To quote Fidel:
"Brussels and mussels... hey, that rhymes!"

Without being my usual cynical self, one weekend is too much time to spend in Brussels. There has to be more to the mussels and waffles and chocolates! (No complaints about the mussels though... I had close to 2kgs worth!) The home to the EU and NATO headquarters is surprisingly a subtly charming little cobblestone and gothic inspired town. (And I mean gothic as in 16th century architecture, not gothic as in Ozzy Osbourne). Lionel and I wandered around (in rain, sleet and hail) for two days without a proper map (the only one we had was in Dutch!) and after about 5 hours of walking, we had covered almost every touristy thing there was to do, including paying the little peeing boy, Mannekin Pis, a visit... three times! By the end of Saturday we were such experts on Brussels, we were giving other European tourists directions to the little Bronze statue (who must be dreadfully cold now that they've taken away his little costume).

Brussels is so small, we managed to bump into Fidel, Raymond, Manda and Khairiah twice! At the same spot! Belgian restaurant owners around the Grand Plaza are also the freakiest thing, as we discovered. These guys beat the Petaling Street peddlers at being completely in your face hands down! It's a good thing the schweeeet mussels totally make up for it. Also I hear that the chocolates are the best part of Brussels. I wouldn't know. I still don't like chocolates. But the displays were really pretty. And the chocolate strawberries and waffles were yummilicious. The more I think of it, the more Brussels becomes symbolic of all the best aphrodisiacs.

Our 4 star hotel was probably part of the attraction too. The best part of it for Lionel was TV (I know it sounds jakun, but we live without a TV in London!) and being able to watch BBC and football highlights. The best part for me was being right in the centre of museums galore! But we didn't enter a single one. Nope! We were for most of the day, stuck at the Grand Plaza exploring every single road and alleyway until we could map out the city ourselves!

In fact we got so good at it, we walked all the way from the Grand Plaza back to the Eurostar train station pretty much by instinct. I wasn't all too happy walking about some dodgy areas and what looked like Edgware road slums, but you just can't get lost in Brussels. And we managed to get into the shade of the station before the weather turned crazy and started sleeting like mad! To add to the excitement, Lionel had to leave his camera at Brussels immigration... which thankfully Fidel managed to pick up since he was leaving 4 hours later than us.

Now we're just waiting for Fidel to bring the camera home.

I can't stand writing this presentation for tomorrow. Stupid group project!