We had breakfast with Adi, the father of four (we found out this morning), and Mike the Italian guy from the room next door. We learned over breakfast that the lovely gentleman that served us Kebabs in the shop down the road last night, is the spokesman for the local Grey Wolf Organisation. The Grey Wolves are an ultra-nationalist, neo-fascist, Turkish idealist youth organisation. Their formal name in Turkish is interpreted as ‘The Idealists’. The lovely gentleman in the kebab shop, spends his after hours time, searching for and beating up Armenians. Well, we wont be going there again.
Adi warned us this morning that today is ‘Summit Day’, the day every month when the EU Summits take place and this city turns into chaos, with helicopters buzzing, expensive black cars with tinted windows speeding through the streets, subway and tram stations closed down, and sections of the city turned into war zones with barbed wire and machineguns. A good day to leave town, so we decided to catch the train to Antwerp (30 minutes away).
When we first got off the train the first thing that impressed us was the line up of diamond stores, after all that is what this city is known for. There were about twenty of them just in the first stones throw, each of them just oozing with extremely expensive jewelry and diamonds like we have never seem before. Antwerp trades 80% of the worlds rough production, and 60% of the worlds polished production. That gives them a turnover of about 40,000,000,000 USD.
We sought out a store called DiamondLand, where you can go in and watch the diamond polishes, and the jewelry manufacturers at work. What we saw really surprised us. There were four crusty old gentlemen sitting behind large machines that looked like they would be quite at home in an engineering shop. What these guys were doing was polishing stones by hand on these machines. What we found was that this is essentially a manual skill, relying entirely on the steady hand, and the critical eye of these craftsmen. It really is incredible to see these old guys looking as rough as the rough stones, and turning them into amazing refractory masterpieces. The idea of this place is that you can choose a stone, and watch them turn that stone into a work of art that you can then walk out the door with, having parted with a considerable sum of money of course. In our case they were disappointed.
With eyes still blinking from the dazzle of a roomful of fine diamonds, we made our way to the Grand Square. As we looked around the square, with its fine buildings, our eye was caught by a piece of cloth waving from a second floor window, above a pub. It was a New Zealand flag. Curiosity aroused we went in to find out what it was doing there. We were told that up until a couple of months ago, the NZ Consulate was there, and when they moved out they forgot to take the flag. We thought afterwards that we should have offered to take it off their hands. A stolen flag from the consulate in Belgium, is that an arrestable offence?
Our next stop today was to be the Museum, but we had a few distractions along the way. As we were walking along the road we were passed by several fire engines, making their way towards a column of smoke a few hundred metres down the road. What had started out to be an innocent nose to tail accident between two compact cars, within a couple of minutes had erupted into an inferno, resulting in the front end of one, and the rear end of the other lying as a puddle of molten plastic on the road between them. The respective other ends were just a charred mess in a semi upright position. The cars parked on either side of the narrow road had the paintwork along their sides blistered with the heat. A bit of high drama on the streets of Antwerp, and we even glimpsed a few smiles of excitement in the crowd. Fortunately the occupants seemed to have escaped unharmed, although shaken up from their experience.
Our next distraction was a café for lunch. It was a quiet day on the café scene today and so the owner spent the entire time we were there asking us about NZ, and like all born and bred Belgians, telling us that he couldn’t wait to leave the place. To quote him directly, “the worst thing about this place is the f****n weather.” Hmmm … we didn’t expect that kind of passion. It seems that they work the minimum hours that they can to qualify for Social Security, in a job that they despise, all the time wishing that they could leave.
We finally made it to the museum, which was interesting, but not as riveting as we had expected. On the upper floors there were a lot of great works by local old artists, with quite a number by Reubens. The lower floor wasn’t as great as we had been led to believe by the promotion material. But perhaps we have been spoilt lately by the fantastic museums that we have been to.
What we did find amusing about this visit, was the closing time ritual that is adopted in this part of the world. (1) An hour and a half before closing time, you can see the guards start looking at their watches.
(2)They come and tell you that they will be closing at five O’clock (and we’re left wondering what the fuss is about, it’s still 90 minutes away),
(3) They start pacing the floor and staring at their watches every time you enter another room (it’s worth back tracking into a previous room just to watch the expression on their faces)
(4) They sit or stand in doorways, almost blocking the way.
(5) They start following just a few feet behind you, every step.
(6) They start locking the doors to the rooms as you leave them.
(7) At 20 minutes before closing time they start arriving from all corners of the museum in the entranceway/foyer. (It is only now that you realize how many of them there are, they outnumber the visitors by three to one).
(8) They each hand the key of the room that they are responsible for, to the ‘key guy’.
(9) They virtually chase you out the front door, before you have your coat and gloves on.
As they hand over their keys you can almost hear the call, “Section one?” “Check.” “Section two?” “Check.” “Section three? … Section three? … SECTION THREE?” “Aw Bob, you’re always late, holding us up, we want to go home.”
Adi warned us this morning that today is ‘Summit Day’, the day every month when the EU Summits take place and this city turns into chaos, with helicopters buzzing, expensive black cars with tinted windows speeding through the streets, subway and tram stations closed down, and sections of the city turned into war zones with barbed wire and machineguns. A good day to leave town, so we decided to catch the train to Antwerp (30 minutes away).
When we first got off the train the first thing that impressed us was the line up of diamond stores, after all that is what this city is known for. There were about twenty of them just in the first stones throw, each of them just oozing with extremely expensive jewelry and diamonds like we have never seem before. Antwerp trades 80% of the worlds rough production, and 60% of the worlds polished production. That gives them a turnover of about 40,000,000,000 USD.
We sought out a store called DiamondLand, where you can go in and watch the diamond polishes, and the jewelry manufacturers at work. What we saw really surprised us. There were four crusty old gentlemen sitting behind large machines that looked like they would be quite at home in an engineering shop. What these guys were doing was polishing stones by hand on these machines. What we found was that this is essentially a manual skill, relying entirely on the steady hand, and the critical eye of these craftsmen. It really is incredible to see these old guys looking as rough as the rough stones, and turning them into amazing refractory masterpieces. The idea of this place is that you can choose a stone, and watch them turn that stone into a work of art that you can then walk out the door with, having parted with a considerable sum of money of course. In our case they were disappointed.
With eyes still blinking from the dazzle of a roomful of fine diamonds, we made our way to the Grand Square. As we looked around the square, with its fine buildings, our eye was caught by a piece of cloth waving from a second floor window, above a pub. It was a New Zealand flag. Curiosity aroused we went in to find out what it was doing there. We were told that up until a couple of months ago, the NZ Consulate was there, and when they moved out they forgot to take the flag. We thought afterwards that we should have offered to take it off their hands. A stolen flag from the consulate in Belgium, is that an arrestable offence?
Our next stop today was to be the Museum, but we had a few distractions along the way. As we were walking along the road we were passed by several fire engines, making their way towards a column of smoke a few hundred metres down the road. What had started out to be an innocent nose to tail accident between two compact cars, within a couple of minutes had erupted into an inferno, resulting in the front end of one, and the rear end of the other lying as a puddle of molten plastic on the road between them. The respective other ends were just a charred mess in a semi upright position. The cars parked on either side of the narrow road had the paintwork along their sides blistered with the heat. A bit of high drama on the streets of Antwerp, and we even glimpsed a few smiles of excitement in the crowd. Fortunately the occupants seemed to have escaped unharmed, although shaken up from their experience.
Our next distraction was a café for lunch. It was a quiet day on the café scene today and so the owner spent the entire time we were there asking us about NZ, and like all born and bred Belgians, telling us that he couldn’t wait to leave the place. To quote him directly, “the worst thing about this place is the f****n weather.” Hmmm … we didn’t expect that kind of passion. It seems that they work the minimum hours that they can to qualify for Social Security, in a job that they despise, all the time wishing that they could leave.
We finally made it to the museum, which was interesting, but not as riveting as we had expected. On the upper floors there were a lot of great works by local old artists, with quite a number by Reubens. The lower floor wasn’t as great as we had been led to believe by the promotion material. But perhaps we have been spoilt lately by the fantastic museums that we have been to.
What we did find amusing about this visit, was the closing time ritual that is adopted in this part of the world. (1) An hour and a half before closing time, you can see the guards start looking at their watches.
(2)They come and tell you that they will be closing at five O’clock (and we’re left wondering what the fuss is about, it’s still 90 minutes away),
(3) They start pacing the floor and staring at their watches every time you enter another room (it’s worth back tracking into a previous room just to watch the expression on their faces)
(4) They sit or stand in doorways, almost blocking the way.
(5) They start following just a few feet behind you, every step.
(6) They start locking the doors to the rooms as you leave them.
(7) At 20 minutes before closing time they start arriving from all corners of the museum in the entranceway/foyer. (It is only now that you realize how many of them there are, they outnumber the visitors by three to one).
(8) They each hand the key of the room that they are responsible for, to the ‘key guy’.
(9) They virtually chase you out the front door, before you have your coat and gloves on.
As they hand over their keys you can almost hear the call, “Section one?” “Check.” “Section two?” “Check.” “Section three? … Section three? … SECTION THREE?” “Aw Bob, you’re always late, holding us up, we want to go home.”
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