h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

and liked it very much. My friend Lia (Julianna to her birth certificate) lives there. Of course, the reason there's not much French spoken is because they are Flemings, a race to whom the British should show greater warmth - sharing, as we do, a dislike of the French, and a love of beer and chips.

Don't really know what the correct term for the belgian language is, Belgiash perhaps? Anyway, that's not the point.

The point is, A few years ago I had a number of flemish speaking guests for a week or two, and - based on this experience alone - I've never met a group of people more open, charming and wity. We discussed various cultural differences between my culture and theirs, and I can only hope and pray that the British culture will open it's arms to theirs.

In fact, most of the other European cultures seem to have their act together far more than we do in the Yuuuk.

Take Germany for example, according to a couple of German buddies have told me that if you attack someone in germany to their injury, you are responsible for their medical bills, the cost of calling the ambulance etc. This - to me - sounds inherently sensible, and I can't understand why Britain doesn't seem to adopt common sense ideals like this.

Ooops, the above has very little to do with my original intention in this post, which was to discuss the animosity existing between Flemmish and Belgian citizens, and compare and contrast the animosity between English and Scottish, or English and French, even, and to finally point out that it's all a bit silly - the animosity, that is - as when it boils down to it, we're all carbon based lifeforms in the end. Sorry. But mind tends to go off in tangents on a regular basis.

As I understand it the animosity results from the fact that the more numerous Flemish, who also claim to be more prosperous and more cultured, had Wallonia thrust upon them when Belgium was created (in much the same way as the great Balkan carve-ups).

One bone of contention I believe is Brussels, which was historically Flemish but which became very much dominated by the Walloons.

You also have the farcical situation where towns have two different names, one French and one Flemish. Antwerpen is an example: the Francophones call it Anvers. The result is that half way to anywhere the signs change and point you to a different place. Sometimes completely different - to get to Mons you have to start off by heading for Bergen!

Went relative tracing a few months ago to the West Coast of Scotland (lewis), and boy, talk about confusing!

In Scotland, for the last few years there has been an unpublicised war between Gaelic Speakers, English Speakers, and Doric Speakers, as to what the national language of Scotland should be. As a result, most road maps no longer mean anything at all.

In Lewis, all the place names are in Gaelic - a very guttural type of language. However, all the maps are in English. Try the spelling of the main village, which in english is Stornoway, but in Gaelic is Steornabhagh, or to find the local council offices, on the map its called Western Isles Islands Council, the sign pointing to it is Ceomhairle Nan Eilan. Lost?

Yeah, so was I.

Speaking of which, where is Lost? the village, I know i've seen the signpost.

Is it anywhere near Hell?

LOL! Went to Dublin a couple of times recently and noticed that most signs are bilingual. Not that it helps: the English spelling of the port is "Dunlaoghaire" but it's pronounced Dun-Leery B{/

How DO you pronounce the B{/ in Dun-Leery B{/ ?

You pronounce it "bloke with glasses and moustache looking somewhat perplexed"

Lol.
In that case Dunlaoghaire is far easier to spell than pronounce, which is kind of scary.

a couple of points...

i myself was born in england, brought up in australia (though currently live in belgium), so i'm well "in" on the anglo-saxon/british mentality, but um.. this actually has nothing to do with the points i wanted to bring up now does it.. doh [i think i just like putting that in words since this need somehow arises to make your heritage known to all when you're surrounded by other cultures/peoples as i do living in belgium and being italian, always having been in contact with italian communities... or something like that]

ok... 1. the language, (languages rather) are flemish, which is actually just dutch, with a hooooorrible accent (compared to IMO beautiful dutch), and french, (also a not-so-pure accent). and yes, as a friend from brussels put it - right where the most friction seems to stem from - "du genre flamands vs francos y'a pas mieux": "of the sort [of race war/whatever] flemish vs french-speaking belgians, there's none better "... so there you have it.
and i myself have seen my fair share of evidence of this in the two years i've lived here. actually it couldn't be more obvious.


onto the actual article now, imo the idea that belgium is a dull, boring, and rather irrelevant country is 100% on the mark
this said, i haven't actually been to antwerp (yet), or if i have it was just passing through, or in the outskirts, and i don't remember much of it.

so there you have it; if you're planning a round-the-world thang including europe, or maybe you're just a close neighbour and are thinking of making the trip... you shouldn't really bother =)

Well, I like Belgium. The food's good and so's the beer.

Yep. Belgian beer's the best. As are their chips

I should know, I used to live in Eindhoven, The Netherlands, which is close enough to the Belgian border.

I remember going on a school tour to Antwerp when I was a wee lad, to visit the zoo. Antwerp has one of the best zoos in Europe, I think.

Also, an interesting point on the name "Antwerp". It originated in a legend where the hero (forgot his name - help me out here GVI!) did noble battle with some giant, slew(?) him and cut of his hand. Which he then proceeded to throw into the nearby river. Now Dutch for hand is, funny enough, hand (the "Ant" part of Antwerp), and the verb to throw is "werpen". cool, no?

I can sympathise. I live in the West of Ireland on the fringes of the Gailteacht (that's the Gaelic-speaking region), and if I head North into Connemara, the English signs get pretty thin on the ground. It's wise to have a full petrol tank before heading up there.

The typically Irish thing is that Gaelic is the only official language of Ireland, even though just 6% of the population speak it well enough to hold a conversation. The most powerful force in Ireland after the church is the GAA (Gaelic Athletic Association), which insists that Gaelic is used at all presentation ceremonies etc - but is always known by its English name. Make sense of that, if you will.

Oh, and I've been to Hell (and back, of course). For the uninitiated, it's a small town in Norway. It was cold and wet - the best piece of graffiti on the shelter there which acts as a railway waiting room was "This is the day that Hell froze over". There is no good reason to go there, other than to be photographed under the station sign.

I think there's a statue in the harbour to commemorate this legend?

That's right.

First, just for the record: I like Belgium. I live in Belgium for 25 years now, and I'm still fond of this great little country.

But now about Antwerp and this legend. The giant was called Druoon Antigoon, the soldier who cut of the giant's hand was Silvius Brabo. If you want to find out more about this, check http://www.trabel.com/antwerp/antwerp-grotemarkt.htm

Antigoon, hmmmmm. Wasn't he also a character (ghost, to be precise) in the comic books Suske en Wiske?

My, it's been a while since I read those!

thanx for the info,

Astro

Seems I have a meeting with my friends in Mechelen in a couple of weeks, to sort out some work for the Belgian and Netherlands offices. Hurrah! I'll get to keep my silver card after all

As Zaphod once said, "Oh Belgium, man!"

He should wash his mouths out with soap.

Antwerpen - Ontwerpen - to plan, to draft.