I have been a bit late with this blog, so it’ll be loosely summarising what I’ve been up since my last entry.
The Sunday I wrote the last Belgium related entry, I did end up going back into Leuven to finish up my sightseeing. I took the scenic route, which allowed me to get a better look at the countryside of Belgium, which was mostly crops. What cattle there is in Belgium is apparently concentrated to the Western part.
So, the first thing I saw when coming back into Leuven (from the north part) was the Stella Artois brewery. Many Belgians don’t seem very proud of this beer. From a distance, I could also see the large spire of the Sint-Geertruikerk from afar. Using this as my guide, I arrived and took some photos around the area. The church was really the only thing of interest on the red-dashed path. Not much else was particularly fancy.
I left the same way, out the north of Leuven, and headed back for dinner. The days rolled by, mostly of office stuff. There was Robby’s PhD Defence on Tuesday, and I also tried out the Aikido that night. Although it was clearly Aikido, it was different. This style appeared to be much more forceful than the one I train in. For instance, the uke is constantly applying force, which makes things much easier, but they are consequently tensed and breakable. And, in order to counter attack, the nage is supposed to briefly apply force. Perhaps I have misread what I was to do there, but it was nonetheless different. Some concepts made good sense though. The concept of straight lines was prevalent here, where when an opponent is grabbing, you can control them by making a singular forearm between yourself and the opponent. This seems to be a difference, in that Taekido seems more circular in its techniques.
Anyway, after Aikido I went down to Amedee, mainly because I was thirsty, but I figured Robby would be celebrating there. I ended up staying for quite a few drinks, as some of Robby’s friends were eager to buy me drinks. A highlight that Dal might like is that I played chess against a master player and got beat in 4 moves. I wasn’t paying much attention to it, clearly.
On Thursday night I went out with some of the office colleagues for trying out the local Leuven nightlife (Thursday is the day to drink, like in NZ). We started at Amedee, downing a couple of beers while playing some games. After this, Laura left and we went to a couple of other bars, mostly of the metal/alternative theme. Honestly, I can’t remember the details, but I ended up drinking 3 whiskeys and several beers over the course of 3-4 bars. This left me rather pissed, and I drunkenly weaved my way home on the bike at about 2/2:30am. Didn’t fall off once! I had the right state of mind to turn my lights on, but if the coppers had caught me, I would’ve got a hefty fine.
Friday started with a mother of a hangover, one of the worst I’ve had in a while. Perhaps it was the beer+whiskey combo, perhaps it was the fact I hadn’t heavily drunk in a while. Whatever the case, I was in no state to go to the office, so I lay in bed most of the day.
I didn’t go anywhere that weekend either, not due to sickness, just because I hadn’t planned to go anywhere. The weekend was fairly normal. I spent half of Sunday shaking, then picking up, the walnuts of the walnut tree. Joost left for his work on Sunday too, leaving the house with one less person.
Tuesday, there was a leaving dinner for a guy called Jan, who I hadn’t met, but a night out sounded better than cooking (Lieve was busy that night and Maurice was also going). We went to a Mexican restaurant (where the menu was in Dutch…). The meal was tasty enough (Fajita Texana and a Hoegaarden beer) but probably a little costly (about 16 Euros). Or maybe not. I dunno.
Nothing much happened on Wednesday, and tonight I’ll be eating out at a student restaurant because Lieve and Maurice are going to a performance their daughter is in. I’m pretty sure that sums up the past 1.5 weeks. Life is starting to become routine, which I guess is better than uncertainty in a foreign country.
This entry was posted on Friday, October 9th, 2009 at 2:17 am and is filed under Europe 2009. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
10/9/09 @ 7:26 am #
Dad once taught me how to win a game of chess in four moves, but you always seem to pick up on what I’m doing and block me! How come you didn’t block the master?! Psht.
Chicken fah-jy-tas!