A Trip Home

So I just returned from a week back in the states. I flew into San Diego last Saturday, and our again one week later, for some technology and business meetings in the unit headquarters. Despite taking the camera, I managed to take exactly two pictures- both from the plane. One is in the Northeast U.S., flying over a frozen landscape, and another of Antwerp at sunrise. Maybe when I return for two weeks next month I’ll actually be able to see more people and snap more pictures. As it was, I only met a few friends for lunch and dinner, and had dinner with the family a few nights. I guess business comes first though.

I’ll post the pictures as soon as I can get them out of the camera.

It was a very busy week for work, as was the week preceding it, and so shall be the following week. In fact, I’ll be pretty slammed through May 1st as our project elements become due, so posting through April may be a bit sparse. Not necessarily because we’re too busy or lazy to post, we’re just quite sure you don’t want to hear about Dutch indefinite articles, project planning, and trips to the grocery store.

Judi and I are looking at traveling somewhere local in March, since we’re budgeting for a longer trip to Paris in April, and both of our “busy” factors will increase. Judi starts her intensive Dutch classes on March 15th. I’ll be taking the same lessons by proxy, meaning I’ll read her text book and work on the same program without actually taking the class, since I can’t actually be there (the class lasts three hours per day, five days per week). That of course, on top of our graduate classes we’re both taking. Fun!

It was nice to eat some Mexican food again. Real Mexican food. We had tried a “Mexican” place in Gent the week before my business trip, and while it wasn’t exactly “horrible” in any sense of the word, it wasn’t exactly Mexican food either. They did have pinto beans- but they were re-fried baked pinto bean chunks that kind of reminded me of those crusty Japanese mochi ice cream balls. Only bean flavored and not chilled- rather crusty and dry. The rice was bland, as if they made white rice and poured chile powder on it thinking that made it Mexican. The burritos were generic store corn tortillas with corn, lettuce, cheese, and tomatos in it, rather like a vegi pita in a tortilla. It was good, but not a burrito. It’s not Belgium’s fault they suffer from a significant shortage of Mexicans.

So it was nice to have a steaming hot plate of cheese enchiladas, a fish taco, “special” quesadilla, and some real runny beans and proper Mexican rice. Oh, and a bean and cheese burrito dripping with salsa fresca. Now I’m hungry again.