living the dream...

Big beautiful flaggy building

It's been almost six years and one week but here I am sitting in a cafe drinking tea in Antwerp.  My new home.  In Belgium.  In Europe.  It feels like a dream now that it is finally happening.  The last year has been a whirl wind of travelling, music and fun, it felt like the adventure would never end.  Then I was back in Melbourne.  Drumming my fingers on the table waiting for various governments to put a little stamp in my passport.  Even then it wasn't quite real.  I was in limbo between European odyssey funsies and my old life.  I couldn't get a job, most of my friends had moved on and weren't particularly interested in the worldly Sophie and I found myself melting on mothers couch watching Charmed most days.  A half lived life for three months that sludged by in a haze of eating too many chips, painting the deck and trying to steal the neighbours cat.

Now it begins.  The next phase.  The new life.  The ultimate adventure.  And I am shitting myself.  My mind is jumping around like an epileptic butterfly.  One moment I am so excited it is all I can do to stop myself from dancing down the street and bursting into song but then the reality that I have no job, no home and no friends crushes me like an oppressive bear.  At least I am making progress, slightly, in all of these areas.  I have a trial for a job as a waitress in a cafe on Saturday.  That won't be enough though.  I am hoping to get some bar work too, but as people are fairly hesitant to hire non flemish speakers and I don't have any experience I am going to have to pull some serious charm out of the bag.  Plus embellish my resume heavily.  How hard can it be to pull a pint?...

I also have a friend.  A BBF in fact.  That's Belgian Best Friend for the uninitiated.  His name is Eric and he is the loveliest thing in the world.  He is practical, unenthusiastic and really good with computers.  So the complete opposite to me.  I feel we make a good pair.  If I don’t annoy him to death that is…

Finding a place to live has not been so easy.  Flat sharing isn’t a big thing over here and the two main sites are in Dutch and French respectively.  So not super helpful then.  Thank god for google translate.  I am currently planning a polygamous marriage between myself, google translate and google maps.  I feel we have a lot to offer each other and no one has made me happier than them in the past week.

So now just to sit back and enjoy the ride.  Float off to wherever the wind takes me.  The locals keep asking me why Belgium?  It always rains.  Then something boring about politics.  Well let me tell you I have always got by on a minimal involvement in politics and I don’t intend to start getting interested now.  And I am from Melbourne.  Don’t talk to me about rain.  When you need a lifeguard to accompany you from the house to your car then we’ll talk about bad weather.  The rain here is so light it’s as if you are being kissed on the nose by wee fairies fresh from their bath.  Delightful!  Which is how I would sum up my new home.  Delightful.

I bought a hat to celebrate getting a job trial.  Not sure what those guys are doing in there though...