Europe Trip

Been in hiatus from blogging for months! However, there were many things happening in the past few months.

I initially planned to have my thesis script finished by early January and be a bit relaxed while waiting for the thesis defense, but it didn't really go as I planned. LOL. So January was kinda hectic and made me anxious. Stuff related to academic, preparation for working (submitting documents, health check, etc.), finding an apartment room, and preparation for my Europe trip.

Thank God, everything went relatively well and I did my thesis defense by the end of January, signed an apartment contract around the same time, too. After that I had a week to do a few corrections to my thesis script before departing to Europe. YEAY!

I was nervous about the trip because just weeks before my trip, there was Charlie Hebdo incident which may caused sentiment towards Islam. So, I omitted Paris from my trip and changed it to Brussels. Departed from Narita, Tokyo, alone, on Feb 7 evening to Dubai for transit and arrived in Amsterdam on Feb 8. Then I traveled through Amsterdam, Brussels, Ghent, Bruges, Wageningen, Munich, Salzburg, and Frankfurt before going back to Tokyo for about 9 days. In the middle of my trip, I was regretting that I only set my trip for 11 days (including the flight to/from Tokyo), I wished I had set for at least two weeks haha. I enjoyed my trip so much!! This wouldn't be as enjoyable as it was if it wasn't because of my dear friends, Mita and husband, Nadia, and also Fahmi and friend. They were great companions during my whole trip. Basically I was always with any of them except for my overnight trip from Wageningen to Munich and on my train ride from Munich to Frankfurt.

- Amsterdam

Right after arriving, Mita and husband brought me to Zaanse Schans. We could see a small village with windmills, and what past dutch villages may have seemed like. In the afternoon we strolled around Amsterdam city, had dinner and not to forget, walked through the red light district (lol). The next day, we went to Rijksmuseum (we were choosing between this one or Anne Frank Museum because I didn't have enough time for both). Of course, main exhibits in the museum were paintings which I don't really understand, but I liked it. Then we strolled around the canals until the time to ride the Eurolines bus to Brussels.

- Brussels, Ghent, Bruges

With poor preparation on how to travel within the city, Mita and me took the wrong local bus right after arriving there. We thought the bus would take us to the direction of our hostel, but because of the route alteration at that moment the bus wasn't heading to that direction! Hah?! Luckily, the man I asked to on the bus was really kind that he discussed with the bus driver to give us the easiest solution :) And we arrived safely and tired at the hostel. That night we decided to just stay in the hotel and browse enough info for the next day trip.

We decided to explore Ghent and Bruges first. And I looooooved these cities so much! They were so pretty that I felt I was in a world of fantasy. I literally WOW-ing again and again there. hahaha. I really recommend to allocate a whole day, at least, to explore Ghent and Bruges. Lucky us, we could ride the boat for canal tour in Bruges, it was worth it.
And on our last day in Belgium, we joined a free walking tour around Brussels. The tour guide was awesome, he was very expressive when giving us explanations around the city. He told us that local people don't eat waffles with toppings, that only tourists do it! haha. So we made a right decision the day before when we ordered plain waffle :)

*My Europe trip wasn't finished here, but I think I would continue on writing later and would add up photos later, too. I hope soon!