Christmas and Brussels

Date: 27 December 2006 21:18:39

Christmas lunch with my boss turned out to be fantastisch (that's a new Dutch word I have learnt, it means fantastic ;)). I caught the bus to their beautiful house (complete with magnificent staircase and marble foyer) and was immediately invited on a pre-lunch bike ride. With all good intentions of burning off 'Christmas calories', we launched off around the neighbourhood for about half an hour. We then went back to the house and consumed, about ten fold, the calories which we had just burnt off starting with:
- champagne and pistachios
then onto lunch with:
- roast duck with chestnut stuffing and gravy
- sweet potato fried with butter and maple syrup
- roasted potatoes and parsnip and
- steamed snap peas
this was then followed by:
- some kind of tasty mousse experiment made from whipped cream and pureed cherries and
- traditional Christmas pudding with brandy sauce and whipped cream
we then played a few card games while munching on some chocolates and sipping tea.

6 hours after I had arrived, I caught the bus back to my apartment. It was nice to spent time with the Ambassador and her family and they certainly made me feel at home (and for those following along, I ended up taking a lovely bunch of flowers and some Dutch dessert delicacies).

Since the Embassy is closed between Christmas and New Years, I have a bit of time up my sleeve so today I made a day trip to Brussels. Arriving on the train, I realised just how busy it was. Even in the -4 degrees weather, this city was packed! I followed the crowds and ended up in the main market place (on the left is the Town Hall and on the right is the Grand Place):

When I walked back through here at night time there was an amazing lights display but there was light snow so it didn't make for good photography. From the square, I followed the crowds once more and went to see the famous Manneken-Pis Fountain:

I then was feeling a bit claustrophobic in the small cobbled streets with all those people so I broke away and did my 'own thing'. This included going to the Musical Instruments Museum. You are given headphones as part of your 5 euro entry fee which use infrared technology. You stand in front of one of the many, many instruments and you can listen to how they sound. It was very interesting. I think my favourite instrument was this one (which I nicknamed 'Medusa'):

There were a few instruments that I am still wondering exactly how they were played such as this one which looks like a selection of glass bowls.....

I then rejoined the flocks of people at the very large Christmas Market (this was my main motivation for going to Brussels at this time of year):

Here I sampled, probably for the 5th time in the same amount of days, the mulled wine as I walked around the stalls. I also found the coolest-most-best-ever Merry-go-Round that I have seen. I even considered kidnapping a child just so I could go for a ride on it! This was one of the things you could sit in:

or one of the flying contraptions:

Not the best photos of the coolest-most-best-ever Merry-go-Round but just take my word for it.

During the day I also visited two amazing churches (one of which I mistook for the Royal Palace at first and the other had a beautiful Icon exhibition inside). I also forced myself to sample the hot waffles, the smell of which seemed to permeate every street. It is now one week until my next adventure - Krakow and Prague.