Mussels in Brussels

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Brussels Day 3

I arrived in Brussels and immediately loved the city. I was filled with excitement to get off the train and begin to explore. I headed first to the Grand Place, being the main market square, to find the tourist office in order to get a list of hostels. I walked into the square and was blown away by how extravagant and beautiful it was. There was gold on everything and carvings all over the place. It really is something to see. I decided to head for the hostel and then to make my way back to the Grand Place to really take it all in. And I did just that…

Back in the Grand Place I stared around me in awe for a few minutes. I then began meandering around the city. Since Brussels is the birth place of all things comic strip (tin tin and the smurfs) the city is full of large murals on the side of buildings of comic strip scenes. Unlike Amsterdam, Brussels does not rely as heavily on bikes. Although Brussels is in the Flanders, dutch speaking, area of Belgium there are actually few dutch speakers and far more French speakers as you would find in Wallonia. There are some people that speak English but I did my best to speak frenglish. I have realized that I can make out a lot more written than I can listening to french people speak.

But back to my walk around the city… I found the famous Mannekin de Pis, which if you haven’t figured out is a statue of a little boy seemingly enjoying taking a pee into a pond. The funny thing about this statue is that although he is meant to be naked people have been dressing him in little outfits. Apparently, some foreign delegate started it all by giving clothes to the statue to wear and since then it has become the norm to change the little guy’s clothes and there is even a museum where you can view all of his outfits. He is really cute though with a devilish grin on his face. What I really enjoyed was the street vendor across from the statue. Can you guess what he was selling?? Why escargot of course!!! All I could imagine was the street vendors in Toronto selling escargot and yelling “street snails… get your street snails here!” I couldn’t help but giggle.

I walked back through the Grand Place and headed in the opposite direction of the peeing boy and found myself at the Church of St. Catherine. There was a chapel in the 13th century on the site of the now gothic church that can be found, built in 14th -15th century. But the old Tower Noir from the Chapel still remains. It was lovely to walk around in with a few very beautiful paintings. After exiting I went around back to see the old Tower Noir and funnily enough saw a restaurant called Couchon D’Or, or Gold Pig, with a big gold pig on the building. Now if you remember I mentioned during my Christmas blog about a golden pig. Well I fasted in the morning of the Czech Christmas and never saw my golden pig but then I saw it today!

It was starting to get dark and raining so I headed back to my hostel for a hot shower and some sleep. Oh and on my way back to my hostel I decided to grab a Belgian waffle from the street vendor cause it smelled soooooooooooo very good and I could not resist any longer. And let me tell you it was delicious.

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Comments

[Cathie Lutes]

WOW, this place is great, I'm glad you found your golden pig and you look like you are really enjoying Brussels. Not to mention enjoying the food. lol. Mom