Woohoo I'm on holiday! Well I don't have to work the 2 days I usually do...and Alex is staying for the week :D Haven't done a lot so far, but going to Brussels and Bruges later in the week, and possibly other places too.

So...news from last week...
I registered at Liege uni! So I can now attend any lectures I want to, and fill up my spare time a bit! Have't started yet, still need to check the timetables. Hoping to do some linguistics courses so I don't forget everything over the year.

I had breakfast brought me by my favourite class last week! They were the ones I cooked the english breakfast for, and as a surprise they brought me in a traditional belgian breakfast! It was amazing, such a nice surprise. We had pains au chocolat, croissants, this nice rice pudding cake stuff you get here, bread and nutella, boiled eggs, hot chocolate, orange juice...I ate lots and lots!

Going to be short and sweet this time, bye for now!

I seem to have been really busy lately despite not really having much to do! I was in school a grand total of 7 hours this week, it's been tough! I shall try and remember interesting things to report on since I last wrote.

Last sunday was a great day, I went to the chocolate festival in Verviers! It was really cool, got to try loads of really nice things and felt quite sick afterwards! My friends from Liege and Brussels came over too, then we all had pizza at mine afterwards and sat on the rooftop for ages and saw a nice sunset :) It was crazy how many languages there were going on, between us we spoke english, french, german, italian and spanish and all of those were spoken at some point during the day, it was cool!

This week I tried to register at the uni in Liège, but the first time I went the office was closed, then the second time I forgot a letter I needed to take with me! So I shall be going back again this week. When I've signed up I'll be able to attend whatever I lectures I want to, should be cool! And don't have to do exams either which is even more cool!

Yesterday I went to Germany! I was taken out for the day by one of the teachers I'm working with and his family, had a really really nice day. In the morning we went to the hautes fagnes which is a fenland region of Belgium near the german border, and really nice countryside. We got there about 6am (I had to get up at 4am!!!) to listen to stags in the forest (!?!) but they decided not to make a noise so it was all a bit pointless! We went into Germany in the afternoon, had lunch in a really nice little town, then went to Aachen and did some shopping there. Looked round the cathedral too, it's a really beautiful building. It was really confusing me having to speak german though, I can just about cope with 2 languages at once, but having to peak french to the people I was with, and german to people in shops and stuff I really couldn't handle! A girl in a shop asked me if I wanted a bag and I just stared at her blankly cos I'd understood but couldn't think which language to reply in!

This week I'm doing things about bonfire night in my lessons, I really want to take sparklers or fireworks in but I don't think they'll let me somehow!

That's all for now,
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Still having lots of fun here :) Had a great weekend, I went over to Liege (nearest city to here) and met up with the other assistants who are working there. On saturday night there was a festival in the town with lots of candles everywhere, it was very pretty. There was a candlelit path up a hill through trees, lots of live music and generally a really nice festive atmosphere. The kind of thing you would never ever get in england cos it would be far too dangerous!
On sunday I went to church here for the first time, it was great! I managed to understand pretty much everything which was amazing and people were really friendly. I went to a bible study there last night which I found harder to understand, think my brain was just too tired to concentrate on understanding french by that point in the day.
I also went to the market in Verviers on saturday, that was nice.
School is still going well, had hardly any hours at all this week, and my weekend starts today! This morning I cooked an english breakfast for some of the students, not really sure if they liked it or not but they ate it anyway! I'm starting to feel like a proper teacher now, been teaching classes totally on my own and have work to mark and give back next week!
Time to return to school
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Today is the second day of my four day weekend, this is the life! I got my timetable sorted at school, I only have 10 hours a week, spread over 3 days so it's pretty good! Monday I have 1 hour at 8.15 in the morning ahich is slightly annoying but at least I can go back to bed after (oops I probably shouldn't write things like that now I know my parents read my blog!)
Tuesdays I have 3 hours in the afternoon and wednesdays I'm in all day, 6 hours in total.
My second day at school went really well apart from me being ill (nothing new there) I gave two presentations about english culture, and helped out with whatever work they were doing. They don't half study some boring stuff in english!
Yesterday I got lots of important things sorted, like I finally managed to open a bank account! I had to go to 4 places before I found somewhere that would let me open one!
I also spent the whole of yesterday on english time cos I wore a watch I hadn't worn since before I came here so hadn't changed the time on...I only realised in the evening, silly me!
Tomorrow I'm going to Liege to meet up with some of the other assistants there so will be nice.
Off to buy curtains for my room now!
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How cool does my blog look now!?! All thanks to my wonderful boyfriend and his computery skills... the picture is one I took the other night, from the kitchen of the first place I found to live actually!

Went to Brussels at the weekend, for the welcome day for all the assistants. Had a great time, it was fun meeting all the others, they're all really nice. I got to do the touristy thing too, saw some of the sights and took lots of photos. Most importantly, I got my first paycheque! Which will unfortunately all go on the deposit for my house :(

Started work in school today, really really enjoyed it. Only had two lessons, pretty tired from those though! Spent most of the time just chatting with the students in english, introducing myself and stuff. They had endless questions for me, some of which were quite hard to answer, for example "what do you think of Tony Blair?" I told them I don't have much interest in politics!
Have to be in school for 8.15 in the morning so I think I'll go home and get an early night now!

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