As you guys might have gathered, my emotions here are sort of all over the place. Overall, I do not hesitate to say that I am having a great time, but there are times when I want to be somewhere else. This is normal for exchange students - or at least that is what I tell myself. But the other day I noticed something that made me a bit sadder. Sitting on the bus I had the realization that one of the reasons that I am able to keep my spirits so high is the knowledge that eventually I will be returning home. Right after I realized this, I decided that I needed to change my outlook. You guys at home are great, but I need to find my place here outside of the context of my return home. Everyone says Christmas is one of the harder times, and the reason they state for it is you aren't with your family and usually you are. I think it is also a hard time because an exchange student has been gone for long enough they realize how long a year away from home really is. So that is my goal, to make myself understand that I won't be going home soon. And I can't lie to myself. I am really bad at it... This should be fun. I don't know if any of this makes sense to anyone, but I felt like I needed to write it down.
So enough of that depressing stuff. Let's write something people might enjoy reading. So in a lot of my blogs I have been talking about this guy, Damien (I am pretty sure that is his name at this point. I would say 87%). Well, yesterday I actually went over to his house. I love his house. I know that might sound strange, but there was something very appealing about it. I don't know how to say this without seeming extremely judgmental and offensive, so if I come off that way please understand I don't mean to. This is just my impressions. Maybe I look at everything too judgmentally...
Anyway, their house. I am looking for words to describe it, and the only thing I can come up with is used. Every bit of space was being used for some practical purpose. Nothing was solely there to look nice. To some it might seem a bit messy, but to me, everything was practical. Things were left where they were used. Bottles of drinks were left in the middle of the kitchen table because when someone was drinking they would sit at the table. Blankets were left on the couch because folding them up and putting them in a cabinet seems silly when the next person is just going to take it out again and use it on the couch. And maybe the practical use of space was a bit out of necessity, because with a dog, 7 cats, and two parakeets living in the house, not to mention the goat and chickens outside, space had to be used efficiently.
Speaking of outside, that space is used to the fullest as well. As I said before there are chickens and a goat (yes, they have a goat, for a pet. It is amazing. I laugh so much when Damien takes the goat for a walk to come and visit us here.) But also they have a green house with bell peppers, chili peppers, egg plants, and tomatoes. They also had lettuce and spinach (I think) in a little garden. Also they had corn growing in another place. There were a few apple trees around the place. They had another little green house place where they were growing vines with grapes. There was probably more that I didn't catch, but When he was showing me all of this, the only though I had was I want to live like this. It is a lot of work, but something about growing your own food has a romantic appeal to me...
So in my other posts I have talked about how Damien talks very little. He is very quiet. Well, I found where all of his words went. His brother, Cedric I think (I'm so bad with names :-/), never stops talking. It is really funny because looking at his parents, there is that same split. Their father is very quiet. The only time I have heard him speak is when he was spoken to or just saying hi to me. Their mother, on the other hand, talks all the time. Their parents live two years in the US before having kids, so she speaks very good English. Even when I tried to answer in French, she would switch back to English, making it very difficult for me to work on my French. But then she and Damien left to go see a play and I got in a conversation with Cedric. My French got quite a workout with him. He speaks very quickly and very often. It was a humorous situation. He would ramble in French and I would try to catch all I could. Usually I got the general idea, but sometime I would get completely lost. In those situations he would look at his father and say, "Traducteur!" in playful exasperation, and sometimes his father would translate, but usually he would just tell Cedric to slow down. Occasionally he would ask me a question, and I would, in my bad French, attempt to give an answer. This conversation is probably the first that I have had in French that I think had some notable substance. We talked about cultural differences between the US and Belgium, political situation in the US and Belgium, what it is like to be on an exchange, and various other subjects. I felt magnificent after that conversation. I don't know how to describe it. In other blogs I have commented how conversations here are fairly superficial or just conveying basic information. It felt good to talk about something a bit deeper. I don't know how else to say how I felt.
Another thing that was great about spending time at their house was Cedric is a fan of Super Smash Brothers. We ended up playing a few rounds of it, and though he, for the most part, kicked my Picachu's butt with Young Link, I still won a few rounds. It was a lot of fun to find someone close to my age here that is easy to interact with. Damien is great, and I really enjoy when he comes over and we talk, but it is difficult for me. I feel a bit awkward the whole time. But with Cedric it was easy. I don't know if that makes sense, once again I feel like my words don't convey exactly what I feel, but I can find no other words to use.
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| Sorry the picture looks pretty bad. It was the best of the ones I took, but the moon was beautiful when I was taking the picture; beauty which I obviously wasn't able to catch fully. Still felt like the blog needed a picture. |
Anyway, walking home from their house last night, I had this feeling of overpowering joy that I almost skipped all the way home. I guess this blog was an attempt to explain that feeling. I guess the whole point is I am really excited to have found this place and I look forward to visiting their house again. I feel like I have found something I had been missing up till now: a group of people I can socialize with where I feel natural. I guess I had that a bit with fencing, but that group doesn't extend outside of the gym. I have a group of people I hang out with at school, but all of their activities revolve around alcohol, and everyone tries to get my drunk. My host family is great, but there is no one here my age. I interact with Laura, but that usually consists of me bouncing her higher than she has been on the trampoline or playing card games while watching Hannah Montanan (I am so sad that her name had enough of an impact on my stay to get included in my blog).
Unfortunately, there may be some negative consequences from finding this new group. Last night, while I was down B spamming with Picachu, there was a party going on in the town where my school is. I was invited, and said I would probably going, but because I had found something more fun and involving less alcohol, I decided to not go and stay in Hamoir and hang out with Cedric. I haven't heard much from people from school, but I did get one message from a girl there asking why I didn't show up. I explained that I was hanging out with someone in Hamoir and I was having a good time, but I also explained that I knew everyone at the party would be trying to get me drunk (they told me this the day before) and I didn't really want to have to deal with all of that. I don't really know what to make of her responses because the first was "Oh, that's a pity :o"(Do I still put quotes around it if I am translating?). But then about 30 min later I got "Ha, ok I understand :)" I don't know what to make of that, but we shall see on Tuesday. (No school Monday! Ha!) But I guess I don't really care what the result is. It will make school hard for me if I lose their support, because they were quite encouraging, but if me not showing up to a party because I don't like to drink makes me lose that encouragement, then I don't really care. We shall see.
So that is what has happened in about 2 days of my week. The other days are pretty boring, so I will just stop with that. Considering how long this is already, you guys probably are not upset by that decision.
I love you all and I am missing you like crazy. Have a great time in the United States.
~Weston Halberstadt
