Arrival in Brussels!

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After the plane landing we found our way to the train, and we bought tickets for the train* heading into Brussels and told us which platform to go to to catch the train. I asked for a map of the metro, and he seemed rather confounded as to why I would need that. Well, this was the train heading into Brussels, so the map did not help us much, except to help us locate at train station that would connect with a train stop, except that there were no stops displaced on the screen telling the stops of this train. We were looking for Gare Midi, but it was not among the stops listed.

Just before the stop that we needed to take, I starting asking Thomas about whether we should take Gare Central (since it was on the metro map) and a man nearby told us, in French, that we really should get off at Gare Central and take the metro from there. We did get out and got acquainted with the gentleman, and I told him about our destination. Hopefully I was able to communicate everything to Thomas effectively, because Christien doesn't speak English. He took us upstairs, and bought us metro tickets because we did not have EU currency. He helped us negotiate the metro to find where to get to our hotel, once out of the stop, he dialed up the hotel with his cell phone, and I got directions from the hotel owner where to find the hotel, and we asked if he'd like to have a drink with us after we settled.

So we met him at a nearby bar, and chatted a bit. It turned out that Christien was a professor at the university. He teaches psychology to education majors. I was delighted, being a teacher myself! His parents were from Gabon, so his native tongue is a dialect from Gabon, but he also speaks French and Dutch. He lives in Flanders (the area just to the north), but teaches in Brussels. He came into the city on an errand and was going to grade some final exams, but completed the errand while waiting for us at the bar, and put off the grading so that he could show us around his beautiful city himself. He asked if my shoes were good for walking, and walk around we did!

First we went to Rue Blaes, an old historic district that is home to many state provided housing buildings. HLMs, or habitation de loyé modéré, are apartments built with state money and rent rates are low enough for the poor to afford. The buildings are attractive and well maintained, and there is no stigma attached to liing there, as the state is expected to take an active role in providing services to the community. The crime is no higher in HLM neighborhoods than anywhere else, according to Christien.

Then we entered into the Grand Sablon, higher up the hill. This pricey real estate was where a few wealthy families bought the land, and leased out shop space on the ground floor, and apartments above. The Petit Sablon is just a little further west. It is impossible to get lost in this big little city. All of the distinctive landmarks give you a reference point, and since it is a medieval city, everything is accessible by foot and easy to access.

We ventured up a busy wide boulevard in search of an ATM, but the ATM did not accept Thomas's card. Christien suggested that we head to Centre Ville where we would be more likely to find a bank that would work. Along the way, we found the Place Royale on the Coudenbourg (the natural hill at the top of the city.)

Here the pictures can tell the story better than a narrative, so I will only add that we were successful in finding an ATM that worked, and along the way, we found hundreds of gorgeous, quaint, quirky sites along the way.

We were able to see all of the historic district, Sablon, Coudenbourg, Centre Ville, and Grand Place and here all of the folklore and local legends thanks to Christien.

Finally, we ate the promised Belgian fries with a main dish that resemble eat but had little taste at a quicky kebab shop, and said our good-byes to Christien. I was so exhausted from the day that I absolutely forgot to get contact information so that I could find him again. He told me that he had once visited Japan, and a local man had shone him around his city because only a local could provide the appropriate tour that showed all the best parts of the city, and he wanted to pay it forward to us. This kindness is something I will never forget, and one that I hope I can pay forward myself one day!



*The man at the ticket window, we find out later ( on the trip back to the airport) could have gotten us on the train heading directly to Gare Midi, bypassing the Metro all together, but then again, we never would have met Christien.

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Photos

Sol pleurant
Weeping willow in the terrain de jeu off Rue Blaies

Affordable housing
HLMs off to the left and run parallel to Rue Blaies for quite a distance

Medieval wall
Remnant of the wall that surrounded the city

Jewish museum tragedy
3 weeks earlier, an French-born terrorist gunman targeted this Jewish museum with an automatic weapon and killed four people

Bridging the divide
The low city (poor) and high city (rich) have an elevator that was installed to bridge the divide, so that residents could have easier access to each other