Chasing Cartoons: Belgium

“Why did you guys come to Belgium instead of heading directly to France? You’re wasting your money”

This question was posed to us within 15 minutes of setting foot in Antwerp, Belgium, by an American cab driver, who was ferrying us to our AirBnB. Although the suddenness of the question startled us, the emotion behind it didn’t. Every travel vlog or blog we had encountered as a part of our research before the trip did mention that a visit to Belgium was ‘overrated’, ‘unnecessary’ and ‘a waste of time’. Why then had we decided to specifically devote time to this place?

The answer? Comics, chocolates, idiosyncrasies and also an inherent inability to pass through a place and not visit it!

However, we did take into consideration the opinions of the above-mentioned travel bloggers and vloggers, and spent only two days and one night in Belgium- one half-day in its capital, Brussels, and the other full day in its quaint little city, Antwerp.

Antwerp

You don’t have to go far to experience Belgium’s eccentricity, for it begins with the name of Antwerp, the Flemish province right across the Dutch-Belgian border.

The name Antwerp/Antwerpen (Dutch)/ Anvers (French) literally means ‘ throwing the hand’. Legend goes that there was once a toll-collecting monster who would chop the hands off of those who refused to pay the toll, and throw them in the river Scheldt that flows through the city. As fate would have it, he was killed by a brave warrior, who also threw the monster’s hand into the river. All this hand business apparently was, inspirational, to say the least and hence the city got its name, a statue in the Grote Markt and creepy hand-shaped foods, including bread and chocolates.

The hand-thrower

Our stay in Antwerp was made extra special by our AirBnB apartment, which was not only beautifully done up, but also right next to the Grote Markt or the main market square in Antwerp. A good thing too, because Antwerp is a teeny little city, so your two feet are probably the best mode of transport. I don’t think I will ever forget waking up to the chiming of the church bells and looking out of the window to see the spires. The city by itself has an old world charm to it accompanied by a nice, sleepy vibe.

The Grote Markt is the central market square in Antwerp, which has a city hall, a tourism office, a fountain and various townhalls. Unfortunately, when we visited the market square, the majestic city hall was under renovation, so we couldn’t take a tour of the building, but a very realistic looking painted cardboard facade more than made up for the exterior. Once again, I couldn’t help marvelling at the simple genius of it all. A weekly open air market was on display as well in the market square, with people putting up their antiques for sale, so it wasn’t the most serene of places to explore that day.

The Grote Markt

The scaffolded City Hall 

But the calmest place was just a street off the Grote Markt, which led to the 18th century Cathedral of Our Lady and a smaller, emptier square laced with cafes, beer shops and souvenir stores. For reasons unknown to us, even the church was closed that day, but there were still the sculptures on the entrance, the tall church tower and the golden clock to admire.

A 'top-down' view of the Cathedral

The detailing on the entrance

The 'quiet' part of the square :-)

The entrance to the cathedral

A very random info nugget in front of the cathedral

Right in the middle of this smaller square was a cute marble installation of a dog and a boy cuddling under a blanket of cobbled road, representing the protagonists of A Dog Of Flanders, a story about a boy Nello and his dog Pastrache, who travelled everyday to the Cathedral to admire the paintings of Rubens housed in it, and following some misfortunes, died in the Cathedral. The installation, set up with the help of a Chinese jewellery company, is a mark of unconditional friendship and pride, and is actually very touching to behold. We spotted a lot of local elderly men and women, who spent hours looking at the statue and possibly reminiscing their friendships.

Nello and Pastrache

But the best part of Grote Markt, as shallow as it sounds, was the food. It’s official - Belgium has THE best fries! They are thick, crispy and salty, and who knew fries with mayo would trump over fries with ketchup? The absolute perfection of these fries have ruined fries everywhere for me!

The Best Fries In The World!

Another must try food item at the cafes near the Cathedral are the waffles. Served with a dollop of cream, or fruit, or sugar or a honeyed syrup (depending on one’s choice) , the waffles form a perfect blend of bland with sugary sweetness without inducing one into a saccharine coma.

The waffles - that syrup on them is heavenly!!

Since our options in Grote Markt had been drastically cut, we headed to explore the other parts of the city, beginning with the bridge on the banks of the river Scheldt


By The River Scheldt

Boats on the river Scehldt

Our visit to the river Scheldt was rather by chance - we were walking in the general direction of the Museum Aan De Stroom, when our eyes fell upon a towering statue of a Viking warrior on a bridge. Wondering what Vikings were doing in Belgium, and curious to see the view from the bridge, we decided to take a small detour.

Our misgivings about Vikings in Belgium proved to be right, as we discovered that the statue was actually that of Minerva, the Roman goddess of wisdom and warfare. Made in 1956 by the Italian sculptor Marcello Mascherini, the statue of Minerva stands parallel to Scheldt facing Antwerp’s oldest building, Het Steen, an erstwhile fortress.

The Magnificent Minerva!

The fact that the seaport of Antwerp is the second largest in Europe is evident by the number of vessels (and one cruise ship) we saw near the statue of Minerva, which is about 3 kilometers from the actual Port of Antwerp. We spent a good twenty minutes by the bridge, just watching the seagulls flying in the blue sky, the boats sailing and taking pictures of the church’s tower, which was beautifully framed by a stone lion and Minerva herself.

The church tower in the background

Museum Aan De Stroom

Museum Aan De Stroon (MAS)

The red glass building of Museum Aan De Stroom (Museum By The River) forms a striking contrast to the relatively older, pastel colour buildings of Antwerp, and is probably where the edginess of the city begins. There are two things rather attractive about this sandstone structure; one, its wavy, curved glass panels, and two, the silver spots on the building that turned out to be - wait for it- hands, because, well, go back to read the etymology!

The Maritime Museum

The zoom lens on my camera could go no closer - can you spot the hands?

I wish I could say the museum inside was as impressive as its exterior, but sadly, it isn’t, unless one counts the floor with the model ships on display and the surprise Tintin installation. The rest of the museum is garbled with information from all over the world and its connection with Antwerp. But the biggest surprise was seeing a big statue of Ganesha in one corner - apparently Ganesha Chaturthi is a major festival in Antwerp as well!

The floor with all the ships!

Ganapati Bappa Morya in Antwerp as well!

However, we hadn’t come to the museum to check out the exhibits - we had come to get a panoramic view of Antwerp from the terrace of this ten-storeyed building. And what a view it was - there was the old city with the church spire and buildings on one side, the hemispherical Maritime museum and the river Scheldt flowing on the other, masts of boats and steamers on the third side and windmills on the fourth side. The best part of this view was that it was absolutely free to see! Apparently we lucked out here - we had visited the museum on a day where there was no entry fee!

The views from Museum Aan De Stroom

Outside the museum, we spotted our first set of comical sculptures in the form of three figures trying to climb up a building trying to talk to the fourth friend sitting right across the road. Belgians do have a funny sense of humour, as we would discover in Brussels.

A collage of the comical sculpture

Tips:

• DO NOT miss the potato fries. Should you happen to miss it, you will live to regret it.
• A tip I missed - for some strange reason, cafes in Europe don’t serve complimentary water, so just refill your own water bottle wherever there are water dispensers. Or just order a beer and THEN order water.
• There are many PG/R-rated spunky advertisements around Antwerp which I couldn’t use because my parents read this blog too, so...do read, click and laugh at them! (Pictures from me available on personal request :-p)
• The servers, the cooks, the shopkeepers and the restaurateurs in Antwerp give the best advice about EVERYTHING, so talk to them!
• Antwerp Centraal - the station- is an architectural beauty in its own right, so do spend more time there instead of just rushing for your train

Brussels

We had planned a specific six hour halt in Brussels for two reasons - the Grand Place (market square, as usual!) and the comic murals. Getting an accurate feel of a place in six hours is really not possible, so my my experiences of Brussels *might* be slightly biased.

Brussels as a city to me seemed overcrowded and unorganised, but that was also possibly because we were in busy, touristy places, like the Grand Place, the Saint Hubert Royal Galleries and the Brussels Zuid station.


The bad luck with tourist places that began in Antwerp continued in Brussels as we found ourselves amidst hordes of people in front of a huge stage surrounded by speakers, amplifiers and billboards, all right in the middle of the Grand Place. It was a struggle to even walk, let alone take in the grandeur of the buildings, but our Indian resourcefulness came into play and we managed to find isolated spots to admire the buildings. 

The Town Hall

The Grand Place, by far, was the most imposing market square we’d ever seen - the fact that we were intimidated by the buildings despite all the hullabaloo going on in the square is proof enough. Like other market squares, the Grand Place is home to the city hall, but unlike other market places, the Grand Place also has corporation houses of bakers, greasers, carpenters etc which look more like palaces, topped with gold plated (or painted?) sculptures and painted in the most aesthetic of pastels.

The Houses of Bakers, Greasers etc

More houses!

Houses of the Dukes of Brabant

The King's House in the background, while a stage takes centrestage!

Not a palace y'all...just the corporation house of workers!

It was time for food, so we headed off the the Saint Hubert Royal Galleries without any delay. The Saint Hubert Royal Galleries is basically a two-storeyed gallery of shops and cafes covered with a cast iron framed roof. Lots and lots of Indians here, so it really felt at home sitting there and listening to women debating on whether paying 6 euros for a bag of gourmet Belgian chocolates was reasonable or not!

Detailing of the roof at Saint Hubert Royal Galleries

A glimpse of the gallery - there was too much light!

Our 'snack' :-p

As I mentioned before, Belgians have a weird sense of humour, possibly related to urination. The biggest tourist attraction in Brussels happens to be the Mannekin Pis, a teeny tiny fountain of a small boy..peeing. Our research also told us that there were two other fountains in the city - one of a girl and one of a dog, both, peeing. Gotta say this - until a couple of years ago, public defecation in India was common, and once you see the real thing, the fountains seem funny no more!

How and why is this a tourist attraction?

But with this weird zany sense of Belgian humour comes their love for comic murals on random walls all over the city, including the station, where we saw a small painted Smurf. Our last deed in Belgium was to Google search for comic murals and just walk through the city looking at them. Brussels has both a comic book museum and a comic mural walking tour, so if you love comics and have more than six hours in the city, go for it!

Tips:

• If you’re visiting by train, keep in mind that Brussels Zuid and Brussels Midi are the same station. We wasted an hour after getting off at Brussels Central, which is another station altogether.
• Visit the comic book stores in Brussels for some really interesting merchandise. Worth it!
• There are other really interesting places to see in Brussels, so plan out at least a full day’s trip.

Belgium as a place is very interesting - the northern part of the country is very Dutch, the southern part French and the eastern part, German. As a result the whole country is a confluence of three very diverse cultures that is palpable in its food and its people. Maybe we were being a tad unfair, having dedicated only two days to it, but had we planned four days in Belgium, we’d have to cut short Paris to two days, which would be very unfair. More on that next week in Paris: Je T’Aime