Friday, November 30, 2007

Belgium awaits

Alan and I are both very excited about our forthcoming holiday trip to Brussels. I’ve started reading up on the trip and I’ve found that besides Flemish, most Belgians speak French and English. I am all the more inspired to on with my attempts at learning French. I’m trying, I’m trying!

Meanwhile, my visa application is now with the Belgian Consulate and they told me it should be out in 2 weeks. There were no lines and I came ready. I have the brochures I’m supposed to read and just reading about the calendar of events gets me all excited because Belgium seems to be very big on Christmas…

I am also eager to browse the pages of Virtual Tourist whihc had been such a treasure trove of information for my last trip to Paris and my side trips to Versailles and Chartres. It’s a very informative site which gives you first-hand information without the hardsell. The entries can also be very detailed delving into points which would otherwise be glossed over by the travel books. And best of all, it’s all free!

I’m still searching for my rice cooker and I’m trying to decide which vacuum food container I should get. Although Angel is now a little more adventurous with the food he eats, I don’t want him not eating well because we couldn’t find a suitable place to get some white rice from. We encountered difficulty right in Maine where we had to search for the Chinese restaurant in town to give Angel his fill of “kanin-rice”. I just don’t want to take the chance in Europe.

I’m eyeing something from Walmart or Target — I’ll get it soon.

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Friday, November 16, 2007

Brussels not Paris

We are getting ready to go to Brussels for our after-Christmas sojourn this year.  I was kind of hoping to do a third trip to my favorite city but the fares just went skyhigh while Brussels remained reasonable.  Would you believe that it would be cheaper for us to go to Brussels than do an Orlando trip?  Isn’t that crazy?!

So I’ve started trying to learn French (for the nth time).  Reminds me of how I went through the same basics when I dabbled in Spanish as part of our senior year curriculum in high school.  AAaaaarrrrggghhhH!!!!  It’s not quite as difficult, though, considering that I want to learn French.  It’s just that it takes some effort to do it. 

Posted by PINAY NEW YORKER at 00:13:12 | Permalink | No Comments »