Smile like you mean it... and let yourself let go...

Welcome one and all once again to Dan's World. This past Saturday marked exactly 5 weeks to the day when I will be going back home. To celebrate the occassion, John and I visited a site of great historical importance: Vimy Ridge.


Vimy Ridge was a captured German stronghold during World War I, and early attempts to reclaim it by the French and British both failed. Then in April 1917, the four battalions of Canadian soldiers were brought together for the first time, and along with a British battalion, successfully captured the Ridge, marking a huge turning point in the war.

The Ridge is located in a small town called Vimy, which is just outside of the city of Arras in northern France. We took a 2 hour train ride from Rouen to Arras leaving at 8 AM Saturday, and arrived to find a huge flea market in progress just up the street from the train station, so we walked around that a bit.


We then returned to the train station from which we had to take a cab to get to the Canadian Memorial. It dropped us off at the Visitor's Center which features informational posters about World War I in English, French, and German. The center is staffed by Canadian students, and we talked to them a bit. They gave us some Vimy Ridge pins for free that they normally sell for 3 euros. Good people.

Walking outside the Center, the first thing you happen upon are the trenches which lie exactly where they did during World War I. The German front lines and Canadian front lines are at times just 100 meters apart! You are able to walk through the recreated trenches and enjoy the beautiful countryside that the whole thing is located in. The terrain is extremely cratered and bumpy due to all the explosions of the war, even though it is all now covered by grass. In fact, they had to bring in sheep to the region and have them graze all over to keep the grass trimmed, as the craters make it extremely difficult to get at with a lawn mower.


Moving on from the trenches, we came to the Canadian cemeteries. A majority of the tombs in the cemetery are simply marked "A solider of the great war; known unto God," while others have a name but simply state that the person is "burried somewhere in this cemetery". Only a select few are "conventional" tomb stones with a name indicating that the person is buried right there.


As we continued our walk on this beautiful 27 degree, sunny, April day, we arrived at our final stop: The Vimy Ridge Canadian Memorial. As some of you may have heard, the Memorial was just reopened to the public a few weeks back in a lavish ceremony after being fully refurbished. Well, they did a good job, as the memorial is beautiful - huge, bright white stone, intricate statues, and the outside covered with the names of the dead whose bodies were never found.


All of this took a few hours, and we were getting tired, so it was time to head back to Arras, where after a quick bite at Subway, we caught the 4:30 PM train back to Rouen, ending an educational day.

That's about it for now. This coming weekend is my final planned trip (for now), being to Stockholm, Sweden. Should be a good time!

Talk to y'as later all.

Dan

... and the sun burnt out tonight...

Well aren't you just the luckiest person ever?! You get TWO (yes, that's right, TWO!) blog updates from me in less than a one-week span. Woohoo. I'm jealous of you.

Soooooo... this past Friday, myself, Kelsey, and Hannah packed our bags and headed out to meet the bus for the school-organized trip to Berlin, Germany at 7:30 PM. You see, this is what time the bus was supposed to arrive. In reality, however, they had us sit around doing nothing for 3 and a half hours before the bus finally arrived just before 11:00 PM. That's ridiculous, even in France.

But alas, all the same, one 17 hour bus ride later, we arrived at our hostel in Berlin. Our hostel was certainly not awe-inspiring by any means, but it was adequate I guess, and fairly close to some cheap eats as well as a metro stop. On the subject of cheap eats, allow me to say that France is soooooo expensive compared to the rest of Europe. Excluding London, every place I've visited has been easier on the pocketbook for food and entertainment than France. I may have picked the wrong country! Now that's not to diss France or anything, because there is a lot I like about the country too, but it certainly doesn't top my list.

So that afternoon, after munching down a delicious pineapple-and-chicken-curry-pizza, we went for a walk and checked out the Berlin Wall's East Side Gallery, which is the longest still-standing piece of the Wall. It gets tagged and spray painted on a regular basis, and was painted in 2000 to restore the drawings that were in place back in 1990. It was quite something to see. I didn't realize there was that much of it still up.


We then walked a bit more up to a little square area where we browsed in a couple of souvenir stores. We were tired at this point, so we basically just grabbed some french fries for dinner and retired to our hostel. We toyed with the idea of going out that night, but eventually gave up and went to bed, exhausted from our travels.
The next morning, we got up early and went out for one of the free walking tours of the city. The idea is, you don't pay for the tour, but you tip as you feel is appropriate at the end. Our tour guide was really good, and she showed us the main sights, including: the Brandenburg Gates, the spot where Hitler's bunker was found, the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe, the other remaining segment of the Berlin Wall, Allied Checkpoint Charlie, some churches, Museum Island, Humboldt University and Book Burning Square, and the Berlin TV Tower.


At the conclusion of the tour, we walked back up to a couple of the sites we had passed, and took a quick walk through the Topography of Terror exhibit, which contained lots of information about the S.S. and the Nuremburg Trials, right in the spot where former S.S. "interrogation" chambers had been. We then caught a metro back to the hostel, stopping for a 2 euro kebab on the way, and changed to prepare for our evening.

That night we went on a pub crawl with the same company that organized the tour. It cost 10 euro, but included pretty much all the free orange juice + vodka shots you could want between bars, and also a free apple schnapps shot with every drink you bought at any bar along the way. It was a good time, we met some fellow North Americans, and enjoyed a bunch of drinks, including a couple of 50% absinthe shots. Hey, 50% is no big deal when you have a half-empty bottle of 140 proof sitting in your room.


The next day, we woke up reasonably early, and headed for the Olympic Stadium, which is where Berlin hosted the Olympics in 1936, where the Berlin football club plays, and also where parts of the World Cup - including the finals - were held in 2006. So yes, this is the scene of the crime of the Zidane headbutt. It was huge, and really cool to see.


After the stadium, we left for the Reichstag, which is currently the seat of the Berlin parliament debate chamber. You can enter one ventricle of the building and climb up to the roof, where there is a glass dome that is really impressive and gives you a great view of the city. We also sampled a bratwurst outside, which is far superior to any kind of hot dog you can find in France.

Once all of that was done, we were getting tired. It had also been beautiful sunshine and 25 degrees celsius all weekend, which was fabulous, but also takes its toll on you when you're walking around all day. So we lay out on the grass by the Reichstag for a bit, then decided to walk back over to Pariser Platz and up the street to a nice little shopping district.


After killing some time in H&M and Galleries Lafayette, we metro-ed back to the hostel, grabbed another pizza, and waited to get back on the bus home (it was only 40 minutes late this time, but had an idiot of a driver who couldn't figure anything out).

And that ended a fun weekend. Berlin is an awesome city, with oh so much history. It also had a few things that reminded me of home, such as:

Anywho, that's it for the time being kiddos. I've got a group project to hand in next Tuesday, so I need to get around to that the next couple of days, so don't expect any super exciting blog entries too soon.

Your truly.

Dan

What's my age again?... What's my age again?...

Welcome one and all to what are becoming sporadic updates of my journeys and adventures over here in that country-sized continent they call Europe.

So for our most recent exploits, last Friday, a large group of us consisting of myself, Kelsey, Heather, Chantale, Stephanie, Alicia, Igor, John, and Nick boarded a train for Brussels, Belgium. Once you get to Paris, the train to Belgium is only about an hour and a half, and so we arrived in the early afternoon and did some walking about, seeing the Grand Place, royal gardens, Palais de Congres, and the most famous Manneken Pis. Manneken Pis is an old statue of a little boy... ummm... urinating... and it is seen as the symbol of hope, pride, and luck for the Belgians. It also gets dressed up in costumes every now and then, which means it can be different every time you go back and visit Belgium!

That first night, we took it easy as we were tired from all of our travels, so after some mexican food for dinner at Chi Chi's, we simply grabbed a world famous Belgian waffle and headed to bed.



Saturday we chilled in the morning and then made our way to the Manneken Pis museum after enjoying a Pizza Hut buffet lunch. In the museum, in addition to other pieces on the history of Brussels, is the collection of Manneken Pis costumes. One costume, dating back to 1958, is of the statue dressed in Montreal Canadiens hockey gear. It is entitled "Canadian Ice Hockey Player". I recited a little speech to it hoping it would give the Habs good karma for their huge game that night, but unfortunately it didn't work out.

After the museum, we hopped on the subway and took it to see the Atomium (a giant statue of an atom) and Mini-Europe. Mini-Europe is a garden full of miniature models of some of Europe's most famous landmarks (ie. the Eiffel Tower, Big Ben...etc.). It's really cool to see, and if you take pictures from exactly the right angles, it might even look like you were actually there to see the real thing!


After Mini-Europe, we headed back to our hostel to shower and change, before going to Fritland for dinner. You see, the Belgians invented the French Fry, and so fries are another local specialty.

After eating, we walked over to Delirium Cafe. Delirium is a bar that is in the Guinness Book of World Records as the place that offers the widest selection of beers at any given time, with an astonishing 2,004. Yes, that's right. At any momemnt, Delirium offers a selection of two thousand and four different kinds of beer. We enjoyed sampling a wide variety, as I got to have a "Blanche de Quebec", some of their home brewed beers, and various other strong and cheap international beverages.


After 6-8 beers each, we headed across the street to an absinthe bar to take a little taste of the drink made most famous by the movie Eurotrip, as well as by rumours of what it has made people do historically. Three of us decided on doing shots, though I refused to buy a shot for the girl-who-shall-remain-nameless as she was already pretty drunk, and I wanted to look out for her. But she kept insisting and begging and pleading that she wanted a shot, so I finally gave in. However, when the bartender came over to me to ask for my order, I got her the weakest absinthe they had, which was 30%, and for those keeping score at home, that's weaker than even a shot of vodka. I got a shot of 89.9% absinthe for myself, and Igor took one at 70%. Now it's a good thing I asked for a 30% shot, because while we were waiting for Igor to return from the ATM to drink them, the female in question started to worry and say she didn't want the shot anymore. This, because, she was explained how taking the shot works. You see, the proper way to take a shot of absinthe is to dip a sugar cube in the drink, then light the sugar cube on fire, and let it melt a bit. Then you drop the cube back into the drink, and the drink catches fire for a little bit. Then you blow the fire out, wait for the glass rim to cool off a bit, and drink it. So this creeped her out I guess, but when I told her hers was only actually 30%, she calmed down. Good thinking eh?


After getting drunk as such, we headed over to a club that kinda sucked cause it was pretty much empty, but it didn't stop us from dancing a bit. We retired at around 3 and I got to watch the last 10 minutes of my Habs season on live internet tv. :(

Sunday, myself and the ladies took a train to Bruges (or Brugge), Belgium to take in their annual chocolate festival. The other guys decided they'd rather be lame and stay in Brussels. But it was their loss. After getting off the 50 minute train ride, we walked to the festival, paid our 10 euro entry fee, and then were treated to all the samples of all the kinds of Belgian chocolate (another local specialty) we could possibly want. There were also samples of amaretto liqueuers, Bailey's, and some cheeses. But mostly chocolate. Lots, and lots of delicious chocolate. Oh and this was on Easter Sunday, appropriately.


We also walked around the city of Bruges, and it is small and quaint, with some nice squares and old-style buildings. At night, we took a train back to Brussels, where we grabbed a kebab for dinner, and then played some cards in our hostel lounge before heading up to bed.


Monday, the others had an early afternoon train back to Paris, while Igor and I were in Brussels till the evening, so we took advantage by catching a bus over to the NATO Headquarters. We got off the bus at the large gates and crossed in front of them, trying to take a picture, only to be shooed away by a security guard. So we crossed the street to get a pic from the other side, then took a bus back to our hostel area.

There we had a really good pita from a Greek restaurant, chilled the afternoon away, and then it was homeward bound.

Since returning from Belgium, I've been busy. Seeing as next week is our school break, many people will not be in town. Furthermore, there are a number of us who have birthdays during that week. So in order to celebrate with everyone altogether, I took it upon myself to organize a birthday party for myself (April 21st), Lindsay (April 21st), John Sime (April 16th), Kasia (April 14th), and Lucia (April 14th). We picked April 11 + 12, with the 12th being most important as it was a Thursday night (party night in Rouen), and also my and Lindsay's reverse birthday!
Festivities began Thursday evening, when I decided it was time to crack open that bottle of 70% absinthe I brought back from my trip to Barcelona. I took a shot or two (the real way again), and must say I love the taste of it. It's kinda like a sambouka/black licorice/cough medicine flavour. It burns because it's strong (and on fire), but it's very yummy. Then I had a lovely surprise waiting for me, as some of the others had prepared a giant card for me, John, and Lindsay, as well as some cakes for everyone to enjoy. Awww guys, you shouldn't have. But much appreciated.

Following that, we caught a bus down to Emporium for their 1 euro shot night. We had a crowd of about 10-12, so it was good times, chilling, chatting, and drinking. Since people had class in the morning, and we were going out the next day as well, we didn't want to stay too too late, so we caught the last night bus home.


On Thursday, we kicked the night off with some more shots of the green inspiration in my room, and then went out for dinner with a buzz going to a restaurant called J.M.'s. I had a good lasagne with a beer to keep my alcohol levels reasonable. We then made our way to Club Velvet where we were joined by some others, pushing our numbers to above 20. That made it a great night, even if for long periods we were pretty much the only ones in the club. That's the advantage of being a large number: anywhere you go, that's where the party's at.

All in all it was a really cool birthday, so thank you to everyone who made it out. My actual 21st birthday isn't till April 21st, but I'm not quite sure what I'll be doing or where I'll be then.

Now I leave for Berlin in a couple of hours to conclude my streak of consecutive weekends with big plans.

To recap, the last few weeks have been...
1. Barcelona
2. London
3. Juno Beach + Disneyland Paris
4. Belgium
5. Berlin

It's been a wild and crazy ride, and quite likely the best times of my life thus far. It's been amazing out here, but I do miss home, and when the time comes (June 2nd), I'll be ready and looking forward to returning to the good old M-dot.

Cya laters all.
Love,
Danny boy

Just another day for you... you and me in paradise...

So we are now up to Monday, April 2nd, 2007. Today is exactly 2 months from the end of my amazing adventure and my subsequent return to my home land of Montreal, Quebec, Canada. And the two month point came in with a bang, as I had an absolutely crazy weekend.

Our story begins one Thursday evening, where myself, Nick C, Kelsey, Chantale, Heather, Alicia, and Katerina went out to dinner to a nice little Tex-Mex place here in Rouen. Some good food and ice cream later, we returned to residence, and then Igor and Pedro came by my room to chill, and we watched some random YouTube videos till about 2:30 AM. Once they left, I checked my e-mail to find out that the deadline to apply for a position on the J.I.C. at John Molson for next year was the following day. That meant I pretty much had to fill out an application right then and there, so I did, and then got to sleep at about 3:30.
Now this may not seem very interesting, but I had to meet John the next morning at 5:50 AM to catch the first bus down to the train station and hop on a train, as we decided to go visit Juno Beach for the day. For those not up on their history, Juno Beach was the Canadian d-day landing beach during World War II. When the allied forces began their invasion of Europe to take it back from the Germans, their point of entry was right here in Normandy, with the Canadians storming Juno Beach, the Americans taking Omaha and Utah beaches, and the British taking Sword and Gold beaches.

So, we caught an early train up to Caen (about an hour and a half ride), and then had to take a bus for about another hour and a half to get to the town of Courseulles-sur-Mer, where the beach is located. We began by entering the Juno Beach Centre, which is a museum and reception point for the beach, staffed entirely by fellow Canadians. The building is supposed to be in the shape of a maple leaf, but I don't really see it.


So we toured the museum, which was kinda small, but interesting all the same, and then made our way over to the beaches. The beaches had many monuments on them, including tanks used in the 2nd world war, bunkers from the war, statues, crosses, and more, pretty much all dedicated to the Canadian troops. After the beaches, we walked through the city to try to find a cab to get us to the Canadian cemetery, but we failed, as Courseulles-sur-Mer is somewhat of a ghost town until summertime. So instead, we went back and walked further up the beaches, then caught a bus back into Caen, where we did a little shopping, as I needed a new belt, and John a new pair of sunglasses.


Then it was back to school where there was a big party being organized IN the school that was to go till 5:30 am. When we got back (8:45 pm), we found out we had to be in the building by 10 PM or else we couldn't get in. So John and I drank up quickly, then headed over to the ESC school building at 9:45 with Heather and Chantale. First thing to note, it was raining out. Now we arrive at the school building, and there is tons of security guards all over, including two ofthem standing with frickin GUARD DOGS! For a school party! They send us around the back to get in, and when we get there, the bouncer asks to see our bracelets. Wait a minute. What bracelets? Apparently, we were supposed to know that to get in, we needed to buy bracelets. Ok, no problem, so where can we get these bracelets? Oh... sold out you say. John tries to argue with "We came all the way from Canada to go to this party!..." while I try to negociate in French. We eventually accept that even if we had no way to know that we needed to buy bracelets, we weren't getting in, so John announces "Alright, let's go back to Canada" as we leave and head to residence. Already a bit drunk, we weren't about to call it a night, so myself, John, Igor, Amanda, and Ashley sat in the Cafet Ango room and played some drinking games, getting totally smashed off combinations of vodka, red wine, and whatever else. {section removed due to censors} But for whatever reason, we walked over towards the school anyway, only to run into two of the party's promoters leaving the event. So of course, I complained to the two girls in drunken French, while John went with the English Canadian approach, explaining how we had been at Juno Beach that day, where we liberated their country. I'm pretty sure they were afraid of us, but eventually we retreated, and called it a night.

Saturday wasn't that eventful, as I made a trip to Carrefour early, picked up some things (such as alcohol, since I had finished two bottled of vodka in 2 nights of drinking that week), and came back to relax and watch a dvd. That night, it was a guy's birthday, and he planned a mini-pub crawl, which we stayed on for 3 bars (Yesterday, Underground, and Murphy's), before catching a cab home as we again had to be up early the next morning.

And that brings us to Sunday, a pretty awesome day indeed. 'Twas the day of the school-planned trip to Disneyland Paris! (formerly known as EuroDisney)
Now, for those of you that didn't know, I'm actually quite a chicken. Yes, hard to believe, I know, with my tough / no fear exterior (lol), but I'm quite the scaredy cat in general. And it's no exception with rides. Sure I've been on Splash Mountain once in Florida, and the Indiana Jones ride there too, but for the most part, I'm more of a It's a Small World / MadHatter's Tea Cups kinda guy. Or I was, until yesterday, anyway.
We started the day off (after our 3 hour bus ride to the park) with Space Mountain. We were in a group of 9-13 people throughout the day, made up of usual suspects for those that follow my blog closely, and I rode alongside Anthony, who was also somewhat frightened by roller coasters and the like. So we gave each other support, and were buckled in and off, and it was fun! As nervous as I was, I don't tend to actually get "scared" per se, so once we were off and running, I was lookin around, talking, and screaming with a big smile on. It took me a little bit to get used to the feelings of the turns and drops and such, but once I did, it was pretty good.

After Space Mountain, we hit up Star Tours, which is a virtual reality 'roller coaster' based on Star Wars. Then we took a coaster break to go on my old favourites of It's a Small World and the Tea Cups (which are much more fun when you're older and strong enough to spin them like crazy), before moving on to the Indiana Jones ride, which is very different from the one in Florida. It's essentially a wooden roller coaster with a 360 degree loop. We waited in line for quite a while for that one, and the loop definitely had me a little worried. But we went and while I didn't love the loop part, it was an experience. The ride was quick and very short, making it a bit disappointing, but still fun.
Next up was the Pirates of the Caribbean which takes you on a boat through a well-decorated building with all kinds of pirate scenes and music. The drops on your ride are small so it's a pretty easy one to take, and was a good rest before our next stop which would, surprisingly, be my favourite ride of the day: Thunder Mountain.
This one required a wait of about an hour, but it was worth it. It was a long ride that was intensely fast with very sharp turns and some drops, alternating between outdoors and pitch black caves. Woo, what a thrill.
Now the day was almost over, but we had time for one last ride, and chose the Haunted Mansion, which was fun, but more funny than scary. And so it was time to go, but it was an amazing day, and we capped it off with a hot dog that was the closest you can find to the real thing here in France.
And that was the weekend. Happy Passover to all for this evening. Next weekend, I'll be in Brussels, Belgium, and the week after starts our spring break though I don't know what that'll involve.

That's all for now. GO HABS GO... it's crunch time boys, you're almost there.

Peace OUT.

Dan