Belgium Part V

Saturday we had a free day. I was flying out of Brussels on Sunday, and I have a Lithuanian Canadian friend, Emi, going to school there now, so I left Kortrijk a day early and when to visit her. After looking at pictures for a couple hours we went out to bars.

We met a couple of her friends, Americans, and we were dancing at a bar. Here began my more vivid impression of Belgians: pigs! This is probably more the tourists than the locals, but the men were offensively aggressive. On several occasion, involving several different men, I had to pretend to be one of Emi’s friend’s brother to get guys to leave her alone. And even then it wasn’t easy.

We moved on, and on, and on, and ended up having a beer at the grand market, which is in fact, probably the grandes thing I’ve ever seen in my life. It’s basically a huge town square surrounded on all sides by castles. We were able to have a beer there because drinking in public is legal in Belgium. In fact, beer comes in vending machines next to Coca Cola and Sprite.

The next day I walked around by myself taking pictures of architecture and two statues: Maniken Pis, and Zhaniken Pis (Peeing Boy and Peeing Girl). The Boy is the most popular tourist attraction in Brussels. He gets dressed up in all sorts of costumes, and there’s a cut out where you can stick your face into an image of him for photos. When I found him, he was surrounded by about forty people taking pictures. The Girl, however, is not well known at all, and most locals don’t even know about her. I asked all over the place. Most people thought I was a stupid tourist; some people had heard of it but didn’t know where it was. Only a couple people could give me vague directions. I found it, though. As you can see from the picture, it’s so seldom visited that they keep it locked up behind bars. And the Pee is turned off.