Luxembourg

The family and I went to Luxembourg Friday morning to visit E's sister and her son. I debated whether or not I was going to go with them, but decided to because I had never been to Luxembourg and I haven't actually traveled with the family yet, because every break I have had I went to see Alex. Well, Alex is back in Iowa until June when he goes to London soooo you know. Luxembourg is about two hours away from Strasbourg by car. Ir gets airsick, boatsick, and carsick before the trip D and I had a contest to see who would sit in the middle, I lost and so I got to experience her car sickness up close and personal for two hours. Gas here is bought by the liter which is insane, we bought 37 liters which is about 9 gallons for 50 euros which is about 67 dollars and we had to fill up twice plus almost 50 euros for tolls, yikes!
Anyway we got to Luxembourg which is a country that has uumm one city. It was beautiful trees hilly and Luxembourg is extremely rich so the roads where nice and the builldings were modern and new and all the old ones are well preserved I couldn't believe it. Not that France is dirty or particularly poor, just in comparison. We had lunch with E's sister at the European Union which is another government building that seems to do exactly what the Council of Europe does, S was trying to explain it to me, they are apparently two completely seperate entities that do pretty much the same thing...or at least that's what I got out of it. We walked around the city center of Luxembourg which is clean and beautiful with shops and very typically European. Afterwards we went to E's sister's house and met her son, Chris. They live in a gorgeous large home in a village near the city. Chris is 16, he is definitely a typical 16yr old, awkward and all of that. I loved him haha he reminded me of my little brothers or my big brothers at that age haha we got along fabulously. We all went to dinner with another Greek family and had a blast. I hear more Greek than I do French, and I am learning new words every day, who knew!
After dinner I went downtown with Chris and his friend Costasdinos, Constantine in English or Costos for short (I don't know how to spell his name). Costos was exactly how I picture a Greek adolescent boy, patriotic, loud, awkward, cocky, a little stupid, and completely lovable. His English was superb and he made it his job to introduce me to everyone on the street. Luxembourg is very small so we met a lot of people. It was a lot of fun. When I go out in Strasbourg with friends they are all international mostly older than me (late 20's) expats who have moved to Strasbourg because of an urge to learn about another culture. We speak in English because we don't know French and despite our desire to learn about another culture we hover together and speak English because it's comfortable and safe in a place were we are completely out of place. When I went out in Luxemembourg it was with high school students who live there. We spoke in English because they were able to do so and make me comfortable. Despite them being between 15 and 17 the conversation switched from French to Greek and English. I guess it is the difference between learning about a culture and being part of a different culture.I really had a good time and I can't wait for the summer when I will learn more about Greek culture and spend more time with the people I met.

ooo yeah, in the city center there was a McDonalds, Pizza Hut, Chi Chi's, and a Subway