Home Away From Home.

I suppose there are a few places I could call my "home away from home", and now I have one more place to add to my list. Norway.. but also, in particular, Rasmus and Kari's home in Kristiansand. :) They have made us feel so welcome, and we are very thankful for them! ..Unfortunately, our time with them is coming to an end.. we leave tonight on a night train. But our time here has been SO good. Rasmus is so kind, and so knowledgable! Whenever we go somewhere, he can tell us the history and purpose, etc of whatever we see. He knows so much! He is a great tour guide. :) He also is an expert driver on these crazy, winding roads. :) And Kari.. Aww, I love her. :) She doesn't speak as good of Norwegian as Rasmus, but she can definately get by! She is so cute and funny. She was serving us supper one day, and she said, "This is cheeze from Norway. This is bread from Norway. This is meat from Norway. And this is tea from.. oh, probably from India." :) Haha, we love her. She makes us laugh so much. :) They have been wonderful to stay with. :)
Now. Let me tell you what we've been up to for the past couple days. :) Or, really only, day and a half, I suppose.
The evening of the time I wrote last, they made us fisk for supper. :) Anna and I are both just not crazy for fish, but the salmon that she made.. I have to say I really enjoyed it! Probably because it is authentic Norwegian fisk. Caught right off the coast of Kristiansand. :)

The morning after, we went to Lindesnes, a spot that is the absolute furthest (..farthest..? Is there a difference?) you can go on mainland Norway. 2518 kms from the North Cap! (Nordkapp, as you see in the picture at the bottom) In the picture below, you can see that the red "A" balloon is the town of Lindesnes, and the black arrow is the lighthouse that is right on the coast. (..Obviously. Thats the best spot for a lighthouse. :)) 

It was beautiful. And God gave us a GREAT day, as well! The sun was shining, and we were all in good spirits as we began our drive along the coast. Oh, man. I LOVE the ocea. Have I mentioned that? There is just nothing that compares. They took us along the scenic route for a while, which is very twisty and turny, and looks like it would be SO much fun to drive on! It reminded me very much of driving through the mountains of BC, on the way to my Grandparents place. :) So fun! Then, we made our way back to the highway, the main highway from Kristiansand to Stavanger, on th west coast. This was a much straighter drive. :) We got there, and it was awesome. There were no trees, the landscape was made up completely of huge rocks. It reminded me very much of what I imagine to East Coast of Canada to be like.. I have never been, but from pictures, it might look something like this. :) 

Anna and I standing at the sign directing us from the farthest South you can go in Norway, to the Northnmost tip. :)

Ahh.. Just beautiful. :)

We climbed the steps up to the top of the rock hill the lighthouse was situated upon, and on the way up, we found a network of tunnels that go everywhere inside, and around the hill. Apparently, this hill is the remains of a German WW2 fort. There is also one in Kristiansand. They were all built in strategic places, where ships were likely to come and attack. .. or whatever. :) (I'm not a huge history buff..) Anyways, the tunnels in this hill were so fun to explore. And to try and imagine what it would have been like when it was actually being used as a fort, with soldiers running around, and cannons going off.. crazy! 

Anna exploring the tunnels! There were so fun. :)

Anna went about exploring them right away, I just wanted to get to the top, because I get "out of puff" (as my Grandma would say) :) so quickly with this darn cold. We thought we had lost her when she didn't come back up to the top for about 10 minutes. As it turns out, she had gotten lost herself! There are so many twists and turns, its like a labrynth. Its so cool. :)

Me with the lighthouse! :)

On the top of the hill is the lighthouse. I LOVE lighthouses. :) And it is usually so very windy up there, because of it being on the coast, and such, but it wasn't! And the sun was shining, it was 6° C outside.. Really beautiful.

Mmm. :) I just can't get enough of it. :)

Kari! And the wide open, unending ocean. :)

The lighthouse. So beautiful.

Anna and I had our picture taken with the lighthouse, by Rasmus, and then.. possibly the most tragic thing of this trip so far happened.. Well, Rasmus was handing me back my camera, and the darn string got caught in someones fingers, and.. it crashed to the concrete steps below. :( ..Even sturdy little Red couldn.t survive that. Yes, my camera broke. We are looking for a cheap replacement here in Norway, but that word ("cheap") does not seem to exist.. :) Rasmus's brother in Bergen, where we are going tomorrow, is apparently really good at finding really cheap things, so we hope to get one soon. But life goes on. :) If you climb up a little more on the hill, you see the old lighthouse, which was a little building with large caves built into the five sides of it. Here, they would build huge fires, and thats how they would warn ships where the coast is! Brilliant. This lighthouse, I believe, was built in 1656. Which makes it the oldest one in Norway! I think the new one was built in 1915, because thats what it says above the door. :) But thats just an assumption. :) We then had lovely little picnic on the side of the hill. Yum. :) After we were done eating, we made our way back to the car, and back home to Kristiansand. Kari had a ladies supper she was attending tonight, and needed to be back by 4:00. And we were!

Haha, figure this out! ..How did I get a picture.. when we are looking at my broken camera.. hm. :)

Rasmus and I taking apart my camera to try and fix it. We got it back together, and..! Well, it worked as much as it did when we started, so thats good.. But the search is on for a "new" old one. Pray that I find one! It would be nice to have pictures of the rest of our trip!

 Then, Rasmus and Kari both thought it was a good idea for me to go to the Emergency Health Clinic in Kristiansand, because my cough was getting worse. So, after dropping Kari off at the supper in town, Rasmus, Anna and I went to the Clinic. We sat in the waiting room for about 2 hours.. (Sorry, Rasmus and Anna!! ..It was a long wait..) Then finally my name was called, and I went in to see what exactly was wrong with me. :) After taking a blood sample, and examining me, the doctor diagnosed me with pnuemonia. ..And according to good ol' trusty Wiki, symptoms for pnuemonia include "cough, chest pain, fever, and difficulty in breathing".. Check, check, check, and check. :) So, he gave me a prescription, and it was too late to go and get it filled then, because the pharmacies were closed, but the lady at the desk gave me two litle pills to start right away. And 500 NOK later.. I am on the road to health. :) But I have travel health insurance, so.. here's hoping. :)

Really, with all the things that have been going wrong with me, losing my bag, not getting to go to Egypt (not just me, of course), breaking my camera, getting pnuemonia.. whatever God is trying to teach me, I hope I learn it real soon!! :)

We went home, went to bed, and now here we are, having a nice relaxing day at home. Rasmus is off at a meeting, Kari is reading the newspaper in the living room, and Anna is sleeping in the living room. :) (Please pray for her too. She is maybe picking up a cold, and has been coughing a bit lately. I just hope she doesn't have my pnuemonia..! Pray for her. That it stops before it really gets going!!) And I find that being on the computer takes my mind off of being sick, and I don't cough as much! ..So, here I am. Updating our blog. As I said, we will be going to Bergen, Norway, tomorrow, and then we have 4 sort of whirlwind days, and so the next time we update this might be when we are in the Czech Republic on March 14! Which is only.. 5 days away. WOW. This is a crazy trip we are on. :)

Haha, well, we will write more later. Hope all is well in Canada, and wherever else you might be when you read this! :) God Bless.

Demara

Scandinavia. Could life get any better..? ..I submit that it canNOT!! :)

Haha, Brian Reagan said it best! (He was talking about peanut butter, jelly and croutons in a squeeze bottle for breakfast, but still.) :) If anyone has not heard of this comedian, check him out. He is fantastic! I can listen to the same show over and over and it makes me laugh every single time. And he is CLEAN! Which is much of the reason why I like him. Anyways.. ..so off topic.. :)

We did, indeed take an overnight train to Denmark. ..However, it did not go entirely as planned. :) We missed our first train, and there was no other overnight train going from Brussels that night, and so we had to take a series of different trains to get to Copenhagen, which made for a very long night. :) But, our favorite part of the trip was when the train went on the ferry to Denmark!!

The train.. on a BOAT! :)
It was so.. mindboggling. How do you just.. put a train on a ferry?! There is a lot of thought having to go into that! But anyways, after the cool ferry ride, :) we got to "Kobenhavn", and began to explore this great city. :) 

We didn't exactly know where to begin, and so we just hopped on a bus, and rode this one until the very end of its route. I love just hopping on buses! Its like we get our own little tour of part of the city. Sometimes for free, because there are no places to get tickets, that we've seen, and the drivers don't understand when we ask how to buy a ticket.. so we don't! :) (I apologize if that seems unethical to some of you.. but we sometimes have no other choice.) :) This time we paid the driver for a ticket, and he actually laughed at us, because I didn't know how to get the change from the machine, and because we were so clearly tourists. :) Sometimes I think we should just put a big stamp on our foreheads that say, "TOURIST".. Actually, we wouldn't even need it. We stand out enough. :) Anyways, we rode this bus to its final destination. Then, everyone got off the bus, including the driver! Before he got off, he handed us a map of the city, which we did not have, then said "Bye!" and hopped off the bus. :) We could have hi-jacked it! But.. we didn't, because that WOULD be unethical. :) SO, we started exploring where the bus let us off, and we ended up right near the harbour. The best part of any city, in my humble opinion. :)

As we were looking at our big "Europe On A Shoestring" book, that we bought before we left Canada, we saw that there were many different things to do and see in Copenhagen. One of them made me laugh, because it described it as "the least interesting thing to see in Copenhagen". ..I wanna go THERE! It was a statue of the Little Mermaid. ..We are not entirely sure why, but it made me laugh. :)
So, as we made our way along the shore, what did we happen to stumble upon, but..



 ..The Little Mermaid!! :) As we were walking along the harbour, we saw a sign for it, meaning we were close, and so then we wanted to find it. But really, as soon as we read that it was the "least interesting" of all the attractions in Copenhagen, we wanted to find it. I mean, c'mon, who wouldn't want to see that?! :) 

Along the way, we saw the most beautiful harbour I perhaps have ever seen. Maybe it was because it was the first one I have seen that was frozen!! 

Boats frozen in water.. wierd. :) 

The only other harbour I have seen is the one off the coast of Prince Rupert, BC, where my grandparents live, and I have never seen it frozen. I don't think it does freeze.. (Correct me if I'm wrong, Momma.) :) Anyways, it was beautiful to see the boats frozen in the water, not going anywhere anytime soon. :) And then we saw the spectacular Little Mermaid.. which really was as un-interesting as the book said. :) But, it was built there in dedication to Hans Christian Anderson, who lived in Copenhagen, and who wrote the Little Mermaid, and millions of other fairy tales. (No, not literally.) So, that was cool! I love Hans Christian Anderson. :) 

Oh, we also were on the search for Danishes! Like, the pastry. .. Not the people.. They were everywhere. :) And I guess they're even called "Danes", aren't they? ..Hm. But about the pastries, we did find some eventually! Ok.. don't tell anyone.. but the ones we found were at a 7-11.. But they were legit!! :) And so good.  :)

Danish Danishes! :)


Shortly after this we made our way to the train station, and actually decided we wanted to go to Sweden! So, we booked a night train to Stockholm! Our plan was to go to Stockholm, and then from there, take the train to other parts of Sweden during the day, at random, and then take the night train to Oslo that night. But then, when we got to Stockholm, (No, we didn't miss our train!! Yay!) they told us that there are no night trains running in Sweden anywhere during the winter. Bummer.. So, we had to take the day train, which was fine, but that left at 3:30 pm ish, and so that meant that we should probably stay in Stockholm to ensure we make that train. It also posed another problem.. Where to stay in Oslo during the night we were going to be on the night train..? So, we phoned one of Jesse Sorenson's friends (a 2nd cousin of ours went to Oslo last year on an exchange, I believe, and so has many friends in Oslo) named Kristine, and asked her if she knew anywhere we could stay. She said she'd check it out, and we'd call her back later. So, we explored the city for the morning, and early afternoon. 

We did not hop on a bus this time, because we saw on a map that the Old Town of Stockholm, called Gamla Stan, was near the Train Station! So, we walked there, and checked it out. It was beautiful! We LOVE old architecture!! And that means we are in the right place, because Europe is full of it! :) We saw a palace, that perhaps still has a Royal family living in it..? We are never sure. There were guards all around it, anyways! And it was not a museum. Apparently, it has 1430 rooms, and that makes it the largest Royal Palace in the world. Cool. :) It was very large! (Oh, and I just checked on Wiki (which is not always trustworthy, but still.), and apparently, and I quote, "The Stockholm Palace is the official residence and major royal palace of the Swedish monarch. (The private residence of the royal family is Drottningholm Palace)" So there you have it.)

And then, when we were walking down a pedestrian street, (a street without cars, mainly for shopping) we saw a huge Canadian flag flying proudly on top of one of the buildings!! We decided to head towards it, thinking it was maybe a Canadian Embassy, not really sure what we were intending to do once we got there.. "Hello!! ..We're from Canada too.." :) But we headed towards it, all the same. :) We got to the building it was situated on top of.. and there was no sign saying anything about Canada at all!! We looked everywhere, and we couldn't find a single thing about Canada. :( Dissapointing. But that solved the problem of what to do when we got there! We just go to sit back, and gaze up at the flag for awhile.. admiring the beauty. It is a beautiful flag, eh? I love it. :) And I've come to appreciate it even more while being here in Europe, with all the flags being just stripes of varying colors.. Ours is original!! And I love it. 

NORWAY!!

Anyways, we headed back to the Train Station, since it was nearing time to leave, and caught our train to Oslo. It announced on the train when we left Sweden and crossed the border into Norway!! I almost stood up and cheered. :) We were in Norway!!! I have always dreamed of going to Norway, and now I was actually there. I was.. overwhelmed. :) We got into Oslo, and called Kristine to see what she found out. She said we could stay at her place!! So we met her at a certain Metro station, called Majorstuen, at midnight. Oh, I don't think I've mentioned it, but we found out that while we would be in Oslo, the FIS Nordic World Ski Championships 2011 would be going on as well!! Talk about hype..! WOW. :) Anyways, Kristine has some friends that are camping out, with tents and the whole deal, near the place where the races will be held. And the night we got in, Friday, Kristine and a bunch of their friends were up there having a bonfire with them!! And thats why we had to wait until midnight to meet her. If we had known thats where she was, we would have asked to come and join them!! It sounded awesome. :) Like Winter Camp, at CLBI! So fun. :) Anyways, we met her, and she is wonderfully, typical Norwegian in appearance. :) Tall and blonde. And beautiful! She showed us to her aparentment, which she shares with 2 other girls, Maren and Soveig. ..I love the name Solveig. :) They were so hospitable!! And very friendly. Kristine also showed us what all we had to see in Oslo the following day, and drew on a map where they were. 

The view from Kristine's apartment, of beautiful Oslo, and its SNOW! :)

So, the next morning, we headed out to see the sights of Oslo! ..With the added hype of the World Championships! ..Wow.. Norwegian pride to the MAX!!! I have never SEEN as many Norwegian flags and sweaters and touques and painted faces all in one place!! It was incredible. I would say it was almost bigger than the Olympics in Vancouver. But thats because its skiing. In Norway. Of course its gonna be huge!! Norwegians invented it! ..Did you know that in its early history, they used skiing to hunt? ..Wikipedia again.. :) We started our day at the Norwegian Museum of Science and Technology. (Norsk Teknisk Museum) Very interesting! The upstairs was all about Music, and Medicine, and Automobiles.. which was very cool to see, and read about, when there was an English translation. No, we don't speak Norwegian, unfortunately. But then you went downstairs and WOW. It became less of a museum, and more like every childs dream!! :) There were buttons to push, things to climb on and in, every kind of interactive science thing you can imagine! It was incredible. It was brilliant. If you ever get a chance to come to Oslo, go here! Its fun. :) You don't even have to be a child to enjoy it! :) If you are a "child at heart", that will help. 

Having some fun at the technical museum.. You figure it out. :)

We then ventured down into the main part of the city, near the National Theater and the Royal Palace (which, yes, is also the official residence of the Norwegian Monarch.. wierd.) was packed with people, at all times during the day!! This is the area where they do the presentation of the metals, and on that stage, during the way, there were live bands, and groups of 6-8 ladies/men doing medlies of songs from the '70'! Complete with matching outfits and choreographed dancing. :) It was AWESOME. 

The ladies were actually very good! ..The men left a little something to be desired, but they were still fun to watch. :) And there were shops everywhere, and and outdoor skating rink, and a jumbotron where you could see what was happening up on the hill, WOOD sculpting, (with HUGE chainsaws!!) and ice sculpting, candy apples, the whole works.. :) It was crazy. Also, while we were there, we walked past a bakery, and in the window, there was kransekake!! (Norwegian wedding cake. It is huge at weddings in my family!) It was so cool to see it in Norway, and it looks exactly like the ones we make! Way to go, Grandma. :) We took a picture, and I'm pretty sure the people in the bakery thought we were a little strange.. :) So, we hung out there for a bit, then we went to see the Opera house! (Kristine prounced it "Oprah", and we were like, "What?! Oprah lives in Oslo?!" :) Not really. We knew what she was talking about.) :) And it was beautiful! You could walk up to the roof, and it had a great view of Oslo, and the harbour of the fjord. :) Lovely. Then, it was getting close to dark, and we went to the harbour, to a place called Akke Brugge, to see the harbour at night. It was beautiful.

The view from the top of the Oprah House, over the fjord.

Earlier in the day, we found out that one of Kristine's good friends had fallen and twisted her arm really badly, and so they were going to go stay with her for the night, which meant that we could not stay at her place Saturday night. Very understandable, but who else do we know that lives in Oslo..?? Hmm.. Well, I remembered my Mom has a cousin named Geir, who lives in Oslo but was out of town until Sunday. We called him to see if there was any place he knew of that we could stay. After some phoning around, he said we could stay at his house with his sister, and his son! Awesome! We had some time to kill before we went to his house, so we had just seen on a TV in a pub, (we were just walking by..) :) that the Medal ceremony was taking place, down on the stage where we were earlier that day, and that was not far from where we were! So, we hustled down there, but we got to see the medal platform, and the HUGE CROWDS coming away from the place. We actually had to hop off the bus to walk to the stage area, because there was extreme traffic congestion. :) It was fun to see that place at night, though. It was beautiful. :) 

The stage where the medals were presented!

After that, we made our way to Geir's house, and only his son, Håkon, was home. We never did meet Geir's sister..! Hm. Soon after we got there, 7 or 8 young Norwegian men just happened to show up.. I think Håkon probably sent a text out to all his friends.. "I have two Canadian girls staying at my place." And they all flocked over. :) Haha, it was fun to get to know some of them though! Two of them were particularly friendly and outgoing, and their names were Robert and Lars. We talked to Lars the most, and found out that he is in the Norwegian Army! Cool. At about midnight, we said we needed to go to bed, and they left for a night out on the town. :) They never did ask us to come with them, so that was nice. :) They were very respectful actually. It was an interesting and entertaining evening. :)

The next morning, our plan was to meet Kristine at Majorstuen, where we met her the first time, and catch the Metro up to the hill to watch the Men's Final in the 50 km Cross Country Skiing!! Well, our train was delayed because of heavy train traffic, so we missed meeting them. Them we went to catch the train ourselves.. and WOW. I think that is definately the most people I have EVER seen in a Metro station in my entire life. It was PACKED. Then when we got on the train.. well, lets just say we became verrry buddy-buddy with the people next to us. :) 

The people waiting to get on the train at the Metro Station. It was absolutely packed with proud Norwegians. It was incredible.. and a bit scary! :)

When we finally got up to the top of the hill, (yes, we survived the crowds.) we found a place right near the track. It was awesome. We watched the skiers going past us, and realized that this was only the warm-ups. We waited and waited for the actual race to start.. but we had a train to catch early that afternoon to Kristiansand, Norway..! So, we had to leave before the race actually began. Which was sad. But we got to see all the hype anyways! 

The official track of the FIS Nordic World Ski Championships 2011!!  

And the crowds went wild everytime a Norwegian skier went past..! And so did we! We definately got caught up in it all. A few times we thought we saw the Canadians go past... but there were SO many red and white uniforms.. :) But most had blue on them as well. So we saw a couple without blue, and figured they had to either be Canadian or Swiss. But generally, there was no way to tell. Anyways, we saw the results later, and Alex Harvey, from Canada got 5th overall! Which is very good. (He got a gold metal earlier on in the championships!) Norwegians, of course, came in first, and third. But we are proud of them too. :)

Us at the official track of the FIS Nordic World Ski Championships 2011!! :) And our various items of Nordic Pride. :) Funny, nowhere were people selling Canadian flags.. :)

We got on the train to Kristiansand, and arrived at about 9:30 pm last night, being picked up by relatives on my father's side! Kind of. Do you want me to explain the connection? :) Well, my father's dad was a first cousin to a lady who married the brother of the father of the person we are staying with. Figure that out. (I think I got it right..) Haha. Don't think about it too much, you're brain might explode. :) Anyways, they are VERY hospitable, wonderful people, and we are very much enjoying our stay here!! His name is Rasmus Morvik. And Kari, Rasmus's wife, even took me to a pharmacy to get some medication to help my cold!! She is wonderful, and so is he. I am glad we get to spend a couple more days here! Today, they took us around the town of Kristiansand and showed us the sights. It is a beautiful little city! And also southernmost city in Norway! Right on the coast. It is lovely. Tomorrow, they are taking us to a spot that is the VERY southernmost part of Norway, and apparently there is a beautiful lighthouse and such. :) Porbably will be a mite cold, since its winter, and the wind is strong, coming right off the open ocean. But we can deal with that!!

Well, thats about it! Just a short little note this turned out to be.. :) Sorry for the long novels, everyone who reads this... I just love writing! I hope you enjoy reading. :)

God Bless, everyone!!!

From the wonderful land of Norway,

Demara and Anna

Amsterdam, Copenhagen, Oslo and beyond!! :)

So, there is not much to catch up on this time, :) but we thought we would get fully caught up before leaving for Copenhagen, or Kobenhavn, this evening. :)


Amsterdam was beautiful. ..Although it was not entirely what we expected. We are not sure what we were expecting. :) We hopped on a tram that looked like it was going in a cool direction, and got off when we saw something interesting. :) It was fun! We saw a few interesting things. We walked on a bridge over a canal that looked much like Venice!

A canal in Amsterdam! ..Looking quite a bit like Venice! :)

The bridge led into a big open square where people were just walking around. On one end of the square we saw something that we couldn't quite figure out, at first. :) There was a statue, wearing a long orange robe, placed on something that looked like it had wheels. It was not moving at all, but then would sometimes wobble in the wind.. Which made me think, maybe its a person! But then we watched it for a bit, and it didn't move, and the face looked completely like stone, even when some young hooligans came running up and pretended to kick over the bowl that was sitting in front of it. But then, as we watched more, it stqrted to verrrry slowly interact with people as they walked by!! And once we saw his face change, so we knew for real then that he was for real. But he was incredible. The first human statue busker I have.. ever seen, I think. Haha, and it was even funnier, because on the other corners of the square were copycats of this guy.. kind of. :) There were three or four of them, and each of them were standing on little boxes, with a can out front, dressed in some sort of Lord of the Rings ringwraith/Star wars outfit, complete with "scary" mask and some sort of sword/blade. Oh, it was funny. :) They would make scary noises at you as you walked past.. hoping someone would pay them..? "Hey man, thanks for scaring me..!" ..? We had a good laugh, anyways. Thats one way to make a living! :)

The statue man.. It took us a long time to figure him out! But he IS very talented!! :)


We kept walking, and found a store to buy some Dutch jewelry. (Because thats what we are doing in every country. Anna buys necklaces, and I buy bracelets! We now have some from India, Italy, Greece, Luxembourg, Belgium and Holland, or The Netherlands.) We spotted this alleyway that looked like it led to somewhere cool. And found a orphanage that had been made into a museum of sorts.. We couldn't really figure it out. :) While walking back to catch a tram to the train station, we saw policemen on horseback ride by!

Policemen on horseback. Kind of like Mounties! :)

The amount of bikes parked outside the train station was incredible. They went on and on and on.. They had their own three level parking garage! Crazy. :)

Once we were back at the train station, we saw on a map outside the train station that the coastline was right behind the station! So we walked back there to check it out, and it was nice. :) But it was just so darn cold! :)

It was cold and windy..!

Us in Amsterdam. :)

So we found a train back to Dendermonde, and got home about 7:30, I think. :) We got the impression that there are a lot of museums in Amsterdam, and a wicked night life.. But other than that, even our guidebook or Europe said there was not a WHOLE lot to do or see, at least for free. The architecture was beautiful, and the city itself was lovely! So we did have fun wandering around the city.

And back in Dendermonde, it was games night at Lieke and Peter's! :) So, we learned a Belgium game.. Once the game was explained, we realized that it was exactly like Farmville (a game on Facebook), except as a board game. ..It was funny. So, we played Farmville! :) With Lieke, Peter and two of their friends from the neighborhood. One of them lived in Calgary for 15 months, a couple years ago! Small world. So, we chatted with him about Canada, and the differences. :) Then, after we were finished the game, we used their computer to Skype our parents. It was fun! We found out that we actually do miss them. :) Well, I guess I should just speak for myself, :) But I am pretty sure Anna misses them a little, too. :) Anywas, it was really good to connect with them. Then, we went to bed, for the last time in Dendermonde!  :(

And when we woke up, the sickness that Lieke had just been getting over came back with a vengance. :( So, right now; Peter and her are both at the hospital, getting her looked at by a specialist. Please pray for her. They have been SO good to us, and she does not deserve to be sick. :( 

Anna and I just went to the grocery store, or supermarket, to buy them some groceries, in hopes of trying to repay, at least a little, the kindness they have shown us. It really has been very good. And another part of being here that has been interesting is find ways to share our faith with them. We keep looking for opportunities to share with them what we believe, and how its so different from the negative view most Europeans have of Christianity, the Catholic view. The Catholics in the past here, in all of Europe I think, have.. not been so helpful. :) But we don't really know our European history all that well. We are learning! Anyways, a couple of days ago, Lieke asked me what I went to school for, and I love this question. :) A Bible School?!? What in the world is that.. :) So, I get to explain to her what we do there, and it basically is a great conversation starter for me to share my faith, which is an entirely foreign concept to her. Church, in her mind, is the Catholic church, there are many things she disagrees with in the Catholic church! So, we tried to explain just how different our church is from the Catholic church. We found if we actually compare it to CouchSurfing, it gave her a better idea of what the church should look like! Often, they have sing-a-longs, where they just get together, hang out, sing some songs, and eat some food. This is comparable to my church back home..! Without the Christian focus, of course. :) But I told her that in my church, we get together on Sundays, to sing some songs, the pastor gives a message, we pray, and then we go and have a potluck! :) Every Sunday. And she said, "Wow.. If there was a church like that here, I would definately go!" ..Which made me think of how we need more missionaries in Europe. They have such a distorted view of Christianity, I would love to see that start to change. :) And then, this morning, we got into a great theological discussion with Peter. :) And for those of you who know me, you know how much I love them.. :) But it was so good to hear his views, and he was very open to hear ours! So, that was fun. Ans we showed him where we were from on Google Earth. ..He was blown away! By how big Edmonton is, and by how..empty my part of the country is. He said he would hate that much openness, and emptyness. :) I love it! ..TWO neighbors in, like, 10 km? SO different from Europe, thats for sure.

And I am so excited to see the rest (what we can) of Europe!! We are heading up to Copenhagen tonight, on an overnight train, then spend the day in Denmark, :) and take an overnight train that night up to Oslo! Thats to plan. ..but we have been discovering, we don't really have a plan.. :) Haha, ok, we have not JUST been discovering this. :)

Anyways, that IS the plan, and when we write on this blog next, we will let you know how much it changed. :)

More later, perhaps from Kristiansand, Norway, where we are staying with some relatives. ..or relatives of realtives, I suppose it would be. :)

God Bless!!!

Demara and Anna

ps. Oh, and Amanda, this is for you. Its the Hungry Caterpillar.. in DUTCH! :)

Ola! or should I say, "Hallo!" ..or maybe, "Bonjour!"

Hello, everyone!! So, I want to get you up to speed about where we are and what we have been doing for the past week or so. Is that alright..? Great! :)

When Anna finished the last blog entry, the boat was just getting into port in Bari, Italy. From there, our plan was to take an overnight train up to Mannheim, Germany. We got on the train in Bari, and eventually found our seats.. in the same tiny room, seating six people in total, as three Italian young men (maybe 22-25 or so..) who did not speak English, but thought they could.. :) It was very interesting.. One of the guys especially was very outgoing, and kept trying to talk to us.. but we could not understand him at ALL!! His friend was a little bit better, and would sometimes translate.. But oh.. it was a very interesting night. They were pretty respectful, nothing TOO wierd happened, :) but it was just a very interesting night.

Anyways, so we got off the train in Milano, never to see those men again, and caught another train all the way up through the beautiful, snowy land of the Switzers! :) Up to Basel, Sziterland. From there we caught another train up into Mannheim, Germany. We stayed overnight with the Shareski's for one night. It was so good to see them again! It felt like it had been AGES since we'd seen them last. :) A lot has happened since then!

 The next morning, we got on a train, heading to Luxembourg! Our goal was to have "lunch in Luxembourg". And we did! However.. It was raining when we got there, and so we could not find any dry, warm place to sit and eat our sandwiches the Shareski's had so generously provided for us! We searched and searched for somewhere to eat.. but not for too long, cause we were cold and wet. We then saw a staircase leading underground! That looked promising. We followed it and it led us to an.. undergroud parking garage.. :) We looked at each other.. then shrugged. Its warm and dry! So we set our stuff down in a spot that said reserved, hoping that whoever it was reserved for would not be coming very soon. :) And then we ate our lunch in Luxembourg! Not entirely what we had been expecting, but it makes for a better story. :) We got a LOT of wierd looks, and once a policeman drove by slowly, and we thought he was going to come back and kick us out. But he didn't. :) 

..In the parking garage, for lunch! :)

After lunch, we wandered around the beautiful city of Luxembourg City, and it was beautiful! Even in the very soft, yet unrelenting, rain.

The view from Chemin de la Corniche, a walkway looking out over a part of Luxembourg City. :) So beautiful. After we wandered around for a bit, we made our way back to the train station to catch a train to our next destination.. Belgium! :)


Dendermonde, Belguim. This might seem like a random location, but it is because we "met" a family from here, and we were planning on staying with them. When I say "met", I don't exactly mean face-to-face. Let me explain. :) In Canada (we can't exactly remember how or from whom..), we learned about this thing called CouchSurfing. I don't know if everyone has heard of it, but its a HUGE community around the world and online where you can either be a "surfer", (a traveler who stays at peoples homes, on their "couch") or a "host", when you host people to stay at your house. Hopefully, you end up being both a surfer and a host at some point! For now, we are just surfers.. But someday I hope to be a host! I think its a wonderful idea. :) When we were looking into it while we were still in Canada, we found this family, (Lieke, Peter, and their 4 kids) who lived in Dendermonde, and asked them if we could stay at their house! They said yes! And so, here we are. We got into the Dendermonde train station, all prepared to find our way to their house using the instructions they gave us when we had communicated back and forth, but then when we got off the train, we heard someone calling our names! ..A very strange experience in a country you have never been in..But it was Lieke! She had come to pick us up because it was raining, and she didn't want us to walk all that way in the rain. Very thoughtful!! She drove us back to their house, and we met Peter. The kids were all in bed, because by this time it was 9:30 pm, or so. I should say 21:30, I suppose, since thats what everyone uses here. :) Then they showed us the house, and where we would be staying..

 Its beautiful! Dendermonde is a little town, I think maybe 40,000, :) But it really does have a small town feel. And the houses and streets are just so beautiful. So medieval! I love it. Just look at the picture! :)

 Anyways, they fed us supper, some leftover chicken and potatoes, with a VERY good orange sauce! Then for desert... Belgian chocolate mousse.. mmMMMmm.. SO good. Wow. I think I can honestly say its the best chocolate I have ever had. It took me a long time to eat, because it was so rich, and because there was quite a bit of it! A glass cupful. But it was so good. Anyways, after supper, we chatted with Lieke and Peter. They are a wonderful couple. SO nice, and just so fun! She is a elementary school teacher, who is at the moment taking some time off because she was just in the hospital for.. some viral infection in the brain, I think.. But she is recovering from it quickly, so thats good. Peter works at the Brussels Airport, and is a artist!! Leike showed us his workshop, and he is so good! So, they have been a fun couple to get to know. :) At about 11:30 that night, we all went to bed. They had to get up early to go to a gymnastic competition of their son, Bavo. And we were planning on going to Brussels for the day. So we all headed to bed. Then shortly after we all went to bed, I had a very.. strange experience.. Well, as many of you know, I have had a pretty bad cold for a couple weeks now, maybe evern three weeks. I just have a really bad cough, thats mostly all it is. Well, at about 12:30 am, I woke up coughing. I coughed and coughed.. and then.. threw up! But that was not the wierd part.. The wierd part was that it smelled entirely, and ONLY, of.. chocolate!! Ohh, it was wierd. :) And I wasn't even feeling sick, before or after I threw up.. It was so wierd. It must have been because I had so much chocolate, maybe. I just hope that I don't always associate the smell of choclate with.. throwing up! So, sorry to talk about throwing up on our blog.. but I thought it was a very.. interesting/unfortunate/funny first experience with true Belguim chocolate! It was SO good! ..but maybe TOO good for me. :)

ANYways.. :)

 The next morning, Anna and I went to Brussels for the day! It was Sunday, and we wanted to go to church. :) We had heard about this Assemblies of God church in Brussels, and kind of had an idea of where it was.. So, we set off to try and find it. ..Needless to say, we didn't find it.. Brussels is quite large.. So, we gave up, and decided to go back to the main square of the city just to wander around and see some things. We hopped on a bus to head back up into Brussels. (Where to church is is quite a ways south, and almost not in Brussels anymore.) The bus we jumped on was SO full!! It was packed to the hilt. So, we got pretty comfortable with the people beside us. The lady beside us was a black woman, who we discovered spoke English when she alsmot got pushed out of the door, and was trying to stay inside. :) We had a fun time trying to help keep her in. :) Anyways, at one stop, she said goodbye to another lady who was getting off the bus. She kissed her on the cheek, and said, "Bye! See you next week!" ..And I thought, "Hmm.. Thats what I say to people after church.. What are the odds..?" And so, I asked her if she had ever heard of this church where  we had just come from called the Christian Center. She said she had just come from there! Awesome. :) Turns out, most of the people on the bus had just come from there. :) And she said that there was an evening service too! Perfect. :) She told us how to get there, and apparently, we had been nowhere CLOSE to the church, when we were looking for it before. :) But now we knew. 

We spent the afternoon looking around a HUGE market and having our first legit Belguim waffle!! SO GOOD. Not what I was expecting at all! Or, not how WE do Belguim waffles at all, but it was SO good. They knew what they're doing! We found our way back to the church around 6, when it was going to start, and we found it! When the service started, we realized that it was entirely in French. We didn't understand a word. :) But some of the songs they sang were familar tunes, just with French lyrics! So we sang along, in English. The message was given by a lady who spoke English, with a translator. So, that was good, we could understand that. :) But it was a great experience. Then, after, we were waiting at the bus stop to catch the bus back to the train station, when a man came and asked us where we were headed. When we told his the train station, he told us they could give us a lift! We recognized them as people from the church, so we weren't worried. :) So, in total, there were three of them, and then Anna and I, in the small car. :) They were all black, from South Africa, and had come to Belguim 13 years ago! It was fun to get to know them a bit as well. The kindness of strangers! We thank God for little opportunites like this to get to know people from ALL different backgrounds. :)  We got on the train back to Dendermonde after a full day in Brussels. 
So, the picture above is our first experience with legit Belgium waffles. :) Basically, the only way you get them is from street vendors. If you get them in a restaurant, they are no longer legit Belgium waffles because they do it up all yummy like we North Americans like it, and it becomes just a tourist attraction. Legit Belgium waffles are just plain. And SO GOOD. Wow. You would not even believe. I was addicted to them for the rest of the trip. Just ask Anna. 

 The next day, we took a day trip to Gent and Brugge. They are two of the most beautiful cities I have ever seen! So.. surreal. :) And very midevil. Beauitful cities to walk around in.

A castle and a moat! In the middle of Ghent, Belgium. It was so EPIC. :)

The picturesque town of Brugge, Belgium. It was so medieval, and SO beautiful. :)

We had offered to make supper for our host family that evening, which was last evening, the 28th.. the last evening of Febuary! So we picked up the makings for stir-fry, and made it for them when we got home. :) It was fun.

Enea and Lieke, reading the books we brought them!

.And we finally met the kids! They had always been gone or alseep when we are here! But we got home early enough last night that we were able to meet ths kids, and give them the books we brough from Canada, and India! We heard that they collect childrens books from everywhere, and so we bought them some before we left Canada, and while we were in India. The youngest, Enea, (she is 5, I think) loved looking through them. She was SO cute! One of the boys, Bavo, who is 8, said that they were studying India in school! And so he brough the books to show the class today. :) Glad to be of service! They have another son, Arne, 10, and an oldest daughter, Nina, who is 16. A very cute, and VERY hospitable family! It has been fun to get to know them.

Well, today we are planning to go to Amsterdam. ..We are not yet sure if we will return to Dendermonde for one more night before making our way up to Norway, or if we will catch an overnight train to Copenhagenm and continue our journey north from there. I think we will spend one more night here. That would be fun! I like the relaxed pace of life here. Its a good break from the GO GO GO! :)

And that will give us time to add pictures as well! I think we will be leaving soon for Amsterdam, as its a two hour train ride, and then spend the afternoon there. Then come back, for one more night before making our way to the "motherland". (As my good friend Jonathon Leslie calls it. :) And I have started calling it that as well. It sounds so.. epic.) :)

Anyways, hope this finds you all very well! Signing off to write another day.. :)

And if you are wondering about the title, its because in Dendermonde, we are in the Flemish speaking part of Belgium, but there is also a French speaking part, with its own government, and a German speaking part as well. Its.. crazy. :)

Anyways,

God Bless!

Demara