Let's writeup a rather...interesting journey I was doing last weekend. Some of you (the people who this is directed to) may have heard of it as the infamous "F|A IRL meeting" . You might have stumbled upon a blog of a certain fintard about the very same topic. So this is basically the same but from another point of view (from a co-leader and archangel that is), without those nasty spelling and grammar mistakes and overall in a better English, hehe.

Alright, let's get this started. My very first journey all on my own via train. The ride took about 6 hours and all I can say is that the ICEs are a nice way of travelling. All trains slower than ICEs suck.

When I arrived at Antwerp Centraal, a quite impressive train station with over 4 levels and lots of stores, I finally received the awaited messages from Alex, that she and the others were about to meet me. First challenge for me was then to find Starbucks, which took me quite a while due to my poor orientation skills. Eventually I found the way all by myself and had some time to sit down and contemplate about the meeting. What would the persons be and look like? How would I react? Would it be a loud group already waving and shouting out for Raziel as soon as they would arrive or the opposite? I wasn't that nervous but rather excited about the new experiences and friends I would make. As Alexandra was the only one I had made contact with (via webcam chat) and from her acting on forums I figured she would be the kind of loud, opened-up and nonstop talking girl you could have lots of fun with. I didn't know anything about the others, little about Joske, who was the only other NQ person.

I was surprised when they finally arrived. Alex was rather shy and quiet, not like I thought she would be. The others looked like nice bunch of guys and the atmosphere was friendly too. No overwhelming first meeting but the usual when you first meet a bunch of unknown people. We introduced ourselves to one another, preferably by our gaming names, Alex being the exception. (The Dude, AJ, Joske, DFighter, Yellow Flash and Raziel) while we were waiting for Moron and shagger who both, due to unfortunate circumstances, failed to join us in the end. So we took a metro to a pub. I immediately lost trust in our guide the Dude, as his first accomplishment was to lead us in the wrong direction. We arrived at the pub nevertheless while Belgium was greeting us with its own interpretation of summer - it was raining hard.

In the pub, we got into talking and drinking beer or whiskey. I contributed with my own set of (bad?) jokes and an inspiring talk about food. Logically, the next goal was to find a place to eat. At the chosen Italian restaurant we were having a good time and pizza, except for Alex. What she ordered and did to her pizza was a crime, a cruelty, just plain evil, which I also told her several times that day.

On the way back to the train station (Dfighter was about to leave us) I had lots of fun talk with all the guys. I guess I was talking and joking with them a lot. Dfighter, who got rid of his pizza in a natural but not very elegant way as soon as he was out of the restaurant, was soon in his train and the rest of us was about to do some sightseeing. I eventually left my heavy backpack at AJs German car (I'm not good with cars, it was a VW Golf, right?).

We soon had a nice view of Antwerp from the top of an interesting building with lots of "art" inside. While Yellow Flash and AJ raced to top, we others fully enjoyed the purpose of the escalators.

After that, we wrapped up the meeting with two rounds of pool. It was the Dude,Alex and me vs. Yellow Flash, Joske and AJ. We won 2:0, or rather the Dude won. I hope Yellow will share the video footage of the fails made there. It was hilarious. The entertaining value cleary outweighed the poor quality of the game.

It was then time to say goodbye to Joske, the Dude and Yellow Flash. AJ drove Alex and me home to Dordrecht where I would stay at Alexandra's house. When we arrived at said house, I was receiving a warm welcome by her mother and some friends of her mother and also the kitty, small, orange, cute, hyperactive kitty. I suppose my gift - a bottle of wine soon emptied by them - made them open up even more along with the German bits Alex threw in once in a while (Scheisse [shit], Ich muss Pipi machen [i have to pee] and Durchfall [diarrhea]) the last one made me laughing quite hard. She also has a brother but I only saw him when I was half asleep, I guess I was partly in dreamland then. Mumbled a "hi" though.

Well the rest of the evening we were outside at the Rivers Festival that took place in Dordrecht. Many bands and beer and Dutch food, delicious Stroopwafels, for example. Lots of people were out there and everyone was wearing some cheap pearl necklaces in different colours. I got a violet one.

But we went back to Alex's house having some forums and Xfire convos at her laptop. Kai, for instance, started to write to Alex with "Hi Raziel" and insisted on talking German with me and ignoring Alex. But the small Kitty took her full attention from time to time, so that was no problem. I also discovered (much to my amazement) that she owned a yellow Gameboy Color (I had that one too once) and Pokemon Crystal.

At the next day, we went to some cafes with Yellow Flash who arrived at Dordrecht with the train. It was a partly sunny day (awesome since sun was a rarity these days). So we enjoyed Palm and Hertog Jan aside with bitterballen (deep fried balls of beef and something else, maybe mashed potatoes).

Also I cooked Maultaschen for Fintard and Dino. We enjoyed them with salad and Jupiler on the balcony with some cool music we could hear from the festival. Kind of a rock mashup, we tried to sing along, but well, they sometimes surprised us with another song starting right in the middle of the other lol.

Even though I met a creepy man who was looking for trouble or a fight at the train station when we said goodbye to Fintard, the day was outstanding.

I travelled home the next morning. I had a great experience from this weekend and met nice people there. Pictures can be found in the trials and members section, FA IRL meeting reviews topic by DFighter. I certainly would like to attend another one in the future.

Also I want to thank Alexandra for the hospitality, Yellow Flash for the company that weekend, AJ for the drive and Joske, The Dude and DFighter for the nice time we had that saturday.

Other things I have learned:

- Demote the Dude for hacking in pool.

- Demote Alex for torturing pizzas.

- Demote Yellow Flash for being a fintard and multiple fails.

- Demote Dfighter for the pizza incident.

- Demote AJ for drinking a scotch as driver.

- Demote Joske for speaking Dutch in main chat with Alex.

- Dutch food is lekker.

- Alex's Kitty gets her whole attention as soon as he appears.

- Beer is more expensive and served in smaller glasses than in Germany, but still good.

- Dordrecht is a nice city with lots of cafes and bars.

- How weed smells.

- Summer in Belgium and the Netherlands equals rain.

- We didn't split up the bills exactly. Whoever had his purse and money out first, was paying.

- Meeting people over the internet can be lots of fun.

- Antwerp and Dordrecht would make good maps in ET, COD and BF.

- Alex is a mixture of Applejack,Rainbow Dash and Rarity according to the Pony Personality Test.

Archangel out.