Brussels, Maastricht, Ghent

This and my next blog posts will summarize some of the things I've been doing in Brussels and also several day trips I took to a number of cities in Belgian and neighboring Luxembourg and the Netherlands.


Brussels (February 12th)

On Saturday, February 12th, I visited the Museum of Musical Instruments and the Cantillon brewery with two American interns, Mary and Siobhan. The Musical Instrument Museum was... unique. I'm not exactly a musical instrument aficionado, so I wasn't expecting it to be very exciting for me. Still, I've never been to such a museum before, so if nothing else it's a first for me. As it turns out, included in the ticket price are headsets that play back a sample of the music of whichever instrument you are standing in front of. That, of course, made the tour far more interesting for me than it would have been to just walk around staring at instruments.

Afterwards, we went to Cantillon brewery on the advice of one of the other interns. They brew a type of lambic beer (a type specific to Belgium) called Gueuze. We paid for a self-guided tour, which didn't include headsets, of course, but we did get guidebooks detailing the process of making beer there. And more importantly, after the tour we got samples of a couple of their specialties. They, and the tour, were fine. Later that night, we met up with several other interns to go to the Carnival Party put on by the US Marines at the Marine House, which was nice though unfortunately is located a fair distance from the center of Brussels (i.e. couldn't take the metro but had to ride the bus).



Maastricht (February 19th)

My trip out of Belgium was to Maastricht, a medium-sized city in the south of the Netherlands. I went via train to meet Andrew, another American intern, an employee of the embassy, and her sister and Belgian friends. We all met at a coffeehouse and then set off to explore the city. Luckily one of the Belgians knew the city well, and she gave us a tour of the main squares and buildings.

Among other things, we went to a famous bookstore that interestingly is inside of what used to be a church, we stopped by two churches: the large St. Servass Church and St. Jan's cathedral. The latter really stood out with its red steeple. and later we crossed the Maas river (which runs from France to the Netherlands through Belgium). In 'The Markt' square we ate lunch, and when we left there was a small demonstration taking place in the square related to the revolution in Egypt (or something like that). After crossing the river again we headed for Bonnefanten art museum. I'm not exactly an art aficionado either, but again it's a first for me in Europe. I found some of the art interesting, but other exhibits were just confusing... At any rate, after finishing at the museum it was getting dark, so we wrapped things up by going to see the old city wall and then getting drinks.



Ghent (February 26th)

The following Sunday I went with Andrew and the Belgian who gave us a tour in Maastricht to Ghent,  a medium-sized city in the Flemish (Dutch-speaking) part of Belgium. The Belgian was kind enough to offer to give us a tour of Ghent, which is her home town. Unfortunately, we did not have good weather that day – it rained pretty much non-stop.

Meeting at the train station, we took the tram to the center of Ghent. There, among other things, the Belgian showed us something called a 'béguinage' (French) or 'begijnhof' (Dutch) – a 13th century residence for single women who needed a place to live but didn't want to go to the extreme of joining a convent. Most beguinages, or at least this one, consist of rows of city houses surrounding a park and a church. Nowadays, of course, they aren't confined to single women, and instead all sorts of people live there – though they aren't cheap. Next, we toured the major historic buildings and squares in the city, visiting, among other things, a large church (or cathedral) that contained at least 8 or more small chapels behind the main alter. Later in the day we stopped by the Leie River to take a photo at what the Belgian said was the most iconic view of the city: with the 'three towers' in the distance: two being part of St. Nicholas' Church, built in the 13th century, and the other Saint Bavo Cathedral, built in 942.  We then visited Gravensteen Castle, built in 1180, but due to time constraints we weren't able to take a tour. Still, I was able to take a couple photos from inside the Castle courtyard. Our visit concluded with refreshments and a walk through a couple parks.