We are already 12 days on the road in North Carolina and I finally managed to put something on the blog. As this is the case, be prepared for a long one.
Our trip here has been fully packed with activities up to now, as you may already have guest from the entries on the blog by Nick. As we are very busy and I didn't read all of the blog, pardon me if I repeat some stuff.
I quick summary of the trip from my point of view:
The Americans arranged a special welcome for us, as it was raining cats and dogs upon arrival in Durham. We felt at home right away. And then came the first nasty surprise (all people from NC should skip the following part). We went to a bar called Thylers because they had a lot of beers (rain and beer, just like home). The hosts said that NC was famous for it's BBQ so I took the BBQ plate with fries. Now, BBQ in NC doesn't mean grilled meat. It means slowly cooked, shopped up pork. So imagine my surprise. And as if that was not enough, the local BBQ sauce is VINIGAR, on pork! And on top of that came the fries, WITH GARLIC ! But at least the beer was good :-).
After that, we rode up to the lake house by Hyco Lake. And what happens at the lake house, stays at the lake house. But just so you'd know, it involved beer, a speed boat, tubing, microwave dinners, sunny weather and some more beer.
First real thing to do: Durham. One of the tree cities making up the NC Triangle, downtown Durham has in recent years reinvented itself after near extinction. The old industrial buildings have been revamped and downtown is filling up with small businesses, restaurants, bars and people. We had a nice walk around the town and over the days visited the different Rotary clubs. We also had two vocational visits, which in my case were Durham solid waste management (and Sonoco) and Orange County solid waste management. We also went to the opening game of the Durham Bulls (baseball) and visited Duke University.
Next up: Raleigh. Capitol of NC, it was for some reason spared during the civil war and so hosts a lot of old buildings. Although "old" in the USA doesn't mean the same thing as in Europe. We walked around and visited the Supreme Court and a museum. And then of course came the Rotary clubs and I must say the strangest invention of all time: a breakfast club. So you can go to a Rotary meeting before work starts... In Raleigh there was a nice addition to the beer, being a wine bar :-). We also went to a jazz evening and vocational visits again. And we were getting more and more tired. Getting up early and doing tree or four different things on one day gets in to your system, even if the four things on one day consist of walk / lunch@club / museum / diner@club. And that's an easy day.
During the weekend we went to Wings over Waeyne. AWSOME :-). One big publicity stunt for the US air force, but who cares? It was a huge air show!
We are almost getting into the present, just a few more days to go :-).
On monday I had my next vocational. I got to ride around in a garbage truck (or as they call it, a 'recycling' truck) and pick up some cans with the big mechanical arm. After that we went to a huge recycling plant where they had a very sophisticated system to split the mixed plastic stream into the different types of plastic.
In the evening Filip bought himself a Blackberry Playbook. And when we got home it didn't work... We were supposed to be drinking beer (again) and playing pool, but he was whining all the time about his non-working playbook. We gave him a hard time :-). The day after that we spent a lot of time at the local Staples getting it fixed...
And that brings us to yesterday. We went to visit Wendell, a small town not far from Raleigh. We went to the local gun shop and were dazzled. Shotguns, M16, FN Herstal (Belgian) semi-automatics that are normally used by British special forces... And that to hunt deer? I would not want to be a deer in NC! And after that we went to a huge clothes labeling and printing company that makes it's own clothes in the US and labels them for universities and colleges around the country. High price but high quality and truly made in the USA (Bruce Springsteen).
In the evening we arrived at our third host family, in Wake Forest.
Today we had a huge brunch at the Lions Gate Inn B&B and toured a bit to see the town. In the evening we had our gazillionth presentation at the local Rotary Club, with good food and of course... beer. What did you expect?
And now it's late and my fingers are done typing for today. And what happens tomorrow? Who knows? Well... I do but I'm not gonna tell you in advance :-).
See y'all later,
Tim Balcaen
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