Santorini, Greece

Santorini took me by surprise, I knew it would be beautiful, but I didn't realize the town was literally on top of a huge rock formation that was an island created from a volcano. I literally rode a donkey up the side of a mountain it was too cool.

Heraklion, Crete

Crete was pretty neat, it is the fifth largest island in the Mediterranean. It was definitely more city like, but had another cool fortress to get a good view and a great main street bustling with greek locals. More residential and densely populated then the other islands for sure.

Patmos, Greece

Patmos was the island of goats and greek orthodox priests meandering around the island. In the evening the air was filled with church bells and greek church music coming from numerous little churches scattered throughout the island. It was a place i had never even heard of but was so happy to just take in one of the less touristy greek islands.

Kusadasi, Turkey

Turkey was my first true Eastern European experience. It was certainly a mix of arab and european culture, slum dog millionaire-esque housing, turkish rugs being sold by the hundreds, and a city filled with vendors selling foreign jewels and clothing. This was in the city center, but right outside of the city in the port was beautiful clear blue water, amazing nature, and a huge abandon fortress that gave magnificent views. It was quite a diverse port stop, it was pretty surreal to stop in a country for literally 3 hours.

Mykonos, Greece

Mykonos was probably my favorite place we visited, it was all turquoise and white buildings with red flowers accenting the building fronts in flower boxes. The sun set perfectly behind the mountains over the water and the windmills were glowing post sun set as the sun hid behind the mountains. The greek music could be heard throughout the entire island and the nautical scenery was picturesque to say the least.

Athens, Greece

Athens was so filled with history... and white buildings haha. Thank goodness my roommate Erika, who also goes to Loyola back home with me and has studied classical languages as her major because little English was spoken. Greek is such a foreign looking language to me! The food, music, and dancing was incredible. My favorite thing was probably the Olympic Stadium, it was just so massive I couldn't imagine competing there, it was unreal.

Huis Trip

Each semester we go on one big house trip, most trips just include the Loyola students, but this trip includes all Belgians and Internationals living in the house with us and always makes for a great time! Above is just a handful of us, but represented are individuals from the Czech Republic, Poland, Hungary, Italy, and Spain.

It started out cloudy for the first castle we went to visit -Veves. Though it added an eery feel to the establishment built some hundred years ago. We had a guided tour inside where we saw the original layout and furniture. It was massive inside and they had rooms for just about everything.

Our next stop was Dinant, a beautiful, quaint little french speaking nautical town. It's main attraction is the cathedral which has pretty magnificent stained glass windows and interior paintings. It also was the birthplace of the saxophone and they were having a commemorative month so the town was filled with saxophones everywhere. It was pretty neat.

By the end of the day when we went to some old Roman ruins and Abbey the sun was shining. Amazing what the sun can do to everyones mood. My favorite part by far was the ruins, they were so beautiful and just standing in the middle of a grass field but looking up at the ivy covered ruins was quite breath taking. Really awesome day trip.

St.Patrick's Day

Sadly enough, St.Patty's Day was not a huge deal in Belgium. The one Irish pub was completely jam packed to the extent of not being able to move, but any other location in the town you wouldn't have recognized it from any other random Thursday night. Though we still paraded through the town in our green and orange to show our pride!

Duvel Factory

The Duvel factory was really interesting, it is one of the most popular beers in Belgium, and in fact the world. A private tour was arranged for the football team and some of us got to tag along which was great. We got to see how the beer was made from water and hops, watch the bottling and capping process, and then "confront" the product... ie) have a taste testing. Great group of people, Great time!

Crepe Convinced: Journal 2 Travel Writing

Upon consuming a delicious sugar crepe in front of Notre Dame I pondered where the name came from? How many creperies were there in Paris? How many kinds of crepes are there? And what was that cool little gadget that so perfectly distributes that batter into a wheel on the skillet? I found myself diverging away from the beauty of the stained glass windows of Notre Dame and somehow diving into the delectable treat I was currently munching on. I glanced over towards my boyfriend, Mick, who was savoring every bite of his as well, and with a mouthful said, “Belgium may be known for its waffles, but France has certainly perfected the pancake.”

He was absolutely right; crepes technically were pancakes. When I thought pancake I automatically thought of Bisquik and the All-American stack of 4 pancakes with syrup dripping off of it at the local diner. These were quite different tasting and looking, but still in the same category by default. It seems crepe was derived from the Latin word “crispa” which means curled; implying all of the crepe fillings are perfectly wrapped up inside of the thin wheat flour pancake, which is referred to as one of France’s national dishes.

This was Mick’s first time to France, and Europe in general and he was blown away by the delicious Parisian cuisine. I may have been minimally jaded by French culture from my previous eight years of studying it, having tasted years worth of mock crepes from French teachers and “wanna-be” French cuisine restaurants this was finally the real deal. The first time I went to France was this past September and I tasted many a crepes then as well and was baffled by their deliciousness, but for whatever reason this time instead of just devouring the crepes I contemplated their existence in the French culture.

The previous day I had treated myself to a nutella and banana crepe and my boyfriend a ham and cheese crepe. What different fillings: one a substantial part to a meal, the other a nice little dessert or snack though both wrapped in the perfect curled, thin pancake shell. Evidently, I wasn’t the only person who recognized the difference. Crepes are broken down into two different categories: crepe sucres (sugary crepes) and glaettes (unsweetened, savory crepes). The dessert crepes are made with sugar in the batter, while the savory more substantial or omlette like crepes are made with buckwheat. I must have starred at the menu for at least five minutes reading all of the crepe options: ham, cheese, mushrooms, asparagus, spinach, onions, not to mention the sugar ones which included pineapple, nutella, sugar, whipped cream, powdered sugar, bananas, strawberries, cinnamon, or syrup.

Not only was I counting the types of crepes, but also after I made my decision and consumed my treat I counted the vast number of crepe stands within the city. Just between two metro stops I counted 17 and that is saying I didn’t miss any, which I most certainly did while taking in the sights and being pestered by those annoying men selling five Eiffel tower key chains for one euro. Who needs 5 Eiffel Tower key chains when they can buy a crepe with that one-euro, honestly? Then it dawned on me, crepes weren’t just served at creperies but in the finest of restaurants as well, so my 17 places where crepes were served in a one-block radius could probably be quadrupled.

Though I could find no definitive answer as to how many creperies there actually are in Paris, I double-checked my findings by Google mapping creperies in the Paris region and the entire map was jam-packed with little stars of locations of creperies. They are on every street corner, in every stand, and at every restaurant. I decided to run my only personal test to see if they were just as popular and delicious as my boyfriend and I had found. I asked my 63 huis mates in a facebook survey when you think of the word French food what is the next word that comes to mind- 54 answered crepes. The other responses were escargot, baguettes, and wine. I wouldn’t count wine as French food but it sure does go well with it. I rest my case that crepes are directly associated and at the top of the list of French foods. In fact, everyday there are 2 new French cuisine books published in France and just about everyone of them includes some sort of crepe involved recipe. That is a lot of recipes, and a lot of crepes!

After this test was run my housemate and good friend Justin and I researched a crepe recipe. Though we did not have the correct carbon steel crepe pan or crepe spatula (the one that resembles a mallet and so precisely spreads the batter evenly throughout the pan) we were rather successful with a non-stick pan on the stove and your old fashioned plastic spatula. We went for the dessert crepes and added sugar, and even cocoa to make the crepe have a chocolaty taste to it before even adding any filling. My one complaint would be the consistency of the crepe; it wasn’t as even as it would’ve been with the genuine crepe making tools. I hope to get my hands on an original French crepe spatula one day so I can make them even closer tasting to the authentic Parisian crepe when I am not lucky enough to be able to gallivant over to France for the weekend for a real crepe.

Disneyland Paris

Disneyland Paris... just as good if not better than Disneyworld. It had a lot of the same rides, but the castle belonged to Sleeping Beauty not Cinderella. The characters were all great, the parade was called the "Next Generation" and included the incredibles, ratatouille, lilo and stitch, and all the more new pixar films. Mick and I had an absolute blast.

Parisians Redeemed: Travel Writing

Though I adored the many sights and aesthetic appeal of Paris during my first visit in early September I was rather disappointed with the overall attitude of the Parisians. I have spoken French for close to eight years and was quite discouraged to find that every time I spoke French I was rudely spoken back to in English while they chuckled. It surely didn’t motivate me to continue my French speaking or be overly friendly to the French population in general.

I will admit, I loved France: the food, sights, and atmosphere so of course when my boyfriend, Mick, visited me I wanted to bring him there to spend a few days in the most romantic city in the world. I was a bit weary to see if the domineer of the Parisian population paralleled my last encounter. To my pleasant surprise, the French welcomed us with friendly “Bonjour’s!” and “s’il vous plait’s” all week.

From the first tour we went on in Montmartre, the Moulin rouge city right outside of Paris, where we stopped for a glass of wine the bartender offered us tips on where to visit on our trip and commended my attempt to tell him where I was from in French. I wasn’t scoffed at or rudely answered in English, but more so asked in French where I learned to speak French and how I liked the visit so far. In addition, he offered us a free map and a genuine “Au Revoir.”

As the trip continued the waiter at our first meal offered us free tap water and two baskets of bread, this may seem like nothing, but in Europe free water and bread is quite rare. She was quite smiley and seemed to while knowing we were tourists still treat us like locals.

Each hotel we visited had an even friendlier receptionist and even the woman cleaning the orange juice dispenser during the continental breakfast offered me a huge smile and friendly “Comment ca va?” as she poured me a glass of fresh orange juice.

Even the man at the Panini stand offered us a lovely French greeting in addition to a warm aperitif while we waited for our Panini to finish cooking. It was a fabulous deal a crepe, Panini, and drink all for 6 euro, pretty reasonable and perhaps one of the best meals we had while we were there. The generosity outpoured throughout the whole trip.

I appreciated the level of respect I was given which outweighed the level of mockery I felt on my first trip. The Parisian crowd most certainly redeemed themselves! I don’t know that I will necessarily be able to return to Paris this year, though in the future I most certainly would like to visit. I’ll be sure to brush up on my French phrases and pronunciation before I go in order to be able to appropriately address the Parisians when they kindly speak to me in French.

Movie Soundtrack Winners

So, all the years of scene it and disney trivia paid off yesterday as Justin, Erika, and myself won the movie soundtrack game. It was a house activity one of the Polish girls, Karolina, organized and perhaps one of the most well organized and well attended event we have had all year. There were 4 rounds, head to head challenges, and best of all fabulous prizes. We ended up winning a CD of all the soundtracks played, a gold medal, beer, and chocolate. All prizes set aside, it was a great time with a great group of friends. Really glad I went.