day 5 (cont'd)
we reached brussels about 2pm, and then proceeded to plod our way to the youth hostel that we booked - yes, it's HOSTEL, not hotel.. it's much cheaper staying in hostels, and on top of it all, free breakfast is provided! =)
we took a metro to the station nearest to our hostel, and i was immediately stunned by the entrance of the metro..
pardon my blurry shot, but it's pretty obvious that there are no turnstiles at the gates leading into the station.. i bet this system works only in brussels - i saw tons of people getting their cards read by the orange machine.. the leftmost orange machine is placed lower than the others to allow KIDS to stuff their cards into the machines, and yes, i've seen kids doing it without being told to.. if this system was to be implemented in singapore, i've no doubt that SBS/TIBS will close shop within one year =)
after coming out of the metro, we attempted to walk to our hostel with the help of our maps.. when we reached a junction, bun wasn't sure which road led to our hostel, so he pulled out his map to check.. and at this moment, the window of a blue van suddenly rolled down, and the driver poked his head out and gesticulated at us - he was shouting something (presumably french =) and pointing at a certain direction.. unsure what he meant, we walked in the direction that the driver pointed at, and we reached another junction.. once again, the map was pulled out, the window of a nearby vehicle was rolled down, another head poking out and directions were again given.. that's how we reached our hostel - using the map as a call for help instead of navigating using it =P
the view of the guys' room from my bed - there were 4 double decker beds inside, with an en-suite bathroom (the red door).. the room stank of something i can't put my finger on (probably a combination of BO + athlete's feet), but besides that, it was clean and beds were pretty comfortable..
hk rented the computer for half an hour (for 1 EUR! eek) to go online, and not surprisingly, his typing speed was horribly slow..
we randomly diffused in town, originally planning to walk to a fish market and finding dinner on the way, but we ended up eating at a christmas market near the st. catharine church.. after that, we went to the
grand'place, and then the
manneken pis at night. on the way..
isn't that oh-so-sinful? a chocolate fondue fountain!
day 6in the morning, we went back to the grand'place, cos the chocolate museum was nearby..
view of the entrace leading to the chocolate museum.. no pics were allowed inside, too bad =) the good thing about museums in brussels is that they have discounted rates for students, which definitely made it more attractive to us scrooges =)
in the choc museum, we learnt how chocs are made, the compositions of dark, white and milk choc, and we got to sample chocs.. and as always,
bun sampled more chocs than any of us =D
on the way to the manneken pis, we saw this.. cool right? there are about 60 of these paintings scattered across brussels (if i rmb correctly, tt is)..
the manneken pis! pity it's kinda blurry =(
after lunch at this cheap asian restaurant (5.50 EUR for soup and a biigg plate of chicken noodles), we went to galeries royale st hubert, which is one of europe's largest covered shopping complexes.. guess who we were placating by going there..
after that, we went to the comic museum.. this pic is a miniature view of how a comic company functions - i can't help but gawk at the level of detail and realism in the model - for instance, the trash can has crumpled paper in it, and there is another ball of paper which presumably missed its target and landed outside the trash can!
and of course, herge - the creator of tintin - is venerated here =)
it was hard for us to understand the comics though, cos everything was written in french, with no english translation provided.. sigh.
and after some random diffusing, we stumbled upon the
museum of the national bank of belgium, which held a free exhibition
just for the night we were there (in conjunction with some festival i can't rmb).. so since it was free, we just had to take advantage of it.. typical mentality of ours =P
$ from 明朝! the paper money reads "大明通行宝钞", and in the smaller chinese text below, it says that the govt will prosecute anyone who tries to fake the paper money.. cool =)
dinner was again at the christmas market we visited the day before..
we then admired the night view of the
basilica.. this picture was taken in a park just beside the basilica.
day 7
we have a knack of revisiting places we have been before, in order to see how it looks like at different times of the day.. this is the basilica (again) in the morning..
we then rushed to the
european parliament, as it had a (free) audio-guided tour at 10am.. this is the debating chamber of the parliament, in which (according to the audio guide) delegates are considered lucky if they could speak for 2 mins without being told to stop..
a "piece of art" located a few stone throws away from the palais royal (which we skimmed past).. don't ask me what it means, but i'm just fascinated by the shoes hung on top of the trees and the neatly trimmed bushes..
the guys then went into the musical instruments museum.. when you stand in front of an exhibit, you'll be able to hear how the instruments sound (not all of them, of course) by standing at a certain designated spot.. the special earphones worn around your ears will then receive signals (infra-red, according to bun's experiments), and then voila, you'll be immersed in the harmonious sounds of the instruments! the picture above shows the musical instruments used in the chinese opera..
we then diffused past
palais de justice, decided to enter the building to look around, and promptly used the toilet before leaving.. not many tourists can boast that they used the toilet in the supreme court of brussels, can they? =D
and for the third night in the row, we ate at the christmas market.. i recall eating reindeer meat, but its taste wasn't that different from normal deer meat.. bun and hk continued eating the smoked salmon that we all had the previous night - was it THAT nice anyway?
went back early, played some bridge, and then retired for the night..
day 8took a bus all the way from our hostel to the 总站, which terminates at heysel..
yes the atomium is closed to visitors, but it doesn't mean we can't gawk at the immense size of the metal
balls atoms..
it snowed pretty heavily that morning! we were initially excited to see snow (it was the second time i saw REAL snow, the first being in cambridge), but as the snow got heavier and colder, we had to make a dash for the warm comforts of a tram, and from this was where this picture was taken.
thankfully the snow stopped, and we were able to visit the berlaymont building housing the
european commission - it finally dawned on me that brussels is THE capital of europe (there are some european committees based in luxembourg, but most of them are in brussels) .. a bit slow, but better than not knowing it =)
the
cinquantenaire (it's a park, btw) houses the largest mosque in brussels.. we even went in, and one interesting discovery was that the
maghrib prayers in brussels was held at 4+ pm (cos it corresponds to the time the sun sets).. in malaysia, it is unfailingly at about 720pm, which had interrupted many of my cartoon-viewing sessions =P
still at the cinquantenaire.. chio right?
the time had finally came for us to leave brussels.. our train was scheduled to leave at 520pm.. we took turns to buy dinner so that we could eat it on the train en-route to amsterdam..
chope-ing of seats - some habits die hard, don't they? =D
(to be continued in part #3 of the trilogy) =PpP
