If It's Tuesday, This Must Be Belgium

So... six months in and we've visited our third country outside of England. But who's keeping track?

A European Regional Conference for Chris's company brought us to Brussels last Monday - my blog title is appropriate as we were still there on Tuesday. Chris's boss, who we were traveling with, has the very cool privilege of traveling on the company's corporate jet, and since we were accompanying he & his wife to Brussels, we had the very cool privilege of being invited to join them. Talk about the friendly skies... I have officially been spoiled. It was just the four of us as passengers, with our own personal flight attendant and a crew of 3. What a hoot. No security lines, no taking shoes off, no showing up 2 hours early, no going through customs... Needless to say, it will be very difficult to go back to flying economy ever again.

Landing in Brussels, we taxied to one of the further out non-commercial terminals and noticed right away a huge China Air 7-something-7 (it was HUGE); we found out later that it belonged to the Premier of China who was also in town for a conference of his own, a Euro-Asia Summitt at NATO headquarters which of course is in Brussels. Could this little city possibly be big enough for the Wronskys and the Chinese Premier?

We headed straight for the company's Brussels office for a sort of welcome reception, then to the hotel, which was very contemporary and European. It wasn't until we started getting ready to go to the scheduled dinner that I realized I had left my makeup bag on the sink in my bathroom at home. After convincing Chris that yes - this was in fact a situation worth freaking out about, we made a quick shopping trip near the hotel where in about 5 minutes I purchased the most expensive makeup I will ever own in my life (and may never even use again - it's from Paris and very cake-y.) I looked trés chic (my face did anyway) as we met the others and were driven to the Grand-Place, a remarkable and breathtaking square in the center of the city bordered by buildings dating as far back at the 1400's - hotels, cafés, the Town Hall, and our restaurant, the beautiful Maison du Cygne ("cygne" means swan.) The food was fabulous and the service superb.

The following day, poor Chris had to work (someone has to keep me in French makeup) and I met 6 other spouses in the hotel lobby for a ride to the Flemish countryside and a visit to the "Kasteel van Gaasbeek" - or Gaasbeek Castle, originally built in 1240 as a fortress, then reconstructed in the 16th century. It was the home of the Count of Egmont, whose story is a popular one in Brussels as he was beheaded during the Spanish Inquisition (leaving a wife and 11 children) after opposing Spanish policies in the Netherlands. The castle was hosting a special exhibition about dragons (which many people thought real during those times) which was neat. Lunchtime brought us to "In den Appelboom" (Dutch for "The Miraculous Apple Tree") for a lovely Belgian meal. Then it was back to Brussels and chocolate sampling in the Sablon Square. This beautiful shopping area has nearly as many chocolate shops as Manhatten has Starbucks. Besides purchasing my share of Belgian chocolate, I also bought an array of their cookie specialty, Spekuloos, that you might recognize as the dark spice cookie with a windmill imprinted on it. After meeting back up with Chris at the hotel, dinner that night (as if I had room for it) was a reception at the Château Saint-Anne, which was a really magnificent building.

Our group was down to 6 the next day, and we stayed in the city for a visit to the Musée Magritte Museum, where we were given a tour of the works of the surreal artist René Magritte. You might recognize his work, "The Son of Man", which is a painting of a man in a bowler hat with a green apple for his face, made famous in the movie "The Thomas Crown Affair" (the Pierce Brosnan, not the Steve McQueen, version.) That particular work wasn't on display here, but our enthusiastic tour guide added much interest to the works we did see. Next, we visited the "Villa Empain" which is a newly renovated art-deco style building (originally built in 1930) that contained an eclectic collection of Asian & European art works. Our final stop before heading back to the hotel was for lunch at the Chalet Robinson, which was a lovely restaurant on a little island all its own - we had to take a short ferry boat ride to get there.

With the conference concluded, we bid farewell to our travel companions. Chris and I had a nice dinner at a local Brasserie - we thought we were going for traditional Belgian food but got French instead - but it was still delicious. The next morning we had just enough time to walk to the "Place du Jeu de Balle" where the locals hold a flea-market style street market every morning, then back to the Sablon so that I could show Chris the chocolate shops. Then it was back to the hotel and on to the train station where we Eurostarred it back to London.

Brussels is a wonderful city, and the Grand-Place especially evoked thoughts of what I always imagined a quintessential European city to look like. It's officially a bi-lingual city, with French and Flemish (Dutch) as its official languages, so I was able to practice my French again (although I found more locals seemed to speak English there than in Paris.) One story that left an impression on me was that of a Belgian pilot who volunteered with the RAF during World War II. After flying a mission and heading back to England, he defied orders and, using sight navigation, mounted a solo attack and bombed the Gestapo's headquarters in Brussels where interrogations and torture of Belgian Resistance fighters were rumored. The pilot, Jean de Sélys Longchamps, was demoted for acting without orders, but subsequently awarded the Distinquished Flying Cross for these same actions, and a monument to him currently stands in front of the building - which also happens to be located just across the street from the Brussels company headquarters. These stories are an amazing reminder to me of the fact that so much horror and destruction occurred in Europe a relatively short time ago, and its citizens truly had to overcome a massive amount of devastation, the likes that we Americans fortunately have not had to experience ourselves. (I don't need to be reminded of 9/11, but I think you get my drift.)

Since returning home we've gotten back to something of a routine. Autumn is definitely here and the holidays will be upon us before we know it. We hope to make it to Prague before the snow flies... or the cold rain begins.

http://picasaweb.google.com/swronsky/Brussels?feat=directlink