Brussels, not Bressels

This past weekend I went to Brussels, Belgium. My friends and I booked it a couple weekends ago because the flights were to cheap (only 80 euros round trip!), but we weren't entirely sure what it would be like. We were pleasantly surprised by our awesome and yet totally weird weekend.  I also wanted to go because the main language spoken in Brussels is French.

Grace, Laura, Olivia, me and David

I went with my roommate Laura, and our friends David, Olivia and Grace. It turned out to be an awesome and easy-going group to travel with. We left Friday morning, and let me tell you, getting to Brussels is a bitch and a half. Summary: hour bus from Florence train station to Pisa, hour and a half flight from Pisa to Brussels, then another hour bus ride into the center of Brussels, and then a metro ride to our hostel. But we made it with no major hiccups and got to our hostel by about 4:30.

Laura snuggled in our hostel

After arriving at our hostel Friday, we went in search of food. We soon realized we were staying in the Arab district of Brussels and our first choice of a restaurant led us into a massive and completely empty restaurant with very formal decor. Needless to say we bailed without cracking the menu, and settled on a cute bar/restaurant where we hunkered down for a few hours. I tried 3 different types of beer, and my favorite was the strawberry beer that my friend Katie suggested I have. It was delicious! We all ordered food, and had a delicious dinner. I just had a salad nicoise since I wasn't that hungry, but David and Olivia ordered steaks that came with an excess of fries, so I had quite a few of those.

Biere Framboise (strawberry beer)

Salad Nicoise

After dinner, we went back to our hostel to regroup and find a place to go out. The concierge at the hostel suggested an area with a lot of bars with loud music so we wandered in that direction. We went to an Irish bar first, and I of course got hard cider. It's so hard to find in Florence, so I always get it when I can. Then, we went to a more crowded bar and then wandered into a gay club where we spent the majority of the night dancing and having THE TIME OF OUR LIVES, as Olivia would say.

The next morning we left the hostel by 11am, thus not abiding by their bizzare 10am-2pm lockout policy. We wandered in search of food, namely waffles, but as we had no idea where we were going ended up walking through the business district of Brussels where all the restaurants are closed Saturday and Sunday. We ended up eating at a Halal place a block away from our hostel after an hour long walk. I had a falalfal wrap and french fries that were both delicious.

David's Batman symbol hamburger!

After regrouping, we got waffles (finally!) and went to Mini Europe! It is exactly what is sounds like: miniature versions of a bunch of major monuments in the EU. It was possibly the most hilariously bizarre thing I have ever seen in my life. It's definitely something to see, if you ever get the chance.

Belgian Waffles!

Mini Europe!

The normal-sized Pisa group at the mini Pisa!

Chloe the winemaker! (they had these things everywhere)

Laura and I in enormous wooden clogs

Saturday night we went to the old town of Brussels, and went to a place that the NYTimes recommended for Moules Frites (French for Mussels and Fries). Laura and I had only been talking about them since Friday morning, so it felt like a long time coming. I got Moules Speciales, mussels with celery, onion and butter, and it was delicious. They come in a VAT with a bowl of unlimited french fries to accompany it. You eat the mussel using the shell, and dip the fries into the liquid on the bottom of the vat, and I ate every bit. It was one of the best meals of my life.

In the Old Towne of Brussels

Moules Frites!

zee group at dinner (Chez Leon)

After dinner we wandered over to the Old Palace and it was gorgeous. We saw the miniature version at Mini Europe, so it was cool to see the real thing the same day. It was some of the most ornate and beautiful architecture I have ever seen. Then, we went in search of Belgian chocolate, which totally lives up to the hype.

The mini Grand Palace!

The real Grand Palace!

chocolate chocolate chocolate

After a relaxing evening we crashed at our hostel to wake up bright and early in the morning to head back to Brussels. Due to our combined effort, we missed our bus to the airport and had to take a shuttle in a cab, but it was only 13 euro so it didn't break our wallets. Other than that we successfully made it back to Florence by 2! All in all a weird but lovely weekend.

New thing: Moules Frites

Genova (not Geneva, and not Switzerland)

On Saturday I went to Genoa with my Metropolitan Studies class. We went there because it's a city that isn't historically a touristy city, but in the past decade it's undergone a lot of renovations, specifically to its port, to make it more attractive to traveling families. These changes were made because Genoa hosted the G8 Conference in 2001. The main additions were the newly designed port area and the Aquarium that was built.

What makes this city really interesting though is that while its modern on the coast, as you move inland you see more and more instances of the Medieval city it once was. There are still stone castles on the hilltops and there are remnants within the city itself. I enjoyed seeing the city, but honestly can't say it was my favorite place in Italy. What we talked about could have probably been achieved in an in-class discussion, but I could tell my professor really loved the city so that made it more interesting.

My favorite thing about the day was probably (and obviously for me) the lunch! Genoa is where pesto was created, so I had pesto pasta and a linguine salad at this local Italian restaurant that my professor recommended. It was a bit of a cluster at the restaurant as there was only one menu and it was in Italian on a photocopied piece of paper. So, figuring out what was available was a bit of a challenge but we managed eventually.

the new port area

an Ancient church in the middle of a market

part of the ancient city wall in the middle of the city

Professor Lombardo

This street was covered with amazing graffiti/street art

I enjoyed traveling with my classes this weekend, but I'm glad I don't have another class trip for a while. Two class trips in a weekend really wore me out. Back to leisurely travel with Brussels this weekend!

New thing: Salted sardine salad with tomatoes and green beans

Genoa from the ferry

To Roma!

Apologies for the delay since my last post, I've been in the middle of midterms this week and it's been keeping me mighty busy. But anywho, I went on two class trips this past weekend and my first one was on Friday, and I finally went to Rome! I went with my Etruscans class. The Etruscans are one of the oldest civilizations in Italy, they were here even before the Romans. The class itself has been pretty boring (as any history lecture in a dark room at 3 in the afternoon will be). But being around all of the monuments and artifacts we've been studying made it so worth the long Monday afternoons of learning.

In the morning we took the train to Rome and went to the Villa Giulia, a museum way off the beaten path that houses a shit ton of artifacts from Southern Etruria. It was totally deserted because, believe it or not, there is not a bad rush to see old urns and pots from Ancient Italy. So, my class had the run of the place.We spent the morning there and had a final lecture before our midterm on Monday in the museum, and then headed into the main part of Rome.

The Spanish steps

We had free time for lunch and we wandered around and found this little pizza bistro, and we all got a slice to go and went and sat in a big square to eat. After lunch we wandered around and eventually found the Spanish steps, but we had to book it right away to go meet up with the rest of our group so we didn't get a chance to climb them. Then we took a walking tour with my professor all around Ancient Rome and saw all the major sights.

Professor Ewell!

the Trevi Fountain

street performers

a completely, legitimate Roman

the Pantheon

there were a million cats in these ruins!

one of the hills of Rome

the Roman Forum

The Coliseum!

The day was such a fantastic first experience in Rome. I loved walking around with my professor all day because he was so knowledgeable about everything! I kept waiting for a student's question to stump him but it never came. I was sad it ended so early and that I could stay Saturday too, but I had to go back to Florence Friday night so that I could go to Genoa (or Genova) on Saturday with another class. I hope I get a chance to go back!

New thing: Being honestly enthralled at a museum

that time I drank 6 liters of beer in a day

I went to Oktoberfest this past weekend and man, oh man was it a blast. The festival is in Munich, Germany and it lasts for 2 weeks (3 weekends) and this past weekend was the closing of it. It literally consists of drinking obscene amounts of beer and eating delicious food, and it didn't get old at all. The majority of the people that go to Oktoberfest are German too (approx 75%), so it's totally an authentic cultural experience.

My (lonnnnnng) weekend began Thursday night when I went to the bus stop with Grace and Vero to meet up with the tour group I was traveling down with. My friends from NYU had booked a hostel earlier in the year and I had a spot in their group, so all I had to do was find transportation and going with Florence for Fun was by far the cheapest option. So we left at 11pm and arrived in Munich around 7am, when we promptly dropped off our stuff, grabbed some coffee and headed to Oktoberfest!

me, Grace, Olivia, Vero

We got into the Hacker-Festzelt tent at 10am when it opened and promptly ordered a beer. Alcohol that early has never sounded remotely appealing to me, but something about the Oktoberfest vibe just made it exactly what I wanted. The beers only come in one size, and that size is liter (just over 2 pints). They come in massive glass mugs, and after the first day my hand was sore from holding it for so long.

our first Oktoberfest beers!

We sat at a table next to an awesome group of Germans and we ended up staying in the tent for five hours. I wasn't too sure of how much fun it would be just sitting, drinking, eating, and socializing for hours in the tents before I went, but it was such a great time. The waitresses come around and take drink and food orders and the service is unbelievably fast, especially considering how many people are there. The tent we were in had a 8,000 person capacity!

Inside the tent

The food was also unbelievably tasty. It was a bit of a struggle finding a vegetarian option since I wasn't sure what any of the German words were, but one of the German girls we met spoke really great English and she helped me find spätzle! It's basically German mac n cheese but SO MUCH BETTER. It has saeurkraut and onions mixed in and then topped with some sort of seasoning. I had it both days for lunch. Obviously the meat was the best thing to get in Germany, and seeing the chicken everyone was eating made me truly crave meat for the first time since becoming vegetarian this summer.

Olivia with her half chicken

my (half-eaten) spätzle and mixed salad

We left around 3pm because Grace had to go meet up with some friends who had just arrived, so I went with her to her hostel and Olivia and Vero went back to theirs to drop off their bags (and take a little siesta). Grace and I happened across a church that was allowing people to climb the bell tower for only 3 euro, and it was quite a trek but it ended up being a great view of the city and the entire festival grounds, and it was huge! You don't really understand how massive it all is when you're in the middle of it.

aerial view of Oktoberfest

We went back to her hostel and recouped for a bit, met up with her friends, and then headed right back into the thick of it. The group of friends I was meeting up with decided to go to Dachau (the concentration camp) before coming to Oktoberfest and, seeing as I was already 3.5 liters deep, decided I should probably skip it. We went to the Hofbrauhaus beer garden (which is just the area outside the tent) and got some more beer (of course) and I hung around with her friends until my group showed up at 8.

There were six of us then and we got a table and caught up for a couple of hours until the tent closed at 11pm. I was pretty poussed by the end of the day, so getting back to our hostel on the outskirts of Munich was a bit of a struggle, but we got there with no issues and promptly all passed out. Our hostel was called The Tent and it was literally a big room with a bunch of mats on the floor, and I have never been more cold sleeping in my life. We piled on the blankets and got through the evening in a massive cuddle train.

In the morning on Saturday, we were told that if we wanted to get into a tent we had to get there by 7:30, but we got there at 9 and got in fine. Rachel and Christina opted to sleep in a bit and meet up with us later, so Dom, Gabbie, Cullen and I ended up going early and got into the Paulaner tent. It took us a while to find seats, but no worries, we had our first beers before 10 (and Dom and Cullen finished theirs before 10:45). Gabbie and I were slightly slower, especially as I was still recovering from my first day in the tent.

Gabbie, Cullen, Dom and me

inside the tent!

The second day went much the same as the first, except with less drinking on my part, and at around 3 again we ventured out in search of other activities. We rode an Olympic rings roller coaster and got snacks from the venders outside. Cullen and Dom were in need of a nap, and Dom had to take his stolen memorabilia home (he successfully stole a beer stein!), so Gabbie and I went to meet up with Rachel and Christina at the train station to explore Munich's historic center city a bit. There honestly wasn't much to see except for some beautiful architecture, but it was great to see/hang out with Rach for a bit.

the roller coaster!

the famous Hofbrauhaus restaurant

We got dinner in center city and then met up with Cullen and Dom in the tents at night and spent the rest of our evening there, of course drinking beer. I surprisingly didn't get sick of beer the whole weekend, although I might be done with it for a while now.

The swings on the festival grounds (I did not partake due to the beer and food inside my already sensitive stomach)

On Sunday Rachel, Cullen, Gabbie and Christina left early because they were going to a castle a couple of hours outside of Munich, so me and Dom were left to our own devices. Despite the rainy weather we decided to go check out the 1972 Olympic fairgrounds. It was cool to go but we couldn't really go inside anywhere, nor were there any info boards so we were more guessing what we were looking at.

the track field

the main Olympiad area

After our exploring we went back to the hostel where my tour group was leaving from, and Dom departed to catch his train. I managed to stay awake for the 8 hour bus ride home so my sleeping schedule wasn't too messed up, and we got back to Florence around 11pm. Exhausting yet amazingly satisfying weekend!

New thing: Literally everything I did this weekend? My new favorite thing was learning/singing all the German drinking songs. I still have no idea what I was saying though.