Bruxelles Avec Mon Oncle

This past weekend I met Uncle Art in Brussels. He was in town on business, so I took the three hour train ride to meet him after work on Friday. When I arrived, after being let in by the housekeeping staff, he was asleep due to jet lag. We went out to eat at a nice Italian restaurant called Ciao and then talked to Ben on the phone before walking back to the hotel.

I woke up early the next morning and did some of my Geography homework before Uncle Art woke up at 11:30. Talk about jet lag. We got waffles from a street vendor before exploring an antique market. We headed towards the town square, followed by a couple on their wedding day going to take pictures in front of the chapel. The bride was wearing a pink and purple dress that barely resembled what most people would call a wedding dress. After strolling through parts of Brussels that most tourists don't get to see, we headed towards the Grand Musee des Beaux Arts a Bruxelles (otherwise known as the Fine Arts Museum). We had lunch at the museum cafe and then explored the museum for about an hour and a half. Some notable things about our time spent at the museum are the huge cargo elevator with chairs (it felt like we should have been in a Disneyland ride) that we took from eight floors below the ground and the French tour group that Uncle Art latched onto for a couple minutes, even though he couldn't understand a word that was said. We went back to the hotel after our afternoon excursion and watched the Maryland vs. Duke basketball game, a little surreal and slightly typical at the same time to be watching it with Uncle Art in Belgium. If you didn't watch or hear about the game, it was humiliating. We also watched a couple of Australian soap operas before going out again for dinner. We ate at a waffle shop for dinner, so we got sandwiches and then waffles with delicious toppings for dessert. We went back to the hotel for the night and watched Air Force One in English on TV before falling asleep.

The next morning we were awoken by the alarm which rang on the TV and then both headed out to the train station around 9:30. I was home a little after Uncle Art's flight was due to take off and had another fabulously awkward afternoon with my host parents before Sally got home from Amsterdam around 8:30.

Pictures from this weekend and my visit to the Philharmonic Orchestra!