Yaaay Brussels!! Today, my first FULL day in Brussels was very eventful. We got up early and went for a tour of the Grand Place, Dr. Sheridan, or Jerry, knows an incredible amount about the "story each building has to tell" in the Grand Place. This is what I managed to retain from his tour.. the Grand Place was destroyed by the Spanish, all the building were destroyed by the fire that the canons and torches showered on Brussels. Except the town hall which was built circa year 990 because the belgians spent so much effort putting out the fires to save this building which meant so much to them! (its the building on the right in the nighttime picture I put up) The rest of brussels was basically flattened. So... they rebuilt it! But not only that.. they rebuilt the Grand Place and 4000 other buildings in 3 years! THAT is an accomplishment - I don't think that could be done today.. and you should see these buildings- no this isn't the cheap stuff developers throw up nowadays either. NO these are building that tell stories! In the Grande Place, each building represents a different guild in belgium- such as the tailors and the cabinet makers. Each has beautiful sculptures and inscriptions about the foundations of society and the purpose of different aspects of each guild, as well as philosophical statements about humanity.

On more personal news, today I also moved in with my home-stay family! I was elated to find out that I would be living with a family with kids my age and a dog and a pool! Geraldine, 20, and Alexi, 18, picked me up and helped me lug my gigantic american bag downstairs and into their cute little european car! They explained that their parents were out of town until Sunday and that their aunt was staying with them for a couple days, so I can't move into my room yet. So for now, I'm in their music/play room. I like it! There is a guitar and a piano and a view of the pretty back yard and pool! But eventually I will have a room near the stars and the door that has its own bathroom and desk :)

The house is beautiful, and I enjoyed hanging out the Geraldine and Alexi's friends today.. but its been kinda stressful for me to adjust to a lot of the changes. They know english decently, but its a chore for them to speak in English. My french has become very rusty over the last 3 weeks, so my brain has been scrambling to make sense of all this french conversation flying over my head. But its slowly coming together. It's frustrating when you realize at a dinner conversation that every time you say something in english you interrupt the flow of conversation :( And as most of you know, its not quite natural for me to be quiet and speechless.. but I've been taking on this new persona somewhat- to spend the time listening to things I can pick up. This is definitely incentive to pull out the French/English dictionary and take some notes! I'm sure many of you are glad to hear I'm doing the listening for once!

To end on the most beautiful part of the day. I met to awesome belgium kids that I'm getting to know! They are very well mannered...I'm envious of this and other things about them. My favorite moment of the day was sitting in their beautiful back yard with Geraldine and her boyfriend and the Dog (BEST DOG IN THE WORLD), playing with the dog, talking about music..and laughing. Its a beautiful place, and though its stressful and awkward to adjust to foreign people in a foreign country, as I looked out the window of the car tonight into down town belgium I felt how much I love adventure. This is it folks. :)

On your mark, get set..

Here is a summary of all the reasons I wanted to study abroad in Brussels, other than the famous Waffles, chocolate beer, and french fries!

Brussels is rapidly emerging as the capital of Europe. It is the home of the European Union and its accompanying array of diplomats, politicians, lobbyists and reporters. It is the headquarters of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, the key institution in transatlantic security cooperation. It is the meeting point for thousands of international corporations and non-governmental international organizations. When you are in Brussels, you are in the center of European decision-making.

During my studies of International Studies at AU, I became very interested in International Environmental Agreements. As many of you know, one of my greatest passions is for the environment! I've been fascinated by the Kyoto Protocol and progress made on the international arena to try and preserve the environment. Europe has been much more progressive than the United States in its efforts to prevent climate change and to find and implement alternative forms of energy. I'm interested to learn about how the EU works, isn't it fascinating that all of those countries are working together to try and meet common goals on many different levels? I'm sure its a messy process, but maybe a sign of growing peace in the world!

Today is monday, I'm leaving to fly to belgium in 3 days! I'm pretty nervous right now about getting to know everyone in the group and meeting my home-stay family in Brussels! I'm sure it will be great though!