This is only a short post about a very uneventful but enjoyable Sunday in Antwerp!
In the morning I got up fairly leisurely and headed to the market in search of some food with a few friends. This has become a common trend that I am definitely okay with. We found a fresh meat butcher in the market and I got a fresh ham sandwich with aged cheese on a baguette. Belgium rocks.
We finished our sandwiches and parted ways to accomplish miscellaneous errands. It's really starting to feel like we live here, I'm starting to already get upset that we'll be leaving in a bit.
I went back to my room and turned on the tv in the for the first time since I've been here. After flipping through channel after channel of Dutch I found the French Open and enjoyed a few hours of napping and occasionally a few points from Federer then followed by more napping. I needed that. We've been running from place to place with homework, dinners and hardly any sleep.
A nap never felt so good.
I dragged myself out of bed and headed back outside. I feel guilty wasting hours inside when I'm in such an awesome place, especially when I'm running out of socks. There is a laundry mat across the street from our hotel that closed early on Sunday, as everything does in Belgium, so I hurried over to throw a load in the wash. After spending about half an hour trying to work the change machine, buy detergent and figure out their spaceship-esque driers my clothes were tumbling in the machine and I was crossing my fingers I hadn't ruined them. Also with 6 euro a piece loads the whites and darks were mixed so I was waiting 35 minutes for pink socks to come out. Oh well!
The other day I had seen a sign outside of a coffee shop a few blocks away advertising 4 euro hand spun milkshakes. Yes.
I sat down for a few minutes on their outdoor chairs while they made the shake. Instead of chocolate syrup they used ground cacao. A belgian chocolate shake is nothing less than incredible. Also, when a place offers drinks to-go it's truly a miracle.
I took myself and my milkshake another few blocks to a large park and walked around for a bit. A few students have been running in the park and I wish I had explored it sooner. Belgium is so active. It was completely packed with runners, families picnicking on the lawn, people playing badminton, volleyball, soccer and cricket.
Heading back to the laundry mat.
Antwerp really surprised me by how metropolitan it was. I somehow assumed all of Europe, even the large cities, had a quaint homey feel. Antwerp has a lot of bustle and I was pleasantly surprised by that.
A statue for once that was not of Rubens.
Back at the laundry mat I spent another twenty minutes of frantically opening the door of the drier to make sure that I wasn't frying my clothes due to Dutch instructions. I ended up with damp clothes and wrinkled clothes by the end of the day. At least they're clean?
The go-to pita shop was on the menu for dinner and Ali didn't let me down again. His constant discounts for the people he likes is making it worth it to go there frequently. Not to mention the euros are awesome. He has promised to make us free ribs on one of our last nights in Antwerp and I'm going to take him up on it.
Later in the night while we were typing away outside we all started craving Dame Blanche (it's now a constant craving) and we set out for mission impossible: A store open on a Sunday at 9:00. HA! Good luck.
Fortunately for us, a tourist trap near the cathedral was open and after their sub-par ice-cream we were disappointed by the dessert but couldn't complain about the late night walk. A great thing about Europe is that it doesn't start getting dark till almost 10:00.
After another paper written I passed out in my bed before another 6:00AM morning coming up.
The trip is jam-packed but so worth it.
Emily
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