Lexus Live

So this past weekend was Christian's first big event in Luneburg, Germany. We set out for Germany on Thursday morning expecting a 6 hour drive. A 6 hour drive turned out to be around 9 hours due to construction; for a moment we thought we were in Detroit except for the beautiful scenery. We arrived in Luneburg at the race track and got right to work. Christian and Dennis decided to see if Christian was longer than a SmartCar...Pretty close, but I think the SmartCar wins Christian! After a long day of driving and setting up for the event, Christian, Dennis and I went out for a well deserved beer & chips.

Then Christian and Dennis shrank after drinking all of that German beer.

For the next two days, we attened the Lexus Live event held at the ADAC in Luneburg, Germany. Some of you don't know what Christian does, well here is part of what Christian does. This is one of the events that Christian has been putting hours and hours of work into.

The pictures below are pictures inside this huge structure that the crew built. (I was able to get pictures before all the guests came in.)

These are the pictures of the drive courses outside.

After two days of hard work, yes I got involved and worked at the event all weekend, we set out for home in Brussels. We did come across this cute little town in Germany...The event for Christian and his team at AMCI was a huge success. Let's hope the next event next weekend in Hockenheim goes just all well. Christian you have put hours of hard work and dedication into this event and I'm very proud of you!

Love, Meghin

Oven

People, here is my oven...

Still can't figure the darn thing out!

Christian jumped out of his seat when he saw these not realizing they were cookies...he thought it was more like road kill.

C & M

Random Sausage

Found in Bruges, flavor unknown, possibly a sun-dried tomato and pepper variety. Not German, possibly Turkish.

After Work Snack

Christian works very hard every day at work, 16+ hour days. When he gets home at night sometime between 6-7pm, he is always really hungry. So what would a housewife living in Belgium do...you got it, make him his Belgium after work snack. The only normal thing to make him here in Belgium since they are crazy about thier salami, cheese and tomatoes are:

Salami & Cheese Plate

or

Tomatoes, Mozzerella & Basil

Here sure does love when he comes home and there is a plate sitting out for him.

Love, Meghin

That's right boys, and she serves it in little shorts and a belly shirt. There is a God...

Cheers, Christian

Another Visitor

This past weekend was filled with fun and laughter. Dennis' wife, Helen, was in town visiting him for the weekend. So Saturday night, we headed out with both of them to the Grand Place for some drinks and dinner. While at the Place having a beer, we saw some really weird events taking place. There were three seperate bachlorette parties going on; the first one had the girl dressed up in a maid's uniform, taking people's orders and then dusting them with a feather. It was very strange; I couldn't get my camera out fast enought to take the picture; Sorry! The second one looked to a goth bachlorette party - way too scary to even look at or take a picture of. We are just going to leave that one alone! :) The third party that walked through was also strange in it's own way. They had a piggy bank, like the ones pictured below that they were collecting money in for her wedding dress. Why in the heck don't we think of these things in the states.

After our drinks in the Place, Eva met up with us and took us to one of her favorite restaurants, Tasso. We sat down to dinner for the next 4 hours and enjoyed some sucking pig (no joke), vegetable pie and ray fish. It was an excellent meal with excellent company.

Thanks to Eva for picking our a wonderful place for dinner and thanks to Helen for coming to visit and spending sometime with us. We will see you soon.

Thank you!

We have to thank everyone who is supporting us here in Belgium. Things have been rough here and there, but having people call, send letters, email and send us our favorite things makes it all the better.

Just wanted to make a special thank you to the following people for sending us some nice care packages. We can't thank you enough!!

From my Mom & Julie~We are addicted to this dressing now. It is so nice to have a salad with Italian dressing. THANK YOU!!!!

From Tiffanie~

We have taco mix, sloppy joe mix, gravey packs, Ranch dressing, Lipton Onion Soup mix; so many different things for us to use. Thank you for your kindness.

From Paul~

Christian's favortie:

Thanks Paul for the cereal and for some U.S. magazines. It has been so nice to sit down and read them.

Thanks again to everyone for their support.

Love,

Christian & Meg

Things are cooling off here in Belgium

It took a while, but we found ice trays that fit in our freezer:

Now that we found them, we are going to start a campaign here in Belgium to hopefully spread the joys of ice.

Life is so much better with ice!!

C & M

I DID IT...

Christian was out of town today, in Berlin, so I had the car here with me along with a list of things i needed to do. It was go time!

I needed to go to the grocery store, so I decided to take the car even though I was a bit nervous to do so. I really wanted to go to the BIG grocery store rather than walking to the little one, So, I set out in the Renault Scenic Megane towards the grocery store down the street. The straight aways are almost a piece of cake, but the one rule that I can't get in my head is that cars approaching on the right have the right away unless they have a small set of painted diamonds on the pavement in front of them. It is so confusing and you really have to be on guard while driving otherwise you'll get a single finger salute from the local Belgians.

I would say I did pretty good driving; I only had one person flash their lights at me - fifeteen times while tailgating - and one person flick me off.

I made it back in one piece, all in all it was a good drive.

The Apartment

I know most of you have been waiting and waiting for this, so here it is. The Gani Apartment in Belgium.

Main Entrance & Staircase:

The Kitchen:

Yes, the silver box in the picture above is my convection microwave oven!!
This is our kitchen pantry and the Michigan Towel (thank you Uncle Joe & Aunt Marie) is hanging on our fridge. The fridge is from the towel down only; the top part is cabinet space.

The Dining Room: The Laundry Closet:

This is the dryer on top and washer down below. They are very, very tiny!!

The Living Room:

Downstairs Toilet Room:

You are not imagining how small the sink looks!!!

Our bedroom:

Our bathroom:Upstairs Toilet Room:

Spare Room (we don't have the bed yet...I will update pics when we get it)

Spare bathroom:

There you have it!! The grand ole place! Now that you all see what it looks like, come visit! Miss all of you.
Christian & Meghin

The Flower Carpet

I have to say...I've learned that as a married man you tend to do things you really dont want to do - but you do them because your wife tells you to. Now that might not seem like anything particularly strange, but here's the key difference. Not only do I have to actively participate in such endeavors...I have to act like I'm enjoying it...which is sometimes a wee bit more difficult!

On friday, Meg thought it would be a good idea to go down to the Grand Place to see...wait for it...flowers. Earlier in the week Meg and her mom caught the "carnie's" setting up the big display which was huge, about 3/4 of a football field in length and width.

Meg wanted to see the finished product for her mom, my mum, several friends (all of which watch Oprah everyday), her sister and other sappy friends. In actuality, the site was pretty impressive. What was most remarkable was the legions of paparazzi that fought tooth and nail to get as close to the fenceline as possible to take some pictures. After slaying the photo bandits, Meg and I finally had our moment in the sun and took a picture in front of what amounts to a large carpet...but an impressive one nonetheless. Apparently Belgium has amazing Bogonias hence their inclusion in the display.

Lastly, seeing the "carpet" made me think about other cities in the world that might have a reason to do something similar. For instance, would Beijing have a carpet full of dead cats? What about London? A carpet with tea and crumpettes? Or what about Toronto? A carpet full of donuts, beer, maple syrup and overpayed, underacheiving, lazy hockey players.

Ummm...something to think about

C&M

Our First Visitor

We had our first visitor to Brussels this past week...none other than...Mom Wojtowicz. Mom arrived on Saturday morning after a long overnight flight from Detroit. We picked her up from the Brussels Airport and took her back to our place for a quick snack and a short nap. After mom's "short" 4 hour nap, we took off to Grand Place for a drink and dinner. This was mom's first time to "the place" and boy was she amazed by the sites.

Sunday we got up really early, picked up Dennis (Christian's co-worker) and we all took off for Bruges, because as he says in his best Dr. Evil voice "that's where daddy's from". (More to come on Bruges later!)

The rest of the week Christian had to work (surprise, surprise), so Mom and I set out to do the tourist things. Monday morning we jumped on the Brussels Site Seeing Tour Bus that took us around the city to see all the major attractions of which there are few! The bus took us to Grand Place, Manneken Pis, St. Catherines, Mont Des Arts, European Union, Royal Palace, Cinquatenaire Arch and the Atomium. It was a very interesting tour and we learned a lot about Brussels and Belgium, very well worth the trip if you decide to come visit us here. The funny thing about the trip was our bus tickets. Tickets for adults were €18, but the driver only charged us €16 (the under 18 and over 65 price). I guess I look under 18 and poor mom must look over 65. It made me laugh!

Tuesday and Wednesday we set out on foot to walk around and see what type of things we would find. We did go to the Mont Des Arts Museum and saw paintings from Bruegel & Rubens. We also had to go to Cinquantenaire Park to take our picture for the Livonia Observer (Amanda & Chad...be on the lookout!)

For out last night out, Mom and I went back to the Grand Place for dinner. Mom decided on a Italian place and we had an excellent meal.

On Thursday morning, I had to take mom back to the airport to catch her flight back to Detroit. It was sad to see her go, but we will enjoy the good times that we spent here in Brussels.

Thanks for everything Mom, we love you!