Shelby's Year in Belgium: First Drum Lessons

Another good week here in Belgium. School is going really well for me. Monday was pretty simple with PE, Accounting and Touristic Geography. Accounting is actually really easy for me to pick up on and the teacher was so surprised I understood so much my first time. In Geography we are learning about the tourism and gastronomy of France. We have an oral project due in 2 weeks on a certain French region. My region is Ile-de-France, which is the region Paris is in! I am a little nervous to give the presentation orally but I know if I practice a lot it will be good. I chose the Ile-de-France as my region because I am going back to Paris at the end of October with Rotary. I am so excited for the trip and it is literally all I can think about! Tuesday I had cooking classes. The last few times in my cooking classes, I worked on something with my friend Elodie, but Tuesday I got to make something all by myself! I made a 4 part cake (1 part eggs, 1 part flour, 1 part butter and 1 part sugar) with apple chunks. It was super easy and super delicious. I was really glad I got to do something on my own. Wednesday I went to Liege for an hour or so. The train ride to Liege is really long (almost 2 hours!) so I didn’t stay long but I did see a beautiful church and some of my rotary friends. Wednesday evening I had my very first drum lessons. Samantha bought me my first pair of drumsticks and I was so excited to use them. I have lessons at RhythmGo in Rixensart for 30 minutes every 2 weeks. It was really fun because I got to learn the parts of the drums in French and in English. I want to buy a drum set in the States so I can play there too! Thursday I had 3 quizzes, 1 in French, 1 in Statistics and another in Human Sciences (normal geography). The French quiz was a vocab one and I practiced the words by using quizlet. I think I did really well on it! Geography and Stats were really easy too. On Friday I worked in the restaurant. Elodie and I worked the bar together. It was a lot of fun making drinks for the clients. My teacher had me ask the guests if they wanted tea or coffee in French. I was really nervous at first because my accent and pronunciation are a little rough but after some practice and help from my classmates I was confident enough to do it and it went really well! Saturday, Elliot had soccer in Brussels so we spent most of the morning watching soccer (or football as they call it here). After lunch we relaxed a little bit and then went shopping at Louvain-le-Neuve. I bought a couple of sweaters and cardigans for when it starts to get colder. At Louvain-le-Neuve there was a huge concert right outside the mall that we watched for 30 minutes. The weather was beautiful and the music was great. Sunday morning we took a walk by Elliot’s school. It was so green and beautiful. We walked to the Foire de Verres which is this huge expo of glass. It was so beautiful and we had to be very careful not to break anything. Later in the day we had a meeting for Samantha’s singing groups. I decided to join the choral with her which I am really excited about. They sing mostly English songs so it shouldn’t be too difficult for me. Today (Monday) I have no school because it is a teachers work day. I was able to sleep in and work on some of my homework for school. Tonight I have a dinner with my Rotary Club. We get to hear the Rotex talk about their exchange and the inbounds (me & 3 others) get introduced to the club. It should be a really fun time!

Until Next Week,

Shelby