Psychedelic Adventures: The One About Antwerp

July 27, 2013, Antwerp Belgium

So, Antwerp. I've been reading the guide and figuring out the maps, but in the end they didn't matter because I just walked aimlessly in this city. I didn't have a plan. What I will see, I will see. I consider myself bad at directions, but whenever I get lost, I always find my way. Perhaps the universe is really guiding me, and what I discovered while traveling in Europe is that people almost always smile back when you smile at them. Contrary to what I originally thought about Europeans, people don't shut you out. A smile goes a long way in a foreign place, I suppose. 

I took a train going to Antwerp from Mechelen. From the Veermarkt bus station, Bus 1 stops every 15 minutes and goes to the Station Mechelen where 2 or 3 trains leave every 20-30 minutes to Antwerpen. A De Lijn bus ride goes for 2 EUR from the bus stop to the station and a two way train ride goes for about 4.80 EUR. It was the first time I ever took public transportation in Belgium, and I was terrified the same way I was scared of riding the subway in New York. After my first adventure, I felt like a rockstar with my newly discovered freedom. 

Arriving at noon in Antwerp didn't exactly give me many options for lunch because the restaurants are full and I found them intimidating. I opted for the next best thing--a belgian waffle with cream and cherries on top. It was legit and felt like a warm hug on a chilly day. The fella who sold the waffles was an old Flemish man. He spoke crooked English but he really tried hard to talk to me. He put extra whipped cream on my waffle.

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Psychedelic Adventures: Mechelen, Belgium

Goodness, it has been a week since I first arrived in Belgium! I've been busy with the things that I had to do at the office and exploring my area that I haven't had the time to blog. I've been writing a lot on my travel journal but I still wasn't able to dive into writing about my hosting city. I would be posting some tips and places to go and all the travel related stuff, but for the meantime, I'll just write about traveling thoughts. 

An excerpt from my travel journal, July 23, 2013:

Mechelen is a winding city with strange little corners and alleys. Everything is like a surprise entryway to something or other. I've been taking a cab going to the office in Duffel from Mechelen because buses don't pass by the client office. I don't mind, since everything has been arranged with the cab company. I've been meeting single serving friends in the form of cab drivers. We get into conversations about religion, our cultures, the cost of living, the opportunities that people have when they are born in Europe, the advantages and disadvantages of working abroad. We talk about food and what the traffic is like in Manila. I tell them it's horrible, but I miss it.

Not to sound TOO melancholy or anything, but there really is something about traveling alone that's both sad and empowering. You're forced to trust people. You rely on their goodness, in their helpfulness and the ability to adjust to the fact that you cannot understand a single word in French or Dutch. At the same time, you rely on your own intuition--figuring out how to order food without sounding so stupid, and how to get from point A to point B using public transportation without getting lost. You get into the routine of things, when you travel for work. It's so much different from Melbourne or New Jersey because it's the first time I've been deployed to a project alone. 

My street Vismarkt is right across the Kanaal Dijle is teeming with locals hanging out for a beer or coffee. The street name literally means "fish market" and there's always something happening in the summer. One evening I went out to withdraw some cash and a band was playing jazz and tango while locals danced to the music. On some nights I would open my hotel room window and I could smell the frites from the restaurants beside the hotel.

I see lavenders everywhere. I picked up some one afternoon and kept them in my travel journal as a book mark. It smells wonderful right now. 

Mechelen is beautiful with its cobblestones, brasseries and cathedrals. It has its own charm, the one that is not apparent when you mention Belgium or Europe. I'm glad that I chose to live in Mechelen. Of course, the choice was made out of convenience, because it's the nearest city to Duffel, but I feel as though this small city has its little place just for me. 

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