Halloween

When the kids were younger and we had au pairs living with us, we made an effort to share American culture with our au pairs.

There are a number of holidays that both Americans and Europeans observe - Christmas, Easter, independence days, New Year's, etc.  Yes we had different cultural spins but these holidays were familiar to our au pairs.

Halloween has no European cultural equivalent.  The pumpkins, the costumes and the candy are uniquely ours.

Even though we are far from home, we are not far from Halloween.  The commissary sells pumpkins and Halloween candy.  The PX has Halloween costumes and decorations.  Club Beyond (the youth ministry here) had a pumpkin carving evening.  Americans are kind of spread out throughout the Mons region, so trick or treating is not quite possible - but the kids can dress up and enjoy trunk or treat.

Here and there I've noticed shades of Halloween among the Belgians.  There are some Halloween type decorations for sale in the local supermarket and I've seen some small nods to it in the neighborhood.  I'm not talking about lovely fall decor - pumpkins, hay and mums.  I'm talking jack-o-lantern pre-printed/factory made stuff.

If one must adopt American stuff, I think, they should take the best part.  Factory made decor not being what I consider the best part.

The best part is trick or treating - costumes and chocolate.  And here that would be costumes and Belgian chocolate.....

People Speak French to Me

For the most part I live in English-speaking culture.  My family speaks English.  All my web/email interactions are in English.  The dominant language of SHAPE is English.  In touristy areas, shopkeepers speak English.  Church is in English.  Chievres isn't only English-speaking, it is completely American.

The first few times a stranger addressed me in French,  I was startled and it took a few moments for my brain to catch up and respond appropriately.  Now I'm a bit faster on the uptake.  Not only that, but I do enjoy hearing and speaking French.  Conversationally, I'm still quite slow, but every day interactions with strangers are getting a bit better.

I like greeting people with a "bonjour!" as I walk the dog and wishing store keepers a "bonne journee" (good day).

I can ask for a pork roast at the butcher's counter and respond when someone wants the extra chair at the dance studio.  I'm not a great French speaker, but I'm decent.  People quickly realize French is not my first language.  They also are generally pleased I am making the effort.

I like the mental exercise of thinking and speaking in French and I expect if I keep at it, it will continue to improve until I once again move back to the US and forget everything I've learned.

Until then- Bonne Journee!

PTA Fall Bazaar

This weekend the kids' school is having their Fall Bazaar.  As entry is free and the location convenient, Kyra and I went to check it out.

Vendors were local professional crafters, antique sellers, home crafters and food sellers.  The products were of uneven quality but some items were really quite charming and interesting.  There was wine, chocolate and cheese.  There were the ubiquitous Belgian waffles for sale - by Americans.  One stall had antique mantle clocks.  Several tables displayed jewelry - mostly hand made.  Christmas ornaments were also a popular theme.

I'd show you photos of things I bought, but all are Christmas gifts and my gift recipients all read this blog.  I don't want to spoil the surprise.

 My favorite item was a handmade manger scene from Poland.  It is soft sculpture with the figures standing about 7 inches tall.  Jesus can rest in his manger or in Mary's arms.  The kings are all well detailed with gold braiding and lovely fabrics.  The animals are soft and fuzzy.  The donkey is particularly charming.  By the time I purchased Christmas gifts, I did not have enough cash to purchase this.

The bazaar is still going on tomorrow.  Kyle reads this blog and Kyra is also aware of my love for this item.  Hint, hint, hint.....

The Commissary

Food shopping seemed to be of interest to those who have responded to my invitation for suggestions.  I'll address this over a few blog posts.

As I will be visiting the commissary today, I think I'll start there.

The closest (and I believe only) commissary in Belgium is located in Chievres.  Depending on farm equipment traffic I can travel one way in 30-50 minutes.  This does not make the commissary the most convenient shopping location.  For most foods though it is the cheapest.

The commissary for the most part looks like your typical American grocery store and it carries the most popular brands and types of food preferred by Americans.  It has a bakery, produce department, and meat counter.  The meat is from the US and all of it has been frozen.

The two major differences between the commissary and a US grocery store are the frozen foods section and the lack of sales/promotions.

At the commissary there are no sales or promotional items.  One is not bombarded with advertising or displays to buy a particular product.  Overall the prices are lower than what I would pay in Northern Virginia.  Not by a huge margin, but lower.  The prices between what I'd pay in a Belgian market and what I pay at the commissary are a bit more remarkable.  Chicken for instance is twice as expensive out on the local economy.

Frozen foods comprise four full aisles of the grocery store.  There is quite a bit of meat, frozen pizzas, frozen prepared meals, frozen vegetables and fruits.  There are two main consumers of these products.  The first group - single soldiers who really have no need to cook and the second group - Americans who live in Brussels or Paris and come long distances to shop at Chievres.  They need food that will keep for long periods of time.

So as much as I dread my weekly trips to Chievres, I am grateful we live as close to the commissary as we do.  Our food budget is much less because the commissary is close by and we can buy a number of familiar and favorite foods that would otherwise be unavailable to us.

Tomorrow - the Belgian market where I shop

Dobby's Diet

 This is what Dobby does all day long.  













Sometimes he moves, so he can lay like this.
As you might presume, this takes a huge expenditure of calories.



Dobby has always been on a special diet.  Corn makes his epilepsy worse, so we have to buy special dog food without corn.   We have it shipped to Europe in sizable quantities.

Apparently we have not been feeding this very active dog enough.  Over the past three days, he has eaten - a bar of soap, chocolate chip brownies, and the glass Pyrex pan that contained said brownies.  These have not affected his epilepsy nor his daily routine of rigorous bouts of sleeping - for which we are thankful, but I think we'll stick to his regular diet and discourage further bouts of experimentation.

Making lists

I've making lists in my head these days, so here's one I've been thinking about...

Things I don't like about Belgium (in no particular order) ...

1. Spiders - they refuse to live outside where they are supposed to

2. I haven't seen the stars since we moved here - too cloudy

3. Rainy (see cloudy reference above)

4. Muddy (see rainy reference above)

5.  Everything (laundry, shopping, administrative stuff) takes longer 

6.  My stove is very small and heats slowly

7.  Blocked from some US websites

8.  I'm doing much more driving (though there is a lot less traffic) 

There are many things I like too, I get to those in the coming days

Amsterdam

On Saturday, Kyra, Flat Stanley (of course!) and I traveled to Amsterdam.   We left SHAPE at 7am in the morning and arrived downtown shortly after 11am.

Planning out our touring plan was a bit of a challenge.  Museums close at 6pm.   Our tour of the Anne Frank house was scheduled for 3:30 right smack in the middle of the day.  The attractions of the city are spread out so one can't easily get from one place to the next.  I had little interest in visiting the red light district and certainly wasn't going to with a 12 year old.  Kyra wasn't interested in art museums.

Our compromise turned out to be touring the city via canal boat that we could get on and off throughout the day.

The canal boat took us past this windmill.  I took a photo because, well isn't it required to take pictures of windmills when in the Netherlands?

From the canal boat we saw many of the canal houses.  We learned about the hooks at the top of the homes.  When one has narrow staircases, the only way to get furniture in or out is through the windows.  The hook was and is used to hoist large items.  You may or may not be able to tell from the photo that the facades of the homes lean out a bit.  This is intentional.  We also saw homes that obviously leaned sideways, this was not intentional.

As we walked around the city we learned about bikes.  They are everywhere.  They are parked and locked all over and the citizens do ride them everywhere.  The most important thing a tourist can learn is - don't walk in the bike path!  Kyra and I quickly learned to be more cautious when crossing a bike path than when crossing the street.

As you can probably tell from the lighting in the photos, the weather was constantly changing throughout the day.  It was cloudy, rainy, sunny, windy, and hailing at various intervals.  Flat Stanley posed by a canal in the brief amount of sunlight we enjoyed.

You can see the canal, bikes and some houseboats in this photo.  The steeple in the background houses the church bells that Anne Frank could hear in the annex.

Tomorrow I'll share more about Anne Frank's house and our memorable visit there.

Birthday

A big thank you for all the kind birthday wishes that arrived via the US mail and Facebook.  I love how the internet makes me feel that much closer to friends and family.

My 42nd birthday passed relatively quietly.  Kyle was in England on business and the kids were at school.  After school I got to drive Kyra to and from dance and pick up Allen from his cross-country practice.  What else do moms do?

I did get the chance to make myself some celebratory cupcakes.  I theory they are black forest cupcakes, but I couldn't find the frozen cherries the recipe called for, so I substituted raspberries.  They still taste good.

It is against "the rules" to ship candles overseas so no birthday candles for me.  I'll have to see if the PX sells them so I can have them in time for Kyle's birthday.

Thank you again for thinking of me - I hope you had a wonderful day too.

Travel

The opportunity to travel was one of the reasons Kyle and I were excited about coming to Belgium.  Within a couple of hours we can be in several different countries, just like many of you in the US can be in several different states within a couple of hours.

What makes travel even easier for us is that SHAPE has a couple of organizations that do all the organizing for you.  There is SHAPE Trips and Tours which runs trips on Saturdays and longer ones during school vacations and there is SHAPE Travel Group which runs week day trips.

Trips and Tours offers Saturday day trips  to England, the Netherlands, France, Germany, and Luxembourg.  Typically these trips leave early in the morning and involve a bus ride of 2-4 hours, some structured tour time and some free time to do as one wishes.  During school breaks they organize longer trips - for the Christmas break they are offering a trip to Egypt and during spring break they are offering a trip to a resort near Barcelona.

SHAPE Travel Group is more of a wives' group.  Yes men are allowed but it is typically the women who are free to travel in the middle of the week.  When I went to Versailles I went with this group.  Their upcoming trips are to a spa in Belgium and for shopping in England and in Germany.

It is easy to travel when someone else does most of the work - picking the place, the activity and arranging transportation and driving.  We just pay the money and get on the bus.

While we dreamed of frequent travel, we aren't getting out as much as we'd like for the same reasons many of you don't bop around your neighboring states - you and your kids are busy.  Even so, we are trying to push ourselves to find the time and make the effort - after all Flat Stanley is begging to have his picture taken in front of more landmarks.

Garbage

As with most other things, garbage service is different here than it is in the US.

At home, we had a trash service.  They provided us with a garbage can and a recycling can.  Both cans were quite large.  Once a week they came and picked up our recycling.  Twice a week they picked up our trash.  On a quarterly basis they billed us a flat rate for this service.

In Belgium, there is a schedule for recycling.  Once every other week, there is a pick up service for our paper, plastic and metal.  The plastic and metal can be co-mingled.  Paper is separate.  There is no curb side service for glass.  Glass must be taken to some large collection bins in our community.  They are separated by clear, green and other.  As far as I know (and Kyle may correct me on this) we don't pay for recycling pick-ups.

Garbage pick-up is once a week.  We don't get a can and we don't get a bill.  Instead we buy the special garbage bags of our municipality.  They definitely cost more than Hefty bags and we don't get to choose the type we prefer - no flex, no special tie, etc.  The cost of the service is built into the bag.  As they are expensive, we don't waste them.  We are careful not to put recycling into them and we really fill the bags.

I was worried that as American consumers and wasters we would far out pace our neighbors in how many bags appeared at the end of our driveway.  Most of my neighbors have two bags and so do we.  Some of my neighbors only have one bag per week - I don't think we'll ever achieve that goal unless we are on vacation.

It is an interesting approach to waste management - pay by the amount.  It makes us think about what we are throwing away and consider if there is another way to dispose of the item.

Empire Market at Waterloo

Every couple of weeks, the Belgian tourism office sends out an email with information about events taking place in and around the region.

A few weeks ago the email mentioned an Empire Market at Waterloo.  I clicked on the website link and saw photos of costumed re-enactors and some merchants selling period stuff.  It looked like a smaller version of a Renaissance festival only different time period.

As it wasn't far away (30 minute drive) I thought it was worth checking out.  Neither kid was interested (big surprise) so Kyle and I didn't take them.

The main landmark of Waterloo is this lion - the site is called "But (pronounced "boo" in French) de Lion" which all Americans call "Lion's But."  This huge hill and its lion statue were built by the nations that defeated Napoleon in this location.

At its foot was the Empire Market, which was as pictured.  There were re-enactors and tents and merchants.  What I couldn't tell from the website but could determine from being there was that the four photos on the website were the sum total of the market.  There were about six guys dressed as soldiers, four tents, a couple of wagons and four market stalls.

That was it.  Kyle and I were really glad we hadn't made the kids come.

So we spent about five minutes at the market, climbed to the top of Le But de Lion, looked over the fields of Waterloo, visited the panorama and then went home.

Conversion

Living in a culture that is not one's own requires a good amount of mental energy.  First one has to discipline one's self to not assume that everyone does things the same way (and not to assume that one's culture does things the "best" or "right" way) and then one must be disciplined to be open to other ways, thoughts, and habits.

As Americans we are well indulged in our way of doing things.  We can travel fairly far and still find ourselves in our own culture.  From the east coast to the west coast (and into Canada) we encounter the same language, same TV shows, same stores, same restaurants and for the most part similar styles of dress. Each region may have a particular flare/personality but if you don't like it, you just head for the Gap or McDonald's.

In Belgium, we can find bits and pieces of American culture and those touchstones are helpful.  We get some American TV, in the Chievres commissary and PX we can find American products, and on base the primary language is English.

Some people can and do limit themselves to speaking English the entire time they live here and socializing only with Americans and only shopping at Chievres.

It is hard work to push beyond one's culture.  Mentally I am always converting things.  Like road signs - they are all in French (except when they are in Flemish).  For many weeks I traveled down a road that displayed a caution sign.  I knew I was to be aware of something, but didn't know what.  The sign said "ornieres"  As a family we had a running debate about these dangerous ornieres.  Was it farm equipment?  an animal?  Eventually, I looked it up - ruts.

Telling time is a process of conversion.  Europeans use military time.  On Monday's Kyra's dance class begins at 1800, on Wednesdays at 1900, on Fridays at 1700 and on Saturdays 1430.  The clocks in our home are set for military time.  Whenever it is 15 something, I always have to pause and figure things out.  Perhaps in another few months I'll just know or maybe not.

My oven is Celsius - my recipes are Fahrenheit as are all the heating instructions on products bought at the commissary.  I have a Celsius/Fahrenheit conversion website on my Bookmarks bar.

To figure out the day's weather is a two step process.  First I find a weather website then I go to the conversion website.  I do know 6 (today's low) is cold but I don't know how cold (43) and I know that 15 (today's high) will feel better (59) but how warm can I expect to get?

These are simple everyday things - cooking, telling time, driving down the road.  We do them without thinking - unless even these things are foreign.

In learning a language there is a stage that sometimes comes after much time and persistence - the stage when one begins to think in the other language without translating out of or into English first.  I hope that stage comes for me when I am not constantly converting language, culture, time or numbers.  It will probably happen right before we move back to the U.S.

Dollars, Euros, Pounds

In the US, we carry the same stuff in our wallets, pockets, purses, billfolds, etc. - there are dollar bills of varying denominations, quarters, nickels, dimes, and pennies.  Occasionally a Canadian quarter or penny will find their way into the mix, but those are easily left for a tip or inserted into a vending machine.

Here in Belgium, my wallet has both US cash and Euros. I also carry a US credit card and a Belgian debit card.  Euros are odd and I'm still learning to manage them.  The euro notes get bigger as the amount gets bigger.  Five euro notes are the size of Monopoly money.  One hundred euro notes are much bigger than our dollar and are hard to stuff into a US wallet.  There are only coins for 1 euro and 2 euros which means that my purse gets heavy.  In addition to the penny we all know and love, there is a 2 cent coin - same color as a penny and only slightly bigger.

I have to not only remember what store takes what kind of money but also have a general idea of the current exchange rate (right now it takes about $1.32 to buy a euro).

At SHAPE, all the stores do business in euros.  The post office takes only dollars. The American high school is dollar-based as well.  The travel office takes only euros and only in cash.

At the US air force base, the P-Xtra, the PX and the Commissary are all dollars.  I can pay with my US credit card at these places.

When we travel to England (hopefully before the end of the year) our dollars and euros are useless, for that we will need British pounds.

From where we live in Belgium we can be in a handful of other countries in a single day's drive.  I can only imagine how much more complex this situation would have been before the change to the euro - how many wallets can one possibly carry?