Il faut le faire! (It has to be done!)

A bit of warning (also an apology) before I get into the meat of this post: this will be quite long. Not that there will be a lot of text (though, I’m sure even if I try to refrain myself, there will be a good deal of that too), but there will be a number of pictures. Okay (this is a note to self), get on with it then.

Day before yesterday: Thursday, August 9, 2007 (¿St. Laurent’s Eve?) – We began the day with a visit to the Centre Belge de la Bande Dessinée, where comic strips reign supreme. Lots of Tin Tin here. Also, on special exhibit was a show about the stereotypes European peoples have for one another, seen through the depictions of various Euros in comics…it was hilarious. I learned that the Spanish are indeed the laziest workers simply because they choose not to work, whereas the French at least find a moral reason not to work and go on strike. Anyway…enough writing, here’s Milo with Captain Haddock, Tin Tin, and Professor Calculus:



When we left the CBDB, we stumbled upon the Meyboom celebration. I provided you with a link, so I’m not going to explain. I must say, reading the information on the Meyboom page will not give you the weirdness of the event, but I’m not sure I could do that either.

Here’s a pic of Mieke and Janneke:



Saint Laurentians (I suppose) carrying the Meyboom:



The attempts to place the Meybook in its spot…they finished just before 5, at which time they would have lost their allowance to pay fealty and it would have passed along to the people of Leuven:



Thursday, though interesting, was miserably wet. So wet that we went through a bunch of clothes and the humidity didn’t allow our laundered clothes to dry:



So, on Friday, Milo got to go out all grunge styles (or, as if he were wearing lederhosen):



Milo crawling around the Place des Martyrs:



We then journeyed south of the inner city, into St Gilles, to appreciate a bit of Art Nouveau architecture and to get a feel of the neighborhood. Not that this is a good example of the aforementioned reasons to venture into St Gilles, but the Hotel de Ville de Saint-Gilles, seen in the background between the buildings, is a pretty cool Horta building:



Saturday, August 11, 2007 (today) – Today we took a train ride out to Bruges, home of both the Memling in Sint-Jan Hospital Museum and the Groeninge Museum (this is in addition to being one of the most picturesque cities I’ve been to). So, yeah…it was a beautiful day: 70 degrees, sunny, a slight breeze. The following are just a bunch of photos with a few captions.

Der Losen; train to Bruges:



Bikes not cabs…awesome (everyone was riding a bike today…when we go back, Milo and I will be touring the town via bike while Jill does more museum/gallery stuff):



Der Losen:



Markt:





Okay, just to ease your worries, we do feed Milo other food besides frites…but I must say, he does love frites with ketchup.


(hmmm…what should I do with this frite?)


CHOMP!

After lunch Jill hung around and snapped a few pics of me and Milo. Here I’m trying to figure out how to get Milo away from this bus without him freaking out when I pick him up and walk away:



It didn’t work. Here’s Milo pretending like he doesn’t have arms (he sticks his arms straight above him as if I’m about to remove his shirt, which means he doesn’t have armpits...therefore, no convenient place to pick him up):



Milo calmed down in his stroller as he watched a puppeteer with his marionettes:



Bruges pics:





Here they steal windmills, strip them of their parts, and put them on blocks:



Milo waking up from his nap:



Playtime:











More Bruges:











Milo in the metro station. By the way, he loves trains, but HATES the subway cars. Something about the noise when the doors open and close scares the heck out of him. Here, though, he’s simply playing with his feet: