Slimy, yet satisfying.

First off, I apologize in advance. This blog will be much less philosophical and whimsical, and more descriptive and explanatory.

So I'm officially all moved in to my new flat; lease signed, everything unpacked, pictures hung, groceries bought, supper made, bed slept in. Unofficial housewarming party is this Friday. All that's left is to is get rid of the rest of the fucking furniture at the old place, clean it (yay..), and figure out this miscommunication and fee situation with the "expert" who does the État des lieux to determine how much money the landlord gets to keep from our deposit before releasing it. Simple. Then when this is all finished I have to catch up on my research for my much neglected studies which took back burner to all of this. But really, the last thing you want to do after 3 days of packing, disassembling, hauling, moving, carrying up 3 flights of stairs, unpacking, reassembling, is start reading up on The Failures of Statebuilding and Mainstreaming Conflict Prevention. Plus Vera was in the city for a week, thank god. She was indispensable with helping me make a few trips with stuff to the new flat, and getting her boyfriend to help me move my desk, chair and heavy suitcase with his car. You know, a good friend will help you move, a great friend will offer to help you move. While other friends just ask how it went and when the housewarming party is...

The new flat is fantastic though! I am actually a little upset that I found this place now, and I'm leaving for Switzerland in two months. If I come back to Brussels in the fall, I'm most definitely coming back here. It is one of those older two storey character apartments that has been redone, painted, and completely cleaned. For a virtual tour click here. 

Bad qualities: outside door knob falls off all the time, keys to the outside door really suck and I can barely get in, no toaster, single bed.

Good qualities: the only walls that are white are the bedrooms, which means colour!; great modern kitchen with gas stove, new oven and dishwasher; very well decorated with everything going together well; laundry!; very nice size bedroom and bathroom.

So-so qualities: third floor apartment with no elevator. And European third floor, which means there is floor 0 (main), 1, 2, and finally 3, of windy tiny European stairs. I don't like this for obvious reasons, that include moving, buying groceries, carrying heavy objects, and going to and from the flat several times a day. I do like that I'm getting a good workout every time I go to the apartment though.

Which brings me to the Great qualities:
A) Location. Amazing. 40 feet from Parc Cinquantenaire, that I have previously mentioned in other blogs. This huge, beautiful parc with tons of benches, grass, fountains, historic arches, etc. Less than 5 minutes from Mérode, a main metro station connection to campus, the centre, everywhere you need to go. And what's even more, something which Vera and I discovered today, a great little shopping district right off Mérode! Cute little cafés, boulangeries, patisseries, grocery stores, sub and healthy food shops/cafés, Mac store, malls, Chocolate shops, banks; bref, everything you need!
B) Roommate. Chavdar is this extremely metrosexual Bulgarian guy who works for some EU institution or big company doing something with finance...lol. He likes things very clean, loves cooking and makes these amazing things. He made Bulgarian meatballs last night for supper after I finished assembling shit (quite possibly the best meatballs I've ever had), and strawberry cheesecake made with real strawberries, homemade strawberry sauce, and Bulgarian cheese as I was moving in. Plus, he always has at least a few bottles of wine on hand and he already knows Tom and that whole network.

If today would be representative of every day in this new flat, I'll take it. As my first day officially waking up in the flat, it was a great day for a few reasons. One is finally have someone enjoyable to talk to when they/we get home. Not that Tom wasn't great, lol, but he was always working or on the computer. Another is the realization that with all of this walking and stair climbing that is now part of my every day, I am getting a fairly good workout. The average day when I have class like today, I speedwalk (which all of my 'alone' walking is) 10 minutes to the tram that takes me directly to school, walk 5 minutes to campus, 5 minutes back from campus to tram, walk two stops from tram to Mérode, walk to parc, wander neighbourhood, walk back to tram, walk 5 minutes to and from campus, 10 minute walk back to flat, climb 4 flights of stairs, walk 8 minutes to grocery stores, walk 8 minutes back from grocery stores carrying two heavy bags, and finally, climb 4 flights of stairs with heavy bags. Weird thing is, today was a very chill day. I met Vera for lunch before she caught her flight back to Berlin between my classes. We walked to a Panos, grabbed sandwiches and went to leisurely eat them in the Parc with full sun, next to the fountain. After this we casually wandered the neighbourhood discovering all these shops, before walking back in the sun to the tram stop. And I mean, after ALL of this today, I still got home, made supper, and finished putting away my room and hanging pictures. And blogging. Strangest thing? I feel great. I love being busy like this. A good busy; a having non-stress inducing things to do kind of busy. I wish every day was like this.

Willkommen, Bienvenue, Welcome

Well I just noticed the other day that I haven't posted an update in quite a while, since beginning of February...In my defence, things have been crazy. My blog isn't the only neglected corner of updates and writing. I have at least 6 lengthy unanswered messages and emails that I still have to respond to, which all took backseat to a letter I wrote last week. That's right, not an email, or message, but an actual letter. It wasn't handwritten, because I hate my handwriting and I type on average 80wmp, which just frustrates me when I'm handwriting, because I'm thinking about how much faster the process would be going if I was typing. Even though I love real letters, their speed frustrates me too. With the internet and email we underestimate the convenience of the instant send and receive. When you write a letter, you first have to go out of your way to mail it, wait for it to get to your receiver (which could take a week or two), and then still wait for them to pick up their mail and read it. Whereas in the mean time you could have spoken to them on the phone and chatted a dozen times already. Holy digression and off topic... For the sake of clarity and non-rambling, maybe I should go get some caffeine before continuing this...

Okay that's better.
Let me restart....

I just finished a book yesterday called Through the Language Glass: Why the World Looks Different in Other Languages by Guy Deutscher.

Amazingly informative book, and extremely well researched well written argument for the importance of languages and how they have the potential to shape our perception of the world around us, by not only the vocabulary and ability to describe certain things, but also by dictating which elements must be conveyed in a sentence. One of the more relatable examples he uses is between French and English. In English I can say "I had lunch with a friend,"and I am under no obligation to specify the gender of my friend. However, in French, I am forced to use either "ami" or "amie" thereby specifying the gender in my story. Other examples he used are languages that force the speaker to include geographic locations or temporal space of elements. This therefore forces the speaker to remember the time and/or exact location of the room, the person, or various elements of the story, thereby slowly shaping our perception of reality. His book is obviously 250 pages more detailed and fascinating than these short examples. I loved it so much I plan on checking out his first book as soon as I have the chance, The Unfolding of Language: The Evolution of Mankind's Greatest Invention.

Yesterday was actually a pretty amazing day. I spent the majority of the day reading that book, but at the same time took the train to Antwerp, and sat and relaxed at Starbucks and outside in Antwerp. I also met up with a Dutch Belgian friend at Starbucks and inspired by my book, had a very philosophically stimulating conversation with her. Back in Brussels I ended up having an amazing supper with a friend from BSIS. Not only was the Traditional Irish Stew, Hoegaardens, and atmosphere great, but it was one of those conversations for the books. Covering everything from school, jobs, relationships, passions and the meaning of life, spirituality, instincts, and bettering and loving yourself. It was amazing and fit in perfectly with the themes of our respective days. One of those moments that just had to happen. After this, I get home and Tom is playing the song from the new Thalys commercial, Willkommen, Bienvenue, Welcome, a remake by MAI of the original song from the movie 1972 movie Cabaret with Liza Minnelli.



The perfect end to my day.

I absolutely love days like that. They make the crappy days when you don't want to get out of bed or leave your apartment and just want to watch a thousand episodes of Glee (not that that happened the day before...), completely worthwhile. But hopefully, the bulk of the stress will soon be behind me. My dissertation proposal and its 10 pages of bullshit has been submitted. That is after 4 topic changes and a last minute meeting with my supervisor to advise me on if my current topic was even feasible. Turns out, it is, and it is perfectly in line (purposely planned that) with the internship I got this summer! (That exclamation is solely for my internship, not my dissertation). I'm doing my dissertation on the nexus between conflict and climate change; why its caused and how its preventable through sustainable peacebuilding efforts. My internship will be working for an International Environmental Lawyer who has her own consulting organization located in a picturesque village in the Swiss Alps.

This woman is not only absolutely amazing, in the sense that she's turning 50, but looks, feels, and acts like she's 35, does more activities than most of my friends combined (long distance swimming, hiking, triathlons, rock climbing, skiing, playing cello with an orchestra, etc.), and is very spiritual and extremely down to earth, but she was actually there for the 1992 'Earth Summit' in Rio that shaped and laid the path for current negotiations on climate change and strategies today, AND helped draft the agreement. Oh, and she's originally Canadian. Today she does advising for the UN, the Security Council, various governments, and has projects with all the top Environmental and Climate Change organizations around the world, including National Geographic. So me and the other 3-4 interns she hired for the summer will be working for her doing research on sustainable development issues and other various projects she has going on, all while living and working alongside her in the Swiss Alps for 3 months. Needless to say, especially after my tirade here, that I am extremely excited. We start end of May.

Until then, I have an exam in late May, 3 essays to write and hand-in for the beginning of May, 3 weeks of classes left, 1 essay proposal left to do and to revise another one, and a presentation tomorrow afternoon. I am also moving in a week. As I mentioned previously, our rental contract is up end of May. So Tom is moving in to a tiny windowless bedroom close to his work where he can save a lot of money, and I am moving in with this (Serbian?) guy Chavdar, who as it turns out, knows Tom through AIESEC (obviously...) and is a friend of his. He has a gorgeous apartment in the European Institutions quarters of the city, which is obviously a lovely neighbourhood filled with bars,  pubs, restaurants, Parc Cinquantenaire basically across the street, a main metro line 5 minutes away, and is a few metro stops from campus and the centre. The apartment itself is fully furnished (yay) very well decorated, spotlessly clean, has a dishwasher and laundry (BIG yay), walls that aren't all white, and an actual closet and bed. All for cheaper than what I pay now. However, this obviously means a lot of work getting rid of the contents of our apartment all in the next week.

What else has been going on since my last blog... Well, other than all of the above, I have travelled to Berlin to party for the weekend and visit Julija and Vera, which I should have written an entire blog about that on its own, they have been to Brussels for a weekend, and Vera is coming back to Brussels today or tomorrow actually. I have been to Antwerp several times, along with Oostende, the Belgian coast, Mons, in French Belgium, Mechelen, and Terhagen, which is a Belgian small town North West of Brussels. Other than getting to finally see actual nature in Belgium, and take a walk down by the river and stuff, it wasn't all that exciting. Since the entire country is so populated, Belgian towns are mostly just suburbs of cities. However, I still do plan on going to see Gembes, the town my ancestors are from way down South near the French border. Since my last post I have also met many many French Belgians, thanks to a now French Belgian ex, and a few Dutch Belgians as well. Let me tell you, the Belgians are pretty much all a peculiar breed. I could write another full blog post about that as well. I also have tried a few European/Belgian classics such as Filet Americain, which is essentially a homemade open faced burger, but completely and totally raw. The shocker? It was actually delicious. In short, it has been very eventful. I'm trying to explore Belgium as much as I can, because, as much as I like Belgium, my favourite aspects of it can be found in almost any other European city which doesn't have Belgium's bad qualities. Like Berlin for instance. Or... as mentioned, almost every other city I've been to; Except for maybe Paris. That is to say that while I still have no plans past the end of my internship in end of August/beginning of September, there is no special attachment tying me to Brussels. Europe yes, Brussels no.