Please Don't Foil Your Banana Right Here

Hello! I spend last weekend (and then some) at on-arrival training for all the volunteers coming to Belgium. There are only 4 of us from ICYE, but about 23 from EVS (European Voluntary Service), so it was a good and lively group! Our orientation was held in Nieuwpoort, which isn't too far from Brugge, but a pain in the tuchas to get to since it's a much smaller town near the coast. But I made it there, and was rewarded with a camp/old cottage/Bates Motel type setting. Very dusty, very cold, and only 4 toilets for 30 people (that's what I call roughing it!) Plus, one room even had deer heads on the wall- lovely.

Luckily, the people were more than enough to make up for it. There are volunteers from all over the world- Germany, Costa Rica, Lithuania, Latvia, Czech Republic, Ireland, Nigeria, Turkey, Malta, Italy, Spain, Serbia, France, Austria, and Georgia. Everyone was very sweet and very friendly. It was a really warm group, and we all enjoyed spending time together. Lucky for me, English was the common denominator so I did alright when I wasn't surrounded by some of the 8 German girls! However, it was pretty amusing to see/hear some people's not-so-good English. Don't get me wrong, I completely understand what it's like to be the one speaking in a broken second language. But it was still funny to read that someone was afraid of being "hoamsick," hear "photogroup" shouted, or hear one guy declare while packing his lunch, "I think I'm going to foil my banana!" Let's just say the other American and I had to try our best not to laugh hysterically. Or say "that's what she said."

We had a wonderful time together and talked a lot about ways to navigate our time in a new country. This included a "Philosophical Walk" to the beach where we got to know each other better, and visiting other cities in small groups to get to know Belgium more. My group went to Leuven, a historical city about 18 miles east of Brussels which houses the oldest Catholic university still in existence. Little did we know, the day we went to Leuven there was a yearly festival going on! It was their "jaarbeur"- an annual sidewalk sale, kermis, and dierenmarkt. What's a dierenmarkt, you ask? Well, "dieren" is animals and "markt" is market! There is one time a year farmers from surrounding villages bring some of their livestock into the center of the city to sell them, and the local breed of horses, the Brabant draft horse, is shown in a ring.

Here are some pictures of the jaarbeur:



Leuven is a nice place to visit at anytime, and we were fortunate to see some calmer, beautiful parts of the city as well. There is a Begijnhof in Leuven, which was a village for religious women (widows, spinstresses, etc) who wanted to dedicate their lives to the church during medieval times. It's a well-preserved and stunning brick and cobblestone community that now houses students and teachers from the nearby university. One student told us the Begijnhof was his favorite place in Leuven since he had belonged to a tight-knit religious community within it and it made the city much smaller and more meaningful for him. Another lady we met in Leuven directed us to a small park nearby that you basically need to know is there in order to find it- and we were glad we found it! It was tranquil, pretty, and the perfect place for an afternoon walk in the park!


Overall, I had a very nice five days, got to experience more of Belgium, and, most importantly, made some really great friends. I'll of course keep you posted on all of our adventures!


Dutch words learned in this adventure:
geestig- funny
tof- cute
goesting- desire
wreed wijs- dialect for "pretty cool"

xoxo
kosher waffle