M&D, Part 2

More beer, as it turns out. We went to the Cantillon brewery and took the tour and sampled the wares. People are always asking me for directions and so on, but nearly always the person is asking in French. I have no idea why this is--maybe the French speakers are more befuddled or more likely to travel without a map, or just have fewer hangups about asking than the rest of the world. Who knows. But with my parents around, Americans felt more comfortable approaching us to ask for advice. Two women had taken a cruise from Amsterdam and had apparently run into the same issue with closed museums, and the tourist information office put them in a cab and sent them over to Cantillon. The neighborhood looks pretty blighted if your eyes aren't open to its charms, and they weren't sure the best way to get back to their accommodations. I showed them where they were and where they were staying, and they decided to take a cab back. Probably for the best.

My dad didn't cotton to the gueuze, unfortunately, but that's probably because his sample wasn't large enough. He had enjoyed the kriek he consumed with his mussels, but the kriek at Cantillon was something else altogether: fruity, but not at all sweet; nothing except a waft of cherry between you and the sour hit of lambic. Delightful, but not to everyone's taste.

Following naps and a trip to the grocery for my parents, at which they agonized over the bread selection because the store was out of the one variety suitable for sandwiches, we went to the Ultieme Hallucinatie, an interesting space with lots of strange Art Nouveau touches. I had a misunderstanding with the waiter about the beer, and he arrived at our table with a Hoegaarden, which I reluctantly pointed out wasn't what I had ordered. Fortunately, it didn't go to waste and was delivered to a woman sitting by herself, already deeply in her cups and very quiet and far away, who finished off several more beers while we ate. I had morels in a cream sauce with pasta, and the morels were meaty and divine.

Tuesday, which was a holiday, I put them on the train to Bruges with some maps and suggestions. At the train station, while buying tickets, I noticed the option to purchase tickets for seniors, and it turns out they were incredibly cheap. Makes me look forward to old age, although they will have probably raised the bar on seniorship by then. We employed the discount throughout the remainder of the trip.

From what I hear, my parents had a lovely time in Bruges complete with hanging out at a bar with a bunch of singing rowdies. I had a quiet day of being crushed to within an inch of my life at a giant annual flea market (I thought it was going to be a secret gem, but since most everything else was closed that day, the entire city showed up) accompanied by a lovely grilled sausage sandwich eaten in a grassy oasis of calm.

Wednesday was the day we were to visit the royal greenhouses, because at my suggestion they had scheduled their trip around the dates it was open. I made the mistake of taking them there the longest possible way, involving a single tram ride that describes a wide arc around the city. It was very pleasant, but better suited to a day with unlimited time. The gardens were lovely, and appropriately astonishing to the visitors, and as different as day and night from the experience a few days prior for me. The fuchsias dripped from the ceiling of the glass passageway while a myriad geraniums climbed the walls. The tropical trees in lush green hues scraped the sky of the central atrium. Hydrangeas billowed out of every corner and orchids gracefully punctuated the scene here and there. We made sure to use the greenhouse's bathrooms, the toilet seats hand-scrubbed after each use by the hardest-working Madame Pipi of all time. And she wasn't even actively shilling for tips!


And then over to the Atomium, where two guys were rappelling down the side to do some cleaning. We had to haul a bit due to all the lost time on the tram, which didn't make my parents terribly happy. But then they got a bit of a break while I did my work, and they subsequently went over to the Horta house for a visit (senior discount) and then to the Wednesday market for strawberries, using a detailed map I had drawn them of the neighborhood since I lost my good visitor's map the day before on the metro. As I had an evening conference call, I supped on ramen while Jack and my parents found a new neighborhood gem.

Jack took Thursday off to make up for the holiday earlier in the week. To break up the monotony of having fantastic coffee and delicious croissants every morning, we went out for breakfast at a nearby spot. Jack and I had coffee and croissants, naturally, while my mom had goat cheese on bread and my dad had an omelet. We saw one of Jack's colleagues walking to work outside the window, which would have proved something, surely, if my parents had seen him as well. I bravely tried the Sirop de Liege on a slice of bread, and it turns out that it's quite tasty--like apple butter but a bit sweeter and finer-textured. Could this be the European condiment I decide I can't live without, purchasing it at outrageous prices at specialty shops in the US? The coffee was good, but naturally not as good as the hotel's.

We spent some time in the art museum (senior discount), the parents and chilluns visiting the old and new sections, respectively. My mom was impressed by the young age of the children being exposed to the art on class field trips, and the earnestness of the docents helping them understand what they were seeing. She was also wowed by the carpeting in the ancient art section, which she referred to as suede-like.

Because Jack felt they hadn't really experienced many of the highlights of the Belgian cuisine to the fullest extent, we stopped by the Chapel Church for frites with mayo. Unfortunately they don't serve them in the paper cone there; creating the cones is a masterful art that is quite mesmerizing to watch, and half the fun of getting fries. My mom snapped some photos of us noshing away with our tiny plastic forks. We then visited the church, which is where one of the Brueghel ("pronounced BROY-gull," my dad says sagely, for he remembers this random fact from an art history class he took in college) clan had a hasty wedding. Subsequently we went to the junk market at Place Jeu de Balle, and then for another break at a sit-down waffle place.

They then bought some chocolates for the folks back home, and we took the metro to the Parc du Cinquantenaire, in a last ditch effort to cram in some culture on their remaining afternoon. We recently discovered that the arch had a viewing platform on the top that was open to the public. Unfortunately the museum through which you access the stairs was closing for the day, so we had to make do with a visit to the park grounds. A walk through some other areas in the European Quarter readied us for dinner, so we made our way back downtown to go to the beer restaurant. We had the same waiter as always, but this time we let him talk us into the aperitif of white beer with kir in it, which was pleasantly refreshing (and, as promised by the French waiter, "it will not give you a 'angover.") The table next to ours was full of Americans as well, and they desperately wanted our opinion on the other restaurants they had made reservations at, none of which we had heard of. I had some really good meatballs. That place might be touristy, but they create out some worthwhile dishes.

We stopped a final time at the Grand Place to sip decaf in the gathering twilight at one of the restaurants there. Et voila! The trip was over. I took them to the train station the next morning for their Parisian extravaganza.