Long before I arrived in Germany, I told my cousin that my one requirement while visiting was that we travel to the nearby Luxembourg and Belgium so I could add them to my list of countries.

Unfortunately it was a dreary day, but I think we still had a great time. We made it through most of Luxembourg in the morning before the rain started. It was much more exciting than I expected. I sorta pictured a modern and kitschy city full of the Lux equivalent of Swiss bank accounts. And perhaps it is on some streets. But I didn’t realize how much history this country had.

We saw the palace and some old streets and churches. Most exciting for me though was the old city walls. Apparently people hid in the passages within them during the wars to get away from the bombs. It was really neat.

Haley (my 9 year old cousin) and I had fun sharing an umbrella when it started raining… I taught her that if you link your arms when sharing an umbrella, both of you are more likely to stay dry and you don’t have that awkward continuous bumping into each other.

After lunch we headed onward to Belgium. We didn’t have enough time to go all the way into the famous cities like Brussels or Bruges, but we got to visit Bastogne. Apparently it was a big deal during World War II. We stopped in the town center, took some rainy pictures, and had a DELICIOUS cappuccino and chocolate crepe.

Then we headed on to the War Memorial to the States and Museum. The museum was new and pretty well done. I’m not a huge war buff as it just depresses me, but I will say that it’s been cool to experience World War II museums in various countries (Japan, Russia, Ukraine, Poland, Germany, USA, England, and now Belgium) because they each have a little bit different focus and often a little bit different perspective. So I definitely enjoyed it. There are also the foxholes nearby, but it was too muddy to visit them.

When we got home, we got donor! Jodie told me that they have a “donor guy” and that its like cheating on your hairdresser if they buy donor from someone else. Haha. So I met the donor guy. He’s from Turkey. I recognized some of the other food in the glass counter by its Turkish name rather than its German name and we instantly became friends. I’d been craving donor since the last time I was in Germany 5 years ago. Yum!!!

So that was a day. 3 countries in 1.