Saturday, October 29th, 2011
Well, I might have 9 hours of school each day, get home 2 hours later than I normally would at home, and have after school classes twice a week, but all of that hard work is rewarded with plenty of school breaks. Actually, the first of 5 long breaks for me! Which is definitely an improvement from the two I get at home...
Today we made plans to go fishing together. Now, fishing, well actually killing animals and such, is not really my kind of thing, but it is one thing that Eddy absolutely loves, so I thought I should give it a try. Luckily, I didn't have to wake up and go at 6 like Eddy, because Pascale was planning to head out and get there around 9. So at least I got to sleep in... We left around 8:45, went to a bakery and picked up crossaints for breakfast (I had the MOST delicious one ever, one filled with rasberries!!!), and then headed to the fishing hole. We went to one of thos places that has fish already in the ponds, or at least once you pay they do. Eddy told me that he paid 10 euro to get in, and then the man in charge put in 3 fish for him to catch and time for half of the day.
But even with the 3 fish they put in, Eddy continued to excel at fishing and somehow caught something like 30 fish. I really don't understand how that works out, that there are so many fish in the pond, unless the 3 orginal fish mated, had babies, and those babies rapidly grew to full maturity in the matter of 4 hours... I did a bit of the fishing, casting the line sometimes, and pulling in the trout once they were already hooked. But when it came time to actually kill them, I just took a nice long walk around the pond... I really do love meat, but I am more of the person that prefers to just have her meat fully cooked and ready to eat on her plate. skip the actual killing of the animal, the cleaning, and the whole raw meat part. Just put it on my plate, no questions asked. My heart is torn between my love for almost every single kind of animal, and the deliciousness of meat. Especially bacon.
The fishing experience was a nice one, I mean everyone should go fishing at least once in their life. But, well, I figured out that I am not much of a fisherman. Or fisherwoman, I guess... I don't really enjoy sitting out in the cold, waiting for the stupid fish to be tricked into biting the bait, and then killing them afterwards. I really do think it is just mainly the whole killing part... So, yeah, I guess I can cross fishing off of my list of potential hobbies that I could enjoy and spend hours doing. I think I will just stick to my sports and scrapbooking...
After fishing, we went home, hung out for a bit, and then went to Eddy and Pascale's friend's house for dinner. Apparently, the guy's whose house we had dinner at has been friends with Pascale for all of their lives. I guess they grew up together, in one of those joined home things. They were only seperated by one house, and spent pretty much all of their time together. And today, they are still good friends and live close to each other. The families even plan out a dinner every month... Really, I was there as they planned out the dates for the next year. Oh Belgians, they really are so organized and on top of things. And in that way, I will never fully fufill the role of a Belge. Because I am just too much of a procrastinator... But hey, it works for me, so why not?
The family was really nice. I didn't talk much to Pascale's friend, but I did talk a bit with his wife and she was nice about speaking semi-slowly and repeating herself if need be. I guess she is a teacher, so she must understand everything that I am going through... They also had a son, who goes to an all English speaking school, who was off on some vacation for the long break, and an adorable little girl who I am guessing was around the age of 7. When we first arrived, she seemed pretty interested in me. Even if they don't speak the same language as me, I still love little kids. I just smiled at her and such, which helps kids warm up to you real fast. It was so cute, after we sat down her mom told her that I was American, and that I didn't speak much French. And then all of a sudden the curious little girl tried to hide behind her mom, as if a foreigner was the scariest thing ever. But as the night wore on, she began to be curious again. And apparently thanks to her older brother, she knows some English because she tried to impress me with the silly, irrelevant phrases that she did know. But I didn't really get that much of a chance to talk with her because she started to annoy her parents when she became silly, I think trying to impress me, so they put a movie on the laptop and put her in the kitchen. And apparently she had already eaten too, because she didn't join us for dinner...
For dinne, we had a full out 4 course meal. An appertif in the sitting room, a soup, and entree, and a dessert. Sometimes it just feels like Belgians are so darn sophisticated! I mean, if we invite people over, it's generally a large group and we are just thinking: What would be easiest to create in a mass and please everyone??? But Belgians, they just go all out with the whole meal thing. For the main dish, we had steak. Well, it looked and tasted like steak, but you can never be too sure... Luckily, Pascale caught on that we were having meat and mentioned that I like my meat, well, not raw like most people here. But luckily, it wasn't a hassle because his wife (I cannot remember their names for the life of me....) is one of the rare Belgians who is sensible and doesn't like their meat completely red as well!
Like most everything here, the dinner lasted quite some time and we probably didn't get home until like 12ish. I was simply exhausted by this point and immediately went to bed. All in all, a pretty darn good day. What I don't understand though is how no matter how much I sleep, or how little I sleep, I always seem to be exhausted here. I have always been one to need more sleep than most, but really it is a bit ridiculous how I always seem to be tired, or on the brink of tiredness. I guess I can just credit that to the near impossibilty of learning and speaking a new language...
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