Of course the first thing you must do is check out the Grand-Place, so we did that. Pretty nice!
We also went to the museum of musical instruments, which is housed in a killer Art-Nouveau building.
They had headphones that picked up signals from each exhibit, so you could go around and hear the instruments being played as you were looking at them in the case. Very clever (except for the idiots who walked around with the headphones around their necks, broadcasting to everyone). They had everything, from 20 types of bagpipes to a whole Javanese ensemble.
We also took a trip out to an open-air market, then headed to a nice park for a picnic lunch. The weather was gorgeous, and there were even baby geese! AWW!
Next to the park there's an African Museum, which was probably the strangest museum I've ever been in. A less-than-subtle relic of Belgian dealings with the Congo, it was filled with preserved specimens of every creature that dared set foot/claw/antenna in the colonized region. Think Jumanji, but stuffed. Oh, and they hadn't changed the exhibits since 1910. The type-written cards (seriously! with a typewriter!) were mostly in other languages, so I could only stare in horror at the displays of parasites whose effects on the human body were so adeptly illustrated and swear to myself that I would never EVER go to Africa.
(Don't worry mom.)
We took it pretty easy so that's all I have to report, except that the street art was pretty intense!
Oh, and we got Mexican food at Chi-Chi's. Probably not a great idea. See if you can spot the first reason why.
I must also add that a sign outside said "FRIDAY NIGHT: FREE LIVE MUSIC!" so naturally it took us by surprise when the hired live musicians went around to every table asking for tips. Awkward!Speaking of food, Belgian waffles were amazing (naturally). There are at least 3 different ways of cooking them, and of course I had to try them from pretty much every place in the neighborhood. YUM.
Finally, a million thanks to my Aunt Betsy, who took very good care of us!! xoxo
