The show must go on!

Hey Caren!!!
This week was not the calmest for me ; )
Was with two students I guided through their master project at a conference (They kicked ass at the conference by the way!  Way to go Steven and Jerome!!! ; ), and afterwards a busy schedule between work, saying goodbye to friends, and meetings for ieee ; )

But this week, Belgium is in many peoples news, because we keep on breaking records!!! Longest formation of a government in Belgium ever, in the world ever ... ; ) And this week, the situation grew to a point where nobody expects a solution soon... even new elections are considered ...

Anyway, as a background, (but wiki explains it a loooot better than I ever can... ) our country does not consist of one nation, does not consist of one economic region, does not speak 1 language in the whole country,... We are a conglomerate of people, bound together by a consitution... Nobody in our country wants to ignore the constitution or call for revolution, but it does put a serious strain on the efficiency of our democracy and government(s)...
The western and eastern part of our country have different political parties, different economic and demographic and intracultural situations, and it is getting extremely hard to get our politicians to agree on a policy that they can use in the whole of the country, even with regional exceptions or special rules... Because nobody can agree on what a special rule is acceptable or not and how much it should cost or not...

Anyway, for more than a year, we are at a loss on how to solve this democratic discussion...
the two main leaders of the different parts don't allow the success of the other... In the newspaper appeared this super cool karikature ; ) they really are like cats and dogs... ; )

And probably the funniest of all is, nobody really misses the federal government... maybe agreeing to not be in agreement is as good a solution as any ; )
This situation is extremely strange for us, because normally, we are a people looking for compromises, always... it is one of our key trades in international disputes ; ) we dont solve the problem, but make everybody happy with the best of the non-solutions ; )
This time, as strange as can be, our country doesn't find the compromise with itself!!!

Big hug Caren! ; )

Good things take time...!

Caren!!!

How was your weekend ? ; )
I told you I would probably tell you about my weekend today, and in a way I will accomplish that ; )

As you know, I was at Rock Werchter, a 4 day rock festival in the middle of the province of Vlaams Brabant. Four days per year, this area in one of the most calm regions of Flanders and Belgium, where the grass is green and the cows do not watch trains pass by... four days per year this area turns into one of the most famous open air festivals in the world ; ) It used to be called Torhout/Werchter (or TW for short) when it was still split of two locations, but a few years ago Torhout site was shut down, and only Werchter is left... This was a sad thay in Belgian festival history... ( and now, there is actually talks about moving it away from Werchter, to be able to expand it ... that will be another, sadder day in festival history... )

Buuuuut that is not at all what I wanted to talk to you about ; )
Festivals are moments we really go crazy ; )
Maybe it is because of the sun cooking our brains,
or it could be the atmosphere of 80 thousand people dancing to the same music you are,
or it could be the effect of not enough sleep or hygiene and too much junk food for a long time,
but a festival is one of those things you have to experience to imagine... ; ) So next time you have the chance, attend one! (anyone, not just Belgian festivals ; )

BUT that is also not what I wanted to talk to you about!!! ; )
I wanted to talk to you about good things, and how good things in our country take a looot of time ; )
(and I am not talking about our current world record government formation, because nobody can guarantee if it will be any good, no matter how long it takes ; )
We have some habits that stuck with us since the times of the Bourgondish rule over large parts of our country (somewhere between 1385 -1506)... Among many things, these where known for appreciation of food and food culture in general. We take from that culture the appreciation of talking during meals, and having talks extend the meals and the meals extending the talks... Lunch can take up various hours of our day, if the occasion is such... ; )
And at the same time, preparation of food can take a looooong time ; ) As meat is not always as tender as we might like it, but meat is still not to be wasted, simmering of meat became very popular in our country. For some reason, we tend to simmer meat in a particular way in our country, which is not familiar in spicing  to other ways I have encountered up till now...

This dish, called "Stoofvlees" (quite literally simmered meat), has to be made with what we normally would consider lesser quality meat; meat with a lot of chewy bits in it. For normal preparations, this meat is unsuitable as chewing it takes as long as... ; ) We take the chewy meat, and cut it into cubes of about 2 cm sides, and shrivel them in boiling butter, to keep in the fluids. In the meantime, a base of onions is getting golden together with garlic, thyme, clove and laurel. Especially the laurel is a critical ingredient.

A nice beer should be added to the meat/onions, and depending on taste, people often add some syrup (apple/pear) to it, to soften the taste. Another crucial part is adding sliced brown bread, with mustard.

This dish, even though made with lesser quality meat, is one of the most tasty dishes we have. It takes a few hours to prepare ( like 4 to 6, depending on the meat), but it is certainly worth the wait!!! ; )

And we go completely crazy if we combine it with fries and mayonaise ; ) It may look a little strange, but this sight makes our mouths water ; )

One day, when you visit Belgium again, we'll prepare this for you to taste ; )

Big big hug!

till soon!

Jan

Too much info in one post

Hey Jan,

I wanted to separate the topics of my posts: a post about tourism another about food etc but this time it's special..

I'm just going to describe my day :)

My dad woke my brother and I very early in the morning to go to a memorial mass for our

neighbor (may his soul rest in peace).

What we didn't know was that the ceremony was going to take place on top (literally) of the mountain!

So we headed for an off-road trip to the top of the mountain! Amazing view!

The picture shows the view from the car on our way to the top!

At the top the ceremony was really sweet..we remembered mum too..prayed for her soul as well..

It was a great start of the day!

(The first part of the post is to describe the beautiful nature of my country :P)

In the afternoon, we had a traditional meal. The food is called "manakeesh" with different flavors: "zaatar" (or thym), cheese and "kechek" (i don't know the translation but it's reallllyyy good!)

The place where the woman was baking the manakeesh is called "saj" (its the round thing in the pic). When you come here you must taste them!!

What else..oh yeah! We danced the traditional "dabkeh", you will learn that too :)

I hope this was inspiring!!

There is more from where that came from!

Big hug,

Caren