Belgian Chocolate

9/30/2009

We woke up this morning both having severely bad sore throats. These were probably a result of our draft room, which is very chilly in the dull Brussels weather. Our plan for the day was to go to MacDonald’s, catch up on things and figure out where places are and then walk around. I find it very interesting that as different as things are over here there are also a lot of things that are modeled after the US (like music, movies, and MacDonald’s) and then there are other things that are similar and probably just because that is the way things are in human nature.

After MacDonald’s we were very hungry and I wanted a Belgian waffle so we walked over to the Grand Place to get one at a cute little café. It was delicious. I also ordered a choco mocha to go along with the Belgian chocolate theme and I needed some coffee. Belgian waffles differ from regular waffles that I am used to in the US because they are on the heavier side and very, very sweet, like I was finding chunks of sugar in my waffle.

As we were walking around, we passed some Laundromats that we noticed also had dryers. Since we didn’t know if dryers would be a common thing over here and we were running low on essentials like socks and underwear, we decided it would be a good idea to do some laundry in the afternoon. I could not get my bearings in Brussels and kept getting turned around. Thank goodness fro Katherine and a map. Also we were told a couple of times that Brussels has a lot of pickpockets so that made us on edge while walking around.

We walked to Les Galleries de St. Hubert, which are supposedly famous because they are a very old glass arcade. I had no idea what a glass arcade was, but we found out that it is a street that has a bunch of shops on both sides and the roofs of the shop buildings are connected by a glass covering. Its nice and would be a very convenient place to shop if it were raining. There we passed a Longchamps store and decided to peek in and look around. Turns out their prices of the trendy purses were just a little lower than what you can get them for in the US and they had great colors, so Katherine and I both bought one. I am very satisfied with my purchase, but it did push Brussels into the lead of most money spent in one stop so far. I cannot even begin to think about the Euro/US dollar conversion for two reasons. Number one, the cost of living is so much higher over here. Number two, the US dollar is terrible in comparison. I would have a stroke if I tried to do the conversions while being over here.

We walked around some more. Saw an H and M, where Katherine bought a belt because she needed one. Walked some more toward this big mall called City 2. That ended up being a mall somewhere along the lines of Lynnhaven mall, but put into a multiple story building. It actually reminded me of a mall I went to in Australia. There I found a store that sold a filofax folder that I wanted so that I could keep all of my paperwork/paper souvenirs in, which I thought was very exciting because being disorganized and having a growing collections was driving me nuts. Then we went to the grocery store in the mall to buy some drinks (water and coke) for cheap, but had some serious issues with the self-check out and the language barrier. Eventually we got some help, checked out, and then enjoyed our beverages for while before we headed back to the hostel to get out clothes for laundry. I find it very interesting that the space to sign for credit cars is gigantic on receipts over here. I could literally write in size 40 font.

Doing laundry was an interesting experience. First we weren’t sure how to get tokens for the washing machine, or what setting we wanted the machine on, or even what detergent to buy from the vending machine because it all was in French. Katherine and I do not speak or read a lick of French and the diagrams were not the self-explanatory. So we winged it and all of our clothes came out clean so I guess we did something right. We did two loads between the two of us and it cost about 20 euro, mighty expensive. Oh well its all clean now. The only major bummer was that I accidentally shrunk a new pair of Patagonia pants, but not too bad. Ill still be able to wear them, but they will just look a little like high waters when I sit down. There were also some of the most naughty kids in the world running around the Laundromat. It was so annoying. Come to think of it, I saw a lot of very naughty children in Brussels. Don’t their parents know how to discipline them?

After getting our laundry done and folded, we went in search for some dinner. I had read somewhere that Belgian food was a mix between German and French, which makes a lot of sense. They have a famous dish called Waterzooi, that I thought about trying, so I looked it up to see exactly what it was. It pretty much was a seafood stew. Now Im guessing we were pretty close to the water because seafood was everywhere, but Im not exactly sure where that water was and it made me kinda skeptical. In addition to that, the only thing I had had to eat that day was the waffle and choco mocha and I was in no mood to be adventurous. I had read that you can get a version of the Waterzooi but with chicken, which I probably would have tried but then I would have had to go through the trouble of seeking out a restaurant that sold it as a chicken dish and I just wanted some food then. Katherine and I always have drastic mood improvements once we eat. We settled on a restaurant called Food Factory. We figured this would be good because they probably would have English explanations on their menus and we wouldn’t have to waste any energy attempting to decipher what dishes were. We split a dinner of garlic bread, salad, and chocolate mouse. We like splitting dishes. On the menu, we realized a restaurant we had passed earlier in the day, called Drug Opera, was a sister restaurant. Originally we wanted to eat dinner there, but didn’t want to spend the energy or time trying to find it. After dinner we went in search of another bar that Katherine’s friend recommended called Dali’s Bar. Supposedly it had something to do with Salvador Dali, but in order to get into it you had to walk through a random sketch door, down a sketch hall, through another sketch closed door. All in all it looked to sketchy for us we decided to bag it. We turned around tow start walking around in search for another bar to get drinks and found ourselves right in front of the Drug Opera. We decided to get drinks there, which ended up being hot tea and lemon for our throats (I know we are wild and we had to get up very early the next day to catch a train). Im not quite sure why it was called Drug Opera. Nothing about the restaurant gave off that vibe. We enjoyed out tea, did some travel planning and discussing and then walked home. Needless to say Drug Opera did have the chicken Waterzooi on the menu. Damn, oh well maybe next time.