Early Observations

We've been here just over a week now, and in that time we have formed some first impressions about life in Belgium. Some are very positive, others not as much. Here's a little list which we may add to over time:

Beer
All of the different beers we've tried have been excellent, except for one: Maes. Those who enjoy the watered-down lagers that are mass-produced in the U.S. might like it, but for us beer snobs it was a major disappointment. The favorite so far is Leffe, which makes both a Blonde and Brune (brown) version, both of which are very good.

Getting around
The mass transit here is excellent, putting even transit-friendly Portland to shame. There are three different Metro (subway) lines, 18 tram lines, and dozens of bus routes that go pretty much everywhere. Driving, on the other hand, appears to be a major source of fear and frustration (though we have yet to try it). Traffic is horrendous, the roads are very confusing, and drivers here are quite aggressive, though I must say they are pretty tolerant and friendly towards pedestrians. Speaking of pedestrians, maneuvering around others you pass on the street is rather interesting as well; people here often play a pedestrian form of "chicken", and will continue to walk three-abreast as they approach you, waiting to see if you'll move first. Thus far we have virtually always been the ones to move and go single file, mostly because we don't feel comfortable enough yet to want to deal with any confrontation that may ensue. I'll maybe follow up on that one as time goes by! :-)

The People
Belgians are somewhat reserved, but extremely friendly and accomodating. Even given our almost non-existent French and completely non-existent Dutch, we have yet to be treated rudely or criticized for our lack of skill in the local languages. An English speaker can easily "get by" with learning only the basics, but seeing how adept many of the locals are with three plus languages really makes us want to make the effort to learn. We've got our work cut out for us!

The Pets
Yes, I feel I must mention the four-legged residents of Brussels, specifically the barking variety. I've read that Belgians adore their dogs, and from what we've seen I would say that is definitely true. Lots of people here have dogs, and we often see them out on the street or in parks walking their furry friends. That's great, until Fido or Fifi does what comes naturally (often in the middle of the sidewalk), and the owner walks off, leaving the steaming pile there, just waiting for an unsuspecting pedestrian to step in it. Seriously, I have never seen so much dog poop on city streets in my life!

That's all for now, more to come soon!

We're finally here!

After months of anticipation and preparation, we finally hopped a plane on August 22nd, and arrived at Zaventem airport in Brussels around 1:30 PM (13:30 the way they track time here) on Thursday, August 23rd. And lest anyone think that this means we finally got our Visas, let me clarify that we STILL don't have them, and will both have to fly back to the States to pick them up once they're finally ready. We have since confirmed that they can be issued once a final piece of information is confirmed by the authorities, and we expect that to occur within the next week. So the visa saga is almost over!!

There was also a small snafu involving the pickup of our two feline companions - basically no one told us where we were supposed to go to get them once we landed, so it took about an hour to locate them! Another interesting thing regarding the kitties, absolutely NO ONE stopped us going through customs to review or question their paperwork or anything! Amazing, and a little bit annoying given how much time went into getting all the health certificates/USDA stamps/EU import forms filled out!! No harm done though, we found them and despite being confined to their carriers for over 18 hours, they did just fine. Such good little troopers!

Since arriving, most of our time has been spent taking care of the details that must be handled when moving to a new place: getting phones, opening a bank account, locating a good map of the area and figuring out where things are, finding a place to live, etc. We've had some success, but let's just say that both of us have aching joints and very sore feet at this point!

We did have a chance to visit the city center Sunday afternoon and check out the Grand Place and the little Mannekin Pis statue, and of course have a few beers and some excellent Belgian chocolate! It was a brief visit, but I snapped a few pictures and have attached them here. Enjoy, and of course there is much more to come!

Ahh, Those Glorious Bureaucratic Delays!

A lot has happened since my last post, including the sale of our house, two cars, and several pieces of furniture; the moving of nearly all the rest of our earthly possessions into a rather small storage unit (you truly don't realize how much stuff you have until you try to cram it into a tiny little room!); and of course the quitting of the jobs. To sum it up, we are now officially homeless, carless, jobless and "stuffless" - if that's even a word?? :-)

So now we're up to the present, and the latest bit of news: we were scheduled to depart for Belgium earlier this week, but after waiting a full 10 weeks now, our visas are STILL not ready! The consulate website puts the wait at 3 weeks, and our oh-so-helpful contact at the LA consular office originally told us it would be 8 weeks. On Monday we faced the critical deadline for changing our flights, and unfortunately we had to immediately re-book our flights for a specific date. Of course we have no specific date on which we know they'll be here, so the best we could do is move the date out several weeks in the hopes that we'll SURELY receive them in that timeframe.

So, our latest scheduled departure date is now August 22nd - let's hope that's the last flight change and the only snafu we'll have during this process!! In the meantime, we're sitting around my brother Mike and his fiance Peyton's house, trying to be somewhat productive and teach ourselves French, since we now won't have time to take the intensive course once we arrive like we had planned originally. C'est la vie!!