I call shenanigans.

It has been beautiful for the last 2 days in Louvain-la-Neuve. Pleasant weather, sun shining, fluffy clouds... Clearly God is rewarding me for something. Probably for not doing what I'm about to tell you about.

Also, that hair salon I thought I found? Not a hair salon at all. Disappointment.

Today, I'm going to get political on you guys. I've been typing this post for a few days now at the suggestion of a few people, but nothing important like Sunday Dinner has happened so I can finally upload it today. I've probably told this story a thousand times since it happened (okay, 4; whatever), but one more time won't hurt. This, ladies and gentleman, is the story of last Thursday night.

WARNING: if you want to keep believing that I'm not a snarly beast, stop reading right now.

Thursday, Nick decided that I was going out; no excuses. To be fair, I've had a lot of excuses. I've been sick since before I went to Prague and I just don't like parties, especially ones where you're told to "dress to get dirty". I don't own things that can get dirty. No thank you. It was a convenient excuse. After a bit of half-hearted kicking and screaming, I gave in and sacrificed a pair of jeans, a sweatshirt, and a pair of shoes to the great kraken known as The Cercle Party.

Let me explain. The "cercles" are fraternities here. They throw crazy insane parties Sunday-Thursday, and none on the weekends because everyone's gone home to recover. According to our Belgian associates, Thursday is the biggest party because it's the last one of the week. These parties, from what I've been told, are disgusting. There's beer on the floor, some may get on your body, and there's a good chance you will be vomited on. There is no way you can convince me that this is fun. It's just not going to happen.

But I went, mostly so I could say, "That was miserable, I'm never doing it again." and never do it again. I digress.

We started the night at Kate's apartment. Kate is one of the girls here from Clemson; her roommates (all guys) are cool people, and they do a pretty good job of taking care of us poor, hopeless Americans. This is especially pathetic as half of them are American freshman age. I am being chaperoned by high school seniors: look at my life; look at my choices. Anyway, we hang out at Kate's for a few hours, playing card games and generally enjoying ourselves, and when the time comes we head to Casa, which is where the night's big shenanigans were supposed to happen. We're a pretty jolly bunch, all skipping and singing down the road.

And then it happened.

We're walking down the street in a mob acting like your typical 18-22 year olds on a Friday night only it was Thursday. Dylan (on of Kate's roommates), and I are making up the back of the line; we all love each other and everything is wonderful, and when Romeo, the only other black kid with us, makes what I assume was a joke (I honestly have no idea what he said), Dylan laughingly responds with, "Somethingsomethingsomething, you crazy n-word-which-I-refuse-to-say."

Oh no. He. Di'n't.

Yes. In fact, he did.

And I went from 0 to 500 in a very impressive half second.

Nick, bless him, was in the middle of Dylan and me, and I think he knew exactly what was about to happen because he looks at me with this miserable look on his face as if to say, "Oh God we are all going to die."

Me being me, which is to say an ill-tempered hoodlum prone to violent outbursts (no, really; it's true), reached across poor Nick and shoved. Hard. And then I stomped off, glaring and still pretty unhappy (to make the understatement of the year and it's only February), to the front of the group with Grace and Karen O., who I think saw me shove but did not hear what happened, and who now want to know why Dylan is looking after me, horrified and afraid for his life. (mild exaggeration; but if he wasn't he should have been)

I got over it in record time, and that says a lot because I get mad and stay that way for at least 3 days (no exaggeration). After a minute or 2 I stopped snarling, and I was almost okay with the world again when I look up and who is in front of me but Dylan, with Nick behind him for what I assume was moral/physical support: moral because the kid still looked petrified, and physical in case I decided to break his nose for funsies.

Dylan, poor boy, tried to explain to me that he didn't mean it like that, and it doesn't mean bad things here in Belgium, and he's not a racist (exact words: "I love black people!"). I'm not hearing it. I'm about to pound on dude's face, and I think Nick can sense this because he starts saying to him, "Say you're sorry. Say you're sorry. Tell her you're sorry." It was a step in the right direction, but we're a bit past sorries, love. Sorry. (see what I did there?)

Eventually, Dylan and I hugged it out in the street, but he spent the rest of the night coming up to me at random intervals and apologizing, even after I told him it was okay. We ended the night dancing together at Casa, and we all agreed to come out again together this week.

Now let's get down to business.

Truth be told, I was waiting on it from someone. Not from anyone in particular, but I was waiting on it because I've been around people and I know what to expect. People never grow out of that good old trial-and-error "let me see what I can get away with" thing kids do. The n-word is a big shiny diamond of "I might get my butt kicked for this but I'm gonna see how far I get", and who do you know that wouldn't go for a big shiny diamond? Exactly. NO ONE.

I do not expect this from everyone. Really I don't expect it from most people. But you never know. Even I've been wrong before. (EGO)

Moreover, I, for one, am having a hard time believing that the n-word is not offensive here. Everyone has their own version of it, and it's horrible in any language; you tell me it's not and I'll call you a liar. I fully realize that "punk" was originally British slang that referred to prostitutes, but the n-word was created to dehumanize and demoralize an entire race of people--it worked, too, and it looks to me like it's still doing a pretty good job of working to this day. It's an evil word, and I've never known evil things to reform themselves. I'm going to look into this, and if I'm wrong then I'm wrong, but as of right now, I call shenanigans.

If you don't know what movie that's from, you're obviously neither my age nor in college.