it could be worse...

so quite a bit of the time here i'm having a rough time being an au pair.
the boys are 8 and 9 and i've been with them for almost nine months now so we're waaay past the "let's be on our best behavior" mode and well into the "i know exactly how to make her mad let's see how far we can push her" mode.
the parents have some...interesting rules and the environment here isn't always 100 and although it's supposed to be like i'm "part of the family" it's really not like that.
however, it could be worse.
that's the great thing about having au pair friends is we're all going through the same thing but totally different situations. we all understand how awkward it is on the weekends and not knowing our place every once in a while. we all know how difficult kids are. and we all know how the real hard part of being an au pair is the parents more than the kids. it's really great to be able to meet up with them and tell them the latest about what the family said or did or what happened and sometimes it's like alright who has the most ridiculous story this week? it's so interesting to hear about the other families and know alright i'm not the only one having a hard time and like i said before i could have it way worse.
so here are things from my other au pair friends that have made me grateful for my situation...
my one friend lives in an apartment with the family, she has her own room but it's still an apartment so only one floor and her room is right next to the kids, the kids are 3 and 5 and the mom just had a newborn. so anytime the kids wake up she has to go and make sure they're ok and now she has to deal with a newborn baby in the apartment. and the mom stopped working so the mom is at home all day and when it's like that you just don't feel like you can be free to go about doing what you normally do and you feel like you're under constant watch.
so i'm soooo grateful that for me there's no babies. the boys sleep through the night and if they don't they're not waking up bawling. also that there's no newborn. and that the mom doesn't stay home all day. the dad does sometimes which sucks and is really awkward sometimes because i feel like i'm being judged if i'm having a lazy day and take a nap or just chill out on my computer but if he wants to judge me oh well. and i'm so glad i have not only my own room but my own floor. all my other friends have their own rooms of course but they share the bathroom and i am so glad i have my own. i don't have to wait for someone else to be done in the bathroom to go in and do my makeup or whatever, i know that any mess is my mess (not that i'm making a mess but it's so annoying with roommates cleaning everything when you know it's not your mess.) and even though the dad's older kids have a room on the same floor when they've come to visit it hasn't been a problem or i've been gone. so it really is convenient and i am so glad i'm not in an apartment. although the apartment she's in is nice.

i have another friend who's host mom is very outspoken and tells her what she thinks on everything. like when she goes out on the weekends and it's nice she'll wear shorts and the mom will look at her when she's leaving and say something along the lines of "you're wearing that?" (first of all, she's not even her mom and my friend is 19 years old she can wear what she wants. she's not on the job or anything and the host mom should let her be.) or if she goes out a few times during the week the mom will mention something to her like "well that's why you're so tired because you go out so much" (we never stay out late during the week because we all have to wake up in the mornings and deal with children.)
luckily for me, my host mom understands that i have a life besides being with the boys all day and i have friends. she is always asking me if i'm going out and she thinks it's odd when i don't go out because i should be enjoying my time in france not just with kids all day then holed up in my room all night. also she doesn't care when i go out or when i get back. no matter what time i get home she's never said anything to me about it. also she understands that if i have plans or whatever and she's home then i can leave. it's extremely nice and convenient because sometimes (ok a lot of times) it's hard to tell if i'm "done" for the day or not. because i don't have a certain time that's like alright clocking out i'm done. and she never comments on what i wear although i don't wear anything too revealing or strange or whatever.

i have friends who in their "light housework" clause of their contract it includes they have to literally clean the kids rooms. meaning pick up their toys, games, clothes, activity supplies, everything. the kids don't tidy it up at all no matter how old they are. once my friend showed me the girls rooms she had to clean...it literally looked like a tornado went through. now, i hate cleaning. loathe it. but at least the boys tidy their rooms so all i have to do is dust and vacuum. for them it's the whole shebang. (is that right? how you spell shebang? oh well) so although i feel like i have quite a bit of cleaning to do, there could always be more to do. some girls don't have to clean anything because they have a cleaning lady and they're the lucky ones.

and last but not least, the worst of the worst that i am sososososooooo happy i don't have to deal with is i know two girls who while they've been here the parents have gotten a divorce. i just feel like that's so difficult to deal with in general and an extremely personal matter that it'd be extremely awkward as the au pair in the midst of it all. especially with the kids helping them adjust and understand what's going on. and, this is the number one craziest au pair experience in my opinion that my friend had happen...so one day she told us that she heard the parents doing things and she felt awkward (for obvious reasons) but left because..yeah. anyways, a few weeks later the cops show up at the door and turns out the dad raped the mom and since my friend heard it she had to talk to the police and tell them what she heard. i mean first of all it's awful that she heard that then to have to deal with the cops and everything?! so not only did her family get a divorce but that also. and of course the kids don't understand why they're not seeing their dad at home and everything. but my friend can't go home because she doesn't have money and she needs a job. i just feel so bad for her. so i'm so grateful that the parents are together and not going through that. and that i'm not having to talk to police.

so when times get tough, i just have to remember it could always be worse.

4 countries later...

i haven't updated in quite some time. and quite a bit has happened!

so let's dive in.

so my last post was on paris with courtney. well after that weekend i went on a grand adventure to four new countries! FOUR! checking things off the bucket list! 

so from paris i went to hamburg, germany to see where alex and jeannette live and that was the starting point of our adventure. (they came along) so day one was exploring hamburg!

so you can't see but this is right by the harbor. alex said it's the largest harbor in europe or something like that. don't go spreading that knowledge because it very well may be wrong..

this is gloekstadt (spelling is most likely wrong) where alex lives. ISN'T IT SO CUTE?! 

so yeah germany! cool stuff. not much to see in hamburg or alex just isn't a really good tour guide...we got ice cream though so that was exciting. 

next day we woke up before the sun. i think we woke up at about 4:15ish to start the journey to....

PRAGUE!!!!!!!

the czech republic! YAS YAS YAS! i was so excited. prague was at the very top of my list of places to go and i wasn't entirely sure why. maybe because it's the closest thing to russia i'll get (for some reason i really like russia and their counterparts. it may be because they have produced some incredible gymnasts) and prague just sounds so cool and exciting. so i was pumped. the train wasn't anything fancy but i thought it was so cool! it was an 8 hour train ride there and we had our own little roomish thing. you know in harry potter how they have their own compartment with sliding door and curtains? YEAH WE HAD THAT! it was so neato toledo. i was so excited. but it seated six and soon enough we had compartment mates. and there were children in the next compartment who kept banging the arm rests against the wall and it was incredibly annoying but besides that it was cool. i get excited over small things. clearly. so we got there and for the record i was the first on in the czech republic (and stepped on the ground in the czech republic) the first lingard! again. the little things. :)

so we hop out and start to head for our hostel. and holy canoli prague is sooooo pretty. i had to resist stopping every ten steps for pictures because we had to find our hostel and we had time for exploring later on when we weren't lugging around luggage. so we found the hostel and then the exploration started! (picture dump to continue. #noregrets)

so these are the buildings in the czech republic.

like what?! 

these houses rival san franciscos.

like sherbet colored buildings. i didn't think a country that has a bit of a rough history with communism and all would have such amazingly beautiful colors and everything. and this is one of my favorite parts of discovering a new city. i can see so much on pinterest and on google but then it's the little things from walking around that i find that amaze me and are the prettiest.

view from a bridge!

the other side!

HOW CAN A PLACE BE THIS PRETTY?!

i think prague might be one of my favorites. it rivals london. the only thing london has on it is the fact that i can understand their money system (99 crowns is about 3.50 and doing that kinda conversion stuff is way too confusing for me) and they speak english. but prague was just so beautiful.

takes my breath away.

we made alex walk up this huge park and boy was it worth it.

john lennon wall! there was someone singing. they weren't good. but that's beside the point. fun fact though..john lennon never even went to prague...but i'm not complaining about this cool wall.

charles bridge!

brother and i in prague! i really like this picture even though i'm holding my hair from flying all over the place. it was so windy it was cray.

TURTLENECK! ok really they're spelled something like trdlnik. well how else would you say that? so i was constantly saying i wanted a turtleneck. in fact right now i could go for a fresh one...

astronomical clock! so here's the dealio with this. once upon a time a guy who was super smart made this highly technological clock (for those days...1400s) shows the position of the sun and the moon and all that jazz and on the hour a couple things happen. (we didn't see the things happen but our tour guide said it's like the second most dissappointing thing to see after the mona lisa) anyways. this guy made this cool clock and the czechs, being as friendly as they are, loved it sooooo much that they were like weeeeeell we don't want a duplicate so we're going to gauge out your eyes so you can't see another one and just to be safe we'll cut out your tongue so you can't tell anyone how you did it either. now i really want to work with czechs.

well homeboy got really mad about all that happening to him so he decided he'd destroy his hard work to show them who's really boss. so not for another few hundred years someone finally was smart enough to fix it and make it work again. yahoo! so now there's this cool clock and an interesting story behind it.

prague at night. it is beautiful. 

the cathedral! so it's inside the castle but really the castle isn't much...i mean sure it's big but i didn't even know i was in the castle. but the cathedral is pretty neat. and i really liked this picture.

traditional czech dinner! jeannette and i had sirloin and dumplings and alex had pork i think and sauerkrat and dumplings. 

prague at night. there was an easter market going on and it was beautiful.

czech it out. peacin out of prague. dawg. 

(lolol)

so in prague we explored and saw all the places to see on the map we had and we did a "free" tour (it's free but you tip what you think it's worth at the end) and it was really interesting. the guy was a real czech man and he lived through communism and was seventeen when it ended so he had a memory of it and he was really cool and the tour was three hours in the cold and rain but it was super informative and interesting and i loved it. but it's really just fun to walk around and take it all in.

but really prague is amazing and beautiful i recommend it to everyone. the czechs aren't scary. although we walked past a warehouse that said czech trap. i still wonder what it is...guess i gotta go back to prague! dakue! (or spelled something like that. it's said like duh-coo-ay it means thank you in czech. learning new languages all the time. watch out.)

next stop waaaaaas....BELGIUM!

to get to belgium we took a plane. so modes of transportation taken thus far: car (from the train station in gloekstadt to alex's house) train, and now plane!

homegirl czech lady had a demonic smile on her face when she found us in line with our suitcases and was like "come with me while i try to charge you to check your bags because they're probs to big for this little box even though on the plane they'll fit just fine but i want to ruin your lives so wahahaha." 

well sucks to be her cause ours FIT! with a lot of pushing and shoving into the little box but it fit! HA! Czechs 0-Lingards 1.

suckas.

anyways. we got to brussels and it was time to show of mon francais! yahoo! ha. and it was time to find a WAFFLE. the real reason i wanted to go to belgium. and fries. although they're called french fries they're not french. they're belgium. come on everyone get cultured.

soooo picture dump from belgium!

bienvenue a bruxelles :)

(welcome to brussels)

I GOT A WAFFLE I LOVE WAFFLES AND I WAS IN BELGIUM EATING A BELGIAN WAFFLE AND THE BOY BEHIND ME IS LOOKING AT ME LIKE OMG I WANT DAT (talking about the waffle not my body although maybe both idk) (jk) (maybe) ( ;) )

still crying over the strawberry that fell on the ground.

mannekin pis.

hahahaha.

atomium! 

once upon a time during the amazing race this was where the pit stop was. I WAS WHERE PHIL WAS ONCE! and i held a ball of the atomium. wahaha. get like me.

this was me the whole trip.

third wheel probs.

GIMME DA WAFFLE SILLY MANNEKIN PIS KID.

i clearly love waffles cause all i can type is in caps when i think about them cause omg yaaaas.

this. now this was the best. my two favorite things. next to each other. omg. a warm liege waffle and strawberry ice cream. om nom nom nom i wish it never ended. if i had one right now i would be happy. if i ever get married this is what i will have instead of cake. and if i don't get married for my golden birthday party this is what i'll eat. all day. YAS.

so in brussels we got there and were totally lost on where our hotel was. alex was worried we got scammed and it wasn't real. but we found it eventually! it was a little sketchy...the guys came out one door but let us in another door...and we had to go up like five sets of steep stairs to get to our room (good workout especially with a suitcase) but hey it was a place to sleep and stay and it's not like we were in the hotel room all the time. also when we left we had to leave our key with the people..odd. but whatever. oh yeah we were so excited because it included breakfast...their breakfast was literally two different types of bread, hot chocolate or orange juice and butter and jam. and they had the audacity to advertise "breakfast is 5 euros" like we would've been so mad to pay 5 euros to find out it was just bread. hopefully nobody pays for it. but also the breakfast was in another building...so there i was thinking it's just downstairs in another room so i go in my pj's and nope we gotta go outside and it wasn't far but yeah i felt silly. also it was alex's birthday in brussels! wahoo! he got a waffle. i can't imagine anything better really. but yeah brussels was really pretty. and i used my french a little so i felt cool.

next stop was antwerp! we took a train. no new mode of transportation. so antwerp! still in belgium however they speak flemish instead of french. so i went back to not knowing what was going on.

the buildings in belgium are so cute.

guess what...ANOTHER WAFFLE! this was amazing. it was like a waffle sandwich with speculoos inside. my mouth is watering.

antwerp central station! one of the prettiest train stations in the world. and i'm not just saying that it's a proven fact.

we were only in antwerp for a little bit of time but it was really pretty. one of my good au pair friends in france is from there so she told me the good places to go and see so it was really cool. it has a cool atmosphere to it and it's fairly small so everything is close so we didn't have to take the tram or anything because in brussels everything was far and in random places so it was nice just being able to walk everywhere.

so after antwerp we went to....AMSTERDAM! we took a bus this time! another mode of transportation. almost have all of them...

so we got to amsterdam about 4 in the evening and it is so pretty. but first we went to where we were staying. we didn't stay in a hostel. or a hotel. or airbnb (although alex said there was one that was like a crate in a crane but it's like 1200 euros per night so a little out of the budget) so where did we stay? 

THE BOTEL! 

yup. a botel. it was so cool. i think it was my favorite. we had bunk beds. i had the top bunk. and we checked off the last mode of transportation! boat! we had to take a ferry to get to the botel then of course the botel. even though it didn't move. 

so here's amsterdam. when i look at pictures i want to literally cry it's so pretty.

just. just. 

i can't.

this place takes the cake as the most photogenic place ever. like really. when you see pictures of cities you know it's just one little section or place that's pretty or like that. but this is everywhere. these houses? everywhere. canals? everywhere. it's seriously so amazingly pretty. i could get lost on these streets and not even care. because everywhere i turned it's another gorgeous place. and ok some may think repetitive but each house seemed like it had it's own character and i just loved this place so much!

of course a bike cause it's amsterdam! 

how could you not love such a place?

and...i found the fault in our stars bench.

so this is the famous bench in amsterdam from the movie the fault in our stars. i wish a million times i got a picture facing it so you could see and match up the background but i didn't think of that when i was there and i think alex was already annoyed i made him walk across the bridge to the other side to take a picture. let's go again?

but yeah this movie is decent. it's good. and i almost cried when i got to the bench to be honest.

judge me.

insert bawling my eyes out face here cause i might.

also fun fact about the bench: it's been stolen quite a few times but now it's bolted/cemented into the ground so no more stealing the bridge. dang it.

i actually didn't see any tulips...woops.

let's play find corinne! it's a twist on where's waldo.

we rented bikes and i have never been happier. honestly. when people ask me what my favorite memory is 

(well no one really asks but i always know what i'd say if i was asked)

i would normally say rowing a boat in spain.

or harry potter studio tour.

and now riding a bike in amsterdam is tied with those guys also. even though half the time we were confused on where we were going and a little stressed on figuring out the biking system (some roads there was a bike lane on one side of the road and not the other but we didn't know how to get back to the bike place without taking that road so we weren't sure what to do)

it seriously was so fun and amazing. i wish i could bike everyday in amsterdam. i'd probably crash from looking around all the time but that doesn't matter.

and wasn't my bike so cute?!

bye world going to bike away my life.

so that was amsterdam. it was crazy and beautiful and went by way too fast. it was the most expensive place we went to (well the botel at least. although they included a delicious breakfast, more than just bread) and it was also one of the most beautiful places i went to. honestly. i wanted to cry when we were leaving. i hate leaving beautiful places. i just don't feel like i got my fill of amsterdam. i wasn't there long enough! and yeah it's really small. but i don't care. it's beautiful. they went to amsterdam on the amazing race and i almost started crying cause i loved it so much. 

is that weird? 

i just love seeing new places and then i get extremely nostalgic when i leave them. and there's always something i wasn't able to see or do and so i feel incomplete and need to go back. but honestly amsterdam. amazing. people think it's just weed and the red light district and honestly i didn't notice that many people smoking weed like i wasn't walking through clouds of smoke and stuff. and the red light district is one street. not the whole city. it's just so beautiful. gah. i love it. take me back.

so then we went back to germany via train. 

bye bye amsterdam i miss you.

we got back to germany about 1 in the morning, into hamburg so the city center...well we still had to get to alex and jeannette's apartment via multiple trains and then walking from the train station to the apartment. boy we were tired. but that's the life of a world traveller and i love it. so we got back and went to bed then in the morning i was off to the airport to go to paris then back to nantes. sad day for corinne. :(

i honestly believe since i've been here i have seen the most beautiful places. they take my breath away and pictures just don't do it justice. i always wonder "why can't my camera take the pictures i'm seeing with my eyes?" and alex explains to me the lenses and all that technical jazz. but honestly i just hope i never lose my memory and if i do then i thank the heavens i have so many pictures. it may seem annoying how many photos i take but i don't care. it's so i can go back and relive those moments. and i love seeing other peoples pictures or seeing a picture online or in an article or in the snapchat stories of different cities and i know exactly where they are. where they're standing and what's around because i've been there. honestly it's one of my favorite things. it's so amazing and cool and i love it. i love travelling! i love seeing new places and new cultures and buildings and people and EVERYTHING! yeah au pairing is super difficult so many days. but it's given me the opportunity to live in france and be able to go on adventures and see so many great places. and it was awesome to be able to do this trip with my brother and his girlfriend. alex and i usually don't get along well but for once we did and it was quite surprising given the stress of travelling to so many places within a week and our different travel styles and everything. we only got in one little tizzy and we got over it. with the help of jeannette of course. without her who knows what might've happened. but it was so fun and so amazing and if i could go back to all these places i would in a heartbeat. i'm so happy i've been able to travel and that my dad helped us out to make it a reality and that the family was flexible and understanding with me that i was able to take a week off to do this and gah. it was amazing. best trip of my life. even though it was on the major cheap, like "we'll buy a baguette and cheese and meat and split it up" (they were trying to tell me usually they just buy a hunk of cheese and meat and a baguette and take a bite of each and it's like a sandwich in their mouth but that's fine for a couple but with me i told them we can splurge on sliced food ;) ) but it was totally fine and we did eat at a couple nice places. i just love living and travelling and i'm so happy i had this opportunity before i got married or had a dog or kids or any real responsibilities. life is beautiful and the world is beautiful and that's all i'm trying to say basically.

ok i'm done. 

:)