Earlier this month, Tonje and I invaded—er, visited—Brussels, the capital of Belgium, and the capital of Europe, for that matter. When my co-worker first heard about our plans, her initial reaction was a puzzled, “What’s in Belgium?”
“Chocolate,” her husband supplied. “Belgian chocolate.”
“Oooh.” She nodded in understanding. “That’s right.”
It isn’t a major tourist destination, for sure. While getting ready for our trip, I’d scanned the local bookstore’s travel section. There were only four or five guidebooks that named a Belgian city, and out of those, only three contained anything substantial. Most guidebooks on Belgium will list a combination of any three of its cities—Brussels, Bruges Ghent, Antwerp, Waterloo—complete with maps. The reason for this is that, well, frankly, the place isn’t that huge. You can cover a lot of ground on foot, and these cities aren’t more than an hour’s train ride away from each other.
Nor is the country as jam-packed with tourist sights as its other European neighbors, so you should definitely know ahead of time what you intend to do and see in Belgium. Otherwise, you might wind up like the baffled lady who stopped us at the train station, just as we were to catch the next ride to the airport, and asked the loaded question of, “What is there to do here?”
Whether you’re planning an excursion to Brussels yourself, or are intending only a short stop before continuing on your way to Paris or Amsterdam, here are seven things you should know about this capital of the European Union.
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Centre Belge de la Bande Dessinée Rue des Sables 20 1000 Bruxelles +32 (0)2 / 219.19.80 http://www.cbbd.be |
It’s always seemed to me that European comics have a more tangible “feel” to them, in comparison with American comics. Not that it’s any surprise—after all, here comics are called the Ninth Art, lauded and studied in its own right. In Brussels, comic shops abound with gorgeous graphics and visceral images, not as something for “nerds” but as something to be marveled at for its artistry.
Well, I have to admit I’m a little biased, myself. . . .
Nevertheless, it goes without saying that the Centre Belge de la Bande Dessinée—Brussels’s very own Comic Strip Art Museum—was a definite must-see for Tonje and I when we invaded the city last week. Stepping in, we were greeted by a red-and-white rocket from Hergé’s Tintin: Destination Moon, while a five-foot-tall Asterix model beamed from inside a glass case.
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