Last Trip of the Year

     I've just returned to York for the last time this year. I spent the past 4 days exploring Belgium. The first day I was in Brussels by myself and went on a lovely free walking tour. I learned lots of random things about food and beer on my tour, such as that there are actually 2 kinds of waffles! The Brussels waffle is crispier and not too sweet and thus you can put loads of sugary toppings on it. The Liege waffle is sweet itself and so you don't put toppings on it. I also learned that fries were invented in Belgium. There was a little fishing village that would catch and fry fish as their main food, but one year it was too cold and the lake froze over so they couldn't fish. Instead, they cut up potatoes in the shape of fish and fried them... and that's how we get fries (according to random Belgian tour guide). Pralines were also invented in Belgium when a doctor decided to coat medicine in chocolate to make it go down easier, then his son/someone I can't remember had the idea to replace the pills with cream. In just 2 short steps they managed to go from a pill to a chocolate dessert.
     Their sugary specialties are not only their specialties, but more like their dietary staples. Brussels was a cool city, but I wasn't too keen on the food options. Basically every block has a waffle place, a Belgian fries place, a chocolate shop, and ice cream. As you all know, I love all of those things and have quite a sweet tooth (I have eaten ice cream for breakfast before... Steamboat Kutandara 2009). Even so, I also do need real food and like eating healthy as well, so dining in Belgium was a tad limited as everywhere you turn all you can find are waffles! I did love my hostel though. In the picture below you can see that the beds were kind of like little wooden caves that you crawled in. Inside, there were even shelves for your stuff and a light. When you left you put your stuff inside and slid the door shut and locked it.
     My second day I went to Bruge which is in the Dutch speaking part (really makes no different to me since I can only say about 5 words in both French and Dutch). The town was so pretty. I went on a boat tour and got to see so many different styles of buildings. Apparently, Bruge was once the richest city in Europe, and it was also once the poorest city in Europe. Now it's doing pretty well with the flocks of tourists. In the afternoon, I took a quick train to the beach in Oostende. I had imagined myself laying on the beach in the sun, but alas it was a bit too cold, so I just enjoyed a long beach walk.
     The next day it was time to go to Antwerp to meet up with Danielle and some of her exchange friends. We had some Thai food and then walked around in some direction I don't remember. They'd been there before so sort of knew their way around. We made a valiant attempt to go to the American Food Store, which requires a walk, a tram and a walk since it's in some odd suburb, but it was closed. Guess I'll just have to wait a week to get American food. We went back to Liege in the French speaking part where Danielle lives and I stayed in a nice hotel in the city. Unfortunately, it ended up a not so pleasant experience since 2 guys tried to get to my room at 1 a.m. (apparently they were incapable of reading numbers or using their brains and thus scared the living daylights out of me). Thankfully the day improved once I met up with Danielle and her friend Emma in the morning. We walked down this 1k long market and then had Chinese food from a mini Chinese festival in the main square. I had sushi and lychee juice! We took the bus up to the citadel and took in the views while eating animal crackers (technically not animal crackers as they were letter shaped). Belgium is an odd place I must say, but it made for a good last adventure (and a waffle dinner of course) and best of all, seeing Danielle again. Thankfully, soon we'll both be home and I won't have to go all the way to Belgium to see her (though the one hour flight for £15 from Manchester was pretty convenient).

Neat hostel bed in Brussels

The beach at Oostende 

 Me and Danielle in Liege