December 3 -- Eating Well in Belgium

Be sure to check out "Dubby's" blog: http://debbiebf.blogspot.com for some news about our trip to Antwerp this week, and be sure to click on the play button under the picture to the right of me and Liliane for a quick 2-second movie of her flaming creme brulee. Debbie was right: lunch was terrific. In fact, all of our meals here have been terrific: the evening with Jim Kelly and Liliane at Estro Armonico (Tunisian) on Thursday; with the Halling Family at the Grote Ganz (medieval) on Friday; with the Staepels (Belgian gourmet) on Saturday; with the Schiltz (Oriental) on Sunday; and today with Liliane (university club, Belgian described on Debbie's post for today). On this trip, we've also had our obligatory Doner Kebap with Frites, and for Sunday lunch, I cooked some kip-schnitzel with balsamic rice and veggies. I've also had pancakes and kip ginger soup. Debbie had her omelet-with-vegetables, and some asparagus soup. I've been making my fresh-squeezed orange juice, since we were able to buy 14 huge navel oranges for 2 euro at the vogelmarkt Saturday morning. The Schiltz's gave us some wonderful Clementines which are so sweet they melt in your mouth. (If you don't know what a Clementine is, you're missing a lot. See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clementine They are deliciously sweet and not even a hint of the sourness y0u'd expect from a citrus.) It has drizzled here almost every day. Can you imagine? Drizzle in Belgium?!? Tomorrow it's dinner with the Boegart's: we'll take the train to Mechelen, just outside of Brussels, and spend the day walking around the canals and 15th-century architecture of Mechelen (pronounced Meck' eh len), including its gothic cathedral. Then it's home to the states Wednesday morning. We've really enjoyed this trip. No JMU duties (to speak of), no surprises, none of the last minute emergencies to handle, no 16-hour workdays... just relaxing and enjoying Antwerp and our friends. Soooo nice.

My Son, the Soldier

I'm very proud of my son, the soldier. It brings tears to my eyes: wherever we went with Allen in uniform, people were stopping and thanking him for serving our country. Although I'm sure most Americans would rather us not be at war, I'm grateful for the many citizens who appreciate what our men and women in the armed forces are doing for the world. I'm especially grateful that they are taking the time to thank those in uniform for their service.

Allen explained that Psyops and Civil Affairs (the part of the Army he's serving with) are the ones who go into an area, learn of the needs of the local civilian population (such as the need for new schools, hospitals, electrical generation stations, telephone systems, etc.), and then arrange for aid to be applied for those purposes, thus trying to win the civilian population to the idea that we aren't really the bad guys. Allen starts his paratrooper training shortly. He's sure enjoyed driving the humvee's up and down cliffs, over the river and through the woods. I guess that jumping out of an airplane beats the pants off bungee jumping at the fairgrounds.

Bry and Louisa

Here are Bryan and Louisa. Louisa was a captain at Gulfstream Air Lines, and flew quite a bit with Bryan on their Caribbean routes. She now is a captain with Miami Airlines. The day before we took these pictures at the Jacksonville Zoo, she had flown from Miami to Guatamala, to San Antonio, to Atlanta, to Jacksonville.

Family Pics

Here's a few familiy pics from Columbus, Georgia. We sure missed Cat-kim, but we understand that her part of Alaska is difficult to get into and out of this time of year.

Boot Camp Graduation

I guess since Dubbie and DJ posted pics of the Fort Benning graduation ceremony, I might as well put up a few, too.



(He's in the exact center of the photo below...)


After the actual graduation ceremony, we hung around a bit and DJ and the Bry got to sit in one of the Bradley fighting vehicles. These things are amazing collections of technology.

Oct 21: Fall Foliage

Fall color is finally here. Sort of. I took all the photos below on the same day: Saturday, October 20. As you can see, some areas of the Shenandoah have color, and some are still green as grass. (Of course, a lot of the grass isn't green, but brown, due to the lack of rain over the past few weeks!)

The first two pictures, showing riotous fall color, were taken on North River Road, about a mile south of the Towers Ruritan Club, southwest of Natural Chimneys Park, just before you enter the George Washington National Forest at Stokesville. Click on the picture for a larger and clearer version.



This next picture is about a mile away from the two above, and actually at a slightly higher elevation, along Lick Run Road, also west of Natural Chimneys Park. This is about five miles west of Bridgewater. Notice the color among the treetops just peeking out over the top.


The picture below is on U.S. 11, in "downtown" Fort Defiance, just north of Augusta Stone Church, on the edge of the cemetery, across the street from the old Fort Defiance Post Office.



This photo below shows one of the many areas of the valley that are still relatively green. Taken on the same day as the others, this view is looking southwest from Spring Hill Road, just north of its intersection with Mt. Solon Road. This is just north of the community of Spring Hill, a few miles west of Fort Defiance and a few miles east of Moscow and Parnasssus, Virginia.

The photo below is also taken on the same day, and shows my office building at JMU: Showker Hall. Notice the nice maples, but also notice the green leaves on the redbud and elms.

By the way, a tidbit for Queen Karena and Sgatorboy: Your chocolate bars are on the way. We had to wait until the weather cooled down a bit so the Belgian chocolate wouldn't melt. Of course, it still isn't cool enough, so you may need a straw when it arrives. Good luck.

And the Winner is...

If you read the posts below, you will eventually come to the July 17 post in which I ask if anyone is reading my blogs. Queen Karana and Sgaterboy are the winners! (And that's because the other two entrants have already had enough Belgian chocolate to last them till Thanksgiving!) Send me an email (fordhadr@jmu.edu) giving me a mailing address and I'll get the chocolate bars in the mail. It is now cool enough that they won't melt in the mail.

Oct 1 -- Apples

For some reason, this year has been a good year for our apple trees. A late freeze last spring killed all the peaches and pears -- we have one little lonesome pear all by itself, and no peaches whatsoever. But the apple trees were just loaded down with juicy apples. They are smaller than you usually get in the store, but mmmm, they are tasty. We had so many, we invited loads of people over to pick them, and ended up putting them on freecycle. I'm a little tired of apples right now.

Sep 30: Mountain Hiking... Shenandoah

I took a walk in the mountains Sunday afternoon, and took a few pictures. The leaves are just beginning to change, still not a lot of color. Because we received a goodly amount amount of rain this past summer, the vegetation is lush and green, so if we get a nice frost in the next week or two, we should have a gorgeous fall color season this year. The sunset is taken from an overlook near Milepost 8 on the Blue Ridge Parkway.

The red leaves above are poison ivy, and sumac.

The leaves are just beginning to turn. The forest is still 98% green.

Nice wildflowers.

View from an overlook on the Blue Ridge Parkway just south of Milepost 8, which is a couple of miles south of Humpback Rocks.

Aug 27: Debbie's Home but not quite well yet...

Debbie has not passed the stone yet, and the doctor said the thing is so big the operation will have to be much more than he originally expected, and he can't arrange the operation until later in the week. See Debbie's blog for more details. Bottom line: She wants to go home rather than sit in a Belgian hospital for three or four more days. So the doctor discharged her, and she'll go back to the US and let her doctor in the Shenandoah Valley work on it. She's home at our Antwerp apartment, but still in considerable pain. The pain medicine they gave her isn't strong enough, probably because she's been taking pain medication for arthritis for so long. She will need some stronger stuff for the plane trip to the US on Wednesday. The hospital stay interfered with Debbie's main reason for coming here in the first place: to see her friends from church, who all have been anxious to see her again. They have been calling us and wishing her well. Oh, well, these things happen. And the medical care, while following way-different customs and protocols, has still been what I consider to be surprisingly good, and even outstanding compared to what I expected from socialized medicine. Debbie isn't happy with it because she's still not well and still in pain, but hey, I'll give her that. The stone has apparently been there for weeks (maybe months... the doctor said one this size doesn't form quickly), and the pressure change on the flights coming over apparently loosened it and let it slip to a spot where it caused discomfort, and finally pain. It apparently is too big to break up with the sound approach used here in Belgium. Debbie is not happy with the prospects of having surgery, even back in the U.S. And everyone who reads this blog knows that *I* think of surgery and hospitals.... ;-) Oh, well, we'll see...

Aug 26: Mijn Vrouw Geeft de Nacht in St. Augustinus Ziekenhuis in Antwerpen

My wife is spending tonight in the St. Augustine Hospital in Antwerp.

Debbie woke up just before 5 this morning rolling around, moaning from unbearable pain in her lower abdomen. A couple of hours later, pain medication, hot baths, and ice packs had done nothing to alleviate it.

We called a pharmacist friend from our Belgian church, and he recommended we take her to St. Augustinus hospital's emergency room. We know where most of the hospitals in Antwerp are located (Stuyvenberg, St. Elizabeths, Middleheim, St. Vincents, Jan Panfijn, Universtaire, etc.,), but this was one we'd never heard of. Turns out it is about three blocks from Middleheim hospital, about a half-hour bus-ride away from our apartment, way down on the south side of town.

The Belgian medical system, although totally socialized, provides what I consider to be excellent medical care. Less than five minutes after walking in the front door, she was already in a treatment room getting her vital signs checked. Three minutes after that, they were drawing blood and inserting an IV. Within 15 minutes of walking in the front door, we were talking with the doctor.

The doctor ordered a CT scan, and within 10 minutes they were taking Debbie up to the radiology department. I went to get a snack at the cafeteria and before I could get back, they had completed the scan and she was back in the treatment room!

Fifteen minutes later, we had a positive diagnosis: kidney stone, absolutely classic, showing up beautifully on the scan.

They put her on an IV drip of medication intended to relax the tube where the stone is lodged, hoping it will loosen and come out where she can pass it. They admitted her for the night, and put her on some really good pain medication, which is making her high as a kite. If the stone isn't out by morning, they plan to surgically remove it. Either way, they expect her to be able to fly home on our scheduled flight Wednesday.

The hospital seems every bit as competent and offering quality care as anything we've seen back in the states. They have a few different customs (for example, astoundingly little paperwork, they let you keep your own clothes on, friends can bring in your favorite food and drink, etc.) but in general, the quality of health care seems excellent compared to the U.S.

I took DJ back to the hospital this evening on the bus to bring her a more comfortable housedress and stuff.

We owe a debt of gratitude to our Belgian friends, Mark and May Schiltz, who not only selected a great hospital, but actually took us there in their car, and visited with Debbie again in the evening, and then drove DJ and me back to our apartment, saving us time waiting on the bus.

The hospital room is costing (get this!) a whopping 75 euro per day! At the current exchange rate, that's about 99 dollars per day! That's NOT our part of the bill with insurance picking up the rest -- that's the whole hospital bill! And the doctor is prohibited by law from sending a "supplemental" bill for physician's services! If this had to happen, I'm kinda glad it happened in Belgium!

Naturally, at the moment, neither of us cares much about what the bill will be. Her smile in the photo belies the heavy intoxication she's under from the pain medicines in the IV drip. I wish I could say she's resting comfortably, but unfortunately, while the medication is helping numb the pain, I know she's definitely not a happy camper tonight. I sure hope she passes the darn thing soon so she'll be more comfortable.

The really good news is that she doesn't have any infection yet, no fever, no kidney failure or damage, and there is no sign of any other problems. Hopefully she'll be home (in our flat in Antwerp) in time for supper tomorrow evening.

Aug 24: Tongeren

Tongeren is billed as the oldest city in Belgium. It was an organized settlement at least 200 years before Christ. A fellow named Ambiotrix is documented to have led the natives of the town in a (temporarily) successful defense against a Roman Legion led by none other than Julius (later Caesar) himself. (Of course, Julius Caesar came back a few years later and won the second time. This was in 57 B.C.)

Here is the statue commemorating Ambiotrix, standing on the Tongeren town square in front of the Stadshuis.



Tongeren is pretty far south. It's almost 3 hours from Antwerp, south of Brussels, on the way to Luxemburg. Even so, however, it is still (just barely) inside the Flemish-speaking part of Belgium. It has the traditional bell tower on its primary church, which today is technically a Basilica and not a cathedral since Togeren no longer has its own bishop.



Debbie's back is better but her tummy is upset today. We took a very long, but leisurely, walk around the old city walls, which turned out to be amazingly lengthy! Those walls enclosed a LOT of territory... several square miles. We stumbled across a nice little park with a lake and paddle-boats, and a little zoo with emu and several kinds of deer that we aren't familiar with. No signs. Does anyone recognize this kind of deer?



Below: here are Debbie and DJ taking a load off their feet and wetting their whistles at the local pub inside the Beguinehof. That's them sitting at the table at the corner of the church at the left.



Tongeren is famous because it is one of the few cities in Belgium that has preserved and/or excavated its Roman-era city walls. A tremendous archaeological effort has gone into digging up and discovering the Roman layout, defences, homes, etc. In the process, they've uncovered the medieval walls, too. You can actually tell the difference by looking -- the construction is different.

For example, here is a tower and city gate, built in 1357, part of the medieval wall




Below is the view through the tower gate, showing the steeple of the Beguine church, where Debbie and DJ were enjoying their cold drinks while I took this picture.



Here is another section of the medieval wall.




And another shot of the 13th-century wall, even though this has arches which you normally associate with Roman architecture:



Contrast the construction above, with the tower below, which is part of the Roman wall, built in the second century (the 100's) by the Romans. Also see Debbie's blog for more pictures of the Roman walls.

Aug 23: Grottes Han-Sur-Lesse (Caverns)

The Lesse is a river flowing through the southern (and very French-speaking) part of Belgium. The town of Han is located on the River Lesse, hence the town's official name: Han Sur Lesse.

Han-Sur-Lesse is really little more than a collection of houses and shops. There are only two streets, and one "T's" into the other on at the center of town. Weyers Cave would be a thriving metropolis compared to this tiny town--- even smaller than Spring Hill or Mt. Solon! Here are Debbie and DJ sauntering down the main street. You can walk from one end of the town to the other in about three minutes.



About a five-minute walk from the center of the little tiny town you can find one of the most beautiful caverns I've been in. And I've been in Luray, Grand Caverns, Kentucky-Down-Under, and Mammoth Cave. This set of caves is fuller and more densely packed with interesting and gorgeous formations (stalagmites, stalactites, curtains, plates, layers, domes, beehives, etc.) than any I've ever seen. They won't let you take any pictures inside (even without a flash!), but suffice it to say that I was impressed. Debbie's back is bothering her, but she withstood the 456 steps of stairs just fine -- she says it's because they were spread throughout the 2-hour cavern tour.

We bought the combi-passes, which includes the 3-hour train ride from Antwerp to Brussels to the Jemelle station, the 30-minute bus ride from the Jemelle station through the southern Belgian countryside to Han-Sur-Lesse, a short 1 kilometer narrow-gauge train ride from the center of town to the cavern entrance, a 2-hour guided cavern tour, a shuttle back to town, a 90-minute Safari ride to the other side of the mountain, entrance to the geological museum, plus admittance to the 3D interactive movie program, along with the return trips, all included, for less than the cost of one adult admission to an American theme park like King's Dominion or Six Flags!

The countryside in this part of Belgium is hilly and beautiful.



Here is where the River Lesse comes out of the mountain, near the exit of the cavern tour.


We did the caverns tour in the morning. In the afternoon, we took the tram ride from the town around to the other side of the mountain, where it entered a huge 1000+ acre game preserve, and our tram ride turned into a safari. It's like a huge open zoo.

The French name for owl is "hibou", and the Dutch name is "uihui", although the guide pronounced the names as "hoo-boo" and "oo-hoo".

The brown bears were in an enclosure, and enjoyed posing for the tourists.


"No, no, really, darling, I just finished my nails..."



We got to practice our French more on this trip than any we've taken since Paris and Strasbourg 2 years ago. Je parle un tres peu Francais, mais Debbie parle Francais tres bonne.

Aug 22: Aquatopia

DJ and I thoroughly enjoyed this world-class aquarium, located right downtown in Antwerpen, on KoningenAstridPlein (Queen Astrid Plaza). Yes, the zoo entrance is also located on this plaza, located right next door to the railroad's Central Station, but the zoo is not affiliated with the aquarium. Here is a picture of DJ looking through a porthole at a passing ray.






The aquarium has dozens of tanks, including several huge ones, like this one, featuring not one but TWO (2) tunnels for humans to walk through, giving the effect of actually being down in the water with the fishes.

Aug 21: Delft, Holland

Since Dubby and Bopnopper have both posted and described Delft, I won't repeat it, but they overlooked some very interesting aspects of this quaint Dutch town that I thought you might enjoy.

First, the picture below is "NieuweKerk", or "New Church". The name is somewhat misleading, however, because the New Church was actually built between 1351 and 1496! Yep, that's right, the "new" church was pretty much completed BEFORE Columbus set sail!



So, click on the picture above, and look closely at the people at the entrance of this church. See how small they are? The church tower is HUGE. It is over 108 meters high, which is the equivalent of a 35 story building.

Now here is the fun part: DJ and I climbed all 386 stairs to get to the top! You can see the spiral staircase on her blog. Once again, an old gray-haired, pot-bellied, 50-plus year-old geezer was able to climb stairs -- without medication! And here is the photo to prove it!



By the way, that's the OLD church in the background.

Of course, to be honest, we did take a couple of breathers along the way up. But hey, climbing stairs for half an hour is supposed to be good for you, if you believe those commercials on TV for the stairmaster. And believe me, these stairs were steeper than anything you'll find on the settings for the stairmaster!




The view from the top was stunningly beautiful. The picture below is the view looking down at the spot from which the very first photo on this post was taken. The building in the center of the photo below is the city hall, or stadshuis. The tower of the city hall is actually attached to the back of the building. That tower is actually part of a castle from the 1100's called "the Steen". The Steen burned and was demolished -- all except for the tower, which was preserved and made part of the new stadshuis when it was constructed in the 15th century. Incidentally, we ate lunch under one of the yellow tents to the right in this picture.




Of course, no trip to Holland would be complete without a photo of a real classic windmill, built in the late 1600's and today holding a pet food store in its base.



Like Amsterdam, Delft is criss-crossed with canals. Take a look at this following picture. Notice anything. Question: how the heck do people get out of their parked cars without falling into the canal? We never found out. Notice: no guardrails, either! They apparently don't have many lawyers in Holland.



We toured the Royal Deflt Ceramics Works, or Pottery factory, or Porcelain Works, or whatever you want to call it ("Fles" in Dutch). Below is a picture taken in the factory courtyard. Europeans love to eat and drink outside. Of course, there aren't very many bugs in Europe for some unknown reason. About the only bugs we ever see are the occasional bee here and there. So eating and drinking outside is very pleasant. And although it is mid-August, the temperature is a very comfortable 70 degrees at the heat of the day, and about 55 at night (Farenheit, of course).



As the Bopnopper pointed out, all of the Delft china and vases and figurines and tiles and stuff is all hand-painted before it is fired. Since DJ's photo is blurred, here is one of the painters at work.



The Royal Works pride themselves on custom pieces, one-of-a-kind, designed and manufactured for one and only one customer. For example, they do unique work for all the kings and queens of the Netherlands. They will do almost any kind of commission, too. Below is a work where the customer decided to let the factory display the wares for a few months before he takes possession of it, sort of as an advertisement for what the company can do. This is a full-sized (100% actual size) reproduction of Rembrandt's famous painting "NightWatch", done bit by bit on a bunch of little 6-inch-by-6-inch tiles, which when all put together, re-create the masterpiece. It is amazing.


Below is a panel which re-creates the famous Vermeer painting of the "Milk Maid". This is all on one panel, but is life-sized (100% the size of the original painting).



The "Milk Maid" is famous because it is the first painting of a common person... prior to this painting, most of the Dutch Masterworks were of royalty or rich people or of religious subjects, or posed portraits. Vermeer was a groundbreaker because he painted common, ordinary folk, doing ordinary things, giving us a fantastic insight into the lives of the commoners from the 1600's.

Vermeer's home town, by the way, was ... Delft! And he is buried in the "Olde" church, or "Oudekerk". Below is a photo of the tower of the Old Church. Notice anything about the tower?



If it looks like it is leaning to the right, it's because.... it *IS* leaning to the right! About ten feet, to be exact. The tower was built in the 1200's. Because practically all of Holland is silt (the saying goes, "God created the world, but the Dutch made Holland") and part of the tower was built on a filled-in canal, the thing leans. The Old Church holds the tomb of Vermeer, as well as Antoine Van Leeuwenhoek, the inventor of the microscope and father of microbiology.

Below is a picture of the Prinsenhof. Students of European History will recognize the Prinsenhof as the place where Balthasar Gerard shot William of Orange (in the very first assassination of a politician using a firearm). William of Orange was the one who stopped Philip II (Holy Roman Emperor, for whom the Phillipines are named, and son of Charles V who sent Cortez to bring back the Incan/Aztec gold to finance his wars to force all of Europe to stay Catholic). William of Orange was a brilliant strategist who started out loyal to Philip, but who grew tired of the murder of thousands in the name of keeping the faith pure by stamping out the Protestants and Calvinists and Lutherans, etc., so William declared the Netherlands independent of the Spanish/Hapsburg empire. If you want some interesting reading, look up the entries on these folks on Wikipedia. Anyway, William of Orange was killed here, and is buried in an elaborately-decorated tomb in the New Church. The Prinsenhof is in the foreground in this photo, and the tower in the background is that of the old church.



Delft is about 2 hours train ride from our apartment in Antwerpen. We had to change trains in Rotterdam, but Delft makes for an outstanding day trip.