-Transport!! 30€ for unlimited travel all over Brussels for a month, using Buses, trams and the metro! Also these buses, trams and metros are ON TIME, CLEAN and REGULAR. Awesome! Also 50€ for 10 single journeys between any two ‘proper’ stations in Belgium! Oh and the AMAZING light boards in the metro stations that show you where every metro is on the line you’re waiting on! :O
-HEMA: an amaaaaaaaaaaaazing shop with lots of beautiful and relatively cheap things in. :D
-Belgians also dislike grackles (holidaymakers), having lived on the south coast of Devon for well… 4 years properly, and 2 years since (and summertime is the worst)… I have GREAT sympathy with these feelings. And can’t help feeling slightly hypocritical whenever I pose for a photo in front of some monument… I DO live here!
-waffles and chocolate. Nuff said.
-Belgians make numbers so much easier than the French! E.g. 70 in French is soixante-dix (60+10) but in Belgium, it’s septante. Obviously! And 90 which in French is quatre-vingt-dix, in Belgium is nonante! I loooooooooove it. And the Belgians love it when we English people use it. :D
-Dimanche sans voiture!!! Did I ever write a blog about dimanche sans voiture? It’s a sunday once per year in September when it’s actually ILLEGAL to bring a car into Brussels without a permit. There are police on the roads checking anyone who drives by. And there’s loads of cool stuff on it town, bands playing etc. And everyone walks everywhere or cycles, AND the public transport is FREEEEEE!! I loved it. And it was SO quiet too. I wish every dimanche was a dimanche sans voiture.
-Random but great things like Manneken Pis (the little statue of a boy weeing that everyone loves), the atomium (a giant model of an atom…?) and the copy of the arc de triumph in park cinquantenaire.
-Tintin and the smurfs. And their general love of cartoons, especially big cartoons painted on the sides of buildings.
-The European parliament (it’s at the end of my road)…(it’s quite a long road)… but I do go past it on the bus or walk past it most days which is quite cool! J
-The fact that EVERYTHING is in at least two, if not three or four languages.
-Cool places like..the Grand’ Place… especially in the dark when it’s lit up. St Katharine (I can’t wait for the German Christmas market), the fountains at flagey, and the view from the palais de justice which is just amaaaaaaaaazing.
-The parks!! I especially like walking through the parc royale on the way to church or GBU central with all its crunchy crunchy leaves!
-They play music in the metro (underground) stations! And at night time it’s classical… makes you feel “safe”. :D
-Really cool shops like…cook and book, fnac, HEMA! …… and loads of cool little places, like the biscuit shop and this record shop I found one day too with mega cheap old skool records… I love it.
-All of the daily and weekly magazines and newspapers you can get in the metro, metro is the daily newspaper that’s comes out in French and Dutch, then theres la tribune de bruxelles once per week, and agenda with ALL of the films and cinemas in Brussels and who’s showing what when… it’s brilliant! It has all the info about expos that are on and bands playing, plays and all that kind of stuff!
-Live Music Café – they have live music EVERY night. Admittedly I only went once… but I have plans to go again. They had this awesome like jazz/blues band with a giant double bass and piano and saxophone..it was faaaaaaaaaaaab. J
-Minute Maid Multivitamines juice drink… my FAVOURITE juice EVER. I will miss it sorely in the UK. Unless I find it exists there too. In which case I will be MIGHTY pleased.
Not so great things:
-UHT milk… if you’ve been abroad… you probably know what I’m talking about. This stuff is NASTY.
-Bise-ing… although I’m getting used to it and I’m going to have to hold myself back when I will proper want to BISE you all, but it’s like… WHAT ARE THE RULES?! Make some rules and STICK to them. Why must it change if you’re on the metro, or are on the phone, or if you’re English or French or Spanish… GOLLY! Stressed out much?!
-Limescale water… I have to rinse out the kettle EVERY time I use it and little flakes of white limescale come out. I can’t drink tap water… it makes me ill.
-Belgians don’t believe in carpet. Apparently…it’s just really dirty… which I guess is true, and I am a big fan of wooden floors. I just feel for the people who live underneath me.
-Crazy, crazy, CRAZY driving.
-Showers/TWIN showers in kitchens/corridors/bedrooms…. Anywhere but the BATHROOM. (thankfully tho… not in my house :D)
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