Brussels, the original home of frites....and the capital city of Europe.

Brussels has to be one of the most underrated cities in Europe, really. By this time I have travelled to most of the heavily hyped cities, and seen what people will tell you is beautiful and so on, but Brussels has just as much to share as any of those places.

I arrived around 1700 on the Thursday, dropped my things off at the hostel, and went for a walk around to see the city at dusk. I walked through the Parc de Bruxelles to the Royal Palace, admired it for a moment, and then over to the steps at Mont des Arts, which give a nice panoramic view of the city, and this just happened to be right when the sun was dipping under the horizon, so I caught a few nice pics.

From the steps I caught a glimpse of the downtown area bustling with people, so I walked down the steps, through the gardens below, and joined the crowds. The downtown here reminds me very much of the Latin Quarter of Paris, with small cafes and restaurants packed into side streets and alleyways. With lots of people wandering around and having a good time, it was a fun atmosphere. I wandered through this area for a little while, and eventually found my way home for the night to get some rest.

[sleep]

Today I was set to meet my friend Inge who lives quite near Brussels. After getting confused about where I was supposed to meet her, I eventually found her a couple minutes after the time we had arranged to meet, but she didn't seen to mind too much, thankfully. We headed into the downtown area where I was last night, I grabbed a sandwich for lunch and ate it outside the La Monnaie Opera house which was nearby at the time. There is a bit of history to this Opera house actually, so I will share it. The Belgian Revolution, which in turn led to Begium's formation and seperation from Holland, was triggered by a production of "La Muette de Portici" at this Opera house back in 1830. When the show finished, the people revolted outside and within a year (I think) Belgium's first King, Leopold I, was sitting on the throne of the new country.

By the time I was done my sandwich, Inge more or less had the route of sightseeing planned for the day. We were off to go see something that has become a symbol for the city, the Manniken Pis. This is a naked statue of a little boy that is eternally destined to pee without end (hope he doesnt eat asparagus...). And what's really fun is that the people of Brussels have been making little uniforms for him to wear whilst peeing, and he now has a wardrobe of hundreds of different uniforms to wear. When we got to the little guy we were in luck! He was dressed up in a red cross uniform, complete with hat and all, haha, too cool. The statue is really tiny too, I was surprised by that, very cute.

On the way to the Manniken Pis we walked through a magnificent town square called the Grand Place. According to my little travel book, Victor Hugo was once quoted as stating it to be the "the most beautiful square in the world", and I can see where old Vic was coming from with that one. The old town hall here matches the beauty that many of the most beautiful churches Italy have to offer, and then there are the old and intricately designed buildings of old Brussels. The detail put into these buildings is beyond belief. The Square really is an amazing place to see.

After the square and the little man, we walked up the hill into the richer area's of Brussels. In the old days Brussels was a marshy swamp you see, and to make the land more suitable to build on, the people would continually dumped soil on the ground to make it more solid. The more soil, the higher the ground, and it is also likely that natural higher land would be reserved for the very wealthy. So historically, the higher the land was, the more wealthy and important the people who lived there would be.

On our way up, Inge caught sight of the Music Academy, and wanted to show me what it was like inside, as she spent a lot of time there growing up, and knew it to be a cool place to see. We snuck in the back door since we weren't really supposed to be in there, but noone seemed to mind too much. At this time of year, like any school, there were exams on, so we couldn't really go into any rooms. We did get to watch a girl taking her Piano exam though, she played beautifully. I really need to get right onto the piano lessons when I settle down again after this trip.

The walk uphill culminated in our arrival at the Palace of Justice, a huge building that functions as a courthouse for the city. We walked in and looked around a little, and it is huge inside as well, very nice to see. Outside, because we are on the top of a hill, we could enjoy a fantastic view of the city, and in the distance the Atomium was visible, I will go see that tomorrow. After enjoying the view for a little bit, we were walking again, through a few parks, relaxing in the shade whenever possible, because despite that fact that we are in Belgium, there is a heatwave occuring it seems, and the temperature was hovering around 35c, and the sun was also beating down relentlessly. It's not often I will complain about the heat, but this was too hot.

Later on we met up with Inge's friend Greg, and went out for dinner. I was a little surprised to find out that steak and fries is considered a typical Belgian meal, but they were going for it, so I joined in. It was an enjoyable meal.

After the meal Greg drove us all around a bit, seeing a huge gate that is similar to the Brandenburg gate I saw in Berlin, but larger. They had a crazy horse thing on there, where people take premolded horses and decorate them with creative designs, and they go on display here for people to vote on which is best. It was certainly something different to see, and pretty fun. I got a picture of 2 that were painted up like Asterix qnd Obelix.

From the horses we drove through the EU building area so I could see it, and then back downtown for ice cream and to see a lightshow at the town hall that my stupid book said would be happening at 2230. My book lied! But it was still fun to enjoy the nightlife for a bit.

By now it was 2300 and Inge had to be heading home, so Greg dropped us off at the train station, I thanked him for the good time, and I escorted Inge through the rather seedy night-time train station. You might remember my tales of Florence, and this place was looking pretty similar, so leaving a girl on her own to hang around this place didn't feel right at all. I made sure she got to her train safely, and we said our goodbyes. It was a great day and really nice to meet up with someone I know on this trip, instead of continually making new short term friends all the time like I have been doing for the most.

[sleep]

Not a whole lot left to see after yesterday, since I got such a good and thorough tour around. But there was one thing I had to see still, and it was my first stop.

The Atomium was built for the 1958 World Fair here in Brussels. It is a model of the Iron Atom, scaled to 165billion:1. It is rather large as such, over 100 metres tall, and normally people can enter it and take elevators to the top for a good view of the city. Sadly for me, the big fan of views that I am, it is currently being refurbished and is closed to the public, ugh. So I had to settle for admiring it from the ground level.

After the Atomium I wanted to grab some pics of downtown Brussels, since I completely forgot to do so yesterday. So I took the metro back and wandered around the streets again, seeing all the sights I enjoyed so much yesterday for a second time. Not quite as fun on your own though. Sadly today the Manniken Pis was in a nudist mood, but I did find a fantastic postcard of him wearing 8 different costumes, so that will be a good souvenir.

Being a bit peckish, I decided to try out a Belgian waffle, and it was brilliant, delicious! I polished it off quickly and wandered around a bit more before heading back to the hostel. I am out of clean clothes again, a problem I attribute to the heat which means clothes can only really be worn for one day, and then they need washed....unless you don't mind smelling awful at least. So I did laundry, had another bite, and then wandered around some more at night.

There were museums I could have seen here, but I wasn't watching my time closely enough and missed my chances to go see them sadly. Pity because the Belgian Comic museum would have been pretty cool to see, but I can do that another time!

I liked Brussels a lot, after Berlin it was really nice to be in a city with some character again. Brussels actually reminded me a little of Canada in a way too, since Belgium, like Canada, has two official languages; Those being French and Flemish (Dutch). Brussels is pretty unique in that the language line runs right through the city, with the northen people tending to speak Flemish, and the southern people speaking French. But luckily for me, they all know English, and this allowed me neutrality on the language issue.

---

---