Tags
beer, Belgium, biking, brewery, bruges, CIEE, cold, damme, food, Fort Lapin, Gray Jacket, In Bruges, snow, waffle, Washington DC, waterzooi, Winter
Yesterday we took another excursion with my program to the wonderful city of Bruges, Belgium. Bruges is a place I’ve been excited to visit for a very long time. Whenever I told people I was studying abroad in Belgium they would immediately bring up Bruges. Because of the movie, its beauty, or both. I kept hearing so much about it and it sounded so beautiful so I was definitely excited to see this city.
Of course the day we were scheduled to go had a terrible forecast. Freezing temperatures, rain, snow, wind, hail… You name it, we got it. We found out later that it was the coldest March 23rd in Belgium since the 1800’s and that it’s also the snowiest March Belgium has had since the 1950’s. Awesome.
We took the 9:30 train and arrived in Bruges at about 10:30 and jumped right into a two hour walking tour of the city. Our tour guide was extremely knowledgeable and showed us all around the city. Bruges is absolutely beautiful, even with gray skies in the freezing cold. It’s so charming and very romantic. I’m looking forward to going back sometime in April or May to see it again in the sunshine! The walking tour was a little painful because we kept stopping to hear our guide talk which didn’t really allow us to get warm. None of us could feel our feet or our hands by the end of the tour and we were all so excited to get into a restaurant to warm up and grab some lunch. We did get to see a small statue that was made by Michelangelo in one of the churches there. It’s one of the pieces that’s not in Italy so that was pretty cool to see.
After we were finished with the tour and with lunch we had a little time to wander around on our own and see some more of downtown Bruges. Has anyone seen the movie ‘In Bruges’? Does the clock tower look familiar?? We also had time to grab some street waffles. Yum. A few days before we had heard from our host brother’s wife that the street waffles in Bruge are way better than in Brussels. Apparently every city has its own style of waffle and there isn’t really any ‘typical’ Belgian waffle. We decided that after hearing this we definitely needed to try a waffle in Bruges especially since I haven’t had a street waffle yet. It was probably the most delicious thing I ever tasted. I could eat those for dayssss. I’ll need to get a Brussels waffle soon and compare the two, but I’m not sure how anything is going to beat the one I tried in Bruges.
After lunch came the 4 hour biking tour out of Bruges and to another nearby city, Damme. Right when we left the bike shop it start to snow. Sideways. I’m not going to lie, this was really not that much fun. The scenery and the views were absolutely beautiful but you could hardly look up because the snow was coming at you so fast. Luckily on the return leg of the trip it stopped snowing and we could look around and take in the sights. Biking through Bruges and the surrounding countryside is highly recommended… Depending on the weather you have while you’re there though. Disclaimer: stole the windmill pictures because my hands were too cold to take my own.
Once we were finished with the bike tour it was time for dinner, everyone’s favorite part of CIEE excursions. Our program director, Michelangelo, really knows how to pick restaurants. We are never disappointed with the food and always leave super full of good food and good wine and beer. I ordered a typical Belgian meal called Waterzooi. It’s basically chicken, potatoes, and vegetables in a delicious creamy sauce. It was the perfect dinner after such a freezing day. That meal and two glasses of wine and I was ready to fall asleep, but no, we were off to a cafe for a nightcap before heading back to Brussels.
We went to a cafe called ‘t Brugs Beertje (what a name, right?) and had some beers. One of the CIEE interns (a student from last semester’s program who loved Brussels too much to leave) was in the group who came to the bar with us and he is really into the beer culture in Belgium so he provided us with some great recommendations of what to order. I got a beer called Fort Lapin which is apparently brewed in some man’s garage in Bruges. Sounds a little sketchy but it was delicious! The man who makes it only makes a little bit (probably cause he only has the space in his garage) so it’s really hard to find this beer anywhere else, I’m glad I got to try it. The intern, Casey, ordered a beer called Gray Jacket which is a collaboration brew. A brewery in DC and a brewery in Belgium teamed up to make this and it’s brand new and pretty darn tasty. He was really excited to see it on the menu so I’m assuming it’s kind of a big deal in the beer world? And check out the label! It has the Atomium on the left hand side and the National Monument, The Capitol, and The Lincoln on the right. What are the chances. I also had to include a picture of the beer that had a bow-tie.
Then we finally made our way back to the train station and got on the last train to come back to Brussels. Everything was going fine until some drunk man started harassing us about being American. We weren’t being loud, noisy, or disrespectful; we were all sober and honestly pretty pooped and subdued after our long day. He approached us with the question “So let me ask you something, because Americans are generally uneducated”…. Ummmm ok? That definitely set the tone for the rest of the conversation. He then proceeded to ask us multiple questions about Belgium and its history to try and prove that we were all dumb and uneducated. We got every single question right. This pissed him off because he clearly wasn’t expecting us to know the answers, because we were all uneducated Americans, right? He started to get a little outrageous so we just ignored him after that but he had pissed us all off quite a bit.
It was the first time I have experienced such blatant disrespect towards Americans while being in Europe and it was extremely frustrating. I’ve had people approach me and say things like “Here’s what stereotype I’ve heard about Americans, is it true?” or things along those lines, which is great (we once had someone ask if all Americans are like Tommy Lee…). At least these people are trying to understand and figure out if what they’ve heard is accurate and not assuming whatever stereotype it is is definitely true. This man, however, was just plain rude. Even though he was clearly drunk and a huge idiot, it’s still very hard to keep your cool when someone is sitting there saying “All you f**ing Americans are so uneducated”. We were glad to get off the train and get away from him.
On a lighter, and warmer, note I leave for Barcelona in just 3 days! It’s going to be a crazy and exhausting two weeks but I couldn’t be more excited! Flip flop weather here I come.
-Emily