Visions about Belgium

Belgium is in war, that's what some people think here! It's really incredible what you sometimes hear. They think that we only speak French and drink beer all the time. Well the second maybe I can't deny... :) The Swiss people look more informed about our particular situation in Belgium. Because they also have a federal country with 4 official languages and there are some more parallels between the 2 countries. The first question if you tell someone you're from Belgium is if you're 'Flamand' or 'Walon' and the second one if you hate the other part of Belgium then. Of course they are laughing at us because we still have no government. Just like the French people the Swiss-francophones make jokes about Belgian people. But I can tell you they are not really creative in that. Our jokes about the Dutch people are 10 times better! ;) Belgium is a country of beer, chocolate and it's the capital of Brussels (the last one comes from an American, they are really well informed about the 'other' world! :P) Well, if you hear the visions about other countries, it's not so bad after all.

France: chauvinistic 100 percent
España: fiesta fiesta! and vamos a la playa!
Deutschland: cold people
Sverige (=Sweden): colder people and always blond
Nederland (=Netherlands): holidays in caravans

Well, I can tell you I agree with some of those stereotypes! :) About Switzerland, it's getting very cold here and they are starting to prepare the winter and Christmas! (see picture)

Nuit moustache

Nicolas

Nicolas, moi et Céline

Xavi

LHC Ole Ole

Ice hockey is the second national sport here and even in some cities where they are really bad in soccer they think it's even more important! Yeah right... Lausanne, the 'capital of sports' is both in ice hockey and soccer in the second league. We went to see the other day the match between LHC (Lausanne Hockey Club I guess) and La Chaux-de-Fonds (for the architects: yes, there's a link with Mr. Le Corbusier). The atmosphere was really great and of course everybody was standing because the concrete to sit on was extremely cold. Lausanne played incredible (hmm...) and humiliated the rivals with 7-2. The movie is of the other team even failing a 'penalty', listen also to the noise. Swiss people are not always that educated and quiet! ;) Ice hockey is a very nice sport with a lot of speed and fysical interaction (read fights). I loved it, but still not number one for me. Looking forward to European Cup here!

'quiet' Switzerland

Mirco, Filippo, Victor

LHC

Basel

Basel, the city of Herzog & de Meuron and a real party for architects! That's what I always heard... But I think it has much more to offer than just that, it reminds me
of some ways of my hometown, Antwerp, and that's of course a good thing! :) I went with Erasmus organisation xChange but in the afternoon we did a small architectural tour with the fanatic architects! I was a bit disappointed about what I saw but of course I just saw a small piece, next time I will see more and be again impressed by Swiss architecture I hope! :) The evening I spent dinner in the apartment of Sergi who cooked for us. Your 'tortilla de patatas' was really great, Sergi! ;) Afterwards we went out partying for some time at a real archi-party which was really great!

Spain people and coldness...

St. Jakobhalle

St. Jakobpark, H & d M

Sergi's house

Silvan proud of 'his' city

Swiss boyscouts, also trying to earn money...

tomb of our hero Desiderius Erasmus

Rathaus

Bosser, bosser! (=Working, working!)

This last week was again a week of madness. All architects now what I'm talking about... We had the second rendu and well it didn't go so well as the last time. It was nor bad nor good. In general the prof told also he was disappointed in the progress of the projects and we had to work harder! Pff... This time I had to do my first 'nuit blanche' so I was really tired at the end of the week. Oh yeah, two guys from Spain came to my apartment with couchSurfing, great guys and it proved once again the system works and really good! Good luck tomorrow in Lausanne, it's a small but really nice city!

Philip, the sculpture guy!

Party after the 'Critique'

Sergi 'upgrading' his model