BrusselsNannyy Diaries: Profiter de la Vie

In front of the train station of Ghent, a large university town just a half hour away from Brussels by train. You can immediately tell its a student town just by looking at all the bikes!

Niki found a giant dandelion!

I am sitting outside a Belgian tavern in Chatelain, a very pretty uptown residence area which also has lots of traditional cafés, bars and unique shops. It’s very near to where I live, and so I thought I’d try out one of the places here on this nice sunny afternoon. I surprisingly have the afternoon off since the grandma is here and watching Felix and the boys are at friend’s houses. It has just dawned on me on how much you can observe when you sit outside a café. For example, a couple in front of me drinking a late afternoon beer, the girl sipping a Framboise Lambic (Raspberry flavored beer, typical for girls to drink on a warm day) and the man enjoying a Duvel, definitely a more male beer since it is one of the strongest. Another, older, couple just received their drinks…the women getting a glass of champagne and the man drinking tomato juice which he proceeds to sprinkle with black pepper and hot sauce. Guess they are in different drink moods… A big group of men share a table, all drinking different Belgian beers, according to each of their preferred tastes. Life in Belgium really does somehow revolve around beer. People reserve time in their day to just relax and drink a beer...and almost everyone does it. Oh, and there is an old man sitting next to me is smoking and orders a cappuccino (with crème léger, (light cream)...guess he is watching his figure) and he is talking to a women smoking next to him, and I picked up one line he said to her: “Profiter de la vie! Oui!” (Basically like saying, “enjoy life” but if you directly translate, it means “benefit from life”...a very Belgian saying). I never realized how peaceful it can be to just sit own your own in the sun and people watch... I need to do this more often!

Let me start this entry off with a quote from Leopold Vereec, chief of the project of public center of social action: “Le Bruxellois type: independent et revêche à toute athorité.” (translation: “The Brussels type: independent and sour at every authority.”—is quite I good explanation, considering life went on in Brussels quite normally even when they had no government for 9 straight months. People just live their lives, ignoring the authority and doing what is best for them. Thought this was quite an interesting observation, especially after my encounter with the police, who don’t even seem to pay attention to their own authority.

Anyway, that quote has not much to do with the coming entry, but just thought it was a good one to share.

Now to the entry:

Usually when I want to get out of my room, but still need internet to work on my laptop and don’t have much time to go all the way downtown, I walk the 5 minutes to a chic coffee bar called Parlor Coffee. What’s cool about this place is that it is totally English speaking. Everything is in English...all the signs, the menu, the exchanges with the waiters. It’s like in its own little English-speaking bubble. It’s nice to go there when I’m feeling homesick.. They also make really good caramel cappuccinos which help my homesickness as well:) Take a look:

Isn't the spoon really nice too? I think it is a real antique one... Love the leaf pattern:)

I think the reason it is there is because the area where I live is filled with Americans. There is even a street called “Rue Américain” where apparently many Americans live. I hear them sometimes when I’m walking down the street…but honestly it is rare. You wouldn’t really notice they were even there if you weren’t paying attention. I also hear them when they come to pick their babies up at the nursery (they go to the same one that Felix goes to). I must say though, I always get a strange feeling of relief when I hear them speaking…makes me feel like I’m not really THAT far away from home. The world is really a small place, right?

Back on the subject of my French improvement, since I have been learning more and knowing more words and grammar, I have been more willing to speak it. This allows me to actually have the confidence now to have a conversation, for example, with our cleaning lady Fariba. The other day, we talked about how so many people in Europe speak English and the reasons for this. Of course, they learn it starting early in school, but she told me that is not the only reason. Her daughter never took English in school, but she knows it quite well. Why? Because she listens to American music and watches American TV shows. America is the leader in media entertainment, and since so many people follow the media, they are exposed. For example, when you go to the movie theater here in Belgium (this applies to Holland as well), most of the movies are American, and they are never, ever dubbed. The movie is always in its original language with subtitles. This is why Belgians and Dutch people tend to speak much better English than people from other European countries where they dub the movies. For example, this applies to Germany. Where I used to live (Dresden, East Germany) the movies were always dubbed. And, as a result, I noticed that many people there do not speak a strong level of English. Anyway, getting off topic... I was proud because after our conversation, Fariba told me that she was really impressed by the improvement of my French over the last few months. Yay:)

I also speak French with Adelina, a 21 year old French girl who comes every Friday to play with the boys and speak French with them. She doesn’t speak a word of English (quite surprising for a young girl who grew up in Brussels, but you never know...) so of course I have to speak French with her. What’s great is she is very helpful when I ask her a word for something or if I don’t understand something she said. She is happy to explain it to me. She is also great with the boys, and it gives me a little break on Friday afternoons (although, I still have to watch the baby Felix). Felix, by the way, has become a pro at walking during the past few weeks. After he took his first steps back in March, he progressed first to a shuffle walk with lots of grabbing onto things, then to a kind of drunken looking walk (as Sylvie put it) and now finally he is really walking normally! Although it’s bad for me since I can almost never take my eyes off of him.. He loves to climb up and down stairs even though he tends to fall whenever he starts climbing them, and this is a problem for me since obviously this 5-story house is FULL of stairs. But, of course, it’s hard to be annoyed when you see how proud he is of himself when he starts running around and picking up toys and things without falling!

OH and guess what?? I have turned Felix into an American baby:) A couple of weeks ago, I let him try a piece of Jonas’s banana with peanut butter with the peanut butter from home that my parents brought (aka the good kind). I will never forget Felix’s face. Pure satisfaction. I made him one of his own, and in 5 minutes he was covered with the stuff and smelled like one giant peanut. But he was smiling so much, and laughing and pointing at the jar making his “da” sound he always makes when he wants something. And I just couldn't help smiling :)

On the topic of the boys, let me tell you a bit about Niki (the younger one, who just turned 6). Niki is a great kid, very unique and, how should I put this…eccentric? Yes, that’s a good word. He tends to sing gibberish rhyming songs in German to himself which somehow just pop into his head, he likes to create things out of empty juice boxes, and…he likes to pretend he’s a girl. The other day, he came up to me, an obvious air of disappointment about him. I ask, “What’s wrong, Niki?” He replied, “Oh Margot, I am so sad because I don’t have a dress or a skirt to wear. I want to wear them all the time.” Hm, how should I respond to this? I go with, “Well, Niki, you know dresses and skirts are made for girls. Do you know any boys who where them?” Niki: “No, but I don’t care. I want to try them!” Thankfully, the topic fades off. However, I still have to paint his nails sparkly pink and bright red every week, and once in a while he even asks me to do his makeup (lipstick, eye shadow). Last week, I did all this for him, and then he declared, “wait, it’s not finished yet!” and he disappeared up the stairs and came back down wearing a big sparkly dress-up necklace, some sparkly high heels he stole from my room and, to top it all off, a big, curly blonde wig. I had to laugh and take a picture:

You may ask what Jonas, the older brother, thinks about this behavior. He is definitely more of the boy in the family, but thankfully he seems to accept Niki’s strange obsession and just kindly laughs at it. When Niki came down, fully decked out in make-up and wig, Jonas declared, “Niki, you look like you are ready for a beauty pageant!” I have to admit, it was quite a good observation.

I have also been bringing the boys now quite often to football practice (or soccer, if you prefer the American name for it) since the weather has been so nice. The field is quite a bit outside the city, and we have to ride the tram for a while. But, despite the long ride, the boys find ways to occupy themselves. Jonas spends the entire time clinging to the plastic window around the driver area, watching the speedometer and all the buttons the driver pushes. Then, when we get off the tram, Jonas announces whether the driver was a "safe" one or not, depending on how fast he went throughout the trip. Niki likes to try out all the different seats as people get off and on and new ones become available. All I can say is, it's quite a challenge to keep an eye on both of them, even if we are in a closed area!