New York, New York

I am not rich, good looking, or especially brilliant in most ways.  But one thing I know I have going for me is a spirit of adventure and a willingness to do absolutely anything I can for the children in my life.  My exchange kids are no different.  I want them to have every possible opportunity during the short 10 months they have with me to experience as much of life in the United States as is humanly possible.  For me, this means a great deal of travel, movies, concerts, museums, landmarks, and more.  In my own life in the last 2 years, I've learned to say "OK! Let's do it!" where I used to say "No. I can't possibly do that."  And I am very pleased that Ine seems to have the same spirit in her.  There is not much I can do to this child that she won't go along with.  The only thing I've found so far that she flat out refuses to do is babysit, and I told her in the beginning she didn't have to, so that is just fine with me.  She placidly eats what I put in front of her, she goes where I take her, she tries all kinds of experiences at school and at home.  She is not outgoing and gregarious, but she has a quiet spirit of adventure that suits me just fine. 

Ine and the NYC Skyline

Along those lines, I have never known an exchange student to come to the US who did not want to go to New York City.  Ine was no different.  I asked her about it when she first arrived and I believe her response was "Of course!" which given that in those early weeks, everything I asked her she responded to with "I don't know" was a dead give away that I had touched on a nerve.  Leah learned about New York in preschool over a year ago and had been after me for at least 15 months to take her to "New York City!" (she doesn't say it quietly, but with a firm conviction and a trill of excitement in her voice so you know she means it!).  I looked over our fall schedule, knowing that Ine would have the swim team coming up, and I had a lot of weekend plans for us here and there over the course of the first couple of months.  Finally, I just picked a date.  November 8th.  I looked over the train fares, but frankly, even though Ine was paying her own way to go, it was just ridiculous--over $700 for all of us to go.  I decided we would take MegaBus instead.  $150 round trip for all 3 of us.  I had never taken the bus, but figured it would be an adventure.

Saturday morning, we were all in the car by 3:30AM to head up to Union Station to catch the bus.  I thought we probably didn't need to leave till 4, but it's a good job we left early because there was a tractor trailer accident that closed 95 down completely, and then two different sets of road construction that left only 1 lane open on 95 and again on 395.  It was just craziness.  We made it to the bus in about an hour and 15 minutes, and I had been very nervous about catching the bus, but it was fine, no problem at all.  We walked up, got on the bus, and I went back to sleep for a while.  It IS a decent bus ride, probably about 90 minutes longer than the train, especially because when we go to Carteret NJ (my dad's hometown), the driver ran out of hours and we had to pull over and wait for a new driver.  Consequently we steamed into NYC around 10:15AM.

Although I had asked the girls repeatedly what they wanted to do in the city, neither one would really tell me.  But they did agree on one thing:  Lady Liberty.  Since the bus dropped us off right at the 1 train, we hopped on and went straight to South Ferry as our first stop of the day.  We were all hungry when we got there, and the world's smartest hot dog cart man was right outside the train station, so we stopped and got Sabrett's hot dogs all around.  We walked over to the ticket area for the Statue and unfortunately the pedestal tickets were sold out for the day, so we could only take the boat and then walk the island.  But we were there and I got the tickets anyway.  It would have been too disappointing for the girls not to be able to go over.  Then we got on line at the security check point area, which was like airport security--we had to take off our coats, belts, sweaters, scarves, backpacks, phones, cameras, empty our pockets.  It was crazy.  It took forever.  I told Ine, "People will ask you what New York was like and you'll have to say, 'I don't know, all we did was stand on line'."  It seriously felt that way.  Never go there on a Saturday!!!  Just crazy.  Finally we got through and got onto the ferry and were on the island in short order.  We walked all over the island, and I got some sand for us and Ine, as she collects it and so do we.  Finally, we got back on the ferry and took the ride over to Ellis Island, but the girls announced collectively they were ready to be 'in' the city, so we just went back to South Ferry and got back on the train and headed north to 42nd Street.

I went to NY alone last year to finish some bucket list items up, and when I was there, I saw parents struggling with strollers--people walking in front of them, banging into them, cutting them off, pushing, shoving, bags whacking kids in the head, and I thought to myself, "You have to be either really brave or really stupid to bring a stroller to this town."  Saturday, I proved it was a bit of both.  I knew Leah would get tired eventually and I knew that she is big enough now that there was no way I'd be able to carry her around the city, so I brought her old umbrella stroller.  She happily hopped in, but it was total madness.  Pushing her around was NOT fun.  We started walking at Times Square, and first stop was to go souvenir shopping.  Ine wanted postcards and Leah wanted nail polish.  We found a Duane Reade right on the corner by the subway stop, and we went in and I let Leah pick out two colors of nail polish--of course she chose pink and purple.  We walked a bit further and found a souvenir stand.  While Ine looked over the post cards, Leah and I looked for a magnet for my friend Yvette and then Leah found a locket with her name on it, so I let her get that as well.  We checked out, Leah hopped back in the stroller and we went on Times Square itself for photos.  I love this picture of the girls, where the sun is streaking through and around the buildings.  It was a pretty dismal day, very windy and cold, but it's nice to see we did get some sun!!!  We were also accosted by some costumed characters, so Leah got her picture taken with the world's worst Hello Kitty, Mickey Mouse, and Minnie Mouse--seriously the stuff of nightmares, and I got stiffed for $3 on that one, but she was happy, so whatever!

Then the big walk kicked off.  In order to see the big sights in New York, you need to walk from Times Square to Central Park up near 59th Street, so we started walking.  And Leah fell sound asleep in her stroller.  Our first stop was Rockefeller Center, and the skating rink is in full force.  The tree is going up for Christmas, and it looks like a beauty.  All the Christmas displays were up in the store windows, which is ridiculous, but at the same time, we got to see stuff without having to go back in December.

After the center, we walked down to St Patrick's Cathedral.  It is an absolutely gorgeous cathedral, and I have been many times, but unfortunately it is undergoing major refurbishment so it is almost entirely under scaffold and tarp.Still, we got to hear the organ play and see some of the stained glass and statuary and the altar.  It was jam packed with tourists (funny, I haven't lived in NY since 1997, but I still don't consider myself a tourist when I go!) and just crazy, so after about 10 minutes, we left.

Then we started walking down 5th Avenue.  I pointed out Trump Towers and Tiffany, and various other famous stores and brands and landmarks.  Ine smiled politely, although apparently she has no idea what Tiffany is or who Donald Trump is (I wish I didn't know who Donald Trump is either! ha!).  Finally, we made it to FAO Schwartz and Leah woke up just in time for the girls to have their picture taken with the toy soldiers out front.

We went inside, but it was an absolute zoo.  I swear, next time I'm just taking the girls out of school for a day and we'll be in NY when no one else is!  Anyway, after about 10 minutes of being pushed around the world's most famous toy store, I thought "Screw this!" and we left.  Right across the street is Central Park, and lots of open, free, lovely space, so we made our way there and began to walk.  Ine got a little weirded out because she heard some Belgians talking and all of a sudden she thought, "Where am I?!"  It made her laugh because it was so unexpected.  Delightful!

Unfortunately I didn't take any pictures of the park, and I tried unsuccessfully to convince Leah to go play on the playground for a while because while she had been resting, Ine and I were pounding some serious pavement--we'd walked 17 blocks north by that point, plus 4 or 5 east, plus battling crowds, so my feet were just starting to hurt.  Ine didn't complain but I was worried she'd be getting tired, as she has some joint issues herself.  But she didn't say anything, so we kept going.  We got into the park and wandered and eventually popped out at 66th Street.  How we made it that far north, I have no idea, because although I knew we were heading in a northerly direction, it didn't feel like we'd gone quite that far, but no matter.  I knew on Saturday there was an AFS event at the COJCOLDS church near Lincoln Center, and I had been invited to stop in and meet Joseph Castellano, our student support coordinator, while we were there.  Since we were there anyway, we did.  I had spoken to Joseph on the phone quite a lot the week before, and I would have known his voice anywhere.  It was so great to meet him in person and he was very welcoming and seemed pleased to see us and to meet Ine, who is on his caseload.  We didn't go into the multicultural fair itself, but we did enjoy talking with him.  I asked him for a pizza recommendation, as we were all quite hungry having eaten only a hot dog so far that day, and he gave us one, but it wasn't in the direction we were heading.  So we thanked him, and headed out.

Our next and final item on the itinerary was to go to the top of the Empire State Building.  I did it myself last year, and was blown away by the experience, but I also knew there were pizza places around there, so I pointed out Lincoln Center to Ine and then we hopped aboard the subway down to 34th Street.  As soon as we got out, we found a hole in the wall joint called Pops Pizza and we went in.  I couldn't teach Ine how to eat pizza like a New Yorker because she ordered two slices of thick crust pizza, but Leah and I went for the thin crust.  Leah, as you can see, did not believe me about eating NY pizza.  For the uninitiated, the point of the pizza is that they cut it big so you can fold it in half.  You start eating at the point and all the grease drips out the back onto your plate (or if you're an amateur, goes up your arm).  If you're eating it like Leah is demonstrating here, you don't know what you're doing.  However, Leah told me I was crazy.  She was sure that she was eating it correctly and I was doing it wrong by folding it.  Tsk tsk.  I have since conferred with several of my NY friends and they've all said my kid is crazy.  So there, Leah!  Anyway, the pizza was delicious, no matter how we ate it and we all gobbled it right up.  Thus refreshed, we made our way to the Empire State Building to go up to the 86th Floor Observatory.  Leah was mad I didn't spring for the 102nd Floor, but maybe next time.

Again, we had to wait on line to have a souvenir photo taken and to go through security, but although it is a long walk from the entrance to the elevators, it is not a line that ever really stops moving.  It's kind of like Disney World--yes, there's a line, yes it takes a while, but you're not stopped dead just waiting for something to happen.

You take the first elevator to the 80th floor and then get on a second elevator to the 86th.  When we reached the top, a guy in a King Kong suit was there posing for pictures, so of course, I had to get one last snap of the girls together in the city.  Then we went out onto the observatory.  Ine confessed just beforehand that she was afraid of heights, but she said she was looking forward to going out onto the observatory, so she bravely did.  There were a LOT of people out there, and every last one of them was taking selfies and/or photos of their partner/friend/etc so it took FOREVER to get into position where we could see out and see the city.  But what a glorious view we had.  It was very cold and crisp, but the view was lovely and clear and we could see the Statue of Liberty even though it was so tiny, as well as many other landmarks.  It was a fabulous night and so quiet up there compared to down below where there are people yelling and horns honking.  I have a bit of an obsession with going to the top of tall buildings, so I loved every minute of it out there, but eventually the cold won out and Leah wanted to leave.  So we headed back down and out.

Happily, we were still on 34th Street and our bus was due to pick us up on the other side of 34th Street, so we started walking.  We had about 7 blocks to go to the bus stop, which doesn't sound like a lot, but was actually a fair way.  We stopped at a little grocery store on the way and the girls got snacks for the bus ride home, and then we got on the bus line and of course, the bus was late!  Eventually it arrived and we piled on.  On the way up, they had put the air conditioning on, so the bus was quite cold, and I was hoping they wouldn't do that on the way home--I wanted warm air so I could SLEEP.  but they didn't care what I wanted, so they put the air on again.  I wrapped my coat around my head and fell asleep.  I was very, very surprised when the lights came on and we were back in Baltimore!  An hour later we were back in DC, and even though it was nearly 1AM, it wasn't too badly late despite the late start.  So we then drove home and arrived back in Fredericksburg at 2AM and immediately everyone crawled into bed and fell sound asleep.

It was a lovely time in the city.  New York is like nowhere else and I was happy to be able to take Ine there and show her around, as I was with taking Leah, who fulfilled a dream of hers to go to NYC.  They were both excellent travelers and brave adventurers, and it was fun for me to see NY with them and remember my own dreams when I moved there at the age of 18 and what it meant to me then and still means to me now.  Since we got back from the trip, someone asked me, "What are you going to do to top that?!"  I have a few tricks up my sleeve for the rest of the year, but NY is probably the piece de resistance.  But I guess you can ask her in June what her favorite part of the year was.  Hopefully she'll have lots of highlights to share with everyone, this being one.

Halloween Weekend

Halloween has turned into something of a big deal here in the United States, although Ine says it is no big deal at all in Belgium.  We took time several nights to drive around and see Halloween displays in certain yards where people really went to town decorating, which she thought was fun, and for Leah it was becoming bigger than Christmas.  I also got both the girls a Halloween bucket of goodies from me.  One of my favorite ways to 'torture' exchange students is to give them Pop Rocks candies, so I was very happy to have found some Pop Rocks while out shopping for Halloween swag.  The night before Halloween, I gave both girls a packet in their buckets and we ate them after dinner.  Hilarity ensued.


Every day Leah would ask "Is it Halloween yet?" or "is tonight the night?" and finally Friday arrived.  She was thrilled!!  I invited my liaison student, Kathy from Germany, to come spend the weekend with us, as I thought it might be nice for Ine to have another teenager around and we had plans for trick or treating Friday, a trip to DC on Saturday, and there was a Native American powwow on Sunday.  I thought it would be great for the girls to experience some Native American culture while they were here. 

Friday after school, I picked everyone up and we had dinner.  Then it was time to get my little Queen Elsa ready for trick or treating.  The girls took an active role in helping her get dressed, and she was very pleased to be pampered by teenagers--particularly since she is five going on 15.  I'm not sure which she was happier about--her gloves that played a few bars of "Let It Go", her glow stick Elsa crown, or the fact that I let her wear eyeshadow for the first time, but she was so pleased by everything.  The girls pampered her appropriately in her mind, and fawned all over her, so she felt very royal indeed!  We started off by meeting our neighbors down the street.  Their two little boys were dressed as Mario and Luigi.  Leah waits with them every day at the bus stop and we have been trick or treating with them almost every year since Leah started trick or treating.  There was a lot of excitement in the air and as porch lights started coming on, the kids were flying up the street.  They did a great job, but excitement overtook the festivities, and unfortunately Leah fell and skinned her knee.  That was the end of trick or treating.  She made it to maybe 6 more houses, and then announced she was too tired and cold to go and she wanted to go home.  So we went home.  After all the excitement, I was pretty surprised that she didn't want to do more, but she did enough, so I wasn't going to complain that I didn't have a half ton of candy sitting around the house!

The next morning, I was trying to decide what to do with the girls.  It was supposed to be cold and rainy and wet, so I was trying to think of indoor activities we could do.  Finally, I decided it would be fun to take them up to DC.  Even though my previous trip to DC was rained out before we could complete it, I was sure we could at least go to the Smithsonian or something if it was really rainy.  Ine and I had talked previously about the Hard Rock Cafe and she said she had never been, so I decided to take them up there for lunch, and then I took advantage of a "locals only" deal for Madame Tussaud's Wax Museum and got us cheap tickets to go in.  The drive up to DC was an absolute dream--little traffic and we were able to park close to the cafe.  Once inside, the host asked where we were from, so I told him the older girls were from Germany and Belgium and that it was all 3 girls' first time inside an HRC.  He took them all over to a 'stage' and handed them guitars and we took some pictures.  They weren't totally impressed with the place, not as I would have hoped, but we had a nice lunch, and now they can say they've been there.

After lunch, we walked just a couple of blocks and found ourselves at Madame Tussaud's.  I learned from a previous adventure there that it was best to just give Leah my iPhone and let her take all the pictures she wanted, so she went crazy posing everyone.  Eventually she calmed down a bit, and we took a few pictures of the girls with famous people.  I was excited to get them with George Washington, the father of our country, and we all posed for a picture with President and Mrs. Obama, which you now have to pay for. I think that's a gyp, back in the day, you could just walk up to them and it was like any other statue, but unfortunately now they are behind ropes and an MT photographer takes your picture.  So we don't have that one.  All the girls enjoyed the celebrity room and had fun with all the famous people there--Brangelina, Katy Perry, Tyra Banks, Beyonce, and more.  I was happy to see the new Stephen Colbert, which I didn't know existed, but where is Jon Stewart!?

Afterwards, since the weather was holding--at most a mild sprinkle here or there--I decided to try the National Mall again.  I drove over and parked at the WWII Memorial as usual and got the requisite picture of Kathy at the Virginia post.  We didn't spend too much time there, as Kathy and I had spoken about WWII a couple of times and her opinion that everyone thinks all Germans are Nazis.  In fact, AFS began its student exchange programs after WWII to help promote peace and understanding.  So it led to some interesting discussions, to say the least.  Anyway, I gave the girls the full National Mall tour on the lower end--we walked over to see Independence Island and I showed them all the signatures of the Declaration of Independence (they were more impressed by the geese), the Vietnam Veterans Memorial (aka The Wall) (they were more impressed by the squirrels), and finally the Lincoln Memorial, which Kathy knew as "that thing with the giant guy sitting inside".

Then we walked down the other side to the Korean War Veterans Memorial and back to the WWII Memorial where we hopped in the car and drove down to the FDR and MLK Memorials.  This is a lovely walk because it is on the Tidal Basin, so there are lots of water views.  The FDR Memorial is my favorite because there are tons of different fountains and everything is amazing.  There are some great statues as well, so I got the girls to pose with the breadline statue that symbolizes the Great Depression, and then we got back in the car and returned home for pizza and sleeping.

Sunday morning, we all went to church and then tried to go to the powwow, but unfortunately it had been canceled due to the weather!  So I took Kathy home and we spent the rest of the day relaxing.  It was a remembrance day in Belgium, so Ine was a little blue, missing her family and whatnot.

On Monday evening was the main event I had been waiting for, my just reward for dealing with Halloween:  going to see Richard Marx in concert!!  Richard Marx was one of my favorite singers when I was a teenager, and about a week after Ine got here, we found out he was coming to do a concert in Virginia.  I asked her if she would like to go and her response was "I don't know", which I took to mean "yes".  Monday after school, a babysitter arrived to take care of Leah and we headed up to Birchmere in Alexandria.  I had never been to Birchmere before, so it was a new experience, and not really one I'd be all that keen to repeat--it's not a great concert venue.We met up with my friend Andy and split a plate of nachos, which were AWFUL, and expensive bottles of water.  But the show was absolutely amazing.I was transported to my teenage years again as Richard sang lots of his old stuff and some of the new stuff.  It was just great.  I asked Ine afterwards if she liked it and she replied "yes, a lot" which is the most enthusiasm I'd heard from her about anything, so I figure it must have been pretty good! :-)

Ine and I are waiting impatiently for nachos and Richard!

It's fun to share this stuff with an older child--Leah will go to concerts because she likes to dance, but generally as it gets late, she gets bored and she doesn't like the noise.  It was fun to go with Ine and sing and have fun.  In December, we'll all be going up to Baltimore to see The Fresh Beat Band live in concert.  The Fresh Beat Band is a kids' rock band and they have been extremely kind to Leah and me since my husband died, so we will go backstage to see them.  This will allow Ine the chance to go backstage at a concert, which I don't know if she has ever done before.  But she'll get the backstage pass to wear and the whole nine yards.  So I think that will be fun--VIP swagger!

So that was our busy Halloween weekend.  The next day was Election Day here, so I took Ine with me to see how the polls are run in Virginia--I can't say in the US because it seems like they are different all over the country.  She remarked that they are very different here than in Belgium.  At least according to movies she has seen, there are big booths with curtains in Belgium, whereas here, we had a table that had partitions around 3 sides, we just stood there, I filled in the bubbles for the candidates I wanted to vote for, and we put the ballot in the machine.

It is fun to share the highlights of our exchange with everyone, but of course, there is always the day-to-day grind of school and housework and homework and quiet nights.  Ine recently revealed that she likes to do jigsaw puzzles, so we completed the below puzzle last week.  it was 1000 pieces and when she first saw it, she said, "I meant I like to do easy puzzles" and laughed, but honestly, she did about 85 percent of that puzzle on her own.  She's like an Olympian of puzzling. It was fun for me because generally I don't do these on my own and my mom and sister and I never have the time at the same time without piles of small children running around getting into things.  A lady at church gave us another puzzle to work on and I gave Ine one for Halloween, although after this, a 300 piece and a 550 piece puzzle should be a snap!

So it is a peaceful and quiet house, which is how I like it, and I've been able to relax and Ine has been blossoming and enjoying her time here.  This week she starts on the swim team, which means lots of late practices and yelling in the stands and my family plans to get together for her first swim meet in a couple of weeks.  My sister has dubbed her The Belgian Bullet and we intend to fly flags and make signs and get the younger children to yell and cheer for Ine.  She'll probably be so embarrassed she won't leave the pool.  But isn't that the perk of parenting teens?  Embarrassing them? :-)  Next weekend she will go see a Wizards game in DC with her school, and then we have a weekend off before Thanksgiving and all the fun and games of a uniquely American holiday.  I am looking forward to having my family together, cooking and baking, Black Friday shopping, and Ine will get to meet my dad!

My next update will detail our trip to NYC, but honestly I still need a couple of days to recover from that one--I'm still exhausted... Still, Ine wanted to see NY and I made darned sure she saw it.  We had a great time.  Stay tuned!