Cupcakes

I tried to make birthday cupcakes a few weeks ago. It was a very important birthday, so I aimed a bit high: margarita cupcakes. I bought a bottle of tequila and some cupcake papers and went to work. The end result was a citrus cake with tequila frosting. The only way to explain what went wrong is to cite my ignorance. These are the things you take for granted if you eat cake in the New World:
1. Matching units of measurement between recipe and measuring cups
2. Not having to use scales
3. Your limes come from Mexico or, you know, someplace typical for limes. The limes here must come from northern Russia or something. Like there is no way this stuff was grown in fertile soil. Plus, I can taste the Tsardom. And the limes are inside of lemons, which are in oranges, inside grapefruits...
4. Cupcake tins
5. Frosting
Despite the conversion complications, this cake looks really nice. Actually, the biggest problem was that the limes were useless. I ended up replacing most of the lime juice with lemon juice and tequila, which is how we ended up with this situation in my refrigerator.

Boterham

Boterham = boter+ham. It's a buttered ham, right? Wrong! It's a sandwich. Not even a sandwich. It doesn't deserve the honor. It's a piece of bread with something smeared on it. Sometimes with another slice on top if you're lucky. So imagine my surprise when I found out everyone around me ate buttered ham for breakfast. "Oh, you know, I can usually eat two, three. Sometimes I put one on top of the other and I call that one." Three buttered hams for breakfast? I knew people ate a lot across the pond, but this is ridiculous. Without butter or ham, how will I survive? A breakdown, you guys. But it's cool. It's just a half-assed sandwich. They don't put peanut butter and jelly together though. That's the only boterham in the New World, but they think it's weird here. "Protein and fruit? I can't even imagine. They're so weird in your country." Oh it's on.

You, Too, Can Become Belgian

Every country has its thing that isn't trendy anywhere else. Belgium just has more of them, that's all. While they're striking in protest of whatever isn't stylish in Belgium that week, they occupy their time with the following things:
1. dancing like poultry. Every non-Belgian in Belgium knows what I'm talking about.
2. being proud of their non-government
3. hating Queen Elizabeth II. Maybe this isn't everyone, but I've heard from a lot of people that she just looks mean.
4. eating cabbage
5. telling me I have obviously heard of this band, because they're famous in Belgium
6. looking like Justin Bieber
7. having more hair than reasonable
8. smoking
9. complaining about public transportation
10. doing their best to look ballin' when mommy drops them off for school because they're not allowed to drive yet
11. telling me that I'm not allowed to drink back home, so it evens out not being allowed to drive
12. they eat peppers too. Everything is pepper flavored. Like bell peppers, not like spicy or salt-and-.
13. complaining about immigrants
14. being hipsters- big glasses, dreadlocks, ironic sweaters, generally being underground. It's getting difficult to tell all these alternative people apart.
15. complaining about school, forcing me to resist telling them about walking through snow uphill both ways, past Ford Street in the North Country winter to get to the library, so I could do some research for my 50 page English paper.
16. talking about feelings
17. talking about Belgium while Japan is melting see: Prince Laurent in Congo. i.e. not seeing the Big Picture
18. Idioms. There is not a single Belgian who speaks literally
19. Surrealism. Just accept what is happening and everything will be just fine. Watch out for the bicyle-pianos, accordeon-trumpets, and amputee guitarists.
20. going on strike about something else

Duidelijk

Duidelijk, contrary to its appearance, has nothing to do with doubt. It's actually the opposite, like clear or obvious. I'm not sure what I thought. Doubt-like? So early on in the year, when I was sitting in class trying my best to learn information in a language I couldn't understand, and the teacher asked if it was duidelijk, I nodded vigorously in hopes that she would help me. The only response I ever got was something along the lines of OK, fine, moving on then. I was left days on end without answers until a dictionary told me I was asking the wrong questions. Then I found out Belgians don't give straight answers anyway. These poor people will be so heavily stereotyped by the time I have to leave.

Oorlog

I was in Spanish class at the beginning of the year and the teacher was asking us to translate widely-known Spanish words into Dutch. I spoke more Spanish than Dutch, so I had a fifty percent chance of success. She asked my group what guerra meant. Someone said oorlog. I said, "no, no, guerra is when people go 'piu, piu!'" and I showed off my best finger gun. My classmate looked at me strangely and replied, "Ja, oorlog." I pointed to my wrist. "Horloge." Ah.

Christmas Vacation

Within a few hours, I will officially have survived my first major vacation in Belgium. I had a three-day weekend here and there, half days and exams, but nothing like Christmas vacation. Yes, it actually is Christmas vacation here, not Worship Freely Winter Break like in the States, because Belgium doesn't play games and they know everyone is Christian anyway. I had to explain Hanukkah to an entire population for the sake of those three or so Jews still in Belgium. I got to learn about a new holiday too. Everyone was glad to introduce me to Sinter Klaas, who looks just like the Pope. That made the newspaper confusing for a month. One is the face of winter holidays and childhood joy and the other woke me up every morning with a speech about condoms and gay prostitutes. I learned a lot from Sinter Klaas. I learned never to eat more than one piece of speculoos per day, that men with beards make me really uncomfortable, and that Sint Niklaas is totally not Santa. Of course, every exchange student feels lonely during the holidays. Or so I've heard. It's not that I missed my family. I just missed the routine of Christmas. I missed recognizing people. On New Year's Eve, the entire city of Ghent may have literally been on the same street and I didn't recognize a single face. I met my host parents' families, which was great. They were very welcoming and they showed me pictures of my host parents as children. I think they really tried to make me feel like part of the family. Of course, I'm still the new face at every event and now I can't stop thinking about why my host parent's parents never thought to put pants on their kids. I accomplished a lot this vacation. I went to Paris, visited some museums, I became a Belgian, I got a legendary New Year's story, I found out I hate Salvador Dalí, and I managed to read everything that has ever existed ever while my folks were out. I also found out Rachel Maddow has a podcast. It's just the show, but I can't watch it on television in Belgium, so it is absolutely lovely to watch Rachel spear the right wing on my iPod while I'm snug under the covers. Actually, the only thing I can watch on the internet is 16 and Pregnant, which makes me glad I'm neither.

Hoor

I don't really know what hoor means, but I use it anyway. I know that's dangerous, mainly because, to my untrained ear, it sounds a lot like both the Dutch and English words for whore. I know it means hear, so I figured it was used either like the "Hear Ye, Hear Ye" old-fashioned newsbearers use it or like the Southerners and their "Y'all come back now, ya hear?" As it turns out, it is exactly neither of those things, but rather placed at the end of a sentence for dramatic effect. Unfortunately, it is used in much the same way as if one were to actually call me a whore, which has led to a few miscommunications. My first few weeks in Belgium, with my utter lack of Dutch skills, went a bit like this:
"Je moet het wel doen hoor."
"Whore?"
"Hoor, not whore."
"Wie hoer?"
"Huh?"
"Who whore?"
"Met mijn oor."