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So this is goodbye, although I hope I will see many of you, over the page, as
it were. I am off to the USA in a couple of days to settle in, take some
holiday and take up the job as North America editor at the beginning of
September.
I wanted to leave you with a few final thoughts, which will also go out on From
Our Own Correspondent tomorrow and will be posted here tomorrow morning.
But the piece didn't turn out the way I had planned it. I had long plotted
that, when I went, I would write a riposte to the man I succeed in Washington,
Justin Webb, who was based here about eight years ago. Justin is brilliant, and
has been hugely helpful to me and my family in our move, but plain wrong in his
most memorable piece from Brussels.
But writing this "FOOC," as they are called in the trade, gave me many more
problems that usual. Try as I might I couldn't fit this initial idea with the
colour I wanted to get in to emphasise the varied nature of Europe, and the
more serious thoughts. So I took the words of the old blue's song to heart: "if
it don't fit don't force it" and abandoned the script. But at our final, final
farewell bash a Belgian friend showed such disappointment at this news that I
have resurrected it, for his and your (this is for you,Tom) delectation:
Perhaps we write the first draft of history - I don't know. For broadcasters,
our fine thoughts and words don't even get the honour of being tomorrow's fish
and chip wrapper - they just dribble away into the ether. But some words have a
power to haunt, and one of my colleague's pieces has been my familiar ghost in
Brussels. Berlaymont building - European Commission HQ
Within a few days of arriving I was pulled aside and told: 'I hope you don't
agree with that dreadful man'. A little while ago I was nobbled at a dinner
party: 'You don't think that way about us do you? If you are leaving us try to
say something nice'.
Brussels, Brussels, poor old Brussels. When a city becomes a synonym you know
it's got problems. In English mouths the name of the place that has been a good
home to me for the last four years is usually spat out, as if a distaste for
what is perceived as European imposition has somehow blended with school day
memories of being force-fed a pungent vegetable. Even British guidebooks feel
free to take for granted a British dislike of the EU and then build on this
assumption the right to sneer at Belgium's capital.
Well, I like it better than London and the suburbs of the south-east - not in
theory, not on paper, not to visit, but to live with my youngish family.
But Justin Webb's piece for From Our Own Correspondent, nearly a decade ago,
had a huge impact on the sensitive denizens of Brussels. Justin said the people
were miserable, called it the dirtiest city in Europe, made special play with
the dog mess that does indeed litter the pavements and attacked the lack of a
service culture.
So why do I like it?
For a capital it is small: and that's a good thing. When we first arrived and
someone asked us over for dinner to their home on the opposite side of the city
to where we live the almost automatic response was to turn down the invitation.
In London you simply wouldn't cross a city for an evening. In Brussels it only
takes half an hour.
Our home backs onto a park and is surrounded by greenery, but walk the other
way and in a few minutes you are on one of the city's main arteries, full of
fast-food shops, night shops and Chinese groceries. It is a ten-minute walk to
the metro, which takes me just about to the door of the office in another ten
minutes. Going out of town, as I did this morning, it's a lovely slow drive
through the dappled sunshine of the park and then through a magnificent forest,
just right for weekend walks. Belgian chocolates
Brussels' modest size means that, unlike most capitals, it doesn't suck the
life out of nearby cities. Leuven and Ghent are great places in their own
right, not dwarfed by their neighbour.
The people are friendly. I love saying "good morning" and "good bye" in a lift,
and wishing people a good afternoon, or day or holiday or whatever it is as you
leave a shop, is charming. "Have a nice day" sounds so much better in French.
When I visit Paris it marks me down as a provincial, and I am always looking
for another reason to scorn Europe's most overrated city.
You know about the mussels and beer and chocolate. But the food generally is
good. You can stop most places in Belgium and be sure the basics will, nine
times out of 10, be cooked well. That is not something you can say about France
these days and, despite all the gastro pubs and unbeatable quality at the top
end, Britain still deserves its reputation for chronic grub.
Bars and clubs are not really my scene these days, but on the odd night out
I've ended up at some pretty decent places and the reports I hear are good.
There's a lot more to Brussels than a silly statue of a boy having a wee.
The lack of service culture is a fair point. It's partly because Belgium,
bizarrely and charmingly, likes to think of itself as an honorary Mediterranean
culture, and people seem more interested in having a chat while they buy their
baguette than getting through the process quickly so they have more time to
work. I am afraid my Protestant work ethic has me hopping madly in the long
queue, but I suspect the fault is mine, not Belgium's.
There is another reason. Those long queues in all sorts of shops at the weekend
is because the thought of employing a Saturday boy or girl (there is no Sunday
shopping) is a non-starter: the tax is prohibitive. The price for middle-class
dinner parties not being full of people whining about the local school and
worrying about health care and fretting about going private is a tax system
that can discourage employment and cripple enterprise. A Brussels dog
Anyhow, one can be too selective about this. I must admit on a recent trip to
Washington, going into a very well-known clothes store, I was delighted to see
about ten people serving - such a contrast to Brussels. But when I tried to
pay, four of them directed me to the till. The surfer dude behind it pointed me
towards another till, which he said was working. He continued to chat to a
pretty girl while I queued. And he probably doesn't have healthcare.
The dog poo? Well the francophone love of small dogs is horrid and their toilet
habits are indulged on the streets, but Brussels isn't generally filthy, just
lived-in. I like my cities on the grimy side. My wife tells me that my fondness
for Brussels is increased because I am rarely here, always on the road in some
corner of Europe. But surely that is what home is, a safe and comfortable
harbour to which you return, before setting off on another voyage. I fear I
would get bored in any one place. It does not have the glory of Rome, probably
and predictably my favourite European capital, nor the buzz of Berlin or the
magnificence of Madrid, but it has been home. And, Justin, they even have
pooper scoopers in the park these days.