a year in balıkesir!: Brussels & Bruges!

Oh my gosh, you guys!

After a little stop at home and a whirlwind adventure around Europe, I'm finally back in Turkey! Crazy business, crazy adventures, but I'm glad to be back. I missed my students over the past month, and I think by now they've mellowed out over the grades they received on their Phonetics exams, so everything should be copacetic by the time my classes start later today. Inshallah.

Anways, readers, let me start from the beginning. I hopped back to my side of the Atlantic for a few days to catch up with some fam and friends, and it was great to be back. Even though it hadn't felt like I had been away for a long time, you don't always release how much you miss home until you go back. I'm really glad I went home, but I'm also glad to be back in Turkey.

This guy!

So after my visit home, I flew to Brussels to start off my very first visit to Western Europe! Extra exciting, right?

On my first day in Brussels, I kind of just walked around the city. I guess I shouldn't have been surprised with how diverse it was, being as it's the capital of the EU, but still... going from Turkey to anywhere makes even the smallest bit of diversity stand out. Without exaggeration, everyone I met or talked to in Brussels spoke at least three languages. The nice guy who took my lunch order at Subway? Three languages. All of their street signs are in Dutch and French, and in addition to that, everyone basically speaks English. It was awesome and alarming at the same time.

So, as I was walking aimlessly around the city, map in hand, I walked through the neighborhood pictured above, trying to read signs in Dutch and praying that the six years of French I had taken would magically reveal themselves to me, I started seeing signs that I could understand.

And then I happen upon this restaurant.

And I realize that I've stumbled into the Turkish neighborhood in Brussels. On my first day in Brussels. And then some old Turkish women asks me to help her fix her cell phone, thinking I speak French, only to find much to her surprise that I speak enough Turkish to get my point across.

Let me stop for a second and emphasize that never in a million years would I have believed you if you told me that my Turkish would have ever been better than my French. It sometimes feels like I'm in the Twilight Zone.

Anyway, Brussels was neat. Even if you're just into walking around a city, there's a whole lot to see.

After meeting up with Kara, she and I headed over to the Grand Place.

So grand!

The Grand Place is basically the beginning of Brussels. The land upon which it sits has been in use since the 10th century, and since then, Brussels' town hall and other important buildings were constructed their since that time. It contains a palace as well as old guildhalls, since it had also become the commercial center for the city in its earlier years.

Also, it's just super pretty to look at.

In the Grand Place, I also had my first Belgian truffle, and it was delicious.

For dinner, Kara and I grabbed steamed mussels and fries- a Belgian dietary staple- from some super famous place in the city, and they were delicious.

The next day, we hopped the train to Bruges, which is the prettiest little city you could ever hope to visit. When you walk around and ignore the multiple Subways, you feel like you've been transported back in time. It's in the Flemish part of Belgium, and it there was just a lessened feeling of Frenchiness in the town... more Dutch signage, less French. Bruges was once the major commercial port for the region; some historians say it could likely have been the most important in the world. It has lots of cool canals and bridges, and it's just a real neat place to spend a few days. Plus, it's a UNESCO World Heritage site, so that should count for something.

First things first: we went to the Bruges-version of the Grand Place, which is called the Markt. Again, it was/is the center of the city in terms of commerce and business and politics and all that jazz. We were hoping to climb the Belfry, but as we would find with many of the places we had hoped to visit in this quaint little city, it was closed for renovations.

Maalesef.

So, we walked around the Markt and its surrounding area.

We visited this super cool store with a really neat collection of nutcrackers, and stopped at a couple of candy stores as well.

These little suckers are called les cuberdons, and they appear to be the Belgian version of Turkish delight/lokum. They're more or less entirely made of sugar, and the inside is gummy-ish. Unfortunately, my forays into the world of adventurous dining had not yet begun at this point in my travels, so I didn't try one.

But how pretty are they anyway?!

After we scouted out the fine delicacies Bruges had to offer us, Kara and I went off in search of the Basilica of the Holy Blood. It's said that this relic of Holy Blood was brought to the city during the Second Crusade, and every year people dress up in medieval attire and parade around the town in reverence.

Side note: Bruges is supposedly all about their bear mascot.
You can find it everywhere!

The Basilica of the Holy Blood was small, and sort of tucked into the corner of a smaller square, but inside, it was really beautiful.

Having what could be the blood of Jesus in your establishment is a pretty big deal-- Pope Clement V allotted indulgences to people who would visit the city. Because the bottle (originally a crystal perfume bottle from Constantinople) is sealed with wax and wrapped with golden thread, no tests have ever been run on the cloth inside it. Even though there's no evidence in the Bible saying the Jesus's blood had been preserved, I guess most people don't want to risk a holy smiting of biblical proportions to find out.

History, plus cool stained glass windows. A winner in my book.

Afterwards, Kara and I went to a small cafe on a side street named The Old Chocolate House.

WARNING: The next set of photos depict the most delicious things in the history of all things. Don't hate me because I got to eat them.

So, The Old Chocolate House. On their menu was more or less anything chocolate you could imagine. Kara had chocolate tea, for goodness sake. I got hot chocolate, but I really had no idea what I was getting myself into when placing this order.

This hot chocolate, before it even arrived, came with an assortment of treats... cookies, candies, marshmallows, creme brulée... and this little chocolate bowl of chocolate chips. Whatever, I think to myself, I'll just eat that too.

Then, the waitress comes back with this massive mug, and I'm like, "AWESOME." Can't wait for this. And I look into it-- and it's just milk. And in my head, I'm like, "Uhhhhh," until I realize that the milk came with a whisk and OH MY GOSH YOU WHISK THE CHOCOLATE INTO THE MILK AND THIS IS THE BEST THING EVER.

And before you ask, yes, it was best hot chocolate I've ever had in my entire life. There's no going back to Swiss Miss after that experience.

LOOK AT THAT MUG.

Like I said, I like to walk places, and Bruges is an even better place to do that than Brussels-- it's quiet, there aren't cars zipping past you left and right, and everything is pretty.

We walked down the Dijver, a river/canal that runs through the center of Bruges and means "holy water" in Dutch.

I'm a little hazy on why I took a picture of a baby
with a harp, but I'm not mad about it.

Once it got dark (and all of the places we had wanted to go proved to be closed), Kara and I walked back to the Markt for dinner, where we feasted on mussels yet again.