Empress Nemo in our nation's capital

An itch behind my right ear told me to get on a train to somewhere. So yesterday I found myself sipping my coca cola light lemon and listening to mp3-bollywoodmusic en route for our nation's capital: Brussels. The destination of the train read: 'Eupen', which brought me to the following question: Where the **** is Eupen? My trusty travel guide has since then taught me that this town, once a part of Prussia, has a distinctive Teutonic feel, but is very unexceptional. Interesting.

My fellow-travellers were late in Brussels' central station. So I spent the first hour of my trip drinking coffee in the galeries St. Hubert and roaming the Brusselian Games Workshop. I also went to visit the King (Albert II, not Elvis), but he wasn't at home. One of the guards told me he had gone to Jordan to persuade King Abdullah II to swap countries. My fellow-explorers, aka the Pink Peacock and Laura Crafty, finally got to the station by 2 p.m., and we went for a drink. It is a much debated dilemma whether one should speak French or Dutch in Brussels. Officially, the city is bilingual, and, truth be told, lots of shopkeepers, waiters, ticket sellers,... speak both French and Dutch. But, truth be told again, almost everyone's first language appears to be French. I know people who categorically refuse to speak French in Brussels. We, on the other hand, had a go at French... It went, well,.. okay I suppose.

We made our way trough the Zavel's African Art boutiques and the Marolles' second hand shops in pragmatic French (i.e. avoiding verb forms at all costs). When we settled down for a late lunch however, our menu was in English... we ordered in French (since the waiter addressed us in french), and got our cider poured in Dutch. This was all in all very confusing, but the food was delicious. With a final 'can we recevoir le rekening' we were off again. For the first time in my life I saw Manneke Pis. I don't see what all the fuss is about, but the Japanese tourists were brilliant. We set out to buy some real Belgian pralines (white with champagne-filling and chocolate truffles), since that is apparently what one should do when touristing Brussels. In the pralines shop the shop lady listened to our not-so-impeccable French, laughed loudly, and continued in Dutch. Sigh. Leterme said some time ago that the Walloons are to stupid to learn Dutch... I wouldn't see that as a one way phenomenon though, Yves. Sipping coffee and munching pralines, we sang our way loudly to Brussels' Warandepark. The day ended there, with us working out our superhero characters: Turbotiny, the Pink Peacock and Laura Crafty, in a Manetesque sangria-sur-l'herbe setting (though not in the nude).

Final conclusion: Brussels is a fun city to visit, and it is one of few cities in the world that will give you a chance to practice all your language skills (verbal and non-verbal) at once.

You are not as fat as you imagine

I'll keep it short today. I love it when music you haven't heard for years suddenly sneaks up on you and results in you crying and/or laughing in the middle of the supermarket (isle four, cereal). Yesterday it wasn't the supermarket taking me by suprise, but a mail-cum-youtube-forward dragging me back about 5-6 years. Don't laugh: Everybody's free to wear sunscreen , Baz Luhrman. Brilliant. I printed the lyrics instantly, and glued them in my agenda. Again, don't laugh. You should look it up. You'll probably think it boring, however. Maybe I just like it out of nostalgia. Maybe it's just brilliant. Maybe this is not important. Maybe you should go and read another blog. I promise you something more relevant tomorrow.

"Dance...even if you have nowhere to do it but in your own living room. Read the directions, even if you don't follow them. Do NOT read beauty magazines, they will only make you feel ugly."

Ostend, Panamarenko and Stormy Seas

Tourism Light (i.e. getting on a train to somewhere else in the country to waste the day away eating, drinking and wandering around the occasional museum) is a wonderful way to pass time better spent studying Arabic. So, although I strongly favour trains above turbo-speeding, airconditioned cars, it was with some delight I found myself racing towards Ostend yesterday morning. After lunch in a café that can only be described as seedy-with-a-hint-of-glorious-past with a 90 degrees turn (you know the kind: carpets on the walls, but stone floors, Corinthian columns, old waitresses on slippers and a hells-angels-look-a-like doing the washing up), we went to see some Panamarenko-installations in de PMMK, which also boasts a few works from Jan Fabre, including an extremely wonderful duo of blue drawings, of which I have forgotten the title. So sue me.

Panamarenko kind of rules. Whether or not his installations, like those of Fabre, can really labelled 'art', is an entirely different question. I will not enter into this here, since I don't feel like it, and since I haven't made up my mind about it myself. Together with surrealists like Magritte, Dali and Delvaux, Panamarenko and Fabre are two of my favourite artists (although I must admit to secretly liking impressionism as well, don't tell anyone). In this brand of art (or unart, whatever) fantasy ultimately overrules both the eye and the rationale, bursts out, and manifests itself as a new, independent, reality. I believe everyone should look at installations like that at least once a year, as a kind of therapy for putting reality into perspective.

That said, there was one thing missing yesterday: It didn't storm... It didn't even really rain. I was in Ostend, and it didn't storm... This added to the sense of surrealism built up by Fabre and Panamarenko at the museum. I have honestly never been in Ostend for longer than an hour or two, without rain, thunder and storm winds messing up my hair. The hair-messing aside, I love storms, especially by the sea, and Ostend happens to be one of the prime places to experience one. For more practical information about storm-watching in Ostend, read the inset on the right. Standing by a stormy sea, watching the sheer force of it, hearing nothing but howling wind and feeling raindrops and salt water hit your face is also one of those things everyone should do at least once a year, as therapy. I do not recommend people getting themselves killed, however. So do NOT take your umbrella storm-watching, and if there are half-naked singing ladies in the water you might want to ignore them. (If the previous remark causes the death of Celine Dion, Britney Spears,... it was unintentional (but quite funny anyway)). So on this lighter note of drowning celebrities, I leave you all, for now...