HE LIVES!! yes, boys and girls, i have successfully made it to europe... this is the first real chance that i've gotten to sit down and do some serious computer stuff since i've gotten here. the internet is cheap in the cafe but very expensive in the hostel. one thing that is very interesting is that the keyboard layout is different. not very different, but enough so that it's led me to change the layout of the keyboard to the english version. so i'm basically discovering how well i actually know the layout of the computer keyboards back home, and i am actually pretty good at it.

i flew into london on the 4th, and had quite an adventure trying to find the hotel, because the Let's Go guide i am using put the hotel in the wrong spot on the map. nice. so i got off at the wrong tube stop and had to walk around for an hour before i basically stumbled onto the right street.

the next day i rode 2 trains for 6 hours to make it to luxembourg. i got there, but it was another adventure. i bought a ticket for the eurostar train the night i got into london. i bought a ticket for the 8:27 train. problem is, i couldn't sleep, so i didn't go to bed until about 4:15. i set the alarm on my little travel alarm clock, but a lot of good that did. basically, i overslept and woke up at 8:44. i thought i was fucked, because the guy told me that the ticket was only transferrable if i did it before the scheduled time of the train. so, i thought i'd have to pay ANOTHER $100 for a ticket!! well, i told the guy at the counter that i had told the ticket agent that i wanted the train for 10:27, but that he must have heard me wrong, and i was so tired that i didn't notice it until that morning. the guy gave me the "i'm not supposed to do this" speech, and then, of course, he changed my ticket for free :)

anyway, luxembourg was absolutely beautiful. i enjoyed just about everything about it. it's very small, and the people that live there hate it for that reason, but that's what makes it so great for tourists. there was a big carnival there called schueberfouer, which was a lot of fun. the rest of the time i walked around the city and took a tour of the valley. it rocked.

now i'm in brussels. let me tell you, there hasn't been one uneventful day yet. last night i arrived here around 8:30. after getting myself together, i got off the metro stop at about 9:30. i got to the hostel i was going to stay at, and, sure enough, it was full. so, 1 hour later, and 3 hotels later, i finally got a room for €60 a night. but, at least its a nice place and i get a private bathroom, so i'm happy. anyway, i'm about to go check out the city. i leave tomorrow for bruges. i'm just happy because today is the first day where i don't have to carry my backpack anywhere!

anyway, time for me to go see the peeing boy statue... later!