What's the Fascination with Peeing?

Brussels has all of the major urban hustle and bustle, where things seem to always be moving at speed. It has now been a full week that I have been in the city and nothing has changed the view that there is little to slowing down and relaxing. The snow had melted away at the weekend so it is into the low 40s during the day, often a bit blustery, and down into the low 30s at night.

The following is the wrap up of the past week:
Wednesday - Ken and I started on working to get our bearings of the place. He and I are both compass-driven just as much as map driven so getting around has been quite reasonable. We met at the hostel and Sabine, the manager, is quite good to work with. We got all of the questions answered and she gave us a full tour of the place, including the rooms that the students will be occupying. We then spent the requisite time at the information centers, the one for Brussels itself as well as the one for the northern, Flanders, region. We then enjoyed a bit of a wander around the central part of town, taking in the sites, ensuring that we got Manneken Pis out of the way early. Now they also have Jeanneke Pis and Zinneke Pis, and add to that the fact that there are tiled Space Invader art pieces all over, many of whom are also peeing. It is a true peeing epidemic in Brussels and the worst part is that there are no sexy or unusual bathrooms for any of this behavior, it is all just a bunch of Wild Peeing (public urination). Ken's brother also arrived so we split up in the afternoon and met for dinner, having a semi-authentic Belgian dinner at in the restaurant district. We now definitely know just why the city is an expensive place, if you don't go with the fixed menu you might just get soaked on cost.

Thursday - Ken, his brother Terry, and I met again at the hostel and Terry and I went out to get a feel for the E.U. part of town and tour Autoworld, which was to be part of the student experience. The E.U. is a nice area, lots of glass buildings, and unfortunately lots of offices for lobbies of all sorts. The students will get a sense of how and why the E.U. was created by going through their Parlementarium on Wednesday. From there Terry and I made our way up to Autoworld, and it was indeed a bit of an up hill walk. The Cinquantenaire is a lovely area and eastern side held the museum. It is a fantastic museum if you love old cars and the development and history that took place. It did get scratched from the list of student visits because I don't see all of them fully enjoying or appreciating what they are seeing. We came back and had lunch as Les Brasseurs, where Ken and I ate for Wednesday lunch. It just happens to be a true microbrewery right on the edge of the Grand Place. We came back up to the hostel to meet up with the last of the students checking in and dropping their take home midterms with me. We then went for a more classic British Meal at the Six Naitons, with some wonderfully well prepared lamb.

Friday - Bike tour of Brussels. This was a great time overall and took a little over 4 hours. The morning started with snow flurries in the air and a good bit of cold to work in as well. We stopped by the overrated long-time wizzer, then when further south to the justice building before heading east over to the E.U. and then back over to the Cinquantenaire after stopping at a place for frites with any number of sauces added for good measure. The one thing the students want to go back for is something on the menu called "cheese crack". From the Cinquantenaire we headed back past the palace and through a couple of parks on our way back. Everyone made it through great, although it is not the most comfortable of places to ride with the close distances with high density traffic patterns. After it was over Ken and I stopped at a small coffee shop. We found one we liked in Freiburg, and now have ours to enjoy in Brussels. In fact I spent Saturday morning there grading papers and will probably spend some time there tomorrow grading midterms. After that we caught up with Terry and figured out our dinner plans, this time it was Iranian food at a restaurant called The Caspian. It was quite lovely in a small street back away from the Grand Place.

Backpacking Duckman was on the bike route. I think I was the only one to stop and photograph him.

Saturday - As I said previously I spent the morning grading so that students could get back some papers. The afternoon entailed 3 hours of class, focusing on issues of urbanizaiton. As part of the class we watched a great new documentary on the topic called "Urbanized". In all truth after such a long day we tried to keep things simple, getting back to the hotel for a bit before going out for Indian. In all truth I have spent very little time shopping or browsing, have only poked my head into a couple of chocolate shops, but mostly it has been about the classwork. This has been all the busier trying to juggle this class with the three going on back home online. It was not a great night at the hotel as there was an irate guest around 11pm and the police had to be called. Things were safe but it was a bit disconcerting to have all of that happening and the loud groups of young kids.

Sunday - Bruges day. We took a morning train to Bruges and spent the entire day in town. I would be perfectly happy commuting by train to Brussels from there for the remainder of my time here. It has such a different vibe and I will talk about it more in the next blog entry. We kept it low key, trying just to wander around and enjoy ourselves. We didn't get back until about 8pm that night so we had about 10 hours in town to wander and explore.

Today - Six hours of class today, three in the morning and three in the afternoon. Needless to say I didn't get out to enjoy the fantastic warm weather much. I did run down to a grocery a few blocks south to pick up some goat's cheese and bread for lunch. I did though manage to spill nearly half of my travel mug down the back of my coat this morning, so I knew it was going to be a brilliant day. Of course that was brought home by the video I wanted to show them on Darfur not working and even more by the fact that the computer network back home wasn't working properly just on the day that my students in a class back home had to take their midterm exam. Grrrrr. Not a happy day by any means. Thank goodness tomorrow is a day off and I will do laundry after breakfast.

Brussels is quite the expensive town. Meals just aren't cheap so I keep heading back to the grocery to get some things. I'm getting best value there, 10 clementines for 2 euro and fantastic herbed goat cheese for less than 2 euro. Don't expect to go to a restaurant and spend anything less than 15 euro, just for the food and some sparkling water 18 euro seems to be a going rate.

So hard to believe there are just 3 class days left and two of them are wrapped up in tours and museums. Thursday morning I have my last class period for 3 hours and then the final exam is in the afternoon. This whole thing will get wrapped up before spring break is truly over. That said I am looking forward to spring break plans of catching up with friends in the U.K. starting Sunday afternoon. Back to the high intensity grind tomrrow, even with it being an off day for the students. I'd love to get out to the Atomium tomorrow, but that may have to wait until Saturday. I'd also love to go back to Bruges for one more day wander, but I only see Saturday as the possibility for hat and I need to come back to pack up in order to be ready to get out to the airport early on Sunday for my flight. I'll do all I can, but the work is definitely driving what gets done.