Subject: art nouveau, comics, chocolate and more

Date: Wed, 27 Sep 2006

So here's the one you've all been waiting for - my first trip email.
I arrived back in Paris Monday just before midnight from a romp around Belgium.
Bright and early Saturday morning, 6:30 AM, I found myself half-asleep at the Eurolines bus station in the outskirts of the glorious city known as Paris. Alex, a friend from the program, and soon to be travel buddy arrived shortly after I checked in.

Three-and-a-half hours later, we landed somewhere in Brussels, without a detailed map, the bleak facade of an industrial monstrosity rising up at our left. This certainly didn’t look like where we wanted to be. So, we wandered into the bus ticket office and asked the way to the city center. We were pointed in the general direction and set out wandering blindly as bats in daylight toward what we hoped was civilization. Right off the bat, we stumbled upon some cartoon murals, which randomly dot the walls of buildings all over the city like Honey I shrunk Tintin. As we marched on, backpacks in tow, we passed our first chocolate store. So we did we do? We got chocolate of course. We bought five pieces at Planet Chocolate (which I remember seeing recommended in a guide book) and immediately sat on a stoop outside, ready to devour our delicious treats with flavors as exotic as Lilly of the Valley in dark chocolate, and cinnamon in white.

Now, I always heard that Belgians make the best chocolate, but I had always figured that if you can make chocolate well one place, you can make it just as well the next place. Well throw that theory out the window. It’s not true. The chocolate there IS better. Indescribably rich and creamy, flavorful and bursting with deliciousness. I don't know how they do it. The chocolate is heavenly.

Trekking on we eventually marched straight into the Grand Place, which contains the old guild houses and Hotel de Ville. Stunning architecture unlike most I've ever seen in person danced like ballerinas in floaty tutus before our eyes. The mercury on our architecture thermometers bursting out the top with the heat of awe, we set out on a mission to find the Mannekin Pis, the ever-touristed fountain of a boy peeing. Yes, you read right, There, we bought a waffle, which was covered in strawberry and banana slices and dripping with chocolate. Again, we sat right down on a stoop and dug in, chocolate oozing onto our anxious fingers and dappling itself over our faces. Again, another culinary delight.

Then, we meandered back to the Grand Place and went to the city's museum. Around the museum, we saw some old art, made friends with an Algerian guy Abdel who is studying in Paris and his Algerian friend Imene, and had our chance to view some of the hundreds of outfits loving constructed for the Mannekin Pis. It's tradition to dress him up and people from all over the world send in their hopeful future ensemble for him. He’s donned everything from Mickey Mouse costumes to African warrior outfits. He’s the best dressed man this side of the Atlantic Ocean.

Following this: the Jannekin Pis mission. Down a small side street, we found her, prisoner behind iron bars, squatted and, like her friend Mannekin, taking an eternal piss. On the way, we stumbled across a free museum with local fashion creations and an exhibit of a designer who used recycled objects to make dresses. Gave me some interesting ideas. Don’t be surprised if you see me walking around in a dress made of filmstrip soon.

All en route throughout the ville, we stopped in every chocolate store to scrounge up any free samples. We walked around a lot, saw noted buildings, came across a random parade, a random free concert, and then decided to head to the hostel pre-dinner to drop off our bags.
Needless to say, with our lack of good maps, we got lost going to our lodging. During our lost wanders, though we found a thrift store with a sale. Yes, that evidently exists. Most notably, I got myself some really quality suede and wool winter boots for 1 Euro (the workers said to me, "well it's usually 3 but we want you to have it for 1”). They were quite nice to us and made us feel as warm and fuzzy as my new boots.

Finally, we found the hostel, checked in and dropped off our stuff. Hungry, we then found restaurant for dinner, a warm, family run Turkish pizza and other foodstuffs joint. After our dinner the waiter came over and gave us free tea. Then, as if that wasn't nice enough, 30 minutes later he brings over two large slices of cake on the house. It was the owner's birthday and well, they had some extra cake and wanted to give it to us evidently.

If the night couldn't get better, we decided to go to a marionette show at the local bar/marionette theater called Toone. On the way, however, we came across another free concert, this one with really well known European bands (or so it seemed). Needless to say, we had a blast at the free concert, and (sadly) did not see the marionette show. But hey, free concert. No regrets.

The next day, morning we hit up the local markets, one a disappointment, the other an antique market with plenty of things I found interesting to look at. Back at the Grand Place, we tried to see the inside of Hotel de Ville. You see, we’d been told by guard the day before it was open. Evidently not, but we tried anyhow. Pretending like we didn't know it was wrong, we walked right in the open door and got through the entryway and halfway up the stairs before a guard saw us and politely informed us that, no, the Hotel de Ville was, in fact, not open for visitors right now. “Oh really? Oh we thought it was. Sorry sir.”

Well by then it was lunch time and we started hiking over to the Musée des Beaux Arts, looking for a restaurant en route. Well lady luck shown her pretty, golden face down us again and we spotted after ten minutes walk a mass of white tents. What that’s mean? A festival of course! A marching band played tunes in a central pavilion as we wandered into the Gascone and wine festival. It was small, but replete with free samples – sweet, refreshing, fresh-pressed grape juice, dried fruit, prosciutto, and of course satisfying regional wines and other local grape-based alcohol (a bit too potent for me, but worth trying).

Lunch was at a very cool, art nouveau-interior restaurant with inventive pita sandwiches.
The Musée des Beaux Arts unfortunately had many areas closed for renovation, but I still got to see some Chagall, Magriette, David's “Death of Marat”, Rubeuns, and Brugel, to name the
big ones.

Then it was to the train station were five minutes later we caught a train to nearby Mechlen in hopes of catching a bell ringing concert at the world's foremost bell ringing school. I hear those accepted to the school are born with a silver bell in their mouth. Their first cry sounds like this: “diiiiiinnnnngrrrriiiiinnnnngdooooonnnnngg”. Unfortunately June-September schedule evidently did not include the end of September, but we walked around for hours and saw plenty of interesting buildings.

Back in Brussels that night, we got beers at Toone, the marionette bar. Belguim is also known for its beer, not just its chocolate and waffles and invention of many popular dances including the Macarena, the Electric Slide and the New York Rumba. I ordered some cherry beer, which was sufficiently tasteful and sweet and therefore quite palatable for me. Alex got a strong local beer called Barbar. I thought it might have elephants floating around in it, but no, no such luck.

Day 3: Upon the advice of so many, we caught the early train to Bruges, whizzing through the idyllic green fields of the Belgian countryside, which stood washed in a cool, morning light. The city was worth the scruples spent on the train ticket. We gorged our eyes on beautiful buildings and canals and our stomachs on the velveteen rich texture of more handmade chocolates. We climbed to the top of the town’s central bell tower, saw the richly ornate interior of the Hotel de Ville, and took in a lace making demonstration by old women with hands as gnarled as tree roots. Making lace is something I don't know I'd have the patience for. It involved hundreds of fine, hair-like threads, silvery pins and some unbeknown knowledge of how it’s all done. The day rolled forth as regal as a red carpet, and after a brief walk around a picture-perfect monastery, we arrived back to the train station with four minutes to spare before the departure our train back to Brussels. The train would land us there at 5:30 with 1.5 hours till our bus left for Paris.

This is where it gets interesting. The conductor on the platform we thought was for Brussels told us that we had the wrong platform. “Odd, this is the platform the schedule listed for Brussels,” Alex and I commented to each other. Being the trusting people we are (I didn’t know gullible was in the dictionary!), we went to the platform he thought the Brussels train was on, arriving just at the train sped into the station. Relieved to have caught the speeding bullet with wheels, we hopped on only, to discover as the train rolled away that not only were we on the wrong train, but it was going in the wrong direction. WOAH. What can you do in a situation like that besides the obvious reenact a scene from Casablanca? You laugh. I was pretty amused by the whole situation. The conductor told us to get off at the next stop where we would have to catch a train back to Bruges and then take the 5:30 back to Brussels. Well that would land us in Brussels with 30 minutes till our bus pulled away, and to top it off, our bags were dozing away in a locker at the hostel.

We needed a plan. On the train back to Brussels, we decided that Alex would buy dinner and then go right to the bus and try to make sure it didn't leave without us. I’d be on bag duty: as soon as the train screeched into the station, I’d marathon up to the hostel (10, 15 minutes walk) and grab our bags.

The train rolled into the station at 7:39 and I was at the door ready. Out I burst from the doors and ran on my way. Of course, it was uphill practically the whole way to the hostel. I ran uphill both was through the sleet and snow with no shoes just like grandpa. Finally at the lodge, I rushed through the hostel doors, got our bags and locker deposit refunds and by 7:46 and booked it like Jackie Joyner-Kersee back down to the station. Winded, I arrived at the Eurolines desk at 6:55, breathing hard as an asthmatic in a sandstorm, and checked in. The bus… The bus wasn't even there yet! Nor was Alex, but, like I said, the bus want there yet! Amusing, eh? Well, I nervously wait and Alex shows up 5 minutes later. The bus has now arrived and we get on. Turns out, the bus doesn't even leave til 7:30, even though our tickets said 7. The irony was so thick and so sweet that it might have been salt-water taffy. Well, at least I now have a story to tell my grandkids as I sit rocking away on my front porch. “When grandma was your age….”

Until the next adventure,
Hannah