I’ve lived in Belgium a long time. Maybe too long. Like many of us, I only meant to stay two years, three at the most. One rental contract, then move on.
But then something happened. Belgium turned out to be a lot more interesting, more surprising, more baffling, than I’d expected. So I stayed on – three more years, then another three, until it added up to 30, and now I’m not sure I could live anywhere else.
And, no, just to be clear, Belgium isn’t perfect. But as we celebrate National Day I’ve come up with 30 reasons to stay in Belgium a little while longer.
1. We have the longest beer lists
You’re not easily going to find a bar like Moeder Lambic anywhere else in the world. It stocks more than 300 beers including some rare lambics. Every city has great bars serving interesting beers, including sophisticated non-alcohol varieties. Each beer is solemnly poured into its own unique glass, because this is Belgium, and they don’t skimp on the details.
2. We have the best frites
What’s that long queue on Ixelles’ Place Flagey? It’s people queuing up for frites, or frietjes. We probably have the best fries in the world. But you have to wait for them, because it takes time. The potatoes (Bintjes, ideally) are fried twice, shaken up in a pan, salted and served with a squirt of mayonaise (or some other sauce of your choice). It takes time because as I said already the people here are perfectionists.
3. We have Madame Pipi
Toilets in bars and stations are often maintained by a woman known affectionately as Madame Pipi. She sits with a newspaper word game, a vase of plastic flowers and a saucer to collect the tips that are often her only source of income. I used to find Madame annoying, but then I encountered a toilet on the motorway in Luxembourg, where you have to use a bank card to get through a turnstile, and that’s when I realised Madame Pipi might not be such a bad idea.
4. We have Bloempanch
We have Bloempanch, even if we don’t know what it is. This Brussels version of blood sausage goes back centuries, and can still be tasted in local restaurants, normally served with caramelised apple. We should count ourselves fortunate to have an endless variety of comfort food in Belgium, such as potjesvlees in Ypres, boulettes in Liège, garnaalkroketten at the coast and countless other local dishes you need to try once in Belgium before you leave.
5. We have comic book walls
We have walls decorated with comic book scenes in Brussels, Antwerp, and Charleroi. They turn a simple walk into a fun ramble through unexplored neighbourhoods. We also have urban walls with vibrant street art in Ostend, Ghent and Mons.
6. We have a language border
It’s not a hard border with armed guards, currency exchange shops and dogs sniffing out drugs. But it’s there if you look for it, running across fields and around houses, a 1962 construction to divide the Dutch-speaking north from the French-speaking south. Admittedly it throws up some challenges, like trying to find Lille in France while you’re driving through Flanders (where it’s signed Rijsel).
7. We have vertical archery
We have vertical archery, which is similar to horizontal archery, but much more dangerous. The sport originated in the eleventh century and is still popular in towns like Bruges, Ypres and Rixensart. The tall archery posts resemble mobile phone masts apart from the little wooden bird perched at the top. The aim is to shoot down the bird without ending up in hospital with an embedded arrow.
8. We have a see-through church
We have endless surprises in Belgium such as a see-through church, a staircase to nowhere and a bike path through the treetops. They are all free. But, please, don’t tell the internet, because we don’t want the whole world to know about them.
9. We have Average Rob
We have Average Rob, who modestly describes himself as ‘a mediocre dude from Belgium’. But Average Rob is actually quite a celebrity with his own beer label called Tout Bien Pils as well as an Antwerp fries shop named La Patate Friture.
10. We don’t have guns, but we do have crossbows
There are ancient guilds in Belgium dedicated to crossbow practice. One of the oldest is hidden down a lane behind the royal palace in Brussels. You can drop in on a Thursday evening and meet up with a friendly bunch of crossbow buddies. They like to down a strong beer or two before they hit the range. And they even let children play around with small crossbows.
11. We have bootscraper art
You have to look hard to find the miniature scenes nestled inside Antwerp’s bootscrapers. They are created by the local artist Elke Lemmens, who lies down on the pavement to decorate the dusty bootscrapers. The miniature scenes she creates in the stone niches are often inspired by the people who inhabit the houses.
12. We’ve got the best processions
The USA took over the Cinquantenaire Park this year for a big celebration. But it was eclipsed a few days later when the Ommegang procession took over Grand Place on two summer nights. Featuring hundreds of nobles, jugglers, stilt walkers and children in sixteenth-century costumes, the parade precisely recreates one of the greatest events in Brussels’ history, when the Habsburg ruler Charles V came to town.
13. We have the world’s weirdest sandwich
No one can say for certain who invented the Broodje Martino. It might have been someone in Antwerp or maybe it goes back to a wartime episode in Ghent. Who knows? All I can tell you is that it is made by cutting a baguette in half lengthways, then adding raw mince, sliced gherkin, chopped onion and a secret spicy sauce. I may have missed out an ingredient. Or got the story wrong. I really don’t understand why anyone would eat a Broodje Martino, but the same goes for the Mitraillette, which may well be the world’s most unhealthy sandwich.
14. It’s never too far to a Dutch beach bar. Or a Lille brasserie.
If you live in New Zealand, beautiful as it is, you are 1,500 km from the nearest foreign country. And that country is Australia, where they speak the same language and play the same sports. But we can hop over the border whenever we want, and experience something entirely different, like German sauna culture or a 26-plate Dutch-style Indonesian rijsttafel.
15. We have a ridiculous statue of a peeing boy
Paris has its Eiffel Tower, which is magnificent, of course, but we have the little Manneken Pis as our national symbol. It’s admittedly small, smaller than the Little Mermaid, smaller even than the plastic replica Manneken Pis statues they sell in the tourist shops. We also have a female Jeanneke Pis, and a dog version called Zinneke Pis, which reveals something strange about the Belgian character, but I’m not sure what.
16. We are extremely average
Whenever you see a survey of EU countries, check where Belgium is placed. And it’s almost always in the middle, let’s say thirteenth or fourteenth out of twenty-seven countries, usually lower than the Netherlands, but ahead of Italy. I find this reassuring. It means we’re not anxiously striving to be top of the class, but we’re also not hopelessly languishing at the bottom. It would actually be terrifying to be best in Europe, unless it’s pharmacies per head, where we outperform the world.
17. We have the weirdest street signs
All the street signs in Brussels are in two languages, French and Dutch. Some signs are also named after cartoon characters, to add another level of confusion. And there are even signs in the local Brussels dialect, just to make sure you are totally confused. It means a single street might have five names. So if you’re ever wondering why your Amazon parcel hasn’t shown up, this might be the reason.
18. We cross the street boldly (but carefully)
We have a brilliant traffic rule in Belgium, which requires vehicles to stop for pedestrians at a crossing. On a good day you can walk across town without stopping once. Most days unfortunately aren’t good. One reason is that trams always have priority. But you also have to bear in mind that bikes, electric scooters and foreign cars may not know about this brilliant rule. Or decide it’s not for them.
19. We have Art Nouveau architecture
Barcelona has Gaudi, but we have Horta, Hankar, Blerot, Strauven and others, each one creating their own unique version of Art Nouveau architecture. Walk down almost any nineteenth-century street in Brussels, Liège, Antwerp or Charleroi, and you’ll come across gorgeous, forgotten architectural gems.
20. We encourage tourists to skip Belgium
It’s generally agreed on the internet that Belgium is boring, apart from Bruges, which is cute. You might think this is maddening, or you might think, great, we don’t have to pay an entry fee to visit Ghent. But there are worrying signs that tourists are starting to discover Belgium. We are maybe going to need to launch a campaign to make Belgium boring again.
21. We have beautiful train stations
We are fortunate in Belgium to have some of the most beautiful nineteenth-century railway stations in the world, like Antwerp Central and Ghent St-Pieters. Along with stunning modern stations such as Liège Guillemins and Mons. We also have Brussels Midi, which is horrible, even with the Tintin murals. But they have a plan to fix it, so let’s not abandon hope.
22. We have spectacular city libraries
Many cities have laid their libraries to rest, figuring out that digital is the future, but Belgium seems to have missed the memo. Over the past decade, our cities have been creating astonishing new libraries, like De Krook on Ghent’s waterfront and Utopia in Aalst. But the most impressive is Mechelen’s Predikheren library located within the walls of an abandoned monastery.
23. We have democracy
A lot has happened since Joe Biden, in a speech to the European Parliament in 2010, argued Brussels could legitimately claim to be the capital of the free world. We now have a US president who says Brussels a hellhole. But maybe Biden had a point, back when he was vice-president, because we have five different parliaments in Brussels. Along with 19 municipal councils, which adds up to a lot of democracy.
24. We have the best chocolates
You are probably aware that Belgium has sublime chocolates. Maybe the best in the world. But you have to do some research to find the finest chocolates in the land, because you probably won’t find them at the airport or in the centre of Bruges. You have to hunt down the small obscure shops that sell handmade chocolates, such as Boon in Hasselt or Passion Chocolat on the Sablon Square in Brussels. Like everything in Belgium, it takes time to figure things out.
25. We have unique coffee bars
This country is great for coffee drinkers (unless you are looking for a Starbucks). We have hundreds of unique coffee bars serving perfect coffee, like MOK coffee in Leuven and Bouche in Brussels (both appear in this year’s list of the world’s 100 best coffee shops). But you will have to search hard to find a Starbucks anywhere. The station branches in Antwerp, Leuven and Mechelen have gone, to be replaced by coffee bars run by Leuven-based Madmum.
26. We have window art galleries
Most houses in Belgian cities have windows on the street. So people put up curtains to hide their interiors from view. But some imaginative residents have turned their front windows into art galleries by lining up strange objects on the window ledge. It might be a collection of porcelain figurines, or dusty statues of the Virgin Mary, or two stuffed beavers. I recommend a stroll down Rue du Viaduc in Brussels to spot some inspiring examples.
27. We are a country of languages
Take the Belgian footballer Romelu Lukaku. According to Wikipedia, he speaks eight languages, namely English, French and Dutch (normal for Belgium), but also Italian, Spanish and Portuguese, together with Swahili and Lingala. This country is genuinely a melting pot of languages, as you realise any time you take a tram in Brussels.
28. We have a special way to say no
Yes we can, only sometimes we can’t, but maybe we can, or not. So we have the useful expression in Belgium ‘non, peut-être’ which translates as ‘No, maybe’. Here is an example. You want a beer, Albert? Non, peut-être. So does Albert get a beer? The answer is, obviously, non, peut-être.
29. We have a National Day but you will probably miss it
We have a National Day in Belgium, but almost no one celebrates it, because we’re all on holiday. It doesn’t help that most people don’t know what we are meant to be celebrating on 21 July. No, it’s not the Belgian Revolution of 1830, or the Belgian Constitution of 1831, but the summer day in 1831 when Leopold I swore the constitutional oath as first king of the Belgians. Bearing that in mind, let’s go down to the palace to watch the military parade.
30. We can have fun, seriously
I kind of enjoy the fun side of Belgium, like the Belgian football fan who dresses up as Obélix (a French comic character), or the quirky humour that pops up on Brussels transport’s social media feeds. Most Belgians seem to agree that it’s the weirdness that keeps us sane. So if you want somewhere normal you have plenty of choice, but if you’re happy to accept the everyday surrealism, and the reliably unreliable weather, and the crazy clutter of contradictory road signs you get whenever a street is dug up, then Belgium might just be the right place for you.
