Slut Spurt (or The Final Days)

Let me just begin by saying that Slut Spurt is Danish for the Final Sprint or Last Days. I saw this written on shop signs for the first couple of weeks I was in Copenhagen, indicating that winter sales were coming to an end. I figured it was a good way to close this blog, so many months after I started writing it back in March (which was not long after we finally got internet in our apartment...)

This post is also going to be a long one as I desire to finish this blog before my self-imposed deadline of December 31st.

Leaving Prague turned out to be as much of a drama as when I arrived. I left the hostel with lots of time to spare as I had to get to the Central Station to catch the Airport Express bus by 8am. Unfortunately I failed to complete a reccy of the station the day before which meant that I had no idea how to get to the bus stop, but it was well signposted. That said, I just missed it by 30 seconds because I had difficulty finding the door out of the station. The bus drove off just as I found it....

But it wasn't all bad as there was another one just 30 minutes later, though I was going to be cutting it fine. That bus driver decided to wait 10 extra minutes for this large group of last minute people who ended up being packed in like sardines (insert payment issues here as well). Compound that with the huge group of Japanese tourists lined up ahead of me at the check-in counter at the airport and I just managed to check in with mere minutes to spare. The fact that my bags were the first off the carousel in Copenhagen shows just how fine I was cutting it, as they were likely the last bags loaded. But we got there in the end.

Having returned from Prague and having managed to get through Copenhagen airport without having my passport checked (not sure how I pulled that off), I decided to have a post-holiday holiday by spending every day that week at the beach, lying in the sun. Bliss.

However, I couldn't stay at the beach for too much longer as I still had a few things to knock off the list of things to see and do.

Carlsberg Brewery


I decided to go check out the Carlsberg Brewery which was only a 15 minute walk from where I lived. It was not that terribly interesting, especially not when compared to the awesome experience I had at the Guinness Brewery, but it did have some historical factoids and a room filled with some 20,000 bottles of beer from around Europe and the world. Other than that: Yawn.

Bagsvaerd Church


I had this one on my list for quite some time but I was waiting for a really nice sunny day to go and visit. This Church was listed in my Wallpaper guidebook as being well worth the trip to Copenhagen's outer suburbs. It was designed by Jorn Utzon, who designed the Sydney Opera House and the key theme in its construction was light.

Found on Taxvej, about 10-15 minutes walk from the train station in the suburb of Bagsvaerd, it looks from the outside like an industrial building. Inside however was really amazing. Concrete and light wood formed the basis of the construction and there were rows of naked light bulbs on the walls. Skylights filled the ceiling space letting in vast quantities of light from the outside.

The Church proper had a white colour scheme with an amazing undulating ceiling and tapestries made by Marrimekko (a Finnish textile design company). The pews were classic Scandinavian design showing woodwork skill that indicates a long history of working with this material.

It would have to rank as a highlight from my time in Copenhagen, along with Grundtvigs Church.

Grundtvigs Church


Now that I mention Grundtvigs Church, I realise that I never mentioned it in one of my earlier blog posts. I shall rectify that immediately.

Whereas Bagsvaerd Church was small and unassuming on the outside, yet beautiful on the inside, Grundtvigs Church held no such pretensions. It was grand and monolithic, and visible from quite a distance away. Found about 15 minutes walk from Emdrup station, this Church took several decades to build and the son of the builder ended up taking over after the father ran out of money and left it in a half-finished state for quite some time.

This Church was HUGE and GRAND and EPIC. It is one of the few Churches I have ever been into that took my breath away when I entered. Built entirely out of light brick, and with original chairs designed in the 60s, it was pretty awe-inspiring. I'm going to stop now and just let the photos do the talking.

Danish Design Museum


This one was also mentioned in my Wallpaper book as a good place to check out. It has examples of lighting and furniture design that go back several decades and includes all the main Danish designers like Arne Jacobsen and Poul Henningsen. It was set in a lovely building surrounding a Courtyard, and isn't too far from the City Centre.

A C Perch's Thehandel (Tea Shop)


I found out about this place when I went to Cafe Retro and bought a cup of tea a couple of months after I arrived in CPH. A C Perch donate tea to Cafe Retro, and it was jolly nice, so I decided to track down the shop (I figured: better late than never).

A C Perch have been purveyors of tea in Copenhagen for nearly two centuries, have a Royal Warrant to supply to the Royal Family, and I don't think their shop has ever moved. Found on Kronprinsengard it was really cool, with the traditional brass scales for weighing, and bins of loose leaf tea all round the walls. It looked like it has never changed in all the years it has been there. I ended up buying four different ones to give Dad for his birthday. One was a Kenyan blend which went well with milk; another was an Indonesian blend; the third was the Queen's blend which was very fragrant and smooth; and the fourth was a white tea called Yunnan Golden Tips. This white tea was surprisingly creamy and very nice to drink.

I was able to get all my teas packed in coloured gift tins and nicely wrapped. And I got through NZ Customs with no issues (surprisingly). I just wish I had found it in early March and not late June, so that I might have been able to enjoy their teas while I was living in CPH.

Tivoli


This is an amusement park found near the centre of Copenhagen. It is a few minutes walk from the Central train station and only open during Spring and Summer. I went because a) I had to see it and b) every friday when Tivoli is open they have a band you can watch perform, and the particular day I went they had Aqua. Some readers may not remember Aqua but they were really popular in the nineties and their most famous song is Barbie Girl. The concert was really cool, and all I had to pay was the entrance fee to the park.

Afterwards, I went for a walk around. I thought that while it is a little tacky and gaudy, it has this really sweet charm about it as well. The lights in particular were really pretty.

The Final Pack


It is surprising how much one can accumulate in just a few months, even when one is aware that each purchase needs to be thought through. That said, I do have one justification in that I did buy several birthday presents for people, and also had a shopping spree at H&M (a fantastically cheap clothing retailer) because they aren't open here in NZ. In the end, my main bag came in at 19.9kgs, my carry-on was full to the brim and I had to post two 10kg boxes home that cost me an absolute fortune, and that doesn't include the other 10kg box I posted back in May. In total I left NZ with about 30kgs of stuff, and returned with 60kgs of stuff. Not bad.

Final Reflection


I quite enjoyed my time in Copenhagen, though I never felt that engaged with the city. Maybe if I was going to be living there permanently it might have been different. That said, there are several things I will miss about my time there.
1) Cargo bikes. Two words: I WANT.
2) H&M: fashion-forward clothing at Hallensteins prices.
3) The look of amazement on my Italian roommate's face that I could eat vegetarian noodle stir-fry 5-6 nights a week and not die.
4) Hearing my roommate's English go from him appearing to think every sentence through before saying it to speaking just as well as I can in just a couple of months. In hindsight I think I should have attempted to learn Italian...
5) A C Perch: seriously good tea.
6) Cheap flights all round Europe: 30 Euros to fly to Paris? Yes please.
7) Public Transport: we are so far behind in NZ it is sad to see.
8) Bottle Return System: what a fantastic idea, charging people 25c when they buy a bottle of beer, then giving it back when they return the empty to the supermarket. Best way to encourage recycling.
9) Being able to lie on a beach for two hours and not get burned to a crisp.
10) Most of all, I miss my amazing warm apartment with its inch thick double glazing, that was always just the right temperature.

Many thanks to all of you who kept up and read my blog, and for all your patience over these last couple of months as I crawled to the finish line.

Goddag, and farvel.

Kutna Hora and the Bone Chapel

While in Prague I decided to do a day trip to a sight I had recommended to me called the Ossuary in the town of Kutna Hora.

After spending about an hour on the train from Prague, with a change in the town of Kolin, I arrived (having spent the first part of my trip sharing a coach with an old lady who repeatedly hoicked, spat and spewed into her handkerchief).

Armed with a trusty, hand-written map from the hostel I eventually found the Ossuary which was an impressive sight to behold.

The history behind it is that once upon a time it was just your usual chapel, until someone brought some soil back from the Holy Land and sprinkled it around the graveyard. Suddenly everyone wanted to be buried there and so the graveyard filled up, and fast (from memory, the Plague didn't help matters). At this point a monk was in residence and he decided  to start exhuming the skeletal remains (to make more room for newly dead people) and stacking the bones in the chapel crypt. Needless to say he was a bit loopy. Many years later we have the tourist attraction that houses the bones of an estimated tens of thousands of people and an incredible bone chandelier made from every bone in the human body.

After the Ossuary, I decided to walk up the hill to the old town of Kutna Hora which used to be quite wealthy on account of silver mines in the area. It was beautiful though a bit sleepy, and after half a day I was ready to head home.

To sum up the day trip is to quote a fellow guest at the hostel who commented that it is a long way to go for a 10 minute attraction. That said, I thought it was totally worth it as there is only one such Bone Chapel that I know of in the world.

What follows is a photo essay of some of the more interesting sights.

Another Church in Kutna Hora

Plague Memorial

View from Old Town hill

Kutna Hora Street

Communist-era Apartment Block

Freud, Kafka and that Other Guy (Part Two)

And now for Part Two!

The Big Babies and Freud

On the Castle side of the River in Prague is a park you can visit that has huge baby sculptures in it, designed by Czech artist David Cerny. Now when I say the sculptures are big, I am not joking: they were taller than me, and they had no faces. From memory, the lack of faces showed the artist's belief that new-born babies have no unique personality, and that they develop one over time based on surrounding stimuli. It is certainly an interesting theory, and made for quite disturbing looking art. You can also see giant babies by the same artist climbing up one of the TV towers in the city.

Also by the same artist is a sculpture of Sigmund Freud hanging by one hand from a pole suspended over a city street.

The Prague Castle

Crowning one of the hills overlooking the city is Prague Castle which is where the President is based. The Castle has a long and delightful history of conflict, including one incident involving people being thrown out the windows....

On the Castle grounds you can find a Singing Fountain, which has been designed in such a way as to be quite musical when the water tumbles into the pond underneath it. Sadly it seemed the Fountain had laryngitis the day I went, but I did see a really cool robo-mower zipping around and keeping the lawns trimmed while I was looking for it.

There is also a ceremonial guard and if you get there around lunchtime, you can see the changing of the guards. It doesn't have the same pomp and ceremony as the Buckingham Palace one seems to have but it is quite cool to watch.

The Concert

After checking out all the formal touristy attractions for a couple of days, it was off to the concert that I won tickets to on my first night at the hostel. 

As I had two tickets, I found someone at the hostel to tag along, as the Aussies who helped me win were feeling, er, 'under the weather' as it were. Turns out they took part in a rather complicated drinking game that they lost quite badly.

That concert would have to rank as one of the weirdest things I have ever experienced. I knew none of the acts and the MCs were bizarre. One of the MCs was Czech and the other was British. The Czech guy spoke his native language while the British girl spoke English and they both seemed to understand the other. The result: monolingual me getting only about one-third of the whole story. But hey! it was free and kinda fun. 

Oh yeah, the other really strange bit: about two hours into the concert my vision switched from analogue to hi-def digital (only way to describe it). I'm still not sure what brought it on though the guy just a few feet away working his way through a serious amount of weed could have had something to do with it...

The Market

After a day spent in Kutna Hora, which I will talk about in a separate post, I decided to spend my final day in Prague looking for a market I had been told about. It turned out to be a couple of blocks from the hostel and was run by Vietnamese people. The market was huge and EVERYTHING was counterfeit. The salespeople were really pushy and would say things like "you like this bag? I put whatever logo you want on. Converse, Adidas, you pick".

I did make a purchase but I won't tell you anymore than that, other than the fact that it took a lot of haggling over price and ended with me getting a 70% discount off the original price plus a feeling that I had been screwed as the item was probably only worth half what I paid for it...

John Lennon Wall

The following morning I concluded my European sojourn and flew back to Copenhagen. But that is another post.

Freud, Kafka and that Other Guy (Part One)

After my two-day whirlwind tour of Paris, it was off for a more sedate wander through the next, and final, two stops on my European sojourn: Prague and Kutna Hora.

Arrival

Arriving at Prague airport I had one of my few "Oh God..." moments when I took some money out of an ATM at the airport. Because I had to pay the balance of my accommodation, as well as get into the city centre, I decided to withdraw 3000 Czech koruna (sounds like a lot but is only about NZ$250) . I figured I would probably get it in 200 koruna notes or something small and manageable like that.... but no. I was given a 2000kr note and a 1000kr note. The transfer to town was going to cost 150kr, and they had no change. Luckily I could also pay in Euros and had the exact amount I needed to pay otherwise it would have been a long, long walk.

Once I did get to town, I applied the age-old traveller trick of going to a supermarket and buying a handful of items then paying with a big note so as to get change. Worked a treat.

Accommodation

My accommodation was a hostel I had recommended to me called Sir Toby's which was a wee way out from town in a suburb called Holesevic. Given that the hostel's instructions to get to it were rather confusing (to put it mildly), I took a taxi. It is at this point that I give the first FUN FACT about Prague. There are only two cab companies that are guaranteed by the local Govt not to screw you payment-wise. Thankfully they are bright yellow Skodas so you can't miss them. I did see some of the other, non-guranteed taxis around and they mostly looked like beaten-up Ladas so you're a mug if you use them.

The hostel was really cool, in a non-touristy part of town. The staff were super-friendly, and on my first night there I won a pub quiz, with the aid of a couple of Aussies. I scored a free Pilsner and tickets to a concert later that week. The hostel was really busy and had a fantastic mix of people there. They also had handles of Pilsner Urquell for less than NZ$3.

FUN FACT number two: Prague is cheap. When I was there, NZ$1 bought you 13kr which sounds neither here nor there until you realise that a 10kr coin is the Czech equivalent of our $1 coin.

Highlights

I was in Prague for four days and covered quite a lot of ground so for the sake of brevity, I will give a few highlights here.

Walking Tour

I decided to do a walking tour which was fantastic. Payment was in the form of a tip at the end and the tour guide I had was really informative. There are soooo many tours available (and enough tourists to fill several QEII cruise ships) so you just pick one. Someone at the hostel tried two tours by different companies and found that both were essentially the same in terms of length and content.

Some cool things I learnt include:

Black Hand

The Black Hand


In one of the Churches near the Prague Castle we heard the story of the black hand and saw it hanging from the roof. Apparently, several hundred years ago a thief broke into the Church and tried to steal some jewels and gold from a statue they were adorning. The Statue grabbed the thief's hand and would not let go. The thief was found the next morning and despite efforts to free him from the statue by locals, in the end he was forced to stay stuck until his hand went black and fell off. The hand was kept by the Church and put on display to ward off other thieves.





The Golem


In one of the Synagogues in town there is reputed to be a Golem in the attic. Golems are huge creatures made from clay that are brought to life by scrolls placed in their mouths with instructions written on. During the time of the Nazi occupation, a German Commandant decided to go into the attic, despite warnings not to do so, so as to dispel what he saw as a foolish myth. He was never seen or heard from again.

The Five Star Priest

On the Charles Bridge, which is a historic pedestrian bridge linking the Old Town with the road to the Castle you can see a statue of a priest with a halo of five stars. The story goes that he took the confessions of the Queen, and such confessions tended to take several hours... The King thought that something dodgy was going on so tried to get the priest to tell him what she was confessing. The priest refused, citing Church law on the subject.  Eventually the King grew tired of being constantly thwarted so decided to stick the priest in a cage and drop him in the Vltava River and drown him. According to myth, five stars appeared in the air above the spot where the priest was drowned, showing other-wordly approval of the priest's refusal to break the confession oath.




Kafka


Franz Kafka is really big in Prague and there is a museum dedicated to him. Outside the museum you can see a sculpture featuring two men urinating into a pond shaped like Czechoslovakia. This represents the Communists urinating on the country during their forty-year reign. One thing that was quite forcefully pointed out was that Czechoslovakia and its modern incarnation have a long history of democracy and the Communist rule was an ugly blot on the region's history. And don't you forget it!

I could go on but I think I'll leave it there for now. In Part Two I will talk about the Castle, the concert, the Vietnamese market I found, and I might even squeeze in Kutna Hora.....

Charles Bridge

Paris je t'aime

To my long-suffering readers, I have finally made the time to share some more travel stories. This time: PARIS!!!

This next stop on my European tour was totally non-negotiable. Quite simply, you haven't gone to Europe if you haven't been to Paris. That said, I was only able to spend two nights here as I couldn't get accommodation for longer.

I travelled to Paris from Ghent via Brussels where I caught the high-speed Thalys which travels at around 250km/h. For 70 Euros I had a first-class seat that was like a lazy-boy, and was given a meal en-route. Upside: no-one checked if I had a ticket. The only downside: turns out that someone couldn't handle the incredibly smooth ride and left what can be described as the mother of all messes in the loo. The splatter pattern was quite impressive.

After encountering a rather rude Frenchman (my first, and only, one) at Gare du Nord who didn't so much not understand me, but rather did not want to, and taking a hour-long detour because yours truly didn't read the Google map properly before he left Ghent, I ended up at my hostel (and just to make it even more fun, it was 30C that day)

I stayed at Le Village which was about 2 minutes from the steps to the Sacre Coeur Cathedral, in Montmarte. It was pleasant enough though quite expensive for what you got compared to other places I had stayed in. On the upside, it was the first place to offer free breakfast and there was a really cheap supermarket a few doors down the street. On the downside, I was a wee bit apprehensive about staying there as it had mixed reviews online, and stories of things getting stolen from rooms etc cropped up a lot. I had no issues, but then I did decide to carry my laptop with me everywhere I went in Paris, just to be safe.

While in Paris I saw quite a few different sights so I will have to be brief in describing them.

The Sacre Coeur


The Cathedral was just around the corner from the hostel, and I had a magnificent view of it from my dorm room. There were so many tourists there, crowding the steps, enjoying the sunshine. There were performers as well, and Africans doing this weird string trick to you. Someone I had class with in Copenhagen suggested that I should be wary of them as he thought they were a wee bit dodgy, but they seemed OK.

The Cathedral itself was really amazing, with a huge domed roof, and an amazing view over Paris from the main doors. I ended up staying for a Mass (wasn't much else to do at 6pm) which was sung entirely by resident nuns, and presided over by a priest. Some people were in tears afterwards. Seems the spiritual experience doesn't lose any gusto on account of being in French. Me? I was kinda hungry....

Arc du Triomphe


The following day I took the subway to the Arc du Triomphe which was quite something to behold. It was so big, and the workmanship and detail was incredible. But ever so slightly more interesting than the Arc was the roundabout it sat in the middle of. This thing was about 8 lanes wide and had no lane markings. There were also about 8 roads converging at this one point. All this adds up to hours of entertainment watching unbelievably risky merging maneuvers and exit techniques. Speed is essential, as is a lack of fear, and also a lack of care that you got no insurance cover if you have an accident at this one roundabout in Paris.

Here is a video for those who want an example of a typical day.

Alas, I had limited time, so it was off to the next destination: the Catacombs. I got there, reasonably early, and the line went round the block and nearly met up with itself. So I had to pass on that one...

After that disappointment, I went to the next stop on my tour.

Saint Chappelle


This was without a doubt the most beautiful Church I have ever seen, and anyone who has been through my Facebook photos will see that I went to a few. The stained glass windows just blew my mind, such beauty and artisanship I have never seen before. Even the floor was interesting, though it seemed that I was the only one looking at it. You can find it on the Ile de la Cite, a lovely island in the middle of the Seine.

I highly recommend it. In fact, don't bother with Notre Dame, which I also saw. Notre Dame is so plain in comparison.

An amble down Saint Germain

Not only is St. Germain a favourite musician of mine, it is a charming Parisian street which I decided to amble down. I found some quite cool shops down side streets that came off it, as well as some seriously nice homeware and furniture stores. Sadly, pretty much everything was closed as it was Sunday but window shopping was plentiful.

One rather cool discovery was that the McDonald's on Boulevard Saint Germain was licensed! Yes, you read that right, you could get a nice Kronenbourg 1664 with that Big Mac combo if you so chose.

Eiffel Tower

The following day I decided to do that thing that you must do in Paris and climbed the Eiffel Tower. I got there really early and took the stairs to the 2nd level. Not only did this save me about 10 Euros compared to taking the lift, it also gave me a serious amount of exercise. After 669 steps leading me up 21 stories (and nearly killing me on the way), I reached the 2nd level of the tower which is about halfway up. I didn't go all the way to the top which many people do, as it was quite a cloudy day and the top of the tower was shrouded in mist. I had a perfectly awesome view from where I was, and was able to take in the vast scale that is Paris.

I could see all the way to the Sacre Couer, which was a dot on the horizon, over the low roofs of the city.

The other thing I saw at the Eiffel Tower, the day previous to me climbing it, was a rather large group of Asian wedding parties having their photos taken in the park by the Tower. It was rather strange to watch as these large groups waved, clapped and posed for photos, much to the amusement of passers-by.

Rue de St Honore


I had this street recommended to me as the street to walk down. It had every high fashion store you could imagine: Ermenegildo Zegna, Chanel, Lanvin, Hermes, Issey Miyake, Collette and many more. It is also home to several embassies like the British one, and I saw a motorcade with foreign dignitaries from Africa blast along the street in Bentleys (from memory) that had no window tints surprisingly.

Another really cool shop along this street is Laduree which sells the best, most delicious macarons ever. I also had a Strawberry and Mascarpone tart that was scrumptious (and also made several people back at the hostel seriously envious).

Collette was really cool. It was the first store I have encountered that uses iPads as listening stations, if you wanted to listen to a CD they sold. They also had a big promotion on Penny Loafers by Tommy Hilfiger. Hmm. Couldn't quite see myself wearing them.

Au Revoir

That about sums up my two days in Paris. In a way, Paris reminded me of Auckland in that you have to either drive or catch public transport to get to anything. Not like all the other cities I visited where you could walk to all the main visiting sights quite easily. At the same time however, it was visually appealing. The architecture and tree-lined streets was quite romantic really, if you are that way inclined.

That said, a new adventure awaited me further east....

At the Belgian Crossroads (and to the West a bit)

As I write this I am back in NZ and am ever so slowly catching up on a variety of things, this blog included. Please bear with me.

When we last met, I talked about Antwerp. However, this was only stop one of three in that wonderfully weird country of Belgium where they like to go hundreds of days at a time without a functioning Government.

Stop Two: Ghent

This was a 30 minute train ride from Antwerp and sits very much in the middle of Antwerp, Brussels and the biggest tourism hotspot in Belgium: Bruges. Consequently, it has been somewhat ignored by tourists who tend to bypass it completely. This is rather unfortunate as Ghent is a truly lovely city to visit.

My first night there I stayed in a hostel called Ecohostel Andromeda, which was actually a canal boat. The owners lived on board as well it appeared, were complete hippies and super friendly. We were served freshly baked bread and other organic goodies for breakfast. It was a shame that I could only stay there one night. The other two nights were at a converted Monastery. It was not so good as the building was very tired and the walls paper thin. That said, BEST shower in Europe so I can't complain too much.

The town centre is very medieval though nearly everything you see was constructed around 100-150 years ago. The story goes that Ghent was Dullsville in the late 1800s, so the town mayor decided that seeing as Medieval was 'in' that it would be prudent to re-design the town with this era in mind. His strategy worked as Ghent soon became a popular place to visit.

Some of the highlights are the Castle, called the Gravensteen, which has been there for several hundred years. You can do a self-guided tour, which wasn't too bad. The castle has a lovely history as a place were people were imprisoned, tortured and killed in a variety of interesting ways. There are two churches and a watch tower on the main thoroughfare through the township that one can view. I didn't as they weren't that interesting architecturally. The streets are all cobbled, and a river runs through the town. There are also a few canals around that are quite beautiful to behold.

One rather hidden treasure I found, so described as it was about 15-20 minutes walk from the town centre was a modern art museum called S.M.A.K. I have no idea what that stands for, but I will say this: that museum had some quality work on display. I paid the youth rate too, of 1 Euro, so that made it all the better. I highly recommend it. Two of the more stand-out pieces were a large aluminium S that had a current running through it so it hummed (innovative use of modern materials in my mind); and a room with a disco ball hanging from the ceiling, and holes where the speckles of light would have hit the floor, walls, and ceiling (slightly spooky).

For eating, there were an abundance of restaurants and cafes. But, just out of the town centre and away from the tourist eateries, was Sleepstraat. This is the main street in the Turkish district and it is lined with fabulous Turkish restaurants. When you see the Turks eating there, you know it's going to be good. I certainly enjoyed mine.

Finally, a rather weird discovery: the City Hall was completely restored to resemble how it would have looked 100+ years ago. The locals thought they had it down until someone found a hitherto undiscovered building plan that showed that one of the downpipes was painted in blue and white striped paint. So, what did the Ghentenaars do? Yip, they painted it. The building now sports its own lollipop-look downpipe. It honestly looks sooooo out of place.

All in all, Ghent was a beautiful, somewhat sleepy town but well worth the visit as there weren't too many tourists around the place. Though maybe go during May/June as this is when the 65,000+ uni students aren't there and before the Turks leave for 2 months to go back to Turkey for a holiday.

Stop Three: A Day in Bruges.

One word, actually not really a word but a sound: AAAAARRRRGGGHH!

There were so many freakin' middle-aged Yankee tourists around the place, and the rest, many eating at restaurants that served Steak and Chips which is NOT Belgian food. I got claustrophobic. Don't get me wrong, it is a beautiful town with pretty Medieval buildings and canals and they shot a seriously good movie there. There is even a Church with the only Michelangelo outside Italy (a statue of the Madonna with Child). But DO NOT come here during high season if you have a dislike of large crowds. After a couple of hours I had to find a more deserted part of town, which I succeeded in doing: a river-side park with a couple of windmills and some sun-bathing Belgians. It was bliss on what was a very hot day.

The two touristy things I did were to see the Madonna (if I didn't know it was a Michelangelo, I would have considered it boring) and a trip to the top of the Belfry, which I think a guy fell off in the movie, and also put me off spiral staircases forever. I got so dizzy going up and down. Also, the wait time was AGES!

In conclusion Ghent was a lovely town, Bruges also but the latter was insanely full of people so if anyone ever goes there to visit, bear that in mind. In case you are wondering, Bruges is about 20 minutes from Ghent by train.

After a tiki-tour through charming Belgium, it was off to Paris. But that is another post...

All This Beauty!

In the ultimate case of the juxtaposition of two disparate images, here I am writing this post while listening to Euphoric Trance and drinking a rather delightful cup of Twinings Earl Grey. I also used the words juxtaposition and disparate in the same sentence. I can tell this is going to be a great post.

Central Station

Having left the joy-filled environs of The Hague, I made my way to the next destination on my itinerary: Antwerp, Belgium.

The original plan was to go to Brussels, but having been warned off it by some fellow international students who described it as dirty and uninteresting, I redirected to Antwerp, a city which I knew next to nothing about.

It turns out that it is a large diamond trading centre (50%-80% of the world's rough diamonds are traded here) and also the fashion capital of Belgium. One of Belgium's finest exports in this respect, Dries van Noten, has a flagship store in the fashion district. It has the second largest port in Europe and the surrounding docklands have a massive concentration of petro-chemical industries and four nuclear power plants. This last point was included for individuals of my ilk who find such inane details incredibly interesting.

The hostel I stayed at was called ABHostel which was in a converted chocolate factory and was privately owned. It was out of the city centre, in the "real" Antwerp. The owner was super lovely, and the hostel itself really nice. It was quite small in terms of capacity which made it more intimate. My particular favourite feature was the beer vending machine. The owner gave me one really good tip: DON'T do as the tourists do and buy chocolate from the boutiques in the centre of town. These are essentially tourist traps. Just do as the Belgians do, and buy it from the supermarket. I did so and got me some damn fine chocolate for 60 Euro cents from a supermarket one block away. In town, that same thing would probably have cost me a few Euros.

I only had one full day here, so I did a small amount of exploring and visited a few places, a couple of which will be explored in some detail:

Diamond District

This area is all around the Antwerp Central Station, which is a magnificent structure I must say. All marble and gilt (read: opulent and gorgeous). There were so many diamond/jewellery shops it wasn't funny. I saw some seriously nice pieces though. I also went down the Diamond Street where all the diamonds are traded behind closed doors and if you are lucky you might see a man handcuffed to a briefcase making a beeline for a particular building. Four of the world's 28 Diamond Banks are in this area, as are quite a number of Hassidic Jews who represent the old school in diamond trading. More recently Indians and Arabs have moved into the trade.

Fashion Museum

Being the home of one of the more prestigious design schools in Europe, it was decided at some point to open a fashion museum in the Fashion District of Antwerp. The exhibition changes every six months, and when I went it was all about knitwear through the ages. There were some really nice bits dating back a few hundred years and others that were only made in the last couple of years. In one area they had a display of Japanese, British, French and Italian knitwear. It was intriguing to see the differences between these four countries and how they approach knitwear.

Sculptural Knitwear

The French designs had simple silhouettes that pushed the boundaries through the use of colour and pattern while retaining cultural references to things like country life. The British designs went further by exploring the limits of the knitwear fabric itself, blurring the line between function and art. The Japanese designs were clearly based on the Kimono and modern interpretations of this cultural icon. The Italian designs were a combination of tasteful design and outrageous experiments in colour and pattern.

It only cost me 1 Euro to visit because in Belgium if you are a youth (which has an arbitrary upper age limit of 24-26 years old) you can get steeply discounted admission rates to quite a few places. I thought this stop was totally worth it!

Modern Art Museum

Modern Art that I can understand

I left this one more bewildered than when I entered. I will say this about modern art: done well, it is thought-provoking and interesting; done poorly it is crass and self-indulgent. I saw plenty of the latter at this museum. Mind you, I got the youth rate for admission so it isn't as though I paid lots only to be disappointed.

Alas, as I only had one full day in Antwerp, I didn't have time to visit an apparently superior museum which had only been open a few weeks that was down towards the docklands called MAS. Someone at the hostel went to it and raved about it. I'll have to save that one for next time...


All in all, I found Antwerp to be a nice stop, with nice architecture in the older part of town, and I would like to go back if only to explore it in a bit more detail.