Sunday, June 11, 2006

leuven, brussels... check, almost check!

Aaaah, the joy of broadband and unlimited time on a computer... It's almost like crack. :P Now, if only I could master this "azerty" keyboard...

So, left Antwerp with no problems, and yet another place to crash while I travel. This is really the life. It's like being an elite bum... Although I am accumulating lots of karma. Once I settle down, it better be in a really nice spot, with at lest 2 guest rooms... so many people to repay back in lodgins! ;) So here is to hoping I figure out this making money thing!

Anyhoo, back to the itinerary. Leuven turned out to be pretty, as promised. It also helped that mother nature finally remembered it is june, and that should mean warm, nice weather. Which she gave plenty of. This whole rest of the week, into the weekend, has been amazing. I am finally starting to miss my summer clothes. Today in the train there were sooo many people with burnt skin. No one was expecting such a revesal of weather!

An afternoon of strolling about allowed me to discover the most picturesque architecture. The town hall is this massively decorated stone building, with a statue of an important person every 2 meters or so. Also strolled through le Beguine, a place formerly used by women who renounced men, but weren't nuns. Widows or spinsters. It's a UNESCO world heritage site. It is now used as dorms for students and faculty. Really cool (enhanced by subconscious envy?). Since it was so nice out, I just laid in parks for whiles. I had dinner in a local brewery, and tasted their beer, which is pumped straight from the production tanks. I'll have to look up the name. quite smooth.

No new friends in this town, just a quiet convo with my roommate over breakfast, but no exchange of contact info. She was from Northern Netherlands. But I got some extra travel info on eastern europe, which was useful. So I headed off to Brussels, to meet a girl I found through the ad I posted in forums. Turns out she is amazingly nice. And so are her two doggies. She is super friendly, yet private and mindful, too. Just one of those people you are happy to know. We spent the afternoon strolling through the center of the city, visiting Grand Place (not quite living up to the hype, IMHO), the mannequin pis statue (another tiny disappointment), and the museums of chocolate and of beer (do not waste your money. They each wanted 5EUR, and you get a tiny room with info you could pull off the internet. They give you one sample in each place, but it's just a waste of time). In the evening we tried to find a place near her apt, got snobbed twice, waitress was just not nice, and finished hanging out at a bar near a concert venue, where tons of cool ppl usually crowd the place. We just pretended like we belonged, too ;)

Today I went off on my own through a museums walk. If you have the stamina to do 5 museums in 7 hours... then I recommend the mont des arts pass (not the belgium pass!) I managed to get to 3, loooved the art nouveau and permanent 20th century collection of the museum of fine arts. Very elegant building, one of those places i would go back just to hang out and get inspired. The royal library was interesting, lots of old typography machines about the hallways... and the museum of musical instruments has a neat system where the headphones you get tune into a radio signal as you approach a showcase, with music of the instrument you are looking at. makes for a bit of a headache, changing music every 4 steps... but cool experience!

So, overall, Brussels is a nice city. A bit too many bums around, many with dogs... but not unmanageable. This evening I joined a new set of hosts, friends of a good friend of mine, who live outside brussels. tomorrow they are headed south, through the countryside and forests of Belgium. I get to see a non-city side of the country!

i do wish i had a camera sometimes... but the freedom of traveling with just a backpack is just too cool :) i really have to look into a multi-functional cell phone purchase.

i have been trying to keep a blog offline, as well. but i think the book idea is finally taking shape. so the notes are mostly for that. and to vent all the personal crap. i am getting inspired. i am struggling with my mind. figuring out the me that *is*, accepting that, rather than fighting to be the me I keep thinking I *should* be... but i have possibilities to unfold. the creative juices are starting to remember what it was like to flow... If I can just get past the ideas, and to the production point, i might actually become a full-fledged artist for real! i think the weather change, the continued support of old friends, and the new social interactions are lifting my spirits. it would be really silly if depression is nothing more than a chemical imbalance. all the crap you go through, and it's just the wrong atoms hanging out in and around you... ah well.

'Hope everyone is well. Do leave a comment when you have time. Those make me feel warm and fuzzy and connected :D

ps) please bear with the lack of editing. i need to fill in the job again :P

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Warm and fuzziness!!! Just saying hi, and I hope you're having fun...

Anonymous said...

Glad to hear all is well stranger.

Also Glad to hear the inspiration if flowing again, look fwd to seeing some of your art.

Besides, you still owe me a little art story to go along with that music I gave you ;) lol

Miss ya!