The Blog: BELGIUM!

BRUSSELS

Liz and I arrived in Brussels the day after Christmas. We started off in our usual fashion by just wandering around the city until well after dark--past the art museums, through the Christmas market, and into the Grand Place, where just by chance, we happened to be right on time for the start of their epic light show. The Grand Place is probably the most elegant, impressive square in Brussels (encircled by the City Hall, and many other ornate stone buildings). The show lit up every building simultaneously, accompanied by dramatic music. It very easily could’ve been cheesy, but it was actually pretty cool. Just watching the light play over those ornate facades was awesome, and the music ranged from joyful opera choruses to some trippy, sinister, Tubular Bells kind of stuff.

Welcome to the Christmas Market!

City Hall

The rest of Grand Place

We also found these rather odd/amusing/blasphemous things:


Come hang out with Aladdin and friends in the hookah lounge!

Apparently in this version, the Baby Jesus was delivered by a stork

Projecting Santa's face over a church at Christmas time...oh, the snarky implications are endless

Yes, these are a bunch of creepy, black-lighted Jesus figurines. And since you probably can't see it in the picture, these were in what appeared to be a hair salon.

For our second evening in Brussels, we went bar/café hopping: from a chandelier-lit, Belle Époque café, to a 1930’s jazz bar with live music, to a little restaurant in the Grand Galleries where we got Belgian waffles, and finally, hidden at the end of a tiny alley, to an old, wood-paneled bar with gorgeous stained glass windows, and a snug, woodsman’s lodge kind of feel that was perfect for winter. We even found some beers we liked--they make some nice fruity ones called Kriek and Framboise.

The third day, Liz slept in while I went to the Magritte Museum. I did a report on Magritte in the 5^th grade and a lot of his images have stuck with me ever since (some of you might remember that I was Magritte for Halloween this year), but I didn’t realize just how awesomely varied and prolific his work was. He used so many different styles and mediums, and he took such simple things and mashed them together in odd and oddly thought-provoking ways. His paintings really give you this strange, suspended feeling of being in another world where our common-sense expectations for everyday life just don’t apply.

In the evening we went out to this Moroccan restaurant called the Kasbah, which, although it had excellent food in generous portions, and really awesome decor with dozens of colorful lanterns hanging from the ceiling, had some of the worst service EVER. Actually--make a note of this, ye travelers--BELGIUM has the worst service ever. (And I live in Paris, which is legendary for bad service). But their Belgian counterparts leave Parisian waiters in the dust, in the race to provide the most neglectful service in the world. They do it with great energy too. Seriously every restaurant/cafe/bar we went into we had about the same experience. Everything takes forever (we usually had to get our menus by stealing them off another table) and yet at the same time, somehow the waiters are all rushing around like chickens with their heads cut off. I wouldn't really be one to judge this, but my sister is a waitress and in her professional opinion these restaurants weren't even understaffed. They're just full of frantic incompetent waiters. I advise anyone going into a Belgian restaurant to bring their aircraft marshaling wands as a hailing device.

That said, the food was yummy, and nowhere was it better than in...

GHENT

We day-tripped out here on our last full day in Belgium. It's a cute little town, with lots of old stone and brick buildings, courts, cathedrals, a belfry, and a castle.

Ghent has as surprising amount of street art as well.

We went up into the Belfry at night, where we got to see a replica of the flying dragon that adorns the top of the tower.

There were some beautiful night views over the city as well, but my camera was no good at capturing them.

We had dinner at a place called 't Klok Huys, which hands down was the most awesome meal we ate during the whole trip. We had two traditional Belgian dishes. One was called Waterzooi, a kind of chicken soup (pictured below), and the other was a Belgian beef stew with french fries. Both were incredible. I would highly recommend these if you're ever in Belgium.