Monschau, Germany Christmas Market

Christmas Markets are very common here. We experienced our first one this past weekend and it helped us get into the holiday spirit. We left all of our Christmas decorations back in Atlanta, so we decided to buy a few typical, German ornaments and a small, wooden tree to start us off. We had a light lunch of roasted chesnuts, potato pancakes with applesauce, and some more potatoes fried in a skillet and topped with mushrooms, onions, and cream--the regional specialties in Germany are yummy, but not at all good for your figure! We took a picture of a kielbasa for you meat eaters. We plan on doing more Christmas decoration shopping. We are going to another market in Cologne, Germany with some friends in a couple of weeks. Brussels also has one on the Grand Place that I'm sure we will check out too.

Television

Couch potatoes would be in trouble here. The TV options for English speakers are very limited even with cable. Most of the channels are in French. They show some American programs, but they are dubbed in French. There’s something very wrong about Bart Simpson and Eric Cartman speaking French! We watch it sometimes just because it’s hilarious.

We get a couple of Dutch channels and all of the shows are in English with Dutch subtitles. These channels are a mixture of Dutch and American TV programs. They show a lot of cop/law dramas and American movies that were made for TV only or that went straight to video. I’m not sure who does the programming here, but they have really bad taste. I hate to think that this is what their idea of American television is. With that being said, we have seen a couple of decent movies and we sometimes get Larry King, Jay Leno, and Conan O’Brien during primetime. Friends is also pretty reliable. I was told that Desperate Housewives comes on Tuesday’s at 10:00, but I seem to keep missing it. It’s one season behind the U.S., so I’ve already seen all of the episodes anyway.

We also have a couple of BBC channels and CNN. Besides BBC World, however, the BBC channels are not much better than the Dutch channels.

Our one saving grace is that we brought our American TV and DVD player, so we’ve been watching a lot of Simpsons and Seinfeld on DVD.

We have definitely lowered or standards as far as television is concerned. We find ourselves watching some of the lamest stuff!

All Settled In

We moved to our new apartment on October 27. All of our earthly possessions arrived relatively unscathed. There were a few scratches here and there, but not too bad. The movers loaded the boxes on to a motorized lift that looks like a ladder with a platform attached to it and sent them up five floors. The boxes were then loaded through a window. I couldn’t watch! I guess this is how they do it in New York City, but I’ve never seen it before.

Our apartment is a decent size and we have plenty of room for guests. It’s strange b/c it’s so modern compared to our house and to many apartments in Europe. We sacrificed character for space, comfort, and location. Because there is such a huge expat community here and people are always coming and going, you can get good prices on second-hand items. We bought a washing machine and some wardrobes that way. European apartments have no closet space. We also made a few purchases from Ikea and now we’re all settled in and ready for visitors! You might want to wait until spring. The weather sucks right now.

More Ghent Pictures

Ghent Pictures

Ghent

We spent a day in Ghent, which is another small city with gothic architecture and canals. It is compared to Bruges, but much less touristy. We went on November 11, which is a holiday (Armistice Day), so it was eerily quiet. Aside from the cold and dreary weather, it was a great time to go. We visited St Baafskathedraal, which houses the famous painting by Jan van Eyck, the Adoration of the Mystic Lamb. You can purchase a headset to get an audio explanation of each panel--very interesting. The inside of the building was amazing, but photos were not allowed. We also toured Gravensteen Castle, which was also very cool. Ghent is a beautiful city and is only 30 minutes from Brussels. We can't wait to go back when the weather is better.

BOO!

Halloween is not as big here as it is in the U.S., but it is growing in popularity. We actually went to a Halloween party. Rick and I are big fans of the holiday so we were glad we had the opportunity to celebrate. This party had a theme – California Gone Wrong. It is an annual event thrown by six people who share a house. Two of the hosts work at Deloitte and are moving to San Francisco. Hence, the theme. One of the hosts is French, but has lived in San Francisco and has parents there. The other is Belgian. The idea was to come up with a costume that was uniquely Californian and add some blood and gore. Rick and I went as tacky, American tourists who got hit by a bus. There were some pretty hilarious costumes! By the way, those are not natural-they may be sans silcone, but they are avec socks! Anyway, I had fun sporting those babies around for one evening.