We've Found the Mute Button

My voice, like me, enjoys traveling. It has strolled through the mountains of pitch, and the valleys of tone. Typically, it finds happiness in considerably safe travels. Wednesday, my voice decided to embark on a journey unlike any of the previous ones. One that would present grave danger and risks. My voice, being quite ignorant, ventured on without giving the journey much thought. It had hoped to make it to an undiscovered planet far from this solar system, but its mental GPS led it straight into a black hole. My voice is no superior creation, and was forced to abide by the laws of nature, vanishing into a void of nonexistence. 

For the amusement of others and the embarrassment of myself, here is a video of me [trying] to speak. Due to the difficultly of understanding what I’m squeaking about, I’ve added subtitles. By recording this video, I learned that I don’t think before I speak. You can tell by the way I heavily question my word choice near the end of the video. 

I’d also like to point out that this was the best I sounded all day. Most of the day went by without even being able to make the squeaky noises. 

It’s also been requested that I write about the chocolate. How does one describe such a magnificent creation? Take every single positive comment you’ve heard about Belgian chocolate, add them all together, and multiply the outcome by pi (that one’s for you, Adam). Now, take your result and throw it away, because it doesn’t even begin to live up to the delicious goodness of the chocolate. Yes, it’s true. Belgian chocolate absolutely deserves all the hype that it gets. 

Even the American chocolates (Twix, Crunch, Snickers, etc.) are one hundred times better here. After going an extended period of time thinking my increased love of these chocolates was due to psychological influence, I realized they, too, are made in Belgium with Belgian chocolate. Never again will I truly enjoy chocolate in America. 

Yes, You Do

I broke the zipper on my favorite pair of jeans. I'm still trying to figure out how I feel about this.

Tomorrow marks my third month here. Every completion of a month comes with a victorious feeling, yet a bittersweet one all the same. I've been considerably proud of myself, as I have yet to have a problem with homesickness. Granted, I do sometimes look forward to doing certain things again in America, but nothing that makes me want to jump on a plane within the next five minutes. I've predicted that one of two things will occur:

     1. I will continue throughout the rest of the year without experiencing a bad case of homesickness.

or

     2. I'm subconsciously shoving any sadness I have to the deepest corners of my mind. One day, an evil imaginary creature will decide it's time to organize my mind, and he'll drag out every single piece of sadness. His organization methods will cause an incredible, outrageously long-lasting breakdown. 

I'm hoping the first one is the winner, but I have been noticing that I'm a very subconscious person. I've found that I'm oblivious to the majority of the things I do. Yesterday's walk to school alone consisted of two subconscious actions. The first one was creepily walking behind a guy and munching the air like a dinosaur. The second was flailing my arms and yelling, "CABOT." Once again, I'm still trying to figure out how I feel about this. 

Seems like I've got a lot of pondering to do.

She's Not Foreign.

While riding the train back to Athus, two girls standing next to me were attempting to prank phone call people. "Attempting," because they were doing a rather terrible job of it. Regardless, I found the situation amusing. At one point, one of the girls received a text message. I assume it was written in English, because she read aloud with choppy pronunciation, "Do you speak French?"
She asked her friend how to say "tu es" in English. This is the moment where I stepped in with, "You are." My unexpected response initiated a brief French conversation that resulted in me successfully convincing both of the girls that I'm a native, French speaking Belgian who learned English as a second language in school. Highlight of my week.

Although I'm the only person who thinks this, I've been doing quite well on my tests. Under normal circumstances, I would enter an intense period of depression if I received a 1.5/20 on a test. But considering all I had to do to earn that point and a half was draw a picture of Jesus in Mexico, I'm quite proud of myself.
Now, this isn't to say I completely blow of every test that's handed to me-- I only do that with math tests. Usually, I do provide a lazy attempt at answering the questions. The relative amount of effort I put forth for my chemistry test, for example, earned me 4 points and a high-energy praise from the teacher.
The only teacher who refuses to praise my low (though existent) grades is my physics teacher. After getting a single question right on a test, her only comment towards me was, "You get to choose three exams to take, correct? Please don't take mine." Oh yes, I'm feeling the love.

Since my arrival in Belgium, I've been craving American Chinese food. This statement has no story behind it. It's simply a statement of sad truth.

Oh Happy Days, Here Comes the Sun.

I went to a volleyball club practice today. Let me begin by giving a rough, general description of the actual practice:

I had initially expected the two hour practice to consist of an hour of warm-ups, and an hour of competing. Unlike my expectations, it was actually just two hours of warm-ups. During these exercises, I discovered how horribly out of shape I am. By the time the second warm-up had started, I was having trouble not collapsing. For those of you who say Europeans aren't athletic, you're wrong. 

Besides the lack of competitive game-playing (and the large amount of chocolate that the coach distributed during practice), it was eerily similar to my old volleyball club in Arkansas. This mostly had to do with the group of people that were there. The coach uncannily resembled Coach Hal, there was the one overly serious and controlling player, and there was the girl who was constantly singing and dancing in her own little world. 

I couldn't help but to look around and think of America. I love volleyball, but it's what I loved in America. Because of this, I kept experiencing a strange feeling within my self that I am unable to properly describe. I don't believe it was homesickness, but I'm sure it was a relative. For that reason, I wasn't thinking I'd want to continue playing here. I would like to avoid doing things that could potentially trigger nostalgia. 

However, things changed immediately after practice was over and I walked outside. The lovely endorphin rush was finally kicking in and I became so overly happy-- I felt as though the world was drenching me in a shower of lollipops and gumdrops filled with happiness and appreciation for all things around me. For the next hour, I couldn't shut up. I just blabbered, and blabbered, and blabbered some more. I'm pretty sure this threw my host parents for a loop, because, although I try to speak as much French as possible, I hadn't spoken that much since being here.

And now, with my swollen fingers and sore legs, I've decided I should continue attending volleyball practices when convenient. Although the practice itself wasn't quite what I was expecting, the amazing amount of happiness I had afterwards was so brilliant that I'm afraid I may have already become addicted to it. 

To add a little variety to this post, Michelle Duggar is pregnant with her 20th child. Welcome to Arkansas, folks!

Il a tombé dans les pommes.

My friend, Jésus, is pretty nifty. He lets me pronounce his name without the accent and add some southern flair to the pronunciation. Today, Jésus "fell on some apples" and crashed into the lockers, resulting in unconsciousness. This incident caused geography to become three times funnier. Praise Jesus! 

This is Jésus. He's so cool. 

I took a math test a couple of weeks ago. The teacher seemed so depressed that day, so I decided happiness was more important than math. In attempt to cheer him up, I wrote cheesy, inspirational phrases all over the paper and drew pictures full of love and harmony. He seemed to really appreciate it, and proceeded to show the entire class what I had done while they were busy calculating various equations. Today, everybody got their tests back except me. I've decided it's because the teacher framed my "test" and mounted it on a wall for never-ending happiness. 

Check.

To those of you who take the time to comment on my blog posts, I would like to genuinely thank you. I apologize for never giving you written responses. If it makes any difference, I do provide each of you with mental responses.... Reading your words truly makes me very happy, and I hope you can all forgive me for never commenting back.
While we're on it, Mrs. Wittenberg, there's a boy here from Nevada. I talk about you and the incredible time I had in Ruby Lake every time I'm with him.

Today, in geography, the teacher was talking about drugs and whatnot and proceeded to ask me what the first thought is that comes to my mind when someone mentions drugs. My only response was a noise of confusion. I must've given the impression that I didn't know what drugs are, because she went on a small drug explanation rant. I interrupted her to tell her that I understood, but didn't know what I thought.
See, when people ask me what I think about something, I tend to freeze up and zone out. It's not because of nerves or anything rational like that. Rather, I temporarily forget what it is that I think about something, so I start thinking about what I think but that only leads me to thinking about how I'm thinking about what I think that I think that I have forgotten that I think. It's really just a vicious cycle of pointless thinking.
So, eventually, she gave up on me and asked another person. Said person didn't get a chance to respond, because I erratically (and subconsciously, I might add) slapped the table and shouted, "PSYCHEDELICS."
For anyone who was present during the "my nipple!" incident in Algebra II, this was kind of comparable to that.
I attempted to retreat to my little mental corner of comfort and assurance, but failed when I started laughing hysterically at the person who answered with "Bob Marley." There I was, choking on my laughter, being stared at intently by confused Belgians. I'm not getting enough sleep.

On a side note, I'll be 17 in seven days. Also, today marks my two month anniversary in Belgium. Huzzah!

SPAZZ.

Remember when I ranted about the lack of thrift stores in Belgium? Well, I lied. Yesterday, I found a thrift store. Even better, said thrift store is walking distance from my house. Holy speculoos, praise the water-filled millipedes that scurry with frenzy to the dark pits of doom. THERE'S A THRIFT STORE THAT'S WALKING DISTANCE FROM MY HOUSE. 

The insane amount of excitement I contained when I entered the store may have caused my sweat glands to go into overdrive. There I was, spazzing, sweating, and trying not to scream. I do believe this is the greatest Belgian discovery I've made so far.

I came across a super ugly sweater with a giant, sparkling flamingo plastered across the center. I don't think anyone will understand how difficult it was for me to convince myself not to buy it. I carried it around for an hour....

I did, however, buy two scarves and an oversized men's sweater. I'm not sure how, but I failed to notice the words "UNITED STATES" written largely across the center until I got home. Huh. 

Je Suis Le Morse

And so we discover my secret love of procrastination....

I'm trying to introduce hugging into everyday Belgian life. My first hug was given out to an unsuspecting Belgian boy who had just given me Across the Universe. I was later told that I give good "cuddles." Not exactly what I was going for, but I suppose that works. Regardless, he told me he now wants to give more "cuddles." My plan to convert their European ways is working already.

I had two memorable "proud moments" today. These are the times when I think to myself, "Dear God, I'm awesome." The first one occurred in French class when I recognized one of Salvador Dali's paintings based on the technique used. I'm probably the only one who considers this to be a noteworthy moment, but it made me giddy inside.
The second occurred after accidentally teaching a native Belgian a new French word. Perhaps this isn't too surprising, considering the things that come out of my mouth are usually rather weird phrases that nobody understands. Even so, I figured Belgians would understand, "Je suis le morse/I am the walrus." Walrus must not be a commonly used word. One point for Cayenne, please.

During our lunch break today, while a few friends and I were charging down the street to get durums, a middle-aged man stopped us, pulled his pants down just low enough to reveal a diaper, and stuck a pacifier in his mouth. What an interesting man.

There's a boy who sings to me every time he sees me. On occasion, he'll modify the lyrics just enough so that they include my name. For instance, a single line of "Hello" will be modified in order to say, "And I want to tell you so much, Cayenne, I love you." He's a fabulous boy. I'm considering adopting him as my life's soundtrack.

1+1= Jesus Fish

I've come to discover that I have a slight comprehension problem. The problem first made itself clear when I completely understood the teacher's lecture about how petroleum is insoluble in water, yet I didn't understand her when she welcomed me to Belgium.

The comprehension problem continued in physics. The teacher wrote a long string of illegible notes on the board that I attempted to copy down.

What I copied into my notebook:

"Vector ate dinner in a sewer because he wasn't invited to a lounge by Dr. Apple."

What was meant to be copied down (English translation):

"The VECTEUR representation: direction, sense, intensity, and application point."

Math isn't really any better. Although it's supposedly the universal language, it doesn't seem very universal when this is what I think the equation is:

umy(90º+Jesus fish)=umyJesusfish

When the teacher wrote some kind of helpful information on the board, this is what I read:

"The complementary colors of a Jesus fish and 'go' equal a negative Jesus fish."

In other news, I completely wiped out while going down a staircase in the school today. It happened while following a few friends to an unknown classroom. You have to understand that there are stairs everywhere in the school. It's like Hogwarts, only less magical. As we were walking down what was probably our fifth staircase, I totally missed a step and went flailing down. Now, I slip and stumble nearly every time I go up (or down) a staircase, but this was the first time I'd really made a fool of myself. Unfortunately, I expect many more of these incidents to occur.

It's Not Polite to Stare, Cayenne

My first almost actual day of school was today. Three days in, and I'm more lost than ever. 

Everyone in my grade gathered into a room to listen for the construction of our schedules. I wrote random classes down, but I honestly don't know what classes I'm actually in. I spent most of the day just following people around.

I went to Religion and math before eating lunch. During those two classes, I just sat and stared at the teachers as they lectured. They'd ask me a question every now and then, and I wouldn't notice, so I'd just continue to stare at them without answering. It's looking as though I won't be getting A's this year. As of right now, I'm not even sure if I'll be able to avoid turning in blank tests/homework. 

A group of friends and I went out for sandwiches and pasta for lunch. As we ate, they would point to everything in sight and say what it was in French. I'm pretty sure they taught me around 70 words just during our lunch break. 

After eating, I followed one of the girls to Spanish class. I was so excited to go to Spanish, because I thought that maybe, just maybe, I'd hear a phrase in Spanish and understand what was going on. Unfortunately, I didn't hear a single Spanish word. 

I was told that I had ecology after Spanish class, so I went wandering around for the classroom. I couldn't find it, so I asked a nice man to help me. After about 10 minutes of searching, he couldn't find it either, so he told me to go home. 

I wasn't sure how to get home, though, so I figured I'd take the opportunity to explore until I hopefully found a way back to Athus. I walked around for a while, made a few spontaneous turns, and ended up at the train station. Just finding the station gave me a huge feeling of accomplishment. I went in to read the train schedule, and saw that I had an hour to spare, so I walked around town until I found a café. 

The bartender and I conversed while I refreshed myself with a beverage. In the middle of our discussion, I noticed a bird in the corner of the building, moving. I've been so disoriented lately, that seeing a bird in a bar concocted a brew of intense fascination. I continued with my staring. I've gotten quite good at staring at people and things for long periods of time. 

After I finished, I said goodbye to the bartender and headed back down to the train station. I re-read the schedule to make sure I knew which train to get on, and realized my train wasn't supposed to arrive for another hour. I tried calling my host father, but I couldn't get either of his numbers to work. I then decided to call Jarrod, who is an absolutely amazing exchange student from New Zealand who's been in Belgium for sixth months already. I didn't really have a point in calling him, I just feel more comfortable when I ramble about my confusion to other people. 

After the second hour had past, I still couldn't figure out what train I was supposed to get on, so I just walked onto a random one that had just pulled into the station. I asked the conductor if the train was going to Athus, and he said the train to Athus wasn't schedule for another thirty minutes. 

Thirty minutes later, I got onto a train. I wasn't sure if it was the right one, but I'd reached a point of not even caring. I just wanted to go somewhere. As soon as I sat down, a boy stumbled onto the train. I didn't want to assume he was drunk, so I instead thought, "Oh, he must have a terrible sense of balance like I do." I should've just assumed, because as soon as he sat down he started spewing chunks of vomit everywhere. What did I do? I stared. I stared as he threw up, I stared as he passed out into the pool of vomit, and I stared as his friends tried to get him to regain consciousness. 

I eventually realized how disgusting it was to be staring at a pile of barf with an unconscious man in it, so I moved to a different section of the train. It took yet another 30 minutes before the drunk boy was taken out on a stretcher. Another 5 minutes or so later, we were finally moving. 

I figured the first stop was mine, so I got off. After staring around mindlessly, I decided it wasn't my stop and got back on the train. The second stop was the winner. I had found Athus, and it only took me four hours. 

Because I don't want to end this post on the unappealing subject of vomit, here's a piece of a conversation that took place at school when a Belgian tried to speak to me in English:

Belgian Boy: In the States, you can drive, no? Do you have license?

Me: Yes, I do.

Belgian Boy: Ooh! What kind of car do you drive? Like, shapely or empty?

Me: ...I drive a Prius. I'm not sure if it's shapely or empty, though. 

Belgian Boy: A pris! Is your car a virgin?