May 5, 2009

Coffee time :D

I looked many times this building from Brussels's Grand Place, but this is the first time (maybe it's new, who the frak knows :P) I noticed that this little fellow is handling a sword like in SoulReaver; the other guys, the monsters, the angels around and the way it's looking, with those wings... it's like I heard already that music and that voice: "I know you Raziel..." So fraking cute, I loved it!

If you're in Belgium, then it's a must to have some "moule et frittes" (mussels and chips) and a pint of local beer in Brugge :D I really like this town, my preferate in Belgium, very good preserved and a delightful medieval atmosphere :)

In the Notre Dame church is this sculpture made by Michaelangelo himself, the reason this piece of art is still here is because the guys who ordered it didn't pay when it was ready for delivery or something like that.

In this basilisk there is a legend that here is kept a relic containing the holy blood of Jesus Christ. The church itself has two levels, the lower chapel and the upper chapel, where the relic is.

Legend has it that after the Crucifixion, Joseph of Arimathea wiped blood from the body of Christ and preserved the cloth. The relic remained in the Holy Land until the Second Crusade, when the King of Jerusalem gave it to his brother-in-law, Count of Flanders Diederik. The count arrived with it in Brugge around 1150 and placed it in a chapel he had built on Burg Square. The real story seems to be that it came from Constantinople, which had an extensive collection of relics including one of the Holy Blood.

The town of Brugge is unique. Everything seems to be the same after one hour, but is not. The weather is changing, the light is changing, colors are different... Nowhere in the Netherlands (they are quite envious because this town is in Belgium), one will find a spot that has preserved its former look in a such a striking way, a great number of magnificent buildings are reminiscent of the unsurpassed flowering during the middle ages. The place is older though, Vikings established a fortified place or "brygghia" here. During the time, foreign merchants offered goods for sale, local artisans prospered, and so they formed guilds. Battles came up, but in the 14th century was Brugge's Golden Age, many independent tradesmen were responsible for the flowering of the cloth industry, foreigners and artists alike established here, and the town became the foremost center of commerce, and the most important money market of Northern Europe.

February 7, 2007

Again in Bruxelles, for one week. Time to rest a little bit :)

This monument is called Atomium, built for Expo '58, it's like a message from the past about the Future's Look, also reminded me about the classic SF, which was really in vogue those years, one year after the Space Race begun...

Well, not only in my opinion the Belgian Beer is the best beer in the world. These guys have over 600 brands, their brewing tradition being for over one thousand years, many of them still made in the abbeys, by the monks. I have to tell you that here the beer has a different taste. It's like you didn't taste a beer before. As you begin to drink the beer from here, a new definition of the beer is printing in your brain. Even Stella Artois is different :)
Bruxelles is well known for its estaminets, sort of pubs, where you can drink as many beers you like till you can't no more. Finally, when you're able to rise from the table to go home or whatever, when you're trying to leave behind the estaminet you're just seeing another one on the other side of the street... And here we go again :)

Bruxelles is also known as being the capital of bandes dessinées (comics). Here you can find many stores dedicated to this culture, within whole isles are only with manga. Any Belgian has in its library at least few comic books, any city I visited - no matter how small it was - having at least one store dedicated to comics.