Number 22!

Yay!  This post officially breaks my record of most posts in one month!  How very, very exciting.  Today I went and registered with a job placement agency.  I had a good feeling after the interview (which was in French!), I think it went well.  Then I got an e-mail today from a private English school, something like what I was working at in Korea.  Then Will (the friend I went to Ghent with) suggested that I work for his old company and gave me an e-mail address to try out.  Sounds like there are lots of opportunities coming my way (HOPEFULLY).

Speaking of Will, he moved.  He is now close (within walking distance... 13 minutes precisely) to where I live.  It's good to have a friend close by.  He is getting a T.V. tomorrow, and he has a Wii so I foresee many a nintendoathon in my future.

That's all!  Hope all is well at home!

French

Oops, looks like I'll have to make 2 posts today because I forgot to yesterday, if I want to break my record for most posts in a month!  Well, I have started to re-go through my Dad's French text book that he lent me.  It's a Canadian book called En Bons Termes.  Since it's Canadian, there is lots of mention about French Canadian culture, which is interesting for me.  There are also notable language differences.  For example:

Québec says "bicyclette" for bicycle, Europe says "vélo".
Québec says "auto" for car, Europe says "voiture".

Just some examples.  Europe can sometimes use the Québec versions too, but it's much less common.  Another notable difference is that you can say "bonjour" as a greeting and as you're leaving in Québec, while in Europe "bonjour" is strictly for saying hello.

Just some examples of differences!  I've only read the first 2 chapters so I'm sure I'll come across more!

Today I'm going to Exaris, another job placement agency.  Should be fun!  Then Sunday I am going to be in another commercial for GAN, a French insurance company.  It will be filmed at a community pool, but they're going to remake an airport.  That should be interesting to see!

Right, time to go.  Buh bye now everyone!

A few more things.

So back in February I made a post about Belgium breaking the world record for not having a government.  I am very sorry, but I made a mistake!  We just broke the European record.  TODAY we beat the world record. 

Also, after a countless amount of times of picking it up, getting frustrated, putting it down, I have FINALLY mastered the Rubik's Cube.  That is quite the accomplishment for me, as I never thought I'd be able to do it!  I actually learned while Alex and I were traveling through the vineyards of Alsace, France but just remembered to put it up here in my blog.  Let's look at some numbers because I feel proud and I also feel like bragging just a bit. :D

There are exactly 43,252,003,274,489,856,000 different ways a rubik's cube's squares can be oriented.  There is only one solution.  In easier (maybe) terms that is just around 43 quintillion.

The youngest person to ever solve a cube was a 3 year old named Yuhan Shi from China.  The oldest was a 90 year old.

Only 5.8% of people in the world are able to solve the traditional 3x3 Rubik's Cube.

As of January of 2009, 350,000,000 Rubik's Cubes had been sold.

One more statistic - I am 100% tired of looking up statistics.  Here's a picture I took of my first solved Rubik's Cube.

The effect I added to everything here except the Rubik's Cube is supposed to show that for a while there, I couldn't focus on anything else until I solved it!

Alright, that's all.

P.S.  I'll let you in on a secret of mine - my record for blog posts in one month was 21 posts in one month.  That was November of 2009 of my Blog "Ian Kivell - Adventures in Korea".  I'm at 20 for March now!  That means tomorrow I'll have to post if I want to tie my record, and then I'll have to post again on the 31st if I want to beat my record!

Fame

Well, being famous has been fun.  I was 'on set' today from 8am - 5pm.  We had free breakfast and a catered lunch (then I took some extra food at the end for dinner!)  The commercial was for Kinder, like the chocolate people.  Their most popular one, in Canada at least, would probably be Kinder Surprise with the little toy inside.  I think the commercial will be on in around 3 weeks, but on French T.V.  There were about 9 cars in the commercial driven by extras.  They are all Belgian so they have Belgian license plates.  The commercial people covered them up with French ones, so that is why I assume it was a French production.

Anyway, my task was to walk across the street.  It was easy.  Then in the afternoon I had to walk down a sidewalk.  It was tedious and boring, but it was also quite fun at the same time.  Something about the guy yelling "3, 2, 1 - ACTION!" Made me feel like a celebrity!

Here are a few pictures!

That's the stoplight I leaned against not knowing it was merely a prop.  I made quite a scene trying to stop if from completely falling and breaking.

Lunch time!  Catered - 3 different salads, I think 3 different meat dishes, bread, bruschetta (or however you spell it), water, wine, pop, juice, coffee, tea, the list goes on!

The man who captures the magic.

Not sure why it says Bollywood, but the other stuff makes sense.  Apparently at this time we were on Scene 4 Take 1.

That was my day as an actor!  I have another commercial on Sunday for something that I don't know what it is.  I'm sure I'll find out when I get there. 

Hope everyone is having a swell week.

Kinder

So I've looked for jobs everywhere... and I mean everywhere!  Tomorrow will be my first dabbling in show biz.  I'm going to be an extra in a T.V. commercial for Kinder!  We'll see how that goes!

Modern Mobility

So today I figured out how to make my blog accessible to those people who have internet on their phones.  I think all you have to do is scan this picture or something.

Actually I'm not sure if that's what you're supposed to do, but if anyone out there reading this blog can either confirm or deny that, I would highly appreciate that!  Just send me a comment!

Strasbourg, Alsace, France. Days 2 & 3

So the last 2 days have been just as great as the first!  Yesterday, I went back to the city centre (which is pedestrian only I should mention).  I ended up on a boat tour which was quite nice.  Actually, it was about 1.5 hours long, and only about 30 minutes of it showed nice buildings and things, the rest of it was just industrial things and dumps which wasn't really pleasant, but it was relaxing to be on the water.  I should also mention that it was 19°C all day!  What a treat!  Afterwards, I met up with Alex and we went to this bar that was on a boat!  Here are pictures from yesterday!

You can see the cathedral in the background

This is the European Parliament in Strasbourg

 Region known as "Petit France" in Strasbourg

 The wine bar!

Then came today.  We had another great day.  Even the weather has been so good - I haven't seen so much sun in months!  So I started off the day by going back to the cathedral.  I decided to go up the steps and take in the view.  I got about 30 feet in the air before I stopped and went back down.  I couldn't do it.  I sat down for a bit and regained my composure and went back in.  I explained to the lady that I have a crippling fear of heights and I'd like to try it again one more time.  She was very kind and let me go back in for another try.  The second time I got up pretty high, but not all the way.  I just couldn't do it.  Just thinking about it now is making me feel sick.  It was terrible.  Oh well.  I met Alex after she finished work, and we left and headed for the castle.  We visited the Koenigsbourg Castle, which is a really big castle.  Took pictures.  Then we went back down the mountain and went along the wine route.  There are vineyards ALL over the place there.  We decided to go for a dégustation (tasting) where we had little samples of a few kinds of wine.  The lady explained all about the wines and how they're made.  In the end, Alex bought 8 bottles and I bought nothing, because I'm poor.  Here are pictures from today!

At the top of the mountain with the castle!

Going to taste some wine!

It was sooooo fun and sooooo French!

 Then we went to a little little town called Riquewihr in the middle of a vineyard field.  It was very charming!  Looked like something from a story book!

The sign says that this road is called the "5th of December, 1944 St."  Underneath the name of the street it explains that that is the date they were liberated.

Tomorrow it's time to go back to Belgium to Brussels.  I think we'll swing by Germany before we head back though, just to be able to say that I've been there.  (I was in the airport in 2006 and underneath the country in a salt mine, but I don't know if those things count).

That's that!  Bye!

Strasbourg, France (Day 1)

Alright, so 2 days ago I decided to come to France with Alex.  Yesterday we came.  It took about 4 hours to drive from Brussels to Strasbourg.  After 2 hours of driving, we arrived in Luxembourg and after another 2 hours we were here in Strasbourg.  Luxembourg was the smallest country, I couldn't believe it.  I think it took around 10 minutes to drive through the whole thing, and we went the longest way through it!  It's not like we drove through just a corner of the country, we drove through the whole thing... 10 minutes.  It was hilarious!

After we arrived here and got settled in a bit, we went downtown and took some pictures.  The cathedral here is seriously breath taking.  A few things are so shocking about it - it's height is 142 metres and for more than 200 years, it was the tallest building in the world.  It really is sooooo big.  Also the colour of it is worth mentioning.  The colour of the cathedral comes from the sandstone in the surrounding mountains - the Volges, so it's a reddish stone colour.  Here are some pictures I took of the cathedral:

 It's so tall that I had to stitch two photos together to get the whole thing in there!

It is said that a proper picture of the full cathedral can't be taken.  It's too tall, and the streets are too narrow in the historical centre of the city.

After that, Alex had to work so I went around and took lots more pictures.  Here are some of the best ones!

She gave me a map and I saw a graveyard marked on it so I walked there.  There were graves from both the first and second world wars and the fallen soldiers are from the French military.

Then came dinner.  Alex took me to her favourite restaurant in the city.  It FAR surpasses my previous favourite meal.  Before, that crown was worn by a meal I had while I was in China in 2009.  This was soooo good I still can't believe it.  Ok.  We started off with a glass of champagne (the real deal... not the sparkling wine junk from the LCBO!)

Then I had grilled fois gras with all sorts of sweet cooked fruits - bananas, kiwis, oranges, pineapples, apples, pears.  It was outrageously good.  Before the meal I was hesitant to taste the fois gras because it's liver, but really it was delicious.  I was worried about what the texture would be like, but that was actually the best part.  It was like butter, just melted away in my mouth.  The fois gras had some salty seasoning on it (not too much) so that saltiness with the sweetness of the fruit really made it perfect.   

That was just a starter!  Then came the chicken courdon bleu.  Instead of whatever cheese they usually put in that, they put a specialty cheese from this region instead.  It was served with this crème sauce and some delicious mish mash of something like carrots, celery and potatoes. 

With that chicken courdon bleu we had this bottle of wine:

It's from Chateau Batailley in the Pauillac region.  It's a region where they're only allowed to produce a certain amount of wine in a season - there are only a limited amount of grapes that are allowed to grow per square metre, so it lends to a really flavourful but not agressive taste.  It went very well with the meat.

Then came desert!!  Real Crême Brulée!

Once again, much better than any other one I've tried before!  The ones I've tried before had the consistency more like pudding, and this was much creamier.  Plus the sugar on top.  Oh boy it was tasty.

That was my meal.  I am happy and proud to announce that it has replaced my previous title holder of "best meal".

Today I plan to go downtown again, and this time I'm going to do what I do best - go get my hands on a walking tour of the city!  Take more pictures!

Tomorrow Alex gets off of work early so we plan to go to Germany and see a favourite castle of hers.  Exciting!!!!!!!!!!

Eurotrip!

So the girl (Alex) who works both in Strasbourg and Brussels came to the city yesterday and we hung out tonight.  She lives in our house when she is in Brussels.  We spontaniously decided that tomorrow, very early, I will leave with her when she goes back to Strasbourg!  I'll be back Saturday afternoon!!  I'm sooooo excited, I'm going to 2 new countries!  Luxembourg and France!  I'll go to them again with my parents when they come too! 

I love spontaneity!!!!

Glassical Mozart!

So. Today I was feeling bored and creative.  A combination that often yields to strange projects in my life.  I decided to make music, but in a different way.  I hope you enjoy this 36 second clip.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GZBesgFxwgE

35 days

Those of you who read my blog about Korea ("Ian Kivell - Adventures in Korea") will know that I am no stranger to countdowns.  In fact, out of 139 posts on that blog, I'm sure more than half of them had a countdown mentioned in there somewhere.

The subject of this update - 35 days - is in reference to the fact that in just 5 weeks, my parents are visiting!!  Then, after that my sister Melissa will be visiting approximately 17 days later!  (It's approximate because the flight hasn't been booked and the dates are donning a status of tentativeness at the moment).

So those are my current countdowns.  It's quite exciting to imagine that I'll be showing my parents around the city (they've visited Belgium, but haven't been to Brussels) to show them where I have been living.  I'm also very excited for Melissa because she has never been to Europe. 

Going downtown today, bringing the camera.  I'm sure I'll find something to photograph.  The weather has been getting nicer and nicer - the skies bluer and bluer.  The trees are starting to come back to life.  It will all make for a much greener Brussels!

Right, well I will shower now and get ready for my day.  oh!  I got a new program for learning French!  It's called Tell Me More.  Since my Rosetta Stone program finished, I found myself kind of at a stand still in terms of learning.  I decided to get this new program and I think it will be good.  I tried it yesterday, but my computer's built in microphone isn't too great, so I borrowed a very high tech one and that should do the trick.

Ok.  Now I'm going!  Have a magnificent week!

More pics!

here are some more pictures!  enjoy!

Spring has arrived!

A beautiful sunny day in Cinquantenaire park.  This is the park the war museum and the royal museum of history and art are.  The Canadian embassy is just to the left.

Lots of people enjoying the day, watching the fountain, eating lunch...

Don't know what this building is but I came across it on a walk and thought it looked nice.

Very big coffee beans!

Some new pics

I don't have any exciting updates, but I do have some more pictures!

One of the streets downtown - restaurants on either side

Then I found an Asian food store and found Kimchi!!!

The mystery has been solved - this is how they clean up all of that confetti!

Going to the park!

This is in a really big forest / park type thing.  Back when the house was lived in, the forest was their personal garden!

It's hard to tell from this, but the deer has been painted on three trees, and you have to stand in the right spot to see it come together

This came out of nowhere, but I like it.

The courtyard of a very old hotel (I think 15th century) close to the Musical Instrument Museum.

This is at the other end of my street.

That's all.  Bye!  Have a good weekend everyone!