A gift to conquer her heart

Good morning. What is happening? What is going on? Welcome to Wingene, Belgium!

I know, the past 3 weeks I wasn't able to upload any blogpost, but I had my finals so my focus was mainly on passing these exams. Most of my finals went good, this thursday I will receive my marks, so it's time to start praying and hoping for the best!

We're at the end of January (time flies) so you know what this means: Valentine's day is around the corner. And for every guy out there who has a girlfriend, I know the struggle and pressure about finding the right gift for your girl. I have bought my present, but in this blogpost I will try to give you some advice on how to find the right gift for your girlfriend!

Jewelery
Girls love to look pretty, and what is more pretty than a personalised piece of jewelery? You can go to a jeweller and buy a beautiful necklace or earrings, but this website www.mynamenecklace.com makes these personlised jewelery for a small amount of money, and believe me: she will love the idea of having something with her that reminds of you. 

Something personal

my name necklace

Teddy bear
When your girlfriend goes to sleep at night she’ll dream of you when she gets a Valentine’s teddy bear. Just find the one you think is the cutest!

Even when you aren't there she can still snuggle you

Perfume

Have you ever seen a girl who doens't like perfume? Indeed, me neither. Girls love to wear perfume, so go to the closest shop and try to find the perfume which your girl will love. Oke, every girl is different and there are many different types of perfume: floral, oriental, green, .. I know for example that my girlfriend loves the floral type perfume, and for this the Si Eau De Parfum from Giorgio Armani is really amazing!

Si Eau De Parfum

Body Care

Something that I have learnt during my relationship is that girls love to take care of their body and that they really take time for it and use a lot of products. A perfect place to find all these products is Lush. Here you can find products such as bath bombs, bubble bars, face masks, shampoo,.. You can also buy gifts where they will try to combine as much products which she will love!

Let your girl feel like a princess with this gift box! 

Lush Love & Kisses

Chocolate and roses

Ahh the classic gifts. Some people will think that these gifts are too mainstream, that girls don't find them special anymore, but I can tell you: they still love it to receive them!

The classic gifts

Something personal

This is maybe the gift where you will have to think the most about. The weeks/months before valentine's day just open your ears and eyes and try to remember the little things that she will say: I want this book, I want this cd, I love this,.. When you have find something that she wants, the only thing you have to do is to buy it and try to convince your girlfriend to not buy that particulary product for the following weeks or months.

So these were my ideas for gifts that you should buy for your girlfriend, combine one of these gifts with a personal love letter and you will conquer her heart even more!

So you guys in 2 weeks!

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2015 was legend .. wait for it..

Good evening. What is happening? What is going on? Welcome to Wingene, Belgium!

First of all: happy New Year! I wish that all your dreams can come through! 31 December 2015, a hectic but a wonderful night. I spent my New Years eve at a party at Betekom (small village near Aarschot) with my girlfriend and her friends. My 2016 started with me kissing my girlfriend in a town that I had never heard before with people that I had never seen before in my life. In 2015 a lot of things happened in my life, and that's also what my new blogpost will be about.

My 100 days

This day is a special day, you celebrate the final 100 days of your secondary school career! There's a parade in the city, you do things with people of your grade, you have a party,.. But everything starts with the pre-100 days. We're almost 18 years old, so we use every occasion to have a drink, same thing happened here. The night before the 100 days everyone went to bars, got wasted and just did crazy things (sometimes too crazy, I have to admit). Me and my friends drank a few beers, but we decided not to be too drunk, because we were looking forward to this day ever since we started secondary school.

6AIT, just the best class ever

So friday 27 february 2015, the day I had been looking forward to since I started secondary school. The day started with whistling, throwing firecrackers everywhere, set off pyro,.. in the streets of Tielt. Everyone had to know that it was our 100 days and that it was going to be a special one! The day started with a breakfast that the school had organised. After that we had a team-building activity at the town square followed by a 'special' lunch that the school gave us. After terrifying the other kids at our school with setting off some more fire crackers we went to the bowling. Nothing special, everyone was just siked to start the parade. So, the parade. Every class of every school had to dress up. Our class decided to wear Panda onesies, because why not? Everyone gathered at the local park where the parade started. Then we all walked to the town square. More than a thousand people came looking at our parade, it was amazing! To finish this wonderful day we had a party until sunrise! 

my friend and I, enjoying the parade with a lot of confetti 

College

My final year at secondary school meant that I had to go somewhere else, I had to go to college! First I got graduated, I received this import piece of paper that decides your future. Deciding what you want to study isn't easy. After going to different universities and colleges I decided to study International Business Management at Artevelde college and university in Ghent. Why International Business Management? I always wanted to work or live abroad and do something in the economic sector, so I thought that this would be the perfect course for me! College is very different than secondary school: more work, not being compulsory to go to class, living in a dorm,.. College brings a lot of responsibilities with it, but so far I'm enjoying every minute of it! I made new friends, live in a dorm, just started a new life.

Trips

2015 was also the year when I went to 4 different countries. During spring break I went to Barcelona with my parents,brother and his girlfriend. I went there before, but I can't get enough of it! We visited Park Guëll, Sagrada Familia, Montjuic, Olympic Park, Camp Nou, and much more! Barcelona is the city where I found myself, I found my identity over here. This city will always have a special place in my heart, and I can't wait to go back there in September!

Barcelona, I love you! 

During the month May something else happened that I had been looking forward to since I started secondary school, I went on my culture trip with school to Prague, Czech Republic! We could choose between Prague and London, but my friends and I decided to go to Prague just because London is so close by. 11th May, 4 am. We all gathered at our school for a 15 hour bus drive to Prague. About this bus ride I'll only say this: it was a hell. After this long trip we arrived at our hotel, Golf hotel. Wonderful hotel: the food was amazing, big and modern rooms and very friendly personnel. The school planned out our trip. During the day we visited places such as the historical city center, the jewish ghetto, Terezin concentration camp and a local glass factory. During the evening we were free, we could go to the city center until a certain hour and then go back to the hotel with the bus. Once back at our hotel we had parties every night. It was just an amazing time!

I tried to make some new local friends, he's a cool guy

This has probably been the trip that I had most been looking forward to: my roadtrip in the North East of the United States of America. I always wanted to visite the US, and I finally did! We went to New York, Newport, Cape Cod, Boston, White Mountains, Albany, Niagara Falls (Canada), Bethlehem and Philadelphia. I won't describe every city seperately (otherwise this blogpost would become book) so I will say what I fascinated me the most. The cliché that Americans only want the biggest things is true. I think New York city is the perfect example for this: skyscrapers, SUV's, hamburgers,.. I'm impressed Americans! Oh yeah, about your food habits: we Europeans don't really like to have fries and hamburgers combined with a milkshake as breakfast, so we decided to go to Dunkin' Donuts. Man, the first time I went there I thought I was in heaven. I didn't knew that there were that much types of donuts.. Since then we decided to go there every morning. Combined with a mango black tea the perfect start of the day!

The bigger the better

The thing that dissapointed me the most were the Niagara Falls. I thought that these were in the middle of the nature, not that you could find the Canadian version of  Las Vegas next to it.. The falls were nice, but not to spend your entire weekend over there. The place that I will always remember is Amish County. They have no pc, no gsm, no radio, no tv. They only have their friends and God, but they're still the happiest people that I have ever seen. Just amazing! My roadtrip ended with the possibility of missing our flight because we were stuck in traffic. Not just a regular one, a traffic jam of 6 hours. We were in Philadephia and had to go to Newark, a trip of 2 hours. Our flight was at 6 pm so we decided to go to the airport at 11 am, so we would be well on time. This would have happened, only if they didn't decided to close the only highway to Newark Airport.. A 50 mile traffic jam combined with a motorway with just too many traffic lights, imagine the frustration and panic the we had! But everything went well, we were able to check-in, go through security and board in just 30 minutes (that's how you should do it Brussels Airport!).

Most fascinating people I have ever met

The love of my life

2015 was an important year for me. I graduated, I had my dream vacation, I found my own identity back but I also found the love of my life. 24th of June, a day that I'll remember for the rest of my life. I had just finished my final oral exam and I was waiting at the train station with a white rose in my hand, just to see her coming off the train. I had met her a few weeks before, and ever since then I knew that she was special, that she was no ordinary girl. The girl her name is Cato, she is 17 years old and lives 100 km away from me, but most important: she's the love of my life. We have been together 6 months, but during our relationship we have had some problems, but as Bob Marley once said: “The truth is, everyone is going to hurt you. You just got to find the ones worth suffering for.” And ladies and gentlemen, I have found her! I'll do everything to make her happy just because she means the world to me. 

“You know you're in love when you can't fall asleep because reality is finally better than your dreams.” 

So this was my review on how my 2015 went. And I got to say,  2015 you were legend.. wait for it.. dary, legendary! Let's hope that 2016 will be as exciting and fun as 2015!

See you guys in 2 weeks with a new blogpost! 

P.S.: you may have noticed that my lay-out changed, thanks to my wonderful girlfriend! I just love it, I hope you do too! 

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life as a 'hipster'

Good evening everybody. What's happening? What's going on? Welcome to Ghent!

It's 14 december 2015, final week before the Christmas Holidays and also final week of the semester. This doesn't only mean that my finals are coming up, but also that my first semester as a freshmen college student has ended.

Going to college, it was a huge step in my life. New people, new friends, new city,.. In my whole life, I was used of doing the same things, at the same time, with the same people at the same location. During elementry and secondary school my whole life was programmed for me. Parents, teachers, doctors,.. they all decided what I did. In my whole life I thought I had freedom, but I only discovered my true freedom when I came to college. As I said in one of my earlier blogposts, I decided to grow my beard at the end of high school. In the beginning, people hated it! My dad always made these 'jokes' that I should shave it off or that I wouldn't find any girlfriend (in your face dad!), my friends and classmates always told me that I was becoming a Jihadi, a teacher even asked me if I were a muslim and if I had some radical muslim thoughts.. Like, what the f*ck society? In what kind of world do we live if a person can't do what they want, without being designated as a weirdo or even a Jihadi?

My girlfriend told me a few weeks ago: "you don't belong in the countryside", and I thought about it, and she is 100 % correct. I grew up in the countryside and have lived their for my whole life. When you live in a small village as I do, everyone knows who you're and what you did. People in the countryside love people who live according to the standards and hate people who are a bit 'different'. My friends at secondary school always told me that I am a hipster. And yes, maybe I'm. I'm not the ordinary guy, not anymore. Before, I was this guy who did what society wanted him to do, but that's not who I'm, that's not how I want to live my life! I want to live how I want, I want to wear the clothes that I want, I want to do my hair and beard how I want, I just want to be who I really am.

The past years, I always had fought with the thought of who I really am. But everything changed when I went to Barcelona during the spring break. I love photography, I love taking pictures of everything. When I did this back home, everyone thought that I was being crazy: "what is this weirdo doing with his camera?" "Is he planing to burgle this house?" and so on.. When I did this in Barcelona, everyone acted normal. I saw people wearing these 'risky' clothing, having a beard and making photographs, and nobody acted suprised. I loved it! The same happened this summer when I was in New York, Boston and Philadelphia. People can be who they want to be when they live in a city!

Some pictures that I have taken while I was in NYC, Boston, Philadelphia and Barcelona

So living in Ghent and going to college in Ghent, it had a huge impact on me! I can finally wear what I want te wear, I can finally listen to the music that I want to listen to, I can finally do my passion (photography) without seeing people staring at me or gossiping about me. When you have lived your whole life in a cage as I did, and when you finally can be who you want to be, you can't describe this feeling. College has given me so much: my freedom, my identity, but also this blog.

As you know, this blog is compulsory for our Business English course. But for me it has been much more than only this blog about school, it has been a tool of telling my story to the world, of sharing my life to the world. And I love it! That's why I decided to continue this blog, even when the course has ended. Ofcourse I will have to change the name of this blog, but the subjects will be the same!

So, this was the big news that I had announced last week, I hope you're looking forward to it as much as I do! :)

See you in 2 weeks with a new blogpost, goodbye!

PS: because photography is my big passion, I'll try to post some pictures everytime when I post a blogpost!

Finals are coming to town!

Goodmorning everybody. What's happening? What's going on? Welcome to Ghent!

Yeah, if you're as much of a no-lifer as I am then you probably recognise the intro that I used. Yes it's the intro that Ben Brown (YouTube vlogger) uses in his YouTube clips. I was watching his latest clip when I realised: "hey I should write a new blogpost", so please don't judge! ;)

So 6 December. In Belgium this is kinda a national holiday for kids. Sinterklaas ( Saint Nicholas) comes to every house and brings gifts for every child, just because he can! But, I'm 18 years old, the days that I was so excited to get my presents are far behind and the only thing special about this day is: shoot, I have to study because my finals are coming.. But don't worry, this blogpost will not only be about my finals, because I don't want to make you depressed! I will talk about what is going on with my life, what has happened in the past months and what will happen in the future!

We had the autumn vacation. My parents went on a trip to Germany, but because I had some trial exams I wasn't able to join them :( luckily they were so kind to buy me a Borussia Dortmund jersey, thanks mom & dad! During this vacation I also worked a bit, college life is expensive you know.. I also found the love of my life! We all have this one person in our life that means so much for you that you would do everything for them, well I found her!

After the autumn vacation we had our trial exams. A trial exam of Accounting and Business Economics. I was kinda scared for these exams. I know, you won't get any marks for it, but it still is an exam! But luckily everything went fine! Without doing that much effort, I was able to get good grades, let's hope that I will have as much luck during my finals! After these trial exams, college went on: go to class, make notes, come home, do homework, make summaries and try to do some tasks for in the future. Also we made some test for International Business English, a listening and vocabulary test. Both tests went good, so it was worth it to give up social life for a certain period!

During the last months something else happened. Curatio had his party week! As you already know, I'm in a student society called Curatio. During the week of the 16th of November, Curatio celebrated their third birthday! Every day of the week, they planned an event. I only went to 2 of those, because I'm too broke to go out every day of the week.. On monday we had a quiz, our team (team fantastic, I know lame name) didn't end last, so that's something to be proud of, isn't? On wednesday we had a gala ball. Everyone was dressed up, every schacht (new member of the student society) had to prepare the decoration or snacks and it was just a wonderful evening!

But yeah, finals are coming! Everybody hates them, but it's something that has to happen.. When you go to class, everybody is talking about it. People say that they should have done more already, some people say that they won't go out anymore, people are sharing their summaries (because sharing is caring!), ... I don't know what I should expect. I think I'm well prepared for these finals. I already made most of my summaries, I'm already trying to gain some sleep and I didn't go out for like 3 weeks. For me, the hardest part about our finals is that we have them during the holidays. I love Christmas and Newyears eve, these are like the most important days of the year for me. But hey, I would rather study during the holidays than studying while everybody is going on a vacation in August!

So, for all my fellow college students out there: good luck and stay strong! 1 month of hard work, and then we have 2 weeks of vacation!

See you in two weeks guys with another blogpost and some big news! ;)

PS: as I said in this blogpost, I'm a huge fan of Christmas. So yeah, I decided to change the layout of my blog, hope you like it!

8750 in Ghent

It has been more than 2 months that I 'live' in the center of Ghent, so I thought: hey why not make a blogpost about one of Belgians most beautiful cities.

Ghent: capital of the province East-Flanders, one of Belgiums most famous university cities, one of the most annoying accents that we have in Flanders,.. As a born and raised West Fleming, I grew up with a lot of prejudices about Ghent. I grew up in a village near Bruges (capital of the province West Flanders), and the hate between Bruges and Ghent goes back to the medieval time. West Flemish people think that Bruges is the best and most beautiful city in Flanders and vice versa. So, me as a West Fleming and 8750er (Wingene for life) who decided to go studying in Ghent, imagine what kind of a prejudices I had about this city.

First of all I had to convince my parents that I wanted to go study in Ghent, and not in Bruges. My mother always told me: "when you have found a course that you want to follow, and when they have this course in a school in Bruges, then you'll go to that one". So luckily I decided to follow IBM, a course which you can only follow in Ghent or Antwerp, and because I don't want to go to Antwerp (another story about prejudices) they would have to let me go to Ghent.

So, I got enrolled in the course IBM and I even convinced my parents to let me stay in a dorm, what now? The first 2 weeks I kinda went on a mission to discover the city of Ghent. I may live about 30-40 minutes away from it, but in my whole life I have been to Ghent maximum 10 times. And I got to admit: I'm in love with Ghent. My dorm is located perfectly: a 5-10 minutes walk to our main campus, a 5 minutes walk to the Veldstraat ,a supermaket located 150 meters from my doorstep, a tram stop located 100 meters from my dorm,.. it's a dream that came true. I always wanted to live in a big city (mainly because I grew up in the countryside) and now I kinda do!

Living in a big city has his pros and cons. Because you live in a big city, you discover new and amazing places. I discovered new places such as Wasbar, Head or Tails (one of my favourites), Foley's and many more. Something else which is amazing about Ghent is the view. One of my hobbies is photography, I like to make photo's of everything. And I got to say: Ghent is truly a goldmine. You can find everything over here: nature, amazing clouds, architectural beauties,.. Some examples:

    

One of the biggest disadvantages is the noise pollution, this is especially hateful when you want to get some sleep after a night out with your friends or student movement..

As a born and raised West Fleming it's hard to say this, but I fell in love with this wonderful city called Ghent. I always wanted to live in a big city and now I finally am! I try to enjoy every minute of it. When I'm not in my dorm studying (something that needs to be done ofcourse) you can always find me in the Head or Tails, Starbucks or just on a mission to discover new places in this heaven on earth!

This blogpost was about how I fell in love with Ghent, see you in a few weeks! :)

Society is a bitch

It's the Ascension holiday, perfect time to write a new blog post. And this time it will be about me, who I really am.

17 August 1997, it was 6 AM and a small kid decided that he was ready to explore this giant world. That small kid got the name Lars Vergote, named after one of Swedish best football players ever: Henrik Larsson. Thus far my relationship with any Scandinavian country, because everytime when I go on a holiday people think that I'm either Scandinavian or Russian.. I got to admit, I don't mind to drink some Wodka, but hey who doesn't? 

I grew up in Wingene, it's a village in West Flanders, and yes it's true what they say about Wingene: there are more pigs than people in our village! I grew up with my parents and 2 brothers: Bram (11 years older) and Pieter (14 years older). I went to Centrumschool (way better than Sint Elooi or Wildenburg, Wingene kids will understand the hate) and I also played football at our local team: KVC Wingene. The first ten years of my life I was obsessed with football, and I don't want to brag about myself but I was really good at it. I scored each season around 150-180 goals and Club Brugge wanted me! But then, on a warm October day in 2007 my life changed forever. 

Try to find me ;)

I was playing football at the playground when I got stuck with my foot in a subsidence. I wasn't looking to my feet and wanted to keep running so my kneecap made a 360. Before I knew, I was lying in the hospital having a knee operation. Conclussion after 4 months of rehabilitation: 1/10 of my kneecap is dead and I will never be able to play football again. When I heard this, my life collapsed because football was (and still is) a huge part of my life. A few years ago we tried to fix my kneecap again because the operation that I had wasn't performed well. So we went to the sports doctor of Club Brugge (my father works there) and he tried to flow some blood in my kneecap again by placing 5 aluminium pipes in it, but the harm has already been done. 

I'm not that kind of person who sits back and doesn't do a thing about it, so I started swimming at the Tieltse Zeeduivels. For the first time after my operation I finally was able to enjoy sports again. I even became third on the Flemish championship 200m crawl! But the amount of school work and intensive training schedule (training at 5:30 am before going to school) decided that I had to stop doing something that I liked, again. 

And life after that wasn't easy. Bad grades during my first year of secondary school, no motivation to do sports again which leaded to becoming fat, getting bullied, having difficulties making friends in secondary school,.. Secondary school wasn't really what I expected it to be. During my second year I was in a new class and made new friends, but the bullying never stopped. It was only during my final year that I decided to do something about.I realised for the first time that life is what YOU make of it. So I grew myself a beard (I always wanted to have one), changed my hairstyle and outfit and started jogging. For the first time in 6 years I was who I am, not a puppet of what society wanted me to be. And I got to say, it was the best decision of my life! 

So to all the kids out there, who are struggling in secondary school: be yourself, do what you want and what you think is best for you. Secondary school is only a phase in your life, don't let those kids decide who you are! 

To end this blog post, I want to share some lyrics of an amazing song (Sum41 - Fat Lip). It's kinda my life motto: " I don't want to waste my time, become another casualty of society". 

See you in a few weeks! 

A cocktail Overpoort & IBM please!

So two weeks have passed by since I posted my first blog post, wow time really flies! The past two weeks not that much happened, but I will do my best to tell about how life is in Ghent as an International Business Management student!

So, first of all it was Jonas his 18th birthday so we decided to give him some amazing but weird gifts and let him do some tasks at Overpoort, just because we can! It was a wonderful evening, we laughed and had so much fun, isn't that what college life is all about? Apart of the regular going out to the Overpoort we also had classes! The introduction to the different courses ended, so school was about to begin, and how...
During the third week, we received a few tasks to do, so I had to find the best way to do all my homework and to still have a social life, it was hard but I suceeded! Also during the past 2 weeks, my thoughts about the course have dissapeared. I thought that language would become a problem because with the specific vocabulary and that I wouldn't be able understand everything. But in the past weeks I realised that everything will go just fine!

During the fourth week most of the things stayed the same: go to class, come home, make homework and watch a movie or go out with my friends. One thing was different, I had my first Cantus! Together with some friends from my class we decided to go to a student organisation: Curatio. It's an Artevelde student organisation for everyone who studies IBM, Bedrijfsmanagement, Journalistiek and Communicatie management. So, my first Cantus... I didn't know what I could expect. We all heard some stories about people who went to a Cantus and what happens over there, but you never know if those stories are really true or exaggerated. Well I can tell you one thing: those stories are really true. During the Cantus a lot of things happened so I'm not going to tell everything, but if I can say one thing: Curatio are party animals!

So this was my second blog post, see you the next time with hopefully more stories!