I took advantage of the remnants of constituency week to visit Flanders and the rest of the southern Dutch speaking areas. A few of us [A;J;M] went to Oostende for a beach trip. It was a classic North Sea holiday spot. Very cold water, kind of foggy, lots of people, crying babies, and horse and carriage rides. Nonetheless, it was good to get out of Brussels and enjoy some sea air, expunging the remnants of my cough.
Then I visited Delft and Rotterdam. Delft especially was very pictoresque. It was how I imagine Amsterdam, but the clean living version. In fact it was one of the nmost wholesome places I;ve been. The people were friendly, helpful; spoke super English, rode bikes everywhere, happy children played in the streets, and it was clean and well maintained. Holland seemed much better maintained than Belgium, but it still had a certain hippy chicness about it. Especially in Rotterdam which was a lot less clean living than Delft. Delft was a tiny bit like Bruges, but seemed like less of a tourist trap. People actually seemed to have jobs for example. Rotterdam seemed like a good place to go shopping.
5 comments:
When you noted getting rid of your cough, it reminded me of how the Victorians used to go to the seaside to rid themselves of ailments. :) I need a time machine.
The Dutch are pretty good with their English. When I worked at the Canex, they were the only ones who could come in and ask for things by their English names. The Germans and Italians used to come in and point to things and say the German or Italian for it. Like, stamps=briefmarkes (no idea how to spell that, that's how it's pronounced) Anyway, I've heard many good things about Rotterdam and they have good shopping eh? Hmmmm..............
Hi Thorfinn,
Just thought I'd say a quick hello.
I'm enjoying reading about your European adventures! It sounds like you're having a very interesting time.
~Marie
p.s. I left this message already, but it didn't seem to stick. Hopefully it will not appear twice! =)
I actually felt very Victorian, because the sea air actually did me a lot of good, and now that I'm back in Brussels, I'm back to my bad health.
I hope you did some shopping on my account ;)
Remember the eddie izzard about the dutch speaking english? Can you count to three... uh.. yes.
My Heavens, you'll have to schedule a trip to Bath soon then! :)
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