Top Ten Things I WON’T Miss About Brussels

1.     Doggie-do – It’s a little known fact that Brussels is the Doggie-do capital of the world.  Neither of us could ever understand why no one felt compelled to clean up after their dog.

2.     Store hours - The lack of stores open after 6:30pm was a constant source of frustration, given our tendency to eat (and plan) late.  Sunday closures were also challenging, but on the bright side, they led me to discover Indian cooking at the one open corner-market down the street.

3.     Confusing road signs – I don’t think we ever managed to reach our destination without a few wrong turns, despite arming ourselves with increasing numbers of maps.  The main obstacle was that each major road had a multitude of names (one French, one Dutch, two numerical) yet none of them ever seemed to map to our map armamentarium.

4.     The weather – We arrived in January for a wet, cold (for us) winter and left just when spring was finally taking hold…in June!  I thought Vancouver was rainy (166 days per year) but Brussels takes the cake at 220 days per year!

5.     Expensive water – While beer and wine were extremely affordable when dining out, a large bottle of water that cost 1 euro in the store would typically be marked up 6 times…I think it’s clear what Belgians consider essential with their meal!

6.     Laissez-faire attitude – We both got along with Belgians on the whole – they were generally friendly and laid-back – but sometimes the degree of laissez-faire was a tad frustrating.  One vivid example is the time I was sold a broken cell phone: the store staff seemed completely oblivious to the fact that it was an inconvenience for me to have to return to the store and then wait 45 minutes for them to fix it.

7.     Elusive food favourites – Jerel and I each lamented the unavailability of a few food favourites – for Jerel it was pinto beans and ‘real’ tortilla chips, and for me it was edamame (a new addiction from China).

8.     Erratic drivers – Even after learning the ‘rule of the right’ (feel free to cut someone off if you’re on their right), the other drivers always seemed totally erratic to me, making me a highly anxious (even more than normal) passenger.

9.     Public smoking – I don’t think I need to elaborate here… Unfortunately, this one applies to most of Europe (and I guess most of the world besides the US and Canada).

10. Our building door – Attractive as our steel door was, I always dreaded having to hip-check it with all my might whenever I entered or exited the building.