What things cost

Now that we've made several trips to our local grocery store (the Super GB, which looks much like a small to medium-sized store in the U.S.), I've compiled a list of what some common items cost here. It's been interesting to see how some things such as bread, wine and coffee are cheaper, while other items like chicken and batteries are quite a bit more expensive. I used a conversion rate of $1.45=€1, which is abysmal but sadly is about what you'd actually pay nowadays if you were to pay by credit card or withdrawal the money from an ATM. Also, these prices include tax, so if you happen to not live in a sales tax-free state you'd need to add that to make a good comparison.

So here's the list:
Bananas, 6 medium $1.77
Granny smith apples, 6 medium $3.28
Broccoli, 500g (one small head) $2.16
Small yellow onion $0.20
Vine-ripened tomatoes, 3 medium $1.33
One liter lowfat milk $1.64
One loaf sliced wheat bread (the cheapest one they sell, but still good!) $.85
Edam sliced cheese, 9 slices $2.16
Ground beef, .38 kg (.84 lb) $4.32
4 boneless, skinless chicken breasts, .89kg (1.95 lb) $11.05
One jar (500 ml/16.9 oz.) Bertolli tomato & basil pasta sauce $2.81
Coffee, 250g (.55 lb) - gourmet, from Colombia, Java, etc. $3.16
Coke zero, six pack of 1.5 L bottles $12.89
Leffe blonde beer, six pack of 330ml (11.16 oz) bottles $6.71
One bottle Penfolds Rawson's Retreat Shiraz/Cabernet, 2006 $7.24
One bottle JeanJean Vin de Pays d'Oc Chardonnay, 2006 $5.39
4-pack Duracell AA batteries $13.04 (ouch! good thing we stocked up in the States)

There are also a few things we haven't been able to find here yet, perhaps because they just aren't used in this country. Non-stick cooking spray (like Pam) is one of them - we definitely miss it when it comes time to do the dishes! We also haven't found any black beans or sliced cheddar or American cheese. We've tried a few things we've never had before though, including voul au vent - it's similar to chicken pot pie, but there's no crust, it's just sold in a jar or plastic container and eaten with bread. The jar we bought cost $3.90 and was 500ml.

Anyway, I thought you might find it interesting to see what things cost here. If there's a specific item you're curious about let me know and I'll be happy to report back!

Site redesign and surveys

I've received a few negative comments about the colors I was using for the blog background and text, so I decided to redesign it in the hopes of making it more reader-friendly. I'm still trying to stick with the same general color scheme (which was chosen to mimic the Belgian flag, as you can see by its prescence on the site now!), but hopefully this will be easier on everyone's eyes. I'm open for feedback, so be sure to vote in the surveys along the right side of the page or leave your comments on the post itself. Thanks!

Can an almost middle-aged dog learn two BIG new tricks at once??

I guess we'll find out, because I've just signed myself up to take courses in two very dissimilar languages at once! Carl and I together are signed up for a 3 hr./week French course through his school, and I have also signed up for a 6 hr./week course in Dutch! The Dutch course is actually free (all you pay is €30 for the course materials) so there was no way I could turn down the opportunity! The Flemish community subsidises the classes for residents of the city in an effort to encourage more people to learn Dutch. I can understand why they're doing that, because it didn't take much time here for us to realize that even though Brussels is officially bilingual, French is pretty much all you hear!

Anyway, I'll be sure keep you all posted on my progress and how confusing it is (or perhaps isn't?) to begin learning two new languages at the same time. Fingers crossed!! :-)

La Roue de la Fortune

In our efforts to learn French, we've begun tuning in to a few gameshows on one of the French networks. They're a great way to practice listening and learning in a new language! The two we've been watching will both be familiar to our American readers - "La Roue de la Fortune" ("Wheel of Fortune") and "Un Contre 100" ("One vs. 100"). The formats of both are easily recognizable when you watch them, but there are a few differences that we've found pretty fun and amusing.

Take Wheel of Fortune for instance - picture the American studio, but add disco lights, a much more animated host, a lot more glitz, and a dog on the set (yes, a dog!). He just sits there or sleeps most of the time, but periodically they'll pan the camera over to him or include him in a little interlude with the host.

One vs. 100 is also pretty much the same concept, but in addition to the disco lights and glitz, they also play a lot of sing-along type music, and people get so into it that when you close your eyes you think you're listening to the fans chanting at a World Cup Soccer match!! Seriously, the French get into their game shows, and I can only guess that when they watch ours, they must think to themselves "Boy are those Americans BORING"!!

A Perfect Afternoon

Today was a special day in Brussels - in French it's called "Dimanche Sans Voiture", in Dutch "Autoloze Zondag", and it means "Car Free Sunday" in English. It happens once a year (this is the sixth year now), and it's evidently done in a lot of cities throughout the EU. The idea is that everyone gets to experience what the city is like without so many cars on the streets. Emergency vehicles, taxis and buses are the only motorized vehicles allowed on the roads, and mass transit is free to everyone for the day. There are also events planned in almost every neighborhood to mark the occasion and get people to come out and enjoy the city "sans voiture".

Today also happened to be one of the most beautiful days we've had since we arrived here, so we decided to take advantage of the opportunity to get out and enjoy the weather and the lack of traffic. We hopped on the metro and took it a few stops in towards the city center, getting off near the Parc du Cinquantenaire and walking under the Brussels version of the Arc de Triomphe. Interestingly, this arch was planned to commemorate the 50th anniversary of Belgian independence in 1880, but was not completed in time and had to be topped off with wood panels for the celebration. It then sat unfinished for years due to disagreements over funding, and wasn't completed until 1905, when it was finally finished using private funding.

Anyway, we continued along towards the city center, walking part of the way (stopping at an outdoor festival) and taking the metro a few more stops as well. We've briefly visited a few of the key sights in the center, but today we were happy to just "get lost" along the carless streets and see what we could find. We walked past St. Michaels cathedral (built between 1450 and 1490), where I snapped the attached photo - notice the cute guy in the Red Sox shirt??

Just down the road from the cathedral we stopped at a Brasilian restaurant/bar, where they were playing live Brasilian music on the terrace outside. These guys were good, and it was so nice out that we relaxed there for a good 90 minutes over beers and an afternoon snack. Then we wandered through the Rue de Bouchere, which I would describe as a very narrow and cozy "restaurant row". Depending on who you ask this area is either a tourist trap that's best avoided or a fabulous place to enjoy a good meal - guess we'll have to try it out one evening and formulate our own opinion!

After that we headed home, but we enjoyed a really terrific afternoon of discovering some areas of Brussels we hadn't yet seen. The no car thing was pretty awesome too, a little eerie for the busier streets that are usually choked with traffic, but once you get used to the lack of car noise and the increased number of bikes, it's really nice - too bad it's only one day a year!

The requested evidence

I had a couple of blog readers say that they found it unbelievable (and more than a little nasty) that there's so much dog poop to be found on city sidewalks...I even had someone request photographic evidence of it (ahem...Chuck!). So here it is, a few photo samples of the landmines that can be found - or if you're REALLY lucky, stepped in! - around the city.

We actually witnessed the "deposit" of the first one the other day along a busy shopping street - it belongs to a Yorkshire terrier whose young female owner looked pretty bored, and I think scooping was about the LAST thing she would think of doing! The second one I found this morning in our neighborhood - notice the fresh produce in crates stacked on the ground across the street. Anyway, to spare everyone from having to see these pictures right at the top of my blog, I'm going to follow up immediately with another post. I figure it's the least I can do!

Important update on graduation

Yes I know we're fast-forwarding a bit by bringing up graduation already, but we have an important update for all of you who are thinking about or discussing the idea of coming over to Canterbury for Carl's graduation (the program is part of the University of Kent at Canterbury so the ceremonies are held in the Canterbury Cathedral - cool, huh?). We've just found out that we were mistaken about when the ceremonies take place, and the actual date is QUITE different from what we thought. It turns out that his ceremony won't be until sometime in November!!

We know this is a big change, and we offer a sincere apology to anyone who has made advance travel plans in anticipation of coming in September - we really did believe it would be then, and are quite surprised and frankly not happy to learn it will be so much later! At this time it is our understanding that Carl will have completed his studies (including his thesis/dissertation) by mid-September, so if you decide to stick with plans to come out then we SHOULD be available to visit with you and perhaps travel - it all depends on internships and jobs though, so again I'm sorry we can't be more committed to a schedule or specific plans. As for November, we're not even sure if we'll still be living here by then or not, so we may be flying across the pond to attend the ceremony ourselves! We'll keep everyone posted as we find out more, and thanks for your understanding!

Skype anyone?

We've just signed up with Skype, an internet "phone" service which allows you to place and receive calls over the internet with any other Skype user worldwide for free, and also offers very cheap rates for calling regular phones worldwide. It's way cheaper than anything else we've seen, so we've opted to do this instead of signing up for a landline phone. For anyone who wants to sign up, go for it and send us your Skype username - ours is carlnjen, so if you get set up let us know and we can give it a try!

The joy of moving!

What an evening we had yesterday! We bought a three-piece sectional sofa (pictured) second-hand from someone who lives fairly close to us, and our new friends Volker and Johanna generously offered to help us transport it in their car. They have a somewhat small vehicle so we were a little worried about whether the larger piece would fit, but when we got there we found out that nothing except the ottoman and pillows were going to fit! We had already promised the girl selling it to us that we would have it out of her house that evening, and in fact it was already out on the street...so we were left with no choice but to carry it to our place by hand, Johanna and I taking the smaller piece and Volker and Carl the larger one. What a nightmare THAT was - it was quite heavy and we had to haul it a good kilometer through the city!! Let's just say that we owe Volker and Johanna BIG TIME!

I think we'll look back on this and laugh at ourselves (as others most certainly were when they saw us on the street), but after we finally got it up the three flights of stairs and into the living room, no one had any energy left to laugh! One thing is for sure though - when it comes time to move out of this apartment, we will GLADLY give this piece of furniture away FREE to anyone who is willing to haul it out of here, because we sure don't want to do it again! :-)

Ghent pictures, as promised!

Well I'm a day late with uploading the photos from the Ghent trip, but hopefully you'll all forgive me because I think they turned out pretty well even though it wasn't the greatest picture-taking weather (hey, it's Belgium!). I neglected to take any pictures of myself or my travel companion though - oops, guess I'll try to remember to photograph people and not just "stuff" next time!

Anyway, the first photo is of St. Baaf's cathedral, which houses a famous painting called "Adoration of the Mystic Lamb". It's one of the earliest known oil paintings (1432), but because neither Johanna or I happens to be an art buff, we didn't pay to go into the room where it's housed. I took that picture, as well as the next one showing a view of the old city, from the Belfort, a belfry from the 14th century. The third picture is of the Gravensteen Castle, complete with turrets, moat and all...it was built in the 12th century (wow!), so it's the real deal! The last few are of the canals and surrounding buildings in the old city, taken from either a bridge or the boat on which we took a 50 minute cruise - which was well worth it by the way!

I will definitely be returning to Ghent again, since Carl didn't get to go with me this time. I wouldn't mind staying overnight next time as well, to have a chance to enjoy the city at night.

First daytrip!

Yesterday I took my first daytrip, to Ghent (Gand in French, Gent in Dutch). What a nice town! I went with Johanna, who is going to be one of Carl's classmates, and we had a great time. Everything is so close here too - the train ride was all of about 30 minutes and cost €15 round trip. I took quite a few pictures, and I promise to upload some of them when our internet access is working, which if all goes well will hopefully be tomorrow. In the meantime I'm doing well but can't wait till Carl gets back so we can continue on this crazy adventure together! I hope everyone is doing well on the other side of the pond!

Doing the internet cafe thing

We've moved into our apartment and we're getting settled slowly but surely, but our internet access won't be turned on until the 13th...so for now my only online access is at public internet terminals. Needless to say, that means limited posts until next week - sorry folks!! All is well though, and we are liking it here so far. Carl heads off to LA tomorrow to FINALLY get his visa (he'll be back the 15th), so for the next week I'm on my own...wish me luck!!

We're not homeless anymore!

After more than a week of internet research, phone calls and wandering of the city streets, we have finally found a place to call home here in Brussels! We're in the southeastern section of the city, near the campus but also relatively close to the city center, which is six metro stops away. It's a 1-bedroom apartment, not large by U.S. standards, but pretty good sized for being in a city - about 75 square meters, or roughly 840 square feet. The place isn't furnished, so on our somewhat tight budget we'll be either buying things second hand, or from that ubiquitous European furniture store, Ikea!! It's on the top floor of a three story building so we'll have some stair-climbing to do, but hey, it'll keep us from gaining weight from all the great chocolate, beer and cheese here!
We got the keys this evening and will move in tomorrow, but we're not sure how long it's going to take to get our internet access hooked up, so I may have limited ability to post until then. In the meantime, let's keep our fingers crossed for a smooth moving-in process!

Early Observations

We've been here just over a week now, and in that time we have formed some first impressions about life in Belgium. Some are very positive, others not as much. Here's a little list which we may add to over time:

Beer
All of the different beers we've tried have been excellent, except for one: Maes. Those who enjoy the watered-down lagers that are mass-produced in the U.S. might like it, but for us beer snobs it was a major disappointment. The favorite so far is Leffe, which makes both a Blonde and Brune (brown) version, both of which are very good.

Getting around
The mass transit here is excellent, putting even transit-friendly Portland to shame. There are three different Metro (subway) lines, 18 tram lines, and dozens of bus routes that go pretty much everywhere. Driving, on the other hand, appears to be a major source of fear and frustration (though we have yet to try it). Traffic is horrendous, the roads are very confusing, and drivers here are quite aggressive, though I must say they are pretty tolerant and friendly towards pedestrians. Speaking of pedestrians, maneuvering around others you pass on the street is rather interesting as well; people here often play a pedestrian form of "chicken", and will continue to walk three-abreast as they approach you, waiting to see if you'll move first. Thus far we have virtually always been the ones to move and go single file, mostly because we don't feel comfortable enough yet to want to deal with any confrontation that may ensue. I'll maybe follow up on that one as time goes by! :-)

The People
Belgians are somewhat reserved, but extremely friendly and accomodating. Even given our almost non-existent French and completely non-existent Dutch, we have yet to be treated rudely or criticized for our lack of skill in the local languages. An English speaker can easily "get by" with learning only the basics, but seeing how adept many of the locals are with three plus languages really makes us want to make the effort to learn. We've got our work cut out for us!

The Pets
Yes, I feel I must mention the four-legged residents of Brussels, specifically the barking variety. I've read that Belgians adore their dogs, and from what we've seen I would say that is definitely true. Lots of people here have dogs, and we often see them out on the street or in parks walking their furry friends. That's great, until Fido or Fifi does what comes naturally (often in the middle of the sidewalk), and the owner walks off, leaving the steaming pile there, just waiting for an unsuspecting pedestrian to step in it. Seriously, I have never seen so much dog poop on city streets in my life!

That's all for now, more to come soon!

We're finally here!

After months of anticipation and preparation, we finally hopped a plane on August 22nd, and arrived at Zaventem airport in Brussels around 1:30 PM (13:30 the way they track time here) on Thursday, August 23rd. And lest anyone think that this means we finally got our Visas, let me clarify that we STILL don't have them, and will both have to fly back to the States to pick them up once they're finally ready. We have since confirmed that they can be issued once a final piece of information is confirmed by the authorities, and we expect that to occur within the next week. So the visa saga is almost over!!

There was also a small snafu involving the pickup of our two feline companions - basically no one told us where we were supposed to go to get them once we landed, so it took about an hour to locate them! Another interesting thing regarding the kitties, absolutely NO ONE stopped us going through customs to review or question their paperwork or anything! Amazing, and a little bit annoying given how much time went into getting all the health certificates/USDA stamps/EU import forms filled out!! No harm done though, we found them and despite being confined to their carriers for over 18 hours, they did just fine. Such good little troopers!

Since arriving, most of our time has been spent taking care of the details that must be handled when moving to a new place: getting phones, opening a bank account, locating a good map of the area and figuring out where things are, finding a place to live, etc. We've had some success, but let's just say that both of us have aching joints and very sore feet at this point!

We did have a chance to visit the city center Sunday afternoon and check out the Grand Place and the little Mannekin Pis statue, and of course have a few beers and some excellent Belgian chocolate! It was a brief visit, but I snapped a few pictures and have attached them here. Enjoy, and of course there is much more to come!

Ahh, Those Glorious Bureaucratic Delays!

A lot has happened since my last post, including the sale of our house, two cars, and several pieces of furniture; the moving of nearly all the rest of our earthly possessions into a rather small storage unit (you truly don't realize how much stuff you have until you try to cram it into a tiny little room!); and of course the quitting of the jobs. To sum it up, we are now officially homeless, carless, jobless and "stuffless" - if that's even a word?? :-)

So now we're up to the present, and the latest bit of news: we were scheduled to depart for Belgium earlier this week, but after waiting a full 10 weeks now, our visas are STILL not ready! The consulate website puts the wait at 3 weeks, and our oh-so-helpful contact at the LA consular office originally told us it would be 8 weeks. On Monday we faced the critical deadline for changing our flights, and unfortunately we had to immediately re-book our flights for a specific date. Of course we have no specific date on which we know they'll be here, so the best we could do is move the date out several weeks in the hopes that we'll SURELY receive them in that timeframe.

So, our latest scheduled departure date is now August 22nd - let's hope that's the last flight change and the only snafu we'll have during this process!! In the meantime, we're sitting around my brother Mike and his fiance Peyton's house, trying to be somewhat productive and teach ourselves French, since we now won't have time to take the intensive course once we arrive like we had planned originally. C'est la vie!!

So much to do, so little time

I'm what you'd call a relocation veteran, having moved across the country (both with and without a job) a total of 3 times in the last 10 years. Let me just say a U.S. move is mere child's play compared to all the work involved in relocating internationally! It can be overwhelming at times, but fortunately both Carl and I are good at compartmentalizing things, and taking it all one step at a time...we make a pretty good team actually!

I haven't yet told anyone about my blog because I want to get used to posting to it and get some content loaded first - but soon, I'll give out the address to friends and family, so the people we care about will know what we're doing and how things are going once we're settled in Brussels. The big move is only about 11 weeks away, so it won't be long now!!

Getting Started

So here it is - my brand-spanking new blog! For anyone reading who needs a little background, my husband (Carl) and I (Jen) are preparing to move to Brussels, Belgium for approximately one year. Carl will be attending the University of Kent at Brussels, also known as the Brussels School of International Studies (BSIS for short), and will be working towards an MA in Political Strategy and Communication. His program begins on September 24th, but we're hoping to arrive in Belgium in early August so we can get acclimated, find a place to live, begin learning the local languages (yep, two of 'em!), and hopefully do a little travelling before his school commitments kick into high gear.

As for me, visa restrictions mean that I will likely not be permitted to take on any formal, paid work. So, I'm going to have to get creative in order to keep myself engaged, challenged, etc...my thoughts thus far include volunteer work, casual/informal work to make a little extra money, working on my French and Flemish language skills, and doing some writing - this blog for instance! More on that, and everything else to come, later...