The thing about the French (and possibly every other culture more or less) is that everone loves the good cultural experiences, like red wine, 35 hour working weeks, brilliant baked goods, a wonderful modern art tradition, Amelie, etc. But you never really get a feel for a country until you experience the shittier side of their outlook on life.
Point in case: Strikes.
The whole of France is having a 3 day train strike. So instead of visiting Luxemburg as intended, and then returning to see the folks in the South of France, I have to take a long, complicated, over crowded (and expensive) train ride down to Toulouse.
Still, Luxemburg should be there for a while yet, and there's always next time.
As for the city I am currently in; Brussels is dirty, ugly and smelly. It has a couple of nice buildings, the undersized and overhyped peeing boy statue, and the best flea market I have ever visited. It was in a good sized market square and had everything, from clothes to trinkets to furniture. Brussels also has lots of chocolate shops, good waffles and amazing fries. They also have lots of great beer. You can get a Chimay at the supermarket for about AUD 1.50m and last night we went to a bar with over 2500 beers, the list was about 5cm thick. I don't think my backpack is going to come home too much heavier, but I certainly will at this rate. So it's all balanced out into quite a good time here.
So yes, on to France tomorrow, and a quite week of lounging around, eating less deep fried and chocolate things and spending some time with the family before they head off to Canada for the Christmas season and I begin to make my way home via a week in Japan. The end of the adventure is in sight.
No comments:
Post a Comment