Christmas gone Belgian

Of course I have to address the question 'how was Christmas different in Belgium?'. And actually, it was more different than I expected. Mostly because of the fact that it's just not as important as it is in the US. Kids don't believe in Father Christmas and neither do they recieve piles of presents because they do believe in St. Nicolas who does come with piles of presents on Dec. 6.
We had a very nice celebration. Christmas was at our house this year, with all the family scheduled to come for a huge dinner and a secret santa exchange of presents (which they call 'cacahuete' which is literally 'peanut' - don't ask me why). We only ended up with about half the family though (still a good 17 people) because the snow kepts so many people away. From the time the guests started arriving at 7 until after midnight we just worked our way through meal after meal. Piles of appetizers, then two main courses, then dessert. It was a thouroughly good evening.
Merry Christmas to everybody!

NOT humming the Jeopardy theme song

We all know Jeopardy. I mean we've all at least heard of it. Surprise of surprises, french-speakers have their own. Because I live in a tiny town, we only get 4 channels (and now that a trees has fallen basically on the house, we don't get anything). One of those is "Euronews". The other three are the three national Belgian channels in French. So we get Belgian news, sports, plenty of movies (often American dubbed in French) and some series. I have to admit that I've become a semi-regular follower of the French soap opera that plays 5 nights a week, Plus Belle La Vie (literally "the life more beautiful"). And occassionally I'm around to see their Jeopardy: Tout Le Monde Veut Prendre Sa Place ("Everybody wants to take his place"). I even occassionally know the answers - American trivia pops up a lot more often, I'm sure, than French trivia pops up on Jeopardy..

Snow and snow and lots more snow

Had the weirdest day today. I woke up at 6:30, expecting a long drive to school because of the snow on the road. I start getting ready, I'm about 30 seconds into my morning rouitine, when my host mom comes in a tells me that there is too much snow, it's impossible to leave the house to go for my last day of exams - my French oral exams. I wasn't gonna complain, so I hopped back in bed for a couple more hours. I woke up again at 8:30 and started the laziest day of my life. There was at least 3/4 of a foot if not a foot of snow. The night before, the SECOND tree fell on the property - this one bumping up on the house and not breaking windows and one of the cars by sheer luck - my host dad had decided the night before to not park the car in the usual place. So after some TV and a slow breakfast, I went out with my brother and siser to pay around in the snow and on this huge - probably 75 foot - tree that was right in front of our house. After, with my host mom and sister, we went on a nice walk in the snow. And after that, lots of reading, TV, a lazy lunch. Enjoying the snow. No exam - that will be for when school restarts, apparently.
Welcome to Christmas vacation!!!!

I'm thrilled to tell you I have no idea what you're saying

Belgium is a country cut in two - the northern more or less half is the Flemish speaking part, called Flandres in French. The southern half is the French speaking part, called Wallonie. In the French part, it is mandatory to take multiple years of both English and Flemish. On many of the products sold in supoermarkets, things are written French and Flemish (and often English or other languages as well). It's an odd language, sort of a combination of German and English. But I absolutely love hearing it. I revel in a language that I am not expected to comprehend. It's normal that I have no idea what someone is saying when they speaking Flemish. I don't have to worry about trying to understand, focusing all my attention on listening to the words as sometimes happens in French or Spanish. Neither do I have to think about trying to translate it, or help the speaker, as sometimes happens with English. I don't want to, don't need to, don't feel expected to understand, and I love.

I'm not turning down free candy even if it does have violent connections..

About a week ago we celebrated St. Nicolas - a holiday extremely simlar to Noel in that it's a day for receiving gifts and eating lots of candy. St. Nicolas also resembles Santa Claus - or maybe it's the other way around. (see a picture of him below)
I asked around a bit and learned a bit the story of St. Nicolas. So, obviously, he's a Saint. He travels from house to house on his donkey, accompanied by a boy who is not black, but who's face is painted black - I believe he's called Pere Fouettard. If you're good, you leave your shoes out December 5 and the next morning St. Nicolas has left you candy and gifts. If you're bad... Pere Fouettard comes and whips you!
There are different stories about St. Nicolas, but I gotta mention this one becuas it's just so violent for a holiday story! So apparently, one night, three kids somehow ended up a butcher's house. I don't remember why - they had to buy something or maybe they were lost. Anyway, this butcher was an evil butcher. So he let the kids in, then killed them all and cut them all into pieces and hung them in room for storing meat. St. Nicolas came to the butcher shop and told the butcher he knew what horrible deed the butcher had done. He told the butcher to bring out the children. The butcher did, begging for mercy for what he had done. And St. Nicolas then revived the children.