A Canadian in Sweden

Brussels redux

Well, I am not so fond of Brussels. I try to avoid putting negative stuff up here, but in the interest of being honest, I think it is necessary in this case. There are many cities I rather like, such as Ottawa, Quebec City, Victoria, Salt Lake City and Stockholm (actually, all Swedish cities I have seen to date, including Sundsvall, Luleå and of course Umeå). The characteristics those cities have in common are: all of them are clean and have easy access to big parks or wide open spaces. They are also friendly. That is a pretty open adjective. To me it is has more to do with the feel a city has rather than any particular characteristic. However, small things contribute to this `friendliness´. For example, I have never had a cab driver tell me they didn't want to take me somewhere prior to this trip to Brussels. However, on this trip it happened several times. Either the destination was too close (ie, the fare would be low) or they simply didn't like the look of me, I have no idea. Still, not very impressive. The rows of restaurants that hire thugs to cajole you to come eat at their establishments - then ridicule you when you pass them by - also didn't impress me very much.

Suffice it to say that in my opinion, Brussels is sorely lacking in many respects. There are plenty of pedestrian areas in the old city, but there are absolutely no parks of any significant size. New York has Central Park, Quebec City has the Plains of Abraham, Ottawa has Gatineau park. Brussels has a few cobblestone squares with statues of old dead guys. That isn't totally true, there is a `park´ at the War museum, but any park that you can stand in and see the four corners from any point inside it just doesn't cut it as far as I am concerned. To get out of the city to exercise properly, I had to get on the train and travel 45 minutes outside the city center. Even there, traffic was heavy and the roads marginal. Many roads in Belgium are concrete rather than asphalt, which is horrible for rollerskiing. Poletips cannot grab concrete, so your poles are useless, and concrete is much more slippery than asphalt. Also, many roads suddenly transform into cobbles with no warning. Cobblestones and rollerskis do not mix.

I did see some cool stuff, of course. Belgium is very big on road cycling (it is the home of cycling legend Eddy Merckx) and while I was out rollerskiing I got passed on a couple of occasions by huge pelotons of hundreds of cyclists. I assume they were cycling clubs. That was pretty cool. I have never seen that anywhere else before.

I suppose the weather didn't help my opinion. It was rainy or overcast and around 0 degrees the entire week. Apparently for Brussels this is about status quo for the month of February however. I have never had a problem with seasonal affective disorder in the winter no matter how little light there is - as long as there is snow on the ground. However, a month or two of drizzly, overcast weather would make me seriously depressed.

In general, Brussels: inte bra. (Swedish for not so good)

posted by Jeff @ 1:26 AM