Mol, Belgium

Our first week in Belgium went very well! The cast was split between the cities of Oud-Turnhout and Mol.  We were greeted with an enthusiastic community.  My host parents Alida and Roger have been hosting since the 80's and both of their daughters traveled in the 90's.

Host code: Fritte(fries)

My CI this week was at De Witte Mol which was a home for severely mentally disabled people and it was so much fun! The first half of the day I was filling cracks on a concrete deck with sand and then the second half we got to have a "dance party" with a bunch of residents.  We had so much fun playing with instruments and dancing and having a good time.  That night, my host parents got me Belgian fries to try.  The first of many Belgian specialties

Thursday, Friday and Sunday(double show day) we had shows, and they were all great.  Amy and I were surprised by a past student who we both hosted in her semester (Amy in staging, my family in Ft Collins, CO), Clara from Belgium.  It was so great to see her again and for us to show her our show this time!

Saturday was our day off, and my parents took me to Antwerp, the shopping capital of Belgium.  I wasn't that interested in shopping (I don't have the weight to spare in my luggages) but I did get to see a beautiful cathedral and have try a famous Belgian beer and Belgian waffles.

Mika(Japan) and I at City Hall of Antwerp

Trying some Belgian beer

My favorite cathedral yet!

Our cast manager Leslie(AZ, left) treated the students in Mol to some waffles! They are best when they are right off the pan with hints of sugar in them (With Kinsey(DC)

Home of Tulips and Wooden Clogs: The Netherlands

New country transition again! After our longest bus ride of 11 hours, we made it into Apeldoorn! My host family was wonderful this week! The first night Janey and Harry were already making fun of my roommate Clemence and I's attempt at speaking Dutch.

Here's to representing CO in the back of the bus!

Vlaai: basically peach pie 

Tuesday we went to the Salvation Army for CI and planted 100 meters of new trees along a walkway in a drug and alcohol rehabilitation area.  It was nice to have manual labor to do.  That night Janey and Harry took us to a surprise which was going looking for wild deer and pigs in the local forest! The weather was beautiful and we had a lot of fun.

On class day we also decided to explore the city and get some much needed ice cream!

Meet Caleb(AZ): He was so excited that we matched, and he also wanted to take a photo with the "parasol".  He is one of the funniest characters in the cast!

Thursday was a very special show day.  We got the opportunity to perform in the Royal Theatre for the Princess of Apeldoorn and many other VIPs of UWP.

Host family day was a full one this week! Janey and Harry took Clemence and I to surrounding villages of Amsterdam.  We saw how wooden clogs were made, had a picnic, saw cheese being made, and even saw a field of tulips! I was so excited because that was something I had really been wanting to do.  All along the way we took some pretty typical tourist photos!

Little Liechtenstein!

This week we got to spend in one of the smallest, richest and most beautiful countries in the world; Liechtenstein.  It is located right in between Switzerland and Austria.  The views everywhere we looked were breathtaking and you could even see the castle form many places!

On Monday we spent the day exploring the city of Vaduz, the capital.  It really only took about an hour to walk the WHOLE city, but we still had great fun! We even stood on the border of Liechtenstein and Switzerland!

Everyone loves to explore!

Two places at once with Katie (MN,USA)

It was kind of cloudy, but the mountains were still beautiful!

A small replication of the castle

Wednesday the cast got to learn many new things! First, we got presentations from a few cast members about different topics.  One girl did a presentation about the mind and did a mind game with us that was very insightful about ourselves.  Another was from the girl in our cast, Barby from Mexico, who has Cerebral Palsy.  She informed us what it was and what it was like dealing with it.  The last one was by a girl with dyslexia.  We also got a presentation from a local alumni who is a chocolate pioneer about his natural chocolate and chocolate fizzy drink.   That night was a special treat because the cast got to go to a local restaurant to eat dinner.  My table learned how to make paper cranes while waiting for our food at one point!

The chocolate soda!

Our cranes at dinner

Thursday my CI was at a local recycled clothing center.  They started back after WWII sending clothes over to Poland.  They still do that as well as allowing low income people to come in and buy clothes for less.  Our whole day was just sorting clothes by size and folding them, but we still had a ton of fun finding some questionable pieces and getting to know each other.  

Our sponsor got us some awesome tshirts for the cast!

Friday and Saturday were great shows.  Friday before the show I was signed out to be with Leslie our cast manager and she taught the group a hip hop routine.  I figured since I know that I am absolutely sure that I can’t dance, I would just go all out and I ended up having a blast.  Saturday was great as well.  The staff did some really awesome things for the cast and just made the day a ton of fun, so the show had great energy. 

Yet another Tshirt from the awesome city!

Sunday for Host Family Day we went over to Austria and had lunch in this quaint little restaurant and then went to a castle and looked around and saw some breathtaking views.  After we went to an outdoor cafe and had some great ice cream! 

Next week is a long drive away from the mountains to the country of wooden shoes, The Netherlands!

Ending Our First European Country, La Chaux-de-Fonds, Switzerland

This week sure was an eventful one! It was also the first city where I've felt true culture shock. Culture shock in UWP is defined as being surprised and maybe even uncomfortable with the new culture you are in.  I didn't have it bad, and it was actually really good for me in the end.

We were back in a French area of Switzerland, which I was very excited about! I was roomed with Norman from Belgium  (yes, we had separate bedrooms) for half of the week with a couple Michele and Sylvie.  They have 3 kids around my age, but none are at home, because they are studying outside the country.  Our first night was dinner at another host-family's house, so there was a ton of French flying! But it was still fun and I loved trying to figure out what was going on, but by the time we got home, my brain was so tired!

My family; Michel, Sylvie and Norman

Yay new roomies! Norman from Belgium

Gwendoline(Belg), Norman(Belg) McKenzie(UT), Joana(Portugal)

Tuesday we went on CI which was super exciting because it was the SA student's first CI in Europe! My group went to Val de Ruiz which was a small river/farm.  We spent the cold day cleaning cut willow branches out of the river and putting them into a truck.  There was probably half an American-Football field's worth of willows that had all their branches cut that we had to pick up.  Nonetheless it was really fun to trudge through the mud and be outdoors staring at the Alps all day.  

Yay group CI!

Wednesday night Norman switched families to live with family of a friend, but they knew the family I was staying in, so we all had dinner together with traditional Raclette which is where you melt individual slices of Raclette cheese and put it on potatoes.  Most of the evening was in french, which really made me think extra hard as I tried to translate with what little french I did know, but it was still a good night!

Thursday we spent the day learning about this little, old village that we were living in.  La-Chaux-de-Fonds was actually a manufacturing city that made some of the biggest watch brands known around the world (Rolex, anyone?)  We got to go into many old buildings and see some beautiful hallways with ornate paintings and some really different architecture.  The city's buildings were actually built with high windows facing the sun so that the workers could have as much light as possible for as long as possible.  We also went to the watch museum which was all about the history of the clock/watch and some rare pieces.   Thursday night I practiced french with Michel while he responded in english, so it was a learning experience for everyone! 

LCF is on a grid system like the US! It made getting around so much easier

My favorite pocket watch in the whole museum, a little violin

Friday and Saturday's shows were great and were in the two cities the cast was split into.  Saturday also happened to be my 19th birthday, and what a wonderful one it was! The day started with some of my closest girlfriends singing a song they wrote to me which you can watch here! It may not make complete sense, but they took a song from the band One Direction and changed the lyrics to tease me in a loving way.   Then my mom had a cake made for me with the help of my awesome Cast Manager Leslie.  It made me cry happy tears.  Then after the show Norman took me out with his host brother and we met up with some other Uppies and just had a good time hanging out :) I came home to my host parents who gave me an adorable little bracelet and lots of hugs and kisses and well wishes for my birthday.

Probably the best birthday cake I've had.  Custard and fruit!

Norman and his host brother Arnaud

Sunday was a really cool learning day for host family day.  We went to the other city that UWP was in, Neuchatel, and we went to an old church inside the castle walls which was so beautiful.  Then that evening we went to Sylvie's godson's birthday celebration which was just a great time to meet more people.  Everyone was really great at speaking english and I even spoke a little french with a little girl about Harry Potter! Turned out that not only was it the godson's birthday, but during the past week it was also his brother's and his sister's boyfriends, and mine, so they had cakes for all of us! So I celebrated my birthday with 3 other guys who live in Switzerland and was sung "Happy Birthday" in french! Another cool experience.

Castle

I don't know what this was, but it was beautiful

The church

I'm really going to miss speaking french and this family! It was a very loving and cultural week! Next week we are off to one of the smallest countries in the world, Liechtenstein!

Guten Tag from Frauenfeld, Switzerland!

This week the cast was split between 2 cities in the Swiss-German part of the country.  Frauenfeld and Weinfelden,  and I was hosted in Frauenfeld.  The deal with split-cities is that the cast is separate for the week besides the show days.  So we meet in different places and do our CIs in those cities.  It was also a very short week because everything is closed during Easter weekend.  We had one CI day on tuesday, but I was in class, then shows on Wednesday and Thursday then Friday through Sunday we had off!

Class on Tuesday was fun because we were in a local Gymnastics training center that was also our beneficiary for the week, so we got to play around on the different mats and trampolines.  Another group did some volunteer work there as well, but the SA students sure did have a bit of fun in between studying!

I was hosted with Hayley from Arizona in a couple's home that had yellow doors! (Yellow is my favorite, so you can understand my excitement)  Here's a little video giving you a tour of how we got into the apartment.  Rudy and Marianne were a very nice couple.  Marianne taught us how to play Rummy with tiles like scrabble, not cards.  On the weekend, we visited several cities and even drove through Germany! We also went to Europe's largest waterfall called the Rheinfall.  It was amazing!! The cities were so quaint, and also very different in architecture than the French part as well.  The weather was colder and rainy/snowy all week, so we took a little break to warm up in a popular cafe with some delicious pastry and coffee.

Rudy, Hayley(AZ) and Marianne at the Rheinfall

Cute little door I thought I would share

The Rheinfall

This type of striped paint was all over every city we went to!

Hayley and I at an old Monistary 

oh Switzerland and your sweets!

On Sunday for Easter I went to a Catholic mass with a few other students and it was an awesome experience.  The music was phenomenal  and even though I didn't understand a lick of the sermon, I could still sing along to the hymns because of the german/latin songs we did in high school choir, and I could zone out on the architecture as well.  Then there was a big brunch for the students hosted in Frauenfeld at the Gymnastics center, so there was more jumping and goofing off.  But many host siblings were gymnasts there, so we also got to see them do some pretty neat tricks.  My host mom also gave Hayley and I little easter baskets with European chocolate, and even a chocolate bunny!  This week went by especially fast, and it was also a great time to rest up and really see the country.  Next week off to another French city!

Hayley and I goofing off

Inside mass

the "choir loft" and Organ

The Uppie Easter mass group

The churches here are really something I can't get over!

My lovely European easter bunny!