Brussel

 

 

 

The original plan was to spend New Year's Eve in Brussels with a friend of H's. However, they hadn't managed to contact each other in time, and she was working that day, so we went up on New Year's Day, a public holiday, without warning the friend beforehand. Brussels is about an hour's drive from Lille, very easily done. H called his friend when we arrived in the city, she got herself ready, we parked in front of her flat and the three of us went off to discover Brussels. The New Year's Concert was playing in the Grand'Place, the buildings had been lit up and there were lots of lights around the city.

 

 

The Mannekin-Pis, statue of a little boy weeing, is famous in Brussels. What I didn't know was that it was particularly small, and only photographiable by fighting one's way through a coachload of Japanese tourists. He also has a girlfriend, Janneke-Pis, who was weeing happily behind bars further down the street.

From the Mannekin-Pis's image, many souvenirs have been crafted, including the sophisticated and elegant ones above. Belgian class.

 

 

Anaïs, H's friend, then proceeded to take us to the biggest beer bar in Brussels, the Delirium (so named after the Delirium Tremens beer, whose logo is a pink elephant... the sort of pink elephant you see floating around after having drunk a few glasses of this 8-degree beer). This bar reputably boasts 2,004 different types of beer since the year 2004, when they entered the Guinness Book of Records for this feat. Out of these 2,004 types of beer, a good two thirds were Belgian; a rather impressive accomplishment for a small country. I'm not a drinker, so I homed in on the one that sounded the most interesting: chocolate beer. I was warned several times that it was absolutely disgusting and did I really want to order that. That made me even more sure of my choice: as I know next to nothing about beer, there was no point in trying to make an educated choice, so I may as well go for the strangest one possible and say that I wanted to taste it. It was delicious, although as you can see in the photo, our guide didn't quite agree with my distinguishing British palate.

 

 

An interesting city, with lots going on even on New Year's Day. In the city centre, there were lots of restaurants aimed at tourists, offering mussels and meat cooked in beer. Anaïs elected to take us to a nice not-too-touristy restaurant near her flat, which turned out to be closed on that public holiday, so we ended up eating sushi before driving back. Apparently, quite a few everyday things are cheaper in Belgium, and there definitely seems to be a wider choice of beer and chocolate than in France. I've found a couple of beers I like, and I can see myself crossing the border fairly regularly if I end up living in Lille.