Brussels (Bruxelles) - Europe's Capital; the Heart of Europe

Brussels is very big compared to Luxembourg. Right when I got here, in the train station alone, I was a bit intimidated. I had to get a metro.pass this time!  Throughout my time here, I visited the Grand Place (which is a big square) during the day, and at night!  It was pretty huge and the buildings were gorgeous!  I also visited the peeing boy, Mannekan Pis I believe he's called.. when I read about it they said it was a statue of a boy peeing and sometimes he even pees beer! Well it was a bit smaller than I imagined.. like, incredibly smaller lol. The statue was probably honestly as big as my forearm.

My next day there, I visited the Atomium and Mini-Europe. The Atomium is a big chemical structure of an iron crystal. It is a HUGE tourist destination of Brussels, and they say it is the Eiffel tower of Belgium. Before I went in it, I walked around the park nearby, the trees were beautiful yellow and orange color, and the ground was laced with leaves!  I paid to go up into the different atoms (all you guys out there who aren't good at chemistry, the atoms are the balls in the photo lol), and I got to see a panoramic view of the city and park. Again, the trees looked awesome, but I wouldn't pay to go up it again.. seeing it from the outside is sufficient.  Afterwards, I headed over to Mini-Europe which was just next to the Atomium, across the street. And I must say, it would've been a lot more fun if I had gone with someone.. the person I would probably have the most fun with there is my cousin Justin.. we always goof off and take the most ridiculous photos with the most ridiculous things.  But it was still pretty cool. Mini Europe had smaller models, built to scale, of all the tourist destinations in Europe. It was actually pretty cool seeing all the things I've seen already, all the things I plan on seeing, and the places I don't have planned for this trip, but probably need to plan for the next one.

I also had Many Belgian waffles.. 4 in the past 2 days.. I used them to replace my meals lol.. not the most nutritious thing but they sure were delicious!!  Also, the fries and sauce = amazing!!  And breakfast came with the hostel :)

Some things I've noticed:
- there are a lot of beggars here, especially in the train station.
- waffles = excellent.. very very sugary.  They have vans/booths/kiosks on the streets that sell them for 1.50-2 euros! #hellyeah
- there were a TON of Americans in my hostel that were studying in Denmark or Italy.
      - most of them were from Cali #ofcourse
- a lot of people come here on the weekends from Luxembourg because they say it's boring there... #what !?  I loved it!
- and a lot of people come here to work from Spain.

<3

In Ghent now, and LOVING IT!  Everything about it!