CONIECTO

OK, winning a trip is a wonderful thing... The details might be a bit less pleasant, but you can't have everything!

I received the trip details by post the day before, because the envelope was returned to the post office, where they couldn't locate it when I asked for it first. Why not email?!

A RyanAir ticket, no luggage, no insurance...sounded a bit cheap. I almost thought we're going to be accommodated in a tent... My friend and I got to Shannon airport at 10am, just to find out the flight was going to be delayed with approximately one hour. While waiting, we witnessed a strange thing happening. The loudspeakers kept on making announcements for a flight to Chicago, and there were probably about 100 people waiting to board that plane. Suddenly, I heard applauses and looked around to see what was going on. Some of the passengers waiting for the Chicago flight were clapping their hands enthusiastically at the view of a group of American soldiers entering the departures waiting lounge. And again...and again... every 3-5 soldiers coming in to grab a beer or a sandwich were saluted with the same enthusiasm. The soldiers didn't look impressed or grateful. I tried to identify the supporters: a bunch of old ladies, followed with less enthusiasm by other passengers. It gave me goose bumps: applauding soldiers is not exactly my thing...

Finally, we took off. The plane was packed, and when we finally landed in Charleroi, it took probably 45 min to get our luggage. We were thirsty, hungry and already tired. When we finally exited, we found a driver waiting to take us to Breda. A limo! now this sounded good... There were 192km to go on the highway... a beautiful day outside, but dark windows and air conditioning kept us "cool"...and then the dreadful traffic around Brussels on a Friday afternoon...it took us 4 hours to get there...I was more dead than alive when we finally got there!

The hotel was nice. The city was charming. We had an excellent dinner in a lovely restaurant on Grote Markt. Came back to life. Located the Irish pub (brown door in the back, behind the cathedral) . Went to bed at 9.




On Saturday morning, we met the other happy winners in the hotel lobby (following the competition , each city involved sent two people in every one of the other 5 partner cities): a friendly couple from s'Hertogenbosch(NL), a trio from Mechelen(BE) (grandmother, mother and daughter?), and another couple from Gent(BE). The people from Chester never showed up, despite of checking in the night before.

Our hosts took us to the old City Hall in Grote Markt, and we were given a presentation on the history of Breda, followed by explanations on the current project: De Nieuwe Mark. Basically, the purpose is to bring the water back in the city (in the 60's, the old harbour was dried off and the first underground parking in Holland was built in its place). Disappointed that there was no water to walk by yet, I was though deeply impressed by the passion and energy our hosts were putting in this huge project.

We spent the rest of the morning walking around the city, guided by Amanda from Breda Promotions. Because it became tedious to give the explanations both in Dutch and in English (the guests from Belgium were all speaking Dutch), Amanda switched to English, having the agreement of the whole group. She took us to beautiful hidden corners and told us stories about things that happened there during the long history of Breda... I was listening to her and thinking that no technology ever will be able to replace her, with her funny English expressions, her passion for storytelling and her humour... answering to questions, caring for everyone and smiling all the time... On the way to Nieuwe Mark, we stopped at the Begijnhof(only in Dutch, sorry!), visited the Tine Merkx Collection of miniatures (amazing doll houses!).
















We passed by William of Orange's statue and by the Castle (nowadays hosting the Royal Dutch Military Academy), and got to the old harbour, where a new "High Bridge" was built, a new pedestrian path created by the river, and the old Fish Market is being rebuilt.
















On the left -what we really saw. On the right - how the river is supposed to look like in a few months. The beautiful weather and the company of the group made the walk very pleasant and helped me forget my frustration that there was no boat tour included...and no water to be seen...

Among the nice stories heard from Amanda, one about beer: because the drinking water wasn't safe to drink, the amount of beer consumed on average was of 450l/year per person(including kids!); there was a special type of beer made, reserved for funerals, and the recipe included some magic mushrooms... probably for getting in touch with the spirit of the deceased...

We visited a shop attached to a small chocolate factory, the Tourist Information Office, where Amanda showed us all kind of artefacts discovered during the works in the old river bed, and in the end we had a good-bye beer in a famous place: Brouwerij de Beyerd!

We tried shopping at De Barones (shopping center with an impressive architecture), but it was simply too crowded, and we found refuge on the hotel's terrace, enjoying the sun and a nice cup of coffee ! In the evening, we took a walk and discovered the Singel (the canal), compared the old and the beautiful with the new architecture, and had a glimpse of the round roof of Breda's Panopticon Prison.

Sunday morning was too nice to do anything else than sit on a bench in the Valkenberg Park, admire the blooming trees and bushes, and observe people, bicycles, carriages and wedding cars passing by... The trip back was much shorter (2h on the highway instead of 4!), but as much as I loved the trip, I wished teleportation would have been possible ...

Back home, I was anxious to find out who were the Beguines... amazing, the place in Breda was a paradise, and I remember visiting the Begijnhof in Amsterdam as well.
And then the beers, and the history of Breda, the prison...so many things I would have ignored if I wouldn't have had the chance to go there...even for such a short time...

I was reflecting on my habits: I usually do a bit of reading before every trip around the people I have to meet, the event I'm attending, the places, their history. Once back, I'm tempted to find out more, to place things in context... No matter how "prepared" I am, I always find something that's very different from the mental model I tend to build beforehand -this time was the missing river, other times it's about people or the course of events... All that matters is to be flexible and enjoy the real thing:-)

One thing I was jealous about was that our two colleagues from Limerick who went to s'Hertogenbosch got not only a boat tour, but also got to visit the Jhieronimus Bosch Art Centre.
They don't seem to have any originals, but they do have reproductions of all Bosch's paintings and drawings. I've seen a few in Munich, a few in Vienna, and one in Luxembourg - but what a feast to get to see all of them together...

More pictures on Flickr.

Labels: Breda, Netherlands, travel, WiHCC