes. To be honest, if someone was to watch this process, they would probably have thought I hit rock bottom. we probably looked like a crack addict homeless guys with our faces covered in chocolate.

Finally, it was time to have our mock European Parliament. To be honest, this was pretty miserable because everyone was roasting Greece and its financial struggles, meaning Chris and I were constantly on the ropes. However, I think Chris and I ended up doing a very good job defending our position, and the program directors actually came up to me after and told us how well we did given such a hard position.

With the end of our mock parliament, we went back to our hotel and then out to dinner. The restaurant was in the famous Grand Place and ended up being really good. I tried Brussel Sprouts (I know, Belgium Waffles and Brussel Sprouts, how fitting). Later that night, we all decided to go out. After an extensive hotel room pregame, we went to a club called Delirium, which is famous in Belgium. It was actually pretty fun until one girl on my program puked all over the floor. Literally, mid sentence, her cheeks puff up and she keels over just letting loose all over the floor. At that moment, the world seemed to be in slow motion as I watched spew gracefully arc out of her mouth and towards the floor. Luckily, I just got my foot out of the way. Thank God, because after that the bar reeked and we all cleared out and went somewhere else.

The next club was actually really fun. We stayed there pretty late, and on our way out, a fight started to break out all over the bar. Our group left the bar quickly, but while we waited in the streets for everyone, one of the girls on my program came outside with napkins clutched to her face and blood all over her chin and coat. It turns out she was caught in the crossfire, and someone broke her nose in the process. I left with her and two other girls back to the hotel to get our program directors and then head to the hospital. Since she broke her nose, she couldn’t really laugh because it hurt so much. Of course, I couldn’t stop cracking jokes. While we were sitting in the waiting room, I turned to her and said she was lucky to have a broken nose so that she couldn’t smell the European B.O. that was wafting throughout the room. By the time I got back, it was around 4:30 in the morning. We all ended up recapping the events and going to sleep.

January 28^th

On our last day in Belgium, we were supposed to go visit Bruges, one of the most well preserved medieval cities in Europe. However, given the previous night’s events, we ended up sleeping to late and not going. Instead, we ended up walking around the city a little more, grabbing a few more waffles. Also, I stopped in at McDonald’s. I’m making it a point to go in each country that I visit. So far, the McDonald’s in Berlin, Athens, and Brussels were all pretty good. It’s funny, at home, you look at a McDonald's as a greasy place with cheap food and sketchy people. Here, you look at the Golden Arches like it’s a historical landmark and can’t help but feel pride. Gotta love Americanization.

We ended up catching the train back to London. The train had a bar in it, so we played drinking games the whole way back. I never want to fly again. To recap, Brussels was a cool place, but if I didn’t have to go there for my program, I would say it would be lower on my list of places to visit.