More Rain in Brussels

Once we got over the smell of my wet shoes, we finally managed to get into bed and start to drift off to sleep.  We were just about in dreamland when we were abruptly woken up by shouts in the hallway.  At first we thought that there must be some sort of emergency or at least a big inter-familial fight going on, but when we looked out to investigate it turns out that it was just a happy get-together.  Apparently all the rest of the rooms on our floor had been reserved by one large family whose idea of expressing their love for one another is slamming doors and yelling until 2 a.m.  At least they were well coordinated; every time we would go out to try to ask them to be quiet, they were conveniently hidden inside a room and actually being quite noiseless.

Needless to say, by the time we finally did fall asleep, we were a bit sour on our neighbors.  It didn't help that they all got up around 6 a.m. to start the routine of banging and yelling all over again.  We tried to sleep through it, but finally just gave in and decided to head to breakfast.  Of course, guess who we found in the breakfast room!  Yes, our lovely neighbors!  Turns out they were so busy making lots of noise that none of them had time to shower--they all smelled horrible!  I guess this is what we get for staying at cheap hotels--it does seem to be a recurring theme, doesn't it?

Once the noisy family managed to organize themselves out the door (lots of screaming required for the task, of course), we realized how nice the hotel and breakfast were.  For the price, we really didn't expect much of the breakfast, but it was really diverse!  They even had an espresso machine, of which I took full advantage.  Of course, being in a culturally French area, there was plenty of bread and various spread to go on top.  Don't forget the Nutella!  We enjoyed the rest of our breakfast in silence, enjoying the nice sunny view out the window and hoping that today might be more pleasant on the weather front than yesterday.

The weather had other plans, however, because by the time we got out the door, it was gloomy and raining.  At least we remembered our umbrellas this time!  We didn't have much of a plan other than to explore the city, so we headed back towards the main square.  When we arrived we saw a large group all staring wide-mouthed at one of the buildings.  We closed in to investigate what was so interesting about this particular building, and discovered that these people were part of a free English-language tour of the city.  We were half an hour late to the start, but joined in anyway.

Because we missed the beginning of the tour, I missed the guide's name.  The group was so large (and seemed to grow progressively along the route), that I never even managed to get close enough to him to ask, either!  But he was a great guide!  He is originally from Scotland, but has already lived in eight different European countries, working as a tour guide in all of them.  He is really passionate about history and culture, and even studied law at University.  His education and enthusiasm really showed through on the tour, and I even dare say that it was the most entertaining (not to mention informative) tours I've ever been on!  He somehow managed to get a group of more than 40 people to follow him around in heavy rain for almost four hours--that is no mean feat!

Here are some highlights from the tour:

A typical Brussels street corner.  The top graffiti is encouraged and sponsored by the local government.  The second, the Space Invader, is created by an anonymous street artist who travels the world putting similar pieces on famous landmarks (Great Wall of China, anyone?).  No one knows anything about him, expect they suspect that his is from Paris based on the high concentration of Space Invaders there.  The white street sign is the "modern" name of the street, usually after famous people or events.  The blue sign is the "traditional" name of the street.  Because Brussels started as a market town, most of the streets are named after the goods that were sold there.  This is Brewers' Street.  All street signs are written in both French (top) and Dutch (bottom).

This bronze statue is the pride and joy of Brussels--"Manneken Pis."  Yes, that means "Little Pee Man" in Dutch. It was originally placed around 1618, but has been stolen repeatedly (eight times) since then.  The current statue is a reproduction created in 1965 after the most recent heist.  The city is so proud of this guy that they actually have on staff a full-time costume designer whose sole job is to create outfits for Manneken Pis to wear.  He has a new one every few days.  Apparently today is his "au naturale" day.  There is so much more history to this little guy than I can fit here, so go check out his Wiki for more fun facts!

This is the interior of the Église Notre Dame du Bon Secours in downtown Brussels.  The church itself isn't very grand as far as European churches go, but I liked the juxtaposition of the symbols of Islam, Judaism, and Christianity all in the same place.  Wonder what would happen if we tried this in the States?

There are murals of cartoon characters all over the city; in fact, the government has sponsored most of them and you can even get special tourist maps that lead you to all of them.  This one is located at the entrance to the traditionally gay neighborhood of Brussels.  It was quite controversial when it was first painted in 1992.  The blond figure on the right is Broussaille, a character from a popular comic magazine, "Spirou."  The work was originally titled simple "Broussaille and his friend."  However, there was an outcry because it was unclear whether the black-haired person was male or female.  To combat this, the city had the mural redone, adding more feminine features to the bust and butt, and adding an earring.  To clear up any remaining confusion, the work was retitled "Broussaille and his girlfriend, Catherine."

This is actually the oldest church in Brussels.  It was originally built in the twelfth century, and is called "St, Nicholas Church," after the patron saint of traders.  It has obviously been remodeled a few times since then, but some of the original features are still visible on the interior.  There is even a cannonball fired by the French in 1695 still lodged in one of the pillars!

This is the view at the end of the tour, overlooking the city of Brussels.  It's beautiful even in the rain!

Unfortunately, because we had just hopped on the tour without any planning (or going to the bank), by the time it finished we realized that we didn't have any cash on us.  I know, I know; I did said it was a free tour, but the guide was so awesome that we really thought he deserved some sort of tip!  While everyone else was paying and saying their good-byes, we looked around for an ATM, but to no avail.  Instead, we vowed that we would track him down again some time before the week was through to give him his tip.

The tour ended near another important square.  I can't remember the name, but it should probably have been called "Gourmet Square" based on all the different types of food offered by the various restaurants there.  It was after 3:00 by now and despite our large breakfast, we were hungry!  We decided to try some local fare, and headed into a Belgian cafe for a quick lunch and reprieve from the rain.  The main attraction of the cafe was its "authentic" Belgian waffles, so of course we had to try one of those (covered in Belgian chocolate, no less!).  As much as we would have loved to eat only desserts all day, we were good an also ordered a curry sandwich to share.  They were both super delicious, although after the night that we had I have to say my favorite part of the meal was the big mugs of espresso we had to complement it (complete with EU sugar packets, in case we forgot where we were).

We did our best to delay our departure from the cafe and back into the rain, but eventually we ran out of excuses to stay.  We decided it might be a good idea to try to find an indoor activity, at least until the rain slowed a bit.  We remembered passing by a museum yesterday, and although we weren't entirely clear on what was inside the museum, knew that it was nearby and that it was open late.  That seemed a good enough reason as any to go, so we did.

DaVinci's Tank.

Belgian Stock Market.
All of it.

It turns out that it wasn't actually a museum per se, but the Stock Market building.  Belgium used to have their own stock market, but it was bought out by the NYSE a few years ago.  Since then, most of the building has been unnecessary for market activities and has been used for cultural purpose instead.  Right now, most of the building houses an exhibit called "DaVinci: The Genius."  The great part about this exhibit is that it is mainly a display of actual models built based on DaVinci's ideas.  There is even an entire room full of contraptions that you can experiment with yourself!  Sadly, the tank was not among the "touchable" objects, but it was still neat to see all of DaVinci's ideas actually created.  Some of them had even been tested, like a giant, pyramid-shaped parachute.  Based on modern knowledge, it doesn't seem like it should work.  But a professional skydiver was brave enough to build it (using only materials and techniques available during DaVinci's time), and to test it by jumping out of a hot air balloon.  Luckily for the skydiver, DaVinci was a smart cookie and the parachute worked.

We wandered around the museum for over three hours, only managing to pry ourselves away when we began to get hungry again.  By now, the sky had cleared and it was actually dry outside.  We decided to take advantage of the relatively nice weather to have a meal outdoors.  Even so, we chose a restaurant that offered covered seating and outdoors heaters.  The restaurant was a bit pricey, but they had decent daily specials, so we ordered those.  I finally got to try some moules frites (something I'd seen with Mom in France but never got around to trying), and some Belgian beer.  Both were very good (despite the reputation of Belgian beers).  Scott had the less exotic spaghetti bolognese, but also got to try some Belgian beer.

We were still a little hungry after dinner, so we headed over to the chocolate shops to see if we could find a little treat to fill us up.  By the time we had checked out all the shops, we didn't need to buy a treat anymore--they had all given us so many samples we could hardly think about food anymore.  Nonetheless, we did buy a bag of assorted chocolates, just in case we got hungry later.

It started to downpour again on the way home, but we did fare better than yesterday with our umbrellas this time.  Until we stood too close to a corner and got splashed as a car turned the corner, that is.  At least by now I had discovered the versatility of our hair dryer!