Ready for our close-ups

Fame has finally caught up to our group! The Paper of Wabash County ran a very long and well-written article about our upcoming trip (see attached link, page 7). The only mistake was saying that the Wabash County Rotary Foundation is sponsoring the trip, when we're actually representing the Central Indiana Rotary District 6540. Whoops. But I emailed them the correction, so hopefully credit will go where credit is deserved. The article is still a great way to let people know about the trip and perhaps even encourage someone else to apply for it in the future.

I can't believe the trip is just about 2.5 months away. I've been working on more Dutch (De meisjes staan naast de hond "the girls stand next to the dog") was part of last night's learning. Useful phrase to know? Probably not, but still fun to learn.

I've learned a bit more about Maastricht, the city where I believe we'll spend a week or so. It is home to Maastricht University, United World College, an Academy of Dramatic Arts, and has a large international student population. It's a super-old city, receiving city rights in 1204, and has made it through many wars. The French once occupied it, the Germans occupied it during WWII, but it was the first Dutch city to be liberated by the allies in 1944.

So there's your 800-year history of a city in a nutshell. It's an hour from Brussels, an hour from Cologne, Germany, and 2.5 hours from Amsterdam. It has several museums, plenty of historical sights, and a good number of parks. Onze-Lieve-Vrouwe Plein is described as a "picturesque tree-lined square with an abundance of pavement cafes." With all the piles of snow and slushy roads around, that sounds pretty nice right about now.