The last post I made, I was getting ready to leave for Madrid. Needless to say, that trip began with a very rocky start. My flight out of Brussels was on a Thursday night. I figured that my 3 and a half hour window after class and before my flight was enough time to make it to the airport and make it to Madrid on time to go out! What I didn't know was that the airport I had to get to was an hour outside of Brussels, and the only bus that could take me there was another half hour away from my house. Bottom line, 3 and a half hours was NOT enough time to get there and I ended up missing my flight. Keeping an open mind and opening my wallet, I bought a ticket to fly out the next morning and took the hour bus back into Brussels, wine bottle in hand, making it back in time for the thursday night dinner party my friends and I arrange every week. Drowning my sorrows and eating the leftovers, I managed to wake up in time and finally made it to Madrid the next morning by noon! I met up with my friend Stephen there, who studied in Madrid last spring and was back visiting his friends. I immediately fell in love with the city as he showed me around. I don't know if it was the sunshine (which I hadn't seen in weeks) the beautiful parks, or the delicious chocolate pastry Stephen bought for me, but I knew I loved Madrid right away. We met up with Izzy, one of my roommates from Madison, and spent the day going to different bars, drinking wine, sangria, and eating tapas with some of Stephen's spanish friends.
I only managed to squeak in a "gracias" or "no hablo espagnol" every once in awhile. This was the first place in Europe it was difficult for me to find people who spoke at least a little bit of English. Thank goodness I had Izzy and Stephen around to translate or else I would have been REALLY lost. Izzy and I spent the next day exploring the city (it was another beautiful day), spying on attractive Spanish couples and admiring the Spaniards impeccable sense of fashion. We met some of her friends from her program and went to a beautiful park in the center of Madrid, called Retiro. 
<-- Izzy and I in Retiro
After enjoying the sunshine all day, we went to a Spanish house party, in which we had to dress up like something that is 2 syllables. I bought some fake flowers and stuck them in my hair and clothes and went as a jardín (or garden, for you non-Spanish speakers) and Izzy was fútbol, sporting an old-school soccer jersey. After getting our drink on with some rambunctious Spaniards, I grabbed a cab to the airport at 4:30AM to make my flight back home to Brussels. *Note to friends from school: Izzy has changed her name to "Isa" since being in Spain, because her silly Spanish friends can't pronounce her real name...
The next week in back in Brussels was different than the rest. Why? Everyone on my program and at school realized that they had to do schoolwork for the first time since being here. And why was that? Midterms. Had. Arrived. As my feeble attempt to "buckle down and get work done," I stayed in Brussels that weekend to study. Did I get much done? Not really. As always, I ended up cramming last minute for my exams. I even had to cram extra hard because I had requested from several of my teachers to take my exams early as my friend Amy offered me her spare ticket to go see the USA vs. Netherlands soccer game in Amsterdam, which happened to fall in the exact middle of midterm week. But I just couldn't turn that opportunity down!
Post-exams, we scrambled to the grocery store to stock up on snacks and drinks for the bus ride to Amsterdam. However, this process ACTUALLY led to us miss our bus. We couldn't wait for the next bus to come or else we would miss the soccer game, so we ran to a different station to catch the next train. This cost us even more money but took much less time. A few drinks and 2 hours later, we quick checked into our hostel, dropped our bags and ran to the metro to get to the game in time. Donning our USA face paint, we had a great time cheering on our home country. The energy in the stadium reminded me of a badger game, especially being surrounded by the surprisingly large amount of American fans!
Final Score: Netherlands 2, USA 1
At the end of the game, we found ourselves chatting it up with another American. He started scribbling things down on a little notepad, which was curious, so we asked if he was a journalist. Turns out he works for ESPN magazine and he interviewed us for a story they're doing about American fandom! Look for this quote from yours truly in an upcoming issue: "I haven't chanted 'USA' this many times since Obama was elected president!" After our starstruck moment there, we ended up running into a bunch of other kids from UW-Madison who were leaving the game and also strangely enough, staying at the same hostel as we were. We went back into town and spent the night in the hostel bar hanging out with them and also meeting travelers from around the world.
We spent the next day in Amsterdam doing a strange combination of cultural activities: checking out the Red light district, touring Anne Frank's House, visiting some of Amsterdam's infamous coffee shops, and seeing the Van Gogh museum. That night, we went over to my family friend's house for dinner. The Ebbink's are a Dutch family that lived across the hall from my family when we lived in New York when I was a baby. They moved back to Amsterdam about the same time my family moved to Minnesota. They were so nice to host us and it could not have been nicer to be in a home eating a meal with familiar faces. This may not be shocking at all at this point, but we missed our bus back to Brussels the next morning, and finally made it home after 4 + hours in traffic on a later bus.
Since that trip, I've been happily spending my weeks and weekends in Brussels, relaxing and really exploring and getting to know my city. This past weekend, my mom came to visit, and it was the first time I was able to be HER tour guide! She had never been to Brussels before, although she's been almost everywhere else in Europe. She surprised me at school on Thursday, and we went to my favorite restaurant on campus, Times Square, for coffee, where we first ran into one of my professors. It felt like middle school parent-teacher conferences again, because she couldn't help but blurt out, "how's Jenna doing!?" Luckily this professor apparently likes me and gave a good 'report.' As we walked outside we happened to run into my boss, and my mom of course asked for more progress reports and a tour of my office! Even though I tell her how everything is going, she was happy to get to experience my day-to-day life here with me for herself. After spending some time in the not-so-glamorous VeCo computer lab, we retreated to the hotel for some relaxing before going out to a delicious dinner with some of my friends at a Belgian restaurant, Les Brassins. It’s a hidden gem that’s tucked away on a small side street and also happens to be next door to Audrey Hepburn’s birthplace! The next day we had lunch on top of the Musical Instrument Museum, which has a view of all of downtown Brussels and of course a lot of great people watching. We walked the entire city that day, taking pictures and soaking it all in. After eating famous Belgian waffles, we went to Delirium, the bar with 2000 different kinds of beer. My mom had been practicing beer drinking at home for this excursion and she got a mango beer and loved it! After the beer tasting we got traditional Belgian frites with spicy samurai sauce and called it a night. I was so happy to have her here and get to show her my new life! Pictures to come soon as they are all on her camera.
I leave for Dublin on Friday with a few friends to check out their beer selection, sights, and see Brother Ali in concert! Updates sooner than later after that.
