today i am in leuven belgium. i left london @ 1030am friday (yesterday) and arrived at 6 or so in brussels. the bus was a good experience. it smelled terrible and the people were interesting, but we still took the chunnel. there are trains made specifically for cars/buses to ride in so they can get across the chunnel the same way the eurostar does. tiany met me at the bus station and we went to go see the mennekin pis. :) hehe. apparently there is this tale of sometime during the war that a bomb was placed in the city centre of leuven, and a small boy peed on it and saved the entire town, thus he got a statue made after him. gotta love it. we ate along this cute side street somewhere in brussels and i ate mussels. gotta say, not really a fan. i had to douse them in salt and other crap to get them down. wandered around brussels some more, tiany showed me the sites (like the famous church in the city centre, city hall, blah blah) ... all the notable things in brussels. we took the trian back to leuven, stopped by her friends house to get a sleeping bag, and headed to her place. leuven isnt a big place, but it's beautiful. the city centre is really cool and they have a courtyard similair to the one in brussels, with the large church and stuff. everything is so beautiful. lots of gold detail on the buildings. really cool @ night. her friend wasnt home, but one of her flatmates was there. he was born and raised in belgium, so met a native! she showed me around leuven some more and then we hit the hay. she has her own apartment, which is cool. tiany is so grown up. she lives by herself, pays rent, works all the time. definitaly an adult. very cool. we woke up late (very adult like, haha) and headed to antwerpen. not sure where it is located in the country of belgium, but very cool city. the train station is the old palace where the king used to live - it is gorgeous. we walked around antwerpen for awhile, and then tiany had to head to work. i got some belgium coffee, and went shopping :) shopping here is ridiculous. everything is in dutch/french. in antwerpen it's all in french, cuz it's in the french area of belgium. belgium is basically a mix of france and the netherlands. leuven is in the dutch area of belgium, so everything here is dutch, and that is the language most people speak. i find it interesting. it's almost as if belgium doesnt have its own idenitity - half of the country thinks its french and the other half thinks they are dutch. but i like it. everything is so gorgeous and they have statues/momuments to commemorate everything. tiany has to work tomorrow, so im waking up early and heading to the netherlands with her friend zoe. have to catch the train at 7am, and then we're driving there (one of zoe's friends has a car). pretty excited! :) 2 countries in one weekend. :) love it.