No sleep in 30 hours, means a great first day in Brussels!

Wow, so we finally arrived in Brussels, and I'm in love with it already!!! I really have no idea where to start, because the trip thus far has been crazy! We start by leaving for the airport about 45 mins later than we planned. We arrived on time anyways, and we begin to check our bags. It's my turn in line and I get the guy to throw my bag on the scale because it's way too heavy for me. Turns out I packed 62 pounds of crap!! Damn that huge suitcase Christine gave me! It allowed me to pack too much. Since I went over 50 pounds I had to pay $100 dollars!! HOLY HELL! Jenna, Whitley, and Lindley had already checked their bags so I couldn't transfer goods at this time. Shit, Shit, Shit. Well, I see it as one more thing that TCU bought. Thanks TCU!

We make our way to the terminal, board the plane, and take off. It all happened within 20 minutes. I was surprised and in shock because I then realized that I was finally headed to Brussels! The 11 hour flight went by fast. They served us nasty food. If you can tell me what this is, I'll be extremely surprised!!

I watched movies, played games, and watched tv, all on this personal tv in the back of the seat in front of me. I slept for probably about 30 minutes...crap I knew I should have packed an ambien. Jenna and I got bored of the tv and played the "Penis" game. For those of you who don't know what that game is, it is where you say penis over and over and each time until it continually grows louder. Let's just say we got slightly loud for this plane. Whitley finally sits up (who was sitting behind us) and goes "why do you guys keep saying penis?" I played it cool and said "oh, you can hear that?" and turned back around.

We landed in Amsterdam 7:30 their time...who the hell knows our time. We were supposed to have a 50 minute delay, but snow delayed us for another 20 minutes, and then another 2o minutes. I couldn't be too upset because the airport amsterdanians are pretty cute!! We finally boarded and I lucked out and had the whole row to myself! Even though it was only a 30 minute flight to Brussels, I passed out! I woke up to a very rough landing from the pilot. Rude. We land, scream a little because we are "home", de-board, grab our luggage, head through

customs which consisted of walking through a hallway, walked into this sea of people and saw a beautiful TCU poster waiting for us. They didn't even need the TCU sign, we stuck out obviously! We were like a lost puppy dog. We probably looked pathetic to the locals. Doesn't matter, because I live here now.

The host family we are staying with are the best people ever! They are sweet and funny and go way out of their way to make sure that we are having the best time ever. They even bought us these waterbottles, called camelbak. You bite and suck and the water comes out! No tipping or pouring, just bite a suck. Their son, who is a sophomore in high school had a wrestling match today and they went to watch him after they picked us up. We decided to take the metro into town to go exploring! Keep in mind, we haven't slept for about 20 hours now. The city center is AMAZING! And I had my first Belgian Waffle. Let me tell you, they are the best thing I have ever had! People aren't lying when they say that they are the best thing ever. Mine had hot chocolate sauce and bananas and powder sugar mmmmm.

We finally decied that we were about to crash, so we headed back to the metro station....too bad we only found it by accident! Whitley passes out on the train, I had a guy sitting WAY TOO close to me, and Jenna and Lindley were zoning out. We reach the station and then walk back to the house. It was about a 2 mile walk, but it wasn't bad. It was really nice outside and Jenna and I had a mild snowball fight. I'm sure the people driving by were thinking "crazy Americans". On our walk back we ran into some sheep. Apparently, I have a gift for sheep calling. I was able to use my baaas to lurn the sheep to the fence. Ya that was a highlight for sure. We ended up arriving back home just as the host family was pulling back into their driveway. We decided to take a power nap that last about 2 hours and then the host family took us out to dinner. This great Italian place that had fantastic wine. Ps the drinking age here is 16 and the driving age here is 18. It starts snowing as we are eating and we get way too excited about that. We we get back home it is snowing so hard that we can't help but play in it. We begged the family to let us walk their dogs in the snow. I'm almost positive they thought that was weird, but they gave in and let us walk them. The snow was way to pretty to be inside, even though it was 9:00 at night.

So I haven't slep in about 32 hours now....I'm going to pass out now! But before I do, this is what I have learned so far about Brussels:

1. Pedestrians DO NOT have the right away.

2. Belgians do NOT look where they are going.

3. When a church says "silence" do NOT let the host familie's cell phone that they gave you for the day ring in the church. Especially when the ring is a loud whistle and then says taxi. And then do NOT proceed to walk around pretending that it isn't yours.

4. Deodorant isn't a priority around here.

5. The waffles ARE as good as they look.

Ps...here is a look at what mine and Jenna's room looks like right now....