Bonnes Frites et Mauvaise Grammaire

Christmas in Grand Place

2008-12-09T03:27:00.000-08:00

In the center of Brussels lies Grand Place (or Groute Markt, depending on your language of choice). For Christmas they have the Plaisirs d'Hivers / Winter Pret. This year has an amazing light show with patterns flashed across one of the old buildings that surround the square with columns of light in the center giving a modern counterpart. There is also a nativity scene with live sheep.

And why a giant Smurf at Christmas time? Because its always Smurf time in Belgium. The Smurfs started in Belgium, where they are known as the Schtroumpf. And this year is thier 50th anniversary.

In addition there many stalls some with food, christmas trinkets, and a lot of vin chaud (hot wine). Then as you walk through the small Chinatown with lit laterns you arrive at one of the coolest carosels I have seen. Following that is a ferris wheel and an ice skating rink. Enjoy the pictures and videos.

A look around the market

And here edited version of the light show:

And a few last photos:

London Good Times

2008-11-25T02:33:00.000-08:00

Several months ago, our friends Sean and Joe (who we know from Seattle but live in Denmark) asked if we'd like to go to London for the premiere of Harry Potter. Well, after we bought the tickets, they set back the premiere of the movie. C'est la vie. We dropped our dogs off for the weekend at a doggy daycare outside of Brussels, and with tickets in hand we left for London anyway.

They flew into Brussels and we had two hours before the train left so we dropped off our baggage in a locker and hit the Belgian Quadruple Slam - grabbed fries as we left the station, strolled by Galler for some chocolate, stopped for a quick round of beer, and finally a waffle on the way back to the train. Then through the chunnel (it was... dark) and in under two hours we were at King's Cross Station.

The dollar is doing better and London was surprisingly affordable. So in between stopping at our old favorite restaurants (wagamamas and pizza express) and some British standards (fish and chips and Indian), we got in a significant amount of shopping. a signficant amount. It seems obvious but London is a big, fashionable, European capital and the shopping reflects that. Not just high end fashion houses, but stylish boutiques, cheap trendy shops, and everything in between. I am a magazine junkie, my favorites being fashion and trendy lifestyle. At home most of these magazines run $15 - 20 because they are imported. I had assumed France would be the place to get cheap magazines, but it turns out it's Britian. The first night I bought a giant bag of them (very heavy). The other non-clothing purchase was groceries. We've been desperately missing refried beans. We have a friend in Brussels who makes them but we could use some canned ones so we're not always bugging her. Most stores in Brussels have a small Mexican food section, but never any beans (yeah, I thought it was a basic too). But thankfully London believes Mexican food is more than just tortillas and Chi Chis restaurant. Throw in some shortbread and we were back to shopping for clothes... and watches... and shoes... and hats...

We did get in one tourist item in while we were there. We went on the London Eye, the giant ferris wheel build for the millenium. Amazing views particularly at night and definitely worth it. There was supposed to be a "German Christmas Market" in the style of the one in Cologne Germany, but it was hardly worth it. Luckily the real Cologne is a short train ride from Brussels.

Overall, we had a lot of fun, came back more stylish then when we left, talked a lot of pop culture (a given when we hang out with Sean and Joe) and remembered why we love London.

And then upon our return to Brussels, snow! (though admittedly it only lasted overnight, Seattle-style)

Because you were wondering "When is that, again?"

2008-11-24T08:41:00.000-08:00

Just a little helpful tip from Britian's The Guardian newspaper:

A new, longer blog post about our weekend trip to London is coming soon, but while you wait for that post, why don't you start planning for 2025.

note the subtle subtitles:
"EU will be hobbled giant"
"Triumph of democracy not certain".

Election Night from Brussels

2008-11-07T07:37:00.001-08:00

What an amazing night... or early morning for us over here in Europe. One of M's fellow students (who's also from Seattle) organized an election night party at a bar here in Brussels. About 40 students came from all different countries. Some were really interested, some slightly interested, and some just liked the idea of a midweek party in the middle of the night.

I worked until just after midnight and then we walked about a 1/2 hour to the bar. Our thought was just to stay an hour or two as we were tired. Well, a couple beers each, Obama wins in Ohio and Pennsylvania seeming to cinch it, and 4 hours later we headed home to catch the final call (CNN World played the same all day coverage as CNN USA). Coincidentally, as we walked home on the empty streets at 4am, we ran into someone else from M's school who was coming back from her own election party. She said "is this real? did they just call Ohio for him? We've won, haven't we? Its just so surreal!" (the surrealness was helped by running into another american in the middle of the street in the middle of the night in the middle of Europe with everyone else asleep). Twenty minutes later we were home. Virginia went to Obama 5 minutes before 5am (8pm Pacific) and I turned to M and said "oh my god, they are about to call it, CA, OR and WA are sure things so the minute those polls close, they're going to make the call!!". And sure enough...

Of course it was nothing compared to Grant Park (watch this to get chills all over again), but one very happy (and tired) apartment in Brussels. Calls home to our families ensued. Excitement all around. I watched as my friends Facebook status's all started to change ("... is speechless", "... is so excited", "... is so proud of America") We ended up watching McCain's concession speech but we both fell asleep in front of the TV before Obama's acceptance speech. 6am. 24 hours since we had last slept.

No worries, a quick 4 hours sleep, a lot of coffee and some aspirin and we were awake again with CNN on the TV and The Daily Show's coverage streaming on our computer. It still hasn't all worn off.

More pictures from that night...

A Bite at the Midi Market

2008-11-02T12:32:00.000-08:00

This sunday we had a very pleasant day with pastries and a huge baguette (1 meter!) in the morning and shopping at the Midi open air market for groceries in the afternoon, which was what I planned to blog about until we had a deliciously crazy flatbread wrapped sandwich. I made a video while standing in the (really long) line. enjoy, and yes, it was really really tasty.

They serve it with hot sweetened tea and everyone then crowds around small picnic tables surrounding the stand. We ate half of it there, brought the rest home, set aside some of the ingredients for a greek chicken dish later in the week and finished the (now reasonably sized) sandwich.

Welcome to the Neighborhood

2008-11-01T09:00:00.000-07:00

We've now been here almost 3 months. A quarter of the way through, so the perfect time to start our blog!

However, 2 of those 3 months were spent trying to get settled. "Settled" became our least favorite word, something we were always trying to achieve. Finding an apartment (that accepted dogs) took 3 weeks. Electricity and Gas? Another week. Cable and internet? Another 4 weeks. Well after many trips to Ikea, Troc (the local furniture thrift store with style galore) and several flea markets, our apartment is now furnished, our internet is streaming The Daily Show and we have Belgian-style Tivo (which we don't completely know how to use).

So for our first post, some pictures of our neighborhood. We've settled in the Brussels neighborhood (or "commune") of Etterbeek, a mostly residential (apartments and condos) area, about 5 metro stops southeast of the main tourist downtown area. We are a few minutes walk from a grocery store, a street of small specialty stores, and a small park perfect for dog walking.

More pictures, our apartment, and Brussels tidbits to come in future posts but for now, we leave you with some photos as we stroll around our neighborhood...