90!

aww...day 90, how cute! het was een leuke dag! AHHH! THAT WAS NOT ENGLISH! i tried to speak only dutch with my classmates today, but considering we had english class for two hours after lunch it was kind of difficult. it was like...listen to english, make comments to my friends in dutch, speak english for the class, talk about this weekend to my friends in dutch..extremely complicated for my already language-limboed brain. other than falling on my way up the stairs to dutch class nothing exciting happened there. have i mentioned that now that we are in level 2 in language class, we are on the top floor of the building? granted there are only three floors total..but thats like 4 flights of stairs! (i'm not sure if that quite made sense, but nonetheless i still fell going up them this morning). then i had some coffee at the tea-house place for lunch with my sandwiches since it is monday, and if you are a regular reader you would know by now that every monday vincent and i have sandwiches for lunch (hot dog buns..i'm serious!). sooo then were the two hours of english...then i went home early because my class had a meeting about their plans next year for university, and it really wasn't necessary for the american to sit there bored considering i do enough of that on a regular basis. the school owed me this one. when i got home i found out the mail man had come earlier, but host mommy was not home so we got a note that said to pick it up tomorrow at the post office. well we decided it would be a good idea for me to see if it was there today instead, but sadly it wasn't. i think it was probably still in the car from the mailman, so i will for sure go tomorrow after school and get it! i am excited because it is my birthday box from my mom, and it is 22 pounds (10kilo)! i will look like an idiot carrying it home..especially if i take my bike, haha! but it was a nice walk to the post office because its not far away and it was surprisingly nice out today. no rain, only a few clouds, and over 50 degrees. at one point i was sitting in my bedroom with the window open and a tee shirt on, and only a little bit cold! maybe i am getting used to it? it's hard to believe that there is snow on the ground sometimes at home these days...seems to early because not all the leaves have fallen here yet. belgium is so pretty in the fall! all the cute little crowded brickhouses, the cobblestone roads, and the orange/brown leaves..quaint eh? so tonight i went to our rotary district person Emi's house for dinner with courtney from south africa, her mom, her host parents, and manuella from brazil. it was nice..we had this cheese thing that i wish i could remember the name of. the actual cheese itself is not the name, but the concept has some name that i should know and i forgot. apparently it is done in brazil too! we each had a little pan and you put some cheese in it, set it under a heater and let it melt, then poured it on your potato along with some ham and pickles and stuff. it was like a grown-up easy-bake oven or something! along with a couple of glasses of french white wine i'd say its a lot different than the get togethers we would have with our rotary people, you think? in brookings it would be like some burgers on the grill and a mt. dew...that being said, eating south dakota beef is my number one priority upon my return in 8 months. at one point we were talking about the differences in crime between our four countries..and boy is it really different! south africa sounds like the bronx, brazil sounds like chicago, belgium is like minneapolis, and brookings is comparable to..nothing. south dakota is such a wholesome safe place (knock on wood)! that is definitely something you can only gain respect for by not having it every day. like not having the convenience of leaving your car unlocked outside wal mart for an hour or something. i'm guessing most brookings-ers don't even think twice about it! so now i am home and its pretty late. i took a shower because i smelled like swiss cheese. i tried to explain my night to my host parents in dutch, but i didn't find it that successful. i'm getting really good at "flinglish" or "dinglish" (flemish/dutch english) and i frequently add english words to my out of order dutch sentences. but..i'm trying, and thats all that counts. my host dad said tonight that my dutch was "incredible" compared to about a month ago. can you believe that, incredible?? all i can say to that is...well, ik probeer. (i'm trying)! and since a blog is not complete without some sort of picture, whether it be stupid or beautiful..here you go. this was my fun tonight with the gummy vitamins from home of course.

so goofy! goodnight!