Brussels, Belgium

When traveling with people, the experience is always colored by the folks I roll with. My host from London came into Brussels for the weekend. They came for the beer. Belgian ales are good drinking. The Delirium cafe (associated with Delirium Tremens) has at least 2004 beers in stock. I like my beer and all, but a few 10% ABV brews… sometimes the color of the experience is hazy. It wasn’t just all about beer. Belgium is also known for chocolate and French fries. Combine them all and you have the trinity of smiles… or was it tummyaches?

I stayed in central Brussels which is mostly a business/tourist area. The Grand Place is pretty grand and at night the light show is a technicolor sight. Brussels is the administrative center of the EU. Did someone say fat cats hemorrhaging tax payer money? Not me. I was busy checking out the Museum of Musical Instruments. There one can look at all these old instruments and in the wireless headphones provided, get to listen to compositions with those instruments when you get close. Did I dork out over the early electronic instruments? Yes. Yes, I did.

In my travels I have seen some pretty ridiculous and large buildings, but the most ludicrous structure I have seen was the Atomium. In the 1950s a group of very powerful Belgian men sat around a table and said, yes, let’s build a 100 meter tall shiny model of an Iron crystal. Now, there is nothing that get’s outdated quicker then something that is supposed to look like it is from the future, but this building still has charm and wow value. If I had the power to do so, I wouldn’t have just renovated the building. I would have put it on a rotating foundation and make it a combination of a megaclub and the biggest disco ball of all time. Dreams… dreams make life worth living.