Say what?

I am enjoying a day or two off after the end of "Nederlands voor Anderstaligen" the level one intensive class I've been taking at the University of Gent. In a just a month of classes, my vocabulary and understanding of Dutch has expanded greatly! Now I can say in Dutch with great precision, "I'm sorry, I don't understand you, do you speak a bit of English?" I can say it so well, that some people continue on in Dutch as if they are certain I must understand what they are saying. I can also interject, "I come from America," and "so please speak slowly".

Okay, I can say some other things to. I can talk about what I like and don't like, and give simple directions. You know those striped lines where you cross the road? They call that a "zebrapad" here. Cute word, eh? I know just enough to badger Travis, "say that in Dutch, please!" Since he doesn't have three hours every day to go to class, I must teach him Dutch. Whether he likes it or not.

But sometimes knowing all of the words in a sentence does not guarantee comprehension. The other day I was working on some homework that involved putting sentences in the book in the negative form. It can be confusing to a non-native speaker. In Dutch they have two different words that make a sentence negative, "niet" and "geen". For example, "ik heb geen geld" is "I have no money". Or, if some one asked, "Zijn jullie moe?" (are all of you tired?) the negative answer would be, "Nee, wij zijn niet moe" (no, we are not tired). Then you get into the question of where to put the word "niet" in the sentence. In the case of a direct object, you would stick niet at the end of the sentence, for example, "nee, ik ken jouw broer niet" (No, I do not know your brother).

Anyway, on my homework I was confronted with "Eet jullie baby vlees?" The direct translation of those words seemed to be, "eat all of you baby meat?" I thought, huh, the writers of this textbook sure have a sense of humour. I hope people would answer that in the negative! So I wrote, "wij eet geen baby vlees" (We eat no baby meat). Later on, when I checked my answers in the back of the book I realized that the word "jullie" in this case was NOT the 'jullie' that is the plural of you, but instead the _possessive_ form (confusing because it is the exact same word, and you must just know it by context) transforming the question to 'Does your (plural) baby eat meat?' and the answer to, 'Nee, onze baby eet geen vlees', or 'no, our baby does not eat meat'. I was laughing so hard that little tears were popping out of my eyes.

I should find out today or tomorrow whether I got into the second level class!

Musee d'Orsay

On Saturday in Paris we visited the Orsay Museum, which contains the collections of art created between the oldest in the Louvre and the Paris museum of Modern Art. The building itself was once a train station, which ceased functioning and was converted in 1977 and opened in 1986. It still looks like a train station, complete with the giant clock, but has art stuffed in the wings, and large sculptures from the likes of Rodin and Carpeaux displayed in the open area where the tracks were.

We viewed paintings by Van Gogh, Degas, Manet, Renoir, Klimt, and other masters of the period. We saw sculptures by Rodin, Gauguin, Carpeaux and others. There were some early photography works on display, glassware, and some models and a respectable display of art nouveau, including an entire reconstructed room based around the theme from top to bottom. Judi is rather a fan of art nouveau, so she was exited to see that.

We had coffee in the café there, which was once the restaurant and feast hall of the hotelthat operated within the congruent wings. This room itself is a work of art, with high painted ceiling and a good view of the Seine. Coffee breaks are good for the feet.

Following our long visit to the Orsay, which is thankfully manageable in a day even if we walked out at the latest possible minute, we once again headed to the Latin Quarter and had Thai food for dinner.

The American in Formula 1

In Europe travelers can save money by staying with a friend, or a youth hostel. If you don't know anyone in Paris and have outgrown dorm-style living, "Formula 1" hotels are the next step up in privacy, without breaking the bank. At breakfast, you can hear a different language spoken at each table nearby. Neat! If you have never stayed in a Formula 1 before, there are a few things you may want to bring with you, as Travis and I discovered:

10.) Your own bottled water and snacks. The hotel does have pretty comprehensive vending machines in the lobby, but they will charge you twice what the products are actually worth.

9.) Your cell phone. Nothing but a payphone in the lobby here!

8.) A travel alarm clock. No clocks in the rooms, or wake up calls either.

7.) Your own soap. Your hotel room comes with sink, and you share a bathroom down the hall with your neighbors. If you want to wash your hands with actual soap in your room, you will need to bring your own soap as none is provided.

6.) Your own towel. The hotel _usually_ does provide you with your own towel. One day the housekeeping staff came into our room and replaced two used towels with only one clean. Seeing as this towel is roughly the size of a washcloth anyway, there really isn't any way you can share it. A full-sized actual towel would be a huge improvement, and use the ones the hotel leaves as hand towels in your room.

5.) Your own breakfast cereal. For a very cheap price you can buy breakfast in the hotel. The choices include plain white bread, chunks of french bread, butter, jam, apple sauce, corn flakes, coffee, hot chocolate, and orange juice. All of it is pretty stale and low quality, and by the fourth day, believe me, you would kill for a cheese omelet or piece of fresh fruit. The corn flakes were the sort that instantly dissolve into mush after the application of milk, and we noticed one family had brought their own mini boxes of much better cereal. Smart!

4.) Some flips flops. This is to wear while you are in the showers, of course.

3.) A blind eye. In our room there were grubby fingerprints everywhere, dust and foot prints on the carpet, and oddly enough, a small wad of gum stuck to the top bunk.

2.) Some The LYSOL® Brand Spray Air Sanitizer. The bathrooms. Oh, the bathrooms. When you unlock the door to leave the bathroom stall, it automatically flushes the toilet. This is the ONLY way to flush the toilet. Sometimes, though, you go into the little room and discover that magically somehow the last person never flushed. Did they never lock the door in the first place??? So you have to lock and unlock the door until the flush mechanism engages. No matter what, every bathroom smells virulently like cat pee. So while you are flapping the lock open and closed, and trying not to look too closely at the dead bugs or curly hairs on the floor, a little Lysol might at least make the air smell better. This whole thing is a bit mystical, as the lights are also turned on as you lock the door. Was someone peeing with the door..open...in the dark?

1.) An open mind. Some people actually seem to live in these hotels as if it is a big dorm. They lounge on their bed with the door open, wander back to their room from the shower in the nude, and their children run around raucously in the halls. It could be nostalgic, if you liked dorm living the first time around.

Or, I suppose, you could save money on all these things and spring for a slightly more expensive hotel. And miss out on this cultural experience? Heaven forbid.

April in Paris

Last week we went on our next trip to Paris, given the four day holiday we had here in Belgium. It was a busy four days, but we continued our exploration of Paris- a feat that can never truly be accomplished in its entirety. This city seems more interesting the more we learn about it, and the “top twenty” tourist attractions only scratch the surface of an ancient and sprawling city covered in monuments, temples, museums, and tombs.

After resting on Thursday night, we set out for The Louvre: Part Deux. It was a heroic effort in stamina, and we spent a full ten hours in the museum (with two breaks for lunch and a snack). This time around we covered the ancient Mesopotamian and Egyptian antiquities, the Italian and Spanish paintings, and French sculpture and some French antiquities. We rented the audio guide to the Louvre as an experiment this time around, and it was actually quite informative and helpful.

It was a great pleasure to see the archetypal Egyptian “Book of the Dead”, completely unrolled and on display. I captured a video of the entire length of it (I do not use lighting or flashes per museum rules, so I apologize for any blurred or dark images). Click here for that video: Book of the Dead.

We also saw the Code of Hammurabi, the code of laws of the first king of the Babylonian empire, which later influenced the Torah and other codified laws. I studied this in World History my first year of college and wrote an earnest term paper on it, and was very pleased to see it.

Of course the most famous piece in the Italian painting collection (and probably the most famous painting in the world), is the Mona Lisa. This time around we braved the crowd and went to see the famous da Vinci. Taking pictures in that chamber, even without flash, is strictly forbidden, but somehow I think you have a good idea what it looks like.

From the sculpture room, this is the fresco of St. George smiting the dragon. Dragons automatically make any piece of art awesome, but I thought the light coming from the window was illuminating the dragon slayer was neat too.

After our challenging day we retreated to a dinner of falafel pitas in the Latin Quarter, a section of Paris that we grew quite fond of during this stay. There are many very good restaurants there with excellent deals. In fact, the Latin Quarter really deserves its own post, which we’ll get around to sometime.

The Secret®

This last weekend was the warmest, sunniest weekend in Belgium since September. The sky was blue, the birds were chirping, and the chairs and tables migrated out of the pubs and cafes onto the streets. So of course, I came down with the flu late Friday night.

I was quite ill all day Saturday, and stayed in bed and slept half the day, and Sunday wasn’t so great either. I was feverish, horribly nauseous, and ached all over. I could hardly look at text or even sit up enough to play on the computer. Woe is that day I cannot even manipulate the mouse!

But you know what? I now know… The Secret®. Yes, via the secret healing powers of... The Secret®, the Law of Attraction® taught to me by former reality T.V. producer Rhonda Byrne® visualized the manifestation of my being non-ill, and so I was healed by... The Secret®.

Actually no, that didn’t happen. The truth is my hero was Judi who got me fluids, and went down to the Apotheek and manifested the true secret- a drug called Motillin®. (® for real this time). The FDA has banned this drug from any use in the U.S.A. (despite the fact the FDA’s division of gastrointestinal drugs had approved the active ingredients, and the non-profit medical group Gastroperesis and Dysmotilities Association has strongly requested it be approved based on all evidence). The active ingredient is domperidone, a stomach settling agent found in breast milk. It is sold over the counter all over Europe, and was actually invented here in Belgium by Janssen Pharma.

Praise be to modern medicine, that stuff was amazing. I was even able to eat a little after taking it, my stomach settled, and nausea was kept at bay. Apparently this drug is one of the major “Secret Imports®” to the U.S. from Canada. Sometimes the FDA is an enigma to me- they block Motillin®, but they’ll let heart stopping cholesterol medicine slide. I say they just put the stuff in some alfalfa capsules and call it a “supplement” since the FDA refuses to regulate those, despite the fact many of them are pretty dangerous. But I digress.

Now you know The Secret®. Except I do not yet have the DVD, book, audio book, soundtrack, day planner, calendar, tote bag, and keychain. Nor have I been invited on Oprah.