belgianwaffle

Belgium

Oh Mr. Rops!


Posted in: Belgium, Family, Princess

The publishing exec arrived on Friday night clutching to her bosom an array of exciting presents. Books all round and a teapot. The Princess is particularly taken with her book which, as a token of supreme approval, she has not even tried to tear. Publishing exec was full of tales of glitzy parties and famous people. She works in non-fiction at the moment and though I think, in her heart of hearts, she would like to be working with brilliant unknown authors on their difficult, yet brilliant, works of fiction, non-fiction has its compensations. Her bit of non-fiction appears to be the “you’re a famous person, why don’t you write a book?” end of things which I imagine doesn’t guarantee quality (think of Victoria Beckham’s biog or Bill Clinton’s) but does guarantee regular meetings with famous people. Famous people seem to be tortured by their book writing deadlines. And I can tell you that, even now, there are a couple of famous people who are being tormented at the prospect of spending the summer trying to finish that book that was supposed to be delivered for last Christmas. Being rich and famous isn’t everything, you know.

Saturday, we decamped to Namur. We felt that it was time that the publishing exec sampled the joys of Wallonia.  I haven’t been to Namur in a long time and I was pleased at how pretty it was.  I had only remembered the long tramp up to the citadel and not the appealing old town.  It was very warm though.  I was sorry that I had told the publishing exec to pack for March weather and, I suspect, so was she as she sweated in her jeans.  We took a trip into the Felicien Rops museum which was air-conditioned and full of steps so all conditions were met for the Princess’s entire felicity.  I had vaguely heard of Mr. Rops as a belle epoque artist and knew he had done some erotic stuff but I hadn’t realised that it was almost his entire output.  The guy was a 19th century pornographer (oh yeah, now you’re all going back to check on the link) but it was quite entertaining stuff in a mildly outrageous way.  Mr. Waffle, the publishing exec and I gasped while the Princess proceeded up and down the stairs watched over and attended to by the kindly middle aged ladies who were the guardians of the house of porn.

On Saturday night we left herself in the hands of the babysitter and went out to dinner.  All very nice and I weighed myself on the antique but, I hope working, scales outside the bathroom (we have none at home in the interest of everyone’s well being) and weighed less than I expected which I was able to report to the waiter who was peering over my shoulder in mild interest.  When we got home, I drove the babysitter back while Mr. Waffle and the publishing exec got stuck in the lift and had to effect a dramatic escape involving jumping between floors and potential risk to life and limb.  All parties, including the lift, are now fine.

On Sunday, myself, the Princess and the publishing exec went to the Horta house which is Mr. Horta’s own art nouveau house.  It is all very beautiful and everything but, if you check out the link, you will see that it is distinguished by its many flights of stairs which I walked up and down numerous times while holding a small girl by the hand.  She never tires of stairs, our girl. All of the chairs in the house have little labels on them saying “please do not sit on this chair”.  I presume this was meant to include, “please do not use this chair as a means of support for your filthy little fingers while cruising round the room” but they didn’t say so and as all of the other visitors were Italians who are notoriously indulgent to small filthy fingered people the Princess was free to cruise in peace.

Speaking of Italians, you will be delighted to hear that after many, many faxes (email? “no, non e possibile”) and a 300 euro postal order as deposit (credit cards? “no, non e possibile”) our guesthouse in Sicily has finally confirmed our reservation.  This is a relief as I was responsible for booking in the entire extended Waffle family.  I can’t help feeling that a pall would have been cast over my brother-in-law’s wedding had his parents had nowhere to stay due to the ineptitude of his sister-in-law (oh come on, I mean me…do try to keep up).

Comments
belgianwaffle

on 19 July 2004 at 12:00

Don’t be sarky miss. Very, very glad you’re back. I missed you. Hope you are feeling great.

silveretta

on 19 July 2004 at 12:10

Ta BW – sadly wasn’t being sarky though…

Locotes

on 19 July 2004 at 13:23

House of porn eh? And trying to justify your visit in the name of ‘art’. Tsk. I knew all you art lovers were a dodgy bunch behind it all…
Good news with the booking though – when’s the trip?

belgianwaffle

on 20 July 2004 at 21:45

Silveretta, it’s so difficult to guage the tone of a blog comment…
Locotes, you’re right about art lovers. Trip is end August, so it should be nice and warm.

Intercultural meetings


Posted in: Belgium, Mr. Waffle, Princess

On Friday the Princess and I went to the Royal Museum for Central Africa where we met the best dressed diplomat and various cousins who were visiting her from distant Chicago.  The little boys had no interest in the Princess but the little girl (6) was delighted with her and showed her round the museum leaving me to stroll in their wake chatting to the adults.  All very pleasant.  And they were all nice Americans, you know the way we used to laugh at our American cousins for being so nice when we were all growing up?  Well, I can tell you, there is nothing as nice as polite, well-behaved, little Americans when you are spending a wet afternoon in a museum with a one year old.
The museum itself is a funny place.  It was built on an imposing scale by King Leopold II to celebrate his conquest of the Congo.  The exploitation of the Congo was particularly dreadful.  Joseph Conrad wrote a book about it “The Heart of Darkness” and Roger Casement wrote a damning report for the British government.  But the museum is curiously unaware of these developments.  Nowhere is there an acknowledgement that dreadful things happened in the Congo when Leopold and co. were in charge.  This may be partly because a lot of the exhibits and display cases don’t seem to have been updated since the museum was built in around 1900.  This is part of the charm of the establishment, in many ways.  There is a piece of wood from the tree under which Livingstone’s heart was buried accompanied by a handwritten note from the donor confirming its authenticity.  There is Stanley’s case which has a handwritten note pasted on to it in fading writing saying “This suitcase accompanied my brother across Africa.  It is not to be used under any circumstances or to be removed from my bedroom.  Dorothea Stanley”.  There are old maps of Africa dating from the 1400s.  The one that impressed me most was one from 1825 where they were truthful about what they knew and almost the entire of central Africa had “lands unknown” written across it.  Best of all, from the point of view of the children, there were stuffed animals.  Lots and lots of stuffed animals. The Princess reached febrile levels of excitement when she came to the enormous elephant.  She grabbed the rail round it and stood on her tiptoes squeaking and pointing.

Friday, was terribly thrilling also as it involved a birthday party.  This was Mr. Waffle’s first children’s birthday party in a long time and, fortunately for him, it was a relatively civilised affair where the adults outnumbered the children by about 3 to 1.  Still and all there was falling, vomiting and crying, so it wasn’t entirely untypical.  One of the attendees was the birthday boy’s minder who is a very nice girl from South Carolina. The Princess was most taken with her and sat on her lap for a considerable time poking at her train tracks.  “These European kids are always fascinated by the braces” she said gamely.  “Right, I see, well, proof that we don’t believe in orthodontics over here” I said in mortified tones.  Princess continued to poke with interest and then offered Ms SC a paprika crisp to show that there were no hard feelings.
We got the birthday boy two books.  I began to feel a bit inadequate as the other presents emerged.  Ms. SC (who let’s face it, must have no cash as a childminder who’s “starting school in the fall”) got him a very elaborate turtle that makes lots of interesting noises when you poke it.  Other people got him a coat and a bottle of wine for his parents; and two very elaborate cuddly toys.  Had the following conversation with Mr. Waffle on the way home:

Me: Did you feel that we should have got him a bigger present.

Him (in tones of deep bafflement): No, why?

Me: Well, the other presents were all bigger than ours.

Him: Really, were they?  Well, I’m sure ours was fine, didn’t his mother thank us for it?

Me: Well, yes, of course, but…

Him: Well then.
Sometimes, I feel that I worry too much.

A life of crime


Posted in: Belgium

I was in the post office a while back and I saw a sign from the Flemish tourism agency saying “fill in a card and we’ll send you all our brochures absolutely free of charge”.  So, I did.  Brochure arrived and it was mostly advertising.  I was about to chuck it in the wastepaper basket when I see that they have a little note as follows:

“As we mentioned, the book of ideas and brochure are completely free: all we require from you is 2.50 to cover post and administration costs”.

The nerve.  However, we subscribe to test achat and we will shop them for their iniquity.  In the interim, I am inclined to pay, but Mr. Waffle is not.  It is not his misspelled name that is on the bill though and I fear that the commune police will come knocking on our door and haul me away for non-payment of debt.  I’m living on the edge here, I can tell you.

Comments
jackdalton

on 09 July 2004 at 01:03

Shop them; they deserve it.

belgianwaffle

on 09 July 2004 at 20:59

Um, HJB, no, Belgium is sort of like Switzerland, if Switzerland has lots of different police forces but it’s not clean like Switzerland and they don’t care about washing anything on the street as far as I can tell. The main task of the commune police is to ring your doorbell to check that you live where you said you lived when you registered with the commune. You think that I’m making this up, don’t you? Would you believe that they have guns to accomplish this difficult and dangerous task.
Jack, would have to compose a letter in French and am probably too lazy for that so it will just sit and taunt me on the desk for a bit, I suppose.

Ill gotten gains


Posted in: Belgium, Princess

Well not really ill gotten.  Went and changed my train tickets and it costs 30 euros less to go the week after next.  I paid by credit card but the SNCF people refunded me CASH.  I spent the loot as follows:

1 coatstand (8 euros – well actually 10 because although they were willing to give it to us for 8, Mr. Waffle felt they needed the money more than we did.  A bit tiresome to get home, I carried it on my shoulder balanced like skis while Mr. Waffle pushed the Princess but we were something of a hazard to other road users – did have a surreal moment while waiting for the tram; best dressed diplomat and her husband came along, stopped to chat and hung up their purchases on the coatstand. Very appropriate for the land of Magritte).

Six porcelain cups and saucers (5 euors – a killing!  Mr. Waffle says that there is a gap in my life only porcelain can fill.  And I got a sugar bowl thrown in as well.  Slightly difficult to carry. Especially with a coatstand slung nonchalently over a shoulder)

2 cinema tickets (Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkabhan – only alright but we have broken our cinema jinx and actually got to see the film we wanted to see)

When we got home from the cinema last night, our babysitter told us that the Princess had woken up at 9.00 and insisted on playing until 11.00.  In our evil hearts we hoped that this would mean that she might wake up later this morning.  No. I have been up since 6.50.  Princess having stood up alone for the first time last night (gasps please) is anxious to keep practising in case she loses the knack. She has also said her first word. Cuckoo.  I’m trying not to draw any conclusions here.  This morning she pointed at her toy train and said choo-choo. Our genius.

Comments
belgianwaffle

on 20 June 2004 at 17:32

We think she may mean coucou which is the French for peekaboo as she usually says it after holding her bib up to her face.

jackdalton

on 21 June 2004 at 17:16

Ah… a multilingual upbringing “Dit ‘allo, Sprogette…” and all that. Impressive. Very impressive……:-)

Daring


Posted in: Belgium, Princess

The French Mama is coming to stay tomorrow with husband and baby.  I will be too deeply consumed with envy peering at her latest purchases to concentrate on blogging.  Also, I will have to stop the Princess roughing up her tiny baby and stealing her cuddly toys.  There was a major scene in the supermarket this morning when I attempted to remove from her steely grasp a rubber toy she had found in the “toys for pets” section of the supermarket (I was trying to choose the right freezer bag on the adjoining display and I was distracted – does this strike you as an odd juxtaposition?  Do Belgians lure their pets into the kitchen with squeezy toys and then freeze them in 1 litre bags?).

The French Mama leaves on Saturday afternoon with her entourage and Sunday sees us going to the Brussels Childbirth Trust Funday where I will be in charge of a stall.  Clearly, I didn’t want to do this but a woman rang me and asked me to do it and my complete inability to say no did not desert me.  As you can imagine, my loving spouse is even more delighted than I am at the prospect of taking his daughter on shetland pony rides while I dole out strawberries and champagne to the great unwashed.

On Monday, the Princess and I will embark on a nine hour train journey to the west of France where my parents will be awaiting our arrival with bated breath.  I am dreading the journey as not only will it be a little hard to keep herself entertained for nine hours on the train but I have to change trains and will be bringing Princess, our gear, buggy and car seat.  I hope to rely on the kindness of strangers but this can sometimes go amiss.  Anyway, we’ll be gone for the week and Mr. Waffle will be left alone and palely loitering and working, obviously. You know, sometimes, being a kept woman is not so very bad.

Comments
belgianwaffle

on 17 June 2004 at 08:17

Very funny.

Parking


Posted in: Belgium

When I drive to my local bakery, I double park on the pavement outside with my hazard lights on while I make my purchases (this does not make me Belgian).

By doing this, I am giving the bus driver who must pick up people from the bus stop from behind where I am parked a difficult but not impossible task (this does not make me Belgian).

This, clearly illegal, double parking is carried out in front of a police station (this does not make me Belgian).

The other day, when I did my usual trick, a policewoman waved at me to move on (this does not make me Belgian).

I stopped to argue with her, pointing out that I would only be in the bakery for a moment (yes, I think that this makes me Belgian).

Though perhaps a real Belgian wouldn’t have given up on the argument so easily.

Comments
belgianwaffle

on 16 June 2004 at 21:02

And may I say how appropriate your nickname is every time you step into a motorised vehicle.

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