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Published: December 23rd 2007
I've had a very long day, without any real reason too. And we actually only had the waffle portion of the title.
I did, by the way, manage to get on a train yesterday with relative easy to come to Brussels to meet Kira, through the first train I wanted to catch wasn't running because the train in front of it broke, so I just caught the next one. It's about 3 hours by train from Amsterdam to Brussels and I used my hour in the train station to buy some much needed shampoo that was confiscated by the Russian airport authorities.
Kira got to Brussels late last night because her bus from London was three hours late , but we still went out and wandered around St. Katherine's square and got some tapas. We're staying at a cute B&B run by an Irish woman who lives in Brussels (don't know why), but she was thrilled to find out everything about Russia that Kira and I could tell her over breakfast this morning.
After a late start this morning, we wandered out and
Rue de Bouchers
The street with all the gourmet restaurants in Brussels.took the metro to the Grand Place. We got a little lost walking from the metro stop to the square itself, but we asked from policemen (my french not quite being what it used to be sadly), but it took four of them to figure out where we were all standing and then were on the map the Grand Place was. By the end of it all, they gave us directions, and it was incredibly close, but really funny because the police, who I don't have to fear in Western Europe, were maybe just as lost as we were.
The Grand Place is beautiful, filled with townhouses and grandious buildings from the 17th and 18th century and the town hall which is from the 15th. Everyone we saw or came in any contact with was in such a great mood because it was just before Christmas and all the holiday decorations were up in the square. We went to the musuem of Brussels, which was interesting, because it served as a mini-history museum of Belgium. From there we walked to the statute of Maanekeen-Pis, which for those of you who don't know Dutch, it a fountain with a little
boy peeing into it. It is for some reason, key to the water works of Brussels and a number of stories have been created to describe his real purpose, includingly tales of a boy who was cursed into never being able to stop peeing and then saving the town from a fire by peeing on it. He was dressed in a Santa suit to fit the festive mood the city is in right now.
From there we walked to the Church of Sants Michels, which is a huge, beautiful gothic church, and sat inside for a little while a listened to the choral concert going on and warmed up. After that we came back to the hotel for a nap before we venture out for dinner. We're thinking something along the lines of Congolese, because it's got to be different than Russian. Tomorrow we're gonna stop by the palace, and then catch our bus back to Amsterdam. If I don't hit a computer before hand: Happy Holidays everyone!
From Europe With Love
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