Easy Weekend

Saturday morning I slept until 11 a.m.. It was amazing to finally sleep in. I had Pad Thai for lunch at a little place that was closed when we arrived. The owners had to turn on the kitchen area and made us some delicious food, they even had to unlock the door to let us back out after we ate. One of my roommates and I walked to a library (where they had a/c) and did some reading for class. We are still reading about 8th amendment issues and it’s easy to have discussion on the death penalty. We went to a pizza place that the Italian Professor’s wife had recommended as the best pizza she had ever had. As a side, the restaurant was right next to some old towers that were used to torture criminals. It was ok pizza, mostly just dough with a little sauce, then a separate heap of toppings like cheese balls and some lettuce type stuff. The restaurant had no available outside seating so we sat inside and it was very warm. After dinner it began to rain and we got soaked making it back to the hotel to go swimming for a bit. We added a bottle of wine and had a nice evening in the pool.

Sunday I wanted to get up early to attend a mass at the cathedral. But, the night before my roommates and I had stayed up talking until very late, and without an alarm I didn’t wake up until 10 a.m.. I attempted to meet one of my friends at the cathedral at 11 a.m., but she had already left when I arrived (I was late as usual). So I met up with two of the people staying at the apartment-hotel and we went on a boat tour around the city. I learned that high ranking Catholic government officials refused to stay inside the city boundary because it was Protestant, and that a whole lot of torture went on in Strasbourg at one point. On the bright side, the boat had a/c. Odd I know, restaurants and hotels don’t have a/c, but boats do. After the tour I did some reading and made it out to a Spanish leaning bar for the Spain-Netherlands Final match. The game was pretty close and Spain won in extra time with (what I consider) a contested goal. But, more importantly, the crowd was awesome. When Spain won the whole place went crazy, there were people everywhere, even blocking the street. There were women wearing nothing but flags and guys hanging out car windows waving flags. The police drove by but must have thought better of removing the crowd so they quickly left. I was wearing a bright orange Netherlands shirt I had bought while in The Hague and received a few comments of ‘better luck next time.’ All in all, it was a good weekend.