Hasselt "City of Taste" & Beer Tasting in Antwerp

I'm now fully back to the old routine at work, and I've been working in Belgium this week. I've been staying in a small city called Hasselt. It markets itself as the "City of Taste". I decided to wander around the city centre taking a few photographs last night. Here's what I got. Interestingly, I saw at least two other people out doing the same. So, we've all got fairly new cameras, then...

I kept coming across a young arty-type fella who was going around the city on his bicycle taking pictures of random traffic cones and bags of rubbish (clearly, it was rubbish collection day the next day, and there was lots of grey rubbish bags around). I so wanted to take a photo of him photographing the rubbish, but I didn't dare.

This is the view from my hotel window at night. I think it's lovely.

On Thursday night we had our project team building event. Belgium is famous for its artists, its beer and its chocolate. There was some culture to the evening; we went to the Antwerp Fine Art Museum. This is the scene opposite it. However, since I work in engineering with lots of men, you can guess what the main theme of the night was... Here's a clue.

It was strange tasting beer as though it was wine. I have to say that this Gulden 1389 (that's when the original recipe dates from) was pretty delicious. Hands up all of you who like beer?

I would like to tell you that I was the model of decorum, but I am (apparently) a "cheap drunk", and was one of the last to stumble, bleary-eyed, into the office on Friday morning.

Start of Autumn - The Proms

We are just about to go into my favourite season of the year - autumn. I like the slightly cooler weather. I like smell of autumn. I like the mistiness we sometimes get in the morning, the way leaves turn gold and russet, and I love the smell of bonfires (not that many people burn bonfires any more). September is usually a much more reliable month weather-wise than June, July or August. I think that because school is restarting, and the family summer holidays are now just memories for another year, people think that the summer is over and no longer have any great expectations of the weather, and so are always pleasantly surprised when we get a warm day in September.

Yesterday evening was the Last Night of the Proms. I went with a group of friends to have a picnic and watch/listen in Hyde Park. I am not a huge fan of classical music, so the lighter classical stuff you get in Hyde Park, together with a bit of easy-listening pop is great for me. I think that you need to be a genuine season ticket holding Prommer, or at least very organised to buy tickets for the Albert Hall. What stood out for me this year was that I got a real sense of the Proms being celebrated all round the British Isles. I'd always considered it a London event, so it was great that for the finale, we had choirs from Glasgow, Belfast (I think), Cardiff and Teesside signing songs/arias that are strongly associated with their part of the UK. This is the second time I've gone to this event in the park, and it felt like a great end to the summer/start of autumn.

Japanese Style Part II - Tea

Despite the proliferation of cool and swanky coffee houses all over the place, I'm still a tea drinker. I like the idea of going into a coffee house with a book or the newspapers on a lazy afternoon when I've got nothing better to do. I like the smell of coffee very much, but that is where the love affair ends. For me, coffee smells better than it tastes. With a St*rf*cks [sorry] on the high street of every itty bitty little town (yes, one arrived here this year too), it seems that the British tea drinker is getting left out in the cold.

A few days ago, I heard a discussion on the venerable Radio 4 about the fact that sales of regular black tea is at an all time low in the UK. But there was a light at the end of the tunnel. It seems that sales of specialist teas - chai, green teas, red teas, fruit and herbal teas were enjoying a bit of a renaissance. People are starting to get picky about their tea, and not just their tea, but their tea making accoutrements too... It made me think about the type of tea I drank (ahem, any number of teas - green, fruit, herbal, black ...), and what I drink from. I have the mother of all teacups & saucers: it holds three-quarters of a pint, and no one drinks from it but me. I also have a whole variety of teapots, depending on what I'm drinking, e.g. this one is for fruit teas. I got it from Mariage Freres in Paris, home to a tea museum, and some of the most fabulous tea rooms I've ever visited (and yes, my schoolgirl French is hideous).

I reserve this one that I bought in Japan for when I'm feeling ultra-special, and want to have a cup of green or white tea with a touch of honey. Sacrilege, I know - did I introduce you my sweet tooth?

Bettys by Post is a fabulous way to indulge. Not only are teapots becoming small items of desire, I noticed that tea is being packaged ever more attractively... "Woman's Hour" on Radio 4 has an article about the perfect afternoon tea at Claridge's Hotel. Coffee, watch out!

Back to Work....

Well, it's all over for me... free time that is. I have been off work for a grand total of nine weeks due to having had a major operation in May. Recovery was slow, but not painful. I felt so well during the recovery period that at times I was in danger of overdoing things a little. My body soon let me know when I'd gone too far. Then I'd spend a day or two brooding over whether I'd done any lasting damage.

The op represented a pretty defining moment for me, a kind of watershed. Having such a long period away from work and the constant travelling gave me a lot of time to think about my life, and how I want it to be from now on. I'm not making huge changes: I love my job, and the company I work for treats it's staff really well. But I think I've decided to move on a couple of things I'd been putting off. I've decided to treat myself better, I deserve better. This has nothing to do with material things as I think I'm pretty lucky in that department all things considered. I just want my life to be better...

So during my time off, I made a list of things that I wanted to get done before going back to work. It was a pretty extensive list, and included stuff that I'd put off for years [fear can really hold you back]. I am happy to report that I've done all bar one, and that is in progress.

And now it's Sunday evening, I'm about to start my regular checking process before going to bed [the whole thing can take a couple of hours, because I'm easily distracted on a Sunday evening]. However today I feel like I do when returning to school after the holidays. Do I have my books? Where is my favourite pen? Is my BlackBerry fully charged? I know that all emails have been downloaded to my laptop, because I did that on Saturday morning. Have I worked out what I'm wearing? Is it ironed? Are my shoes clean? Where's that doctor's certificate that I have to submit? Arrrrgggghhh...

My Power Element Is ...

I've seen this on a number of blogs, and thought I'd see what my power element is. I think this is largely right. I was going to say that green and brown are not my favourite colours, but actually I wear these autumnal colours quite a bit. Hmmmm?

Your Power Element is Wood

Your power colors: green and brown Your energy: generative Your season: spring Like a tree, you are always growing and changing. And while your life is dynamic, you are firmly grounded. You have high morals and great confidence in yourself and others. You have a wide set of interests, and you make for intersting company.

What's Your Power Element?

Reduce, Re-use, Recycle

Global warming, climate change, environmental issues, being green - you can't ignore it. It's everywhere: on the news, in chain emails, in the papers, online. A number of local councils in the UK have started ABC programmes. One week the regular household rubbish is collected and on alternate weeks recyclable rubbish is taken; glass items are a separate collection, and garden waste is another one again. Our council encourages you to buy a garden waste bag which they collect (pretty sporadically as far as I can tell), and then they sell the compost they have made with your garden waste back to the public... Alternatively, you can have your own compost heap in your back garden - I went for that option. Unfortunately no one told me that you had to nurture a compost heap. Grass and flower cuttings don't just turn into compost on their own! So now I have to take all the grass out, and put a rotting agent in there. It can come as no surprise that I've been putting this off for a while... ~sigh~

Then there are the supermarkets trying to reduce the number of carrier bags we use. Stores are now selling some rather good looking jute totes (or hemp or whatever). They are very popular. This weekend whilst shopping with my sister, we noticed just how many people were carrying reusable bags, and just managed to get the last two in John Lewis. I think they're kinda cute. During the shopping frenzy (we started at 9am for an all day session in the sales), I saw some beautiful glass earrings that I just had to have. When I came to photograph them, I started hunting around the house for something to display them on, and found a glass tumbler that previously had shop bought dessert in it, some gauzy ribbon left over from a present I wrapped for someone eons ago, and a few flowers from a bouquet I'd received last week. Now that's what I call reduce, re-use, recycle!

Pretty Things...

Due to a major operation, I've been at home for several weeks. This is a big change for me as I normally do a weekly commute to continental Europe for work. (Yeah, I know - how can going to Rome every week be work, right?) But the chance to watch lots of craptastic British TV (and I'm not telling you which programmes) whilst drinking a proper cup of tea has its own appeal. The other thing I've been able to do, with a lot of help from my dad, is tend the garden. I've always wanted to put in Hostas, and despite everyone telling me that they are slug-candy (including random people at the garden centre), I've managed to put in a couple in a small bed.

Gratuitous close up of the flower of the hosta on the right (Hosta "Frances Williams")...

Of course once I snapped this picture, I went a little crazy in the garden and snapped the Cape Daisies...

And a close up of the Fuschias... And a lil peektur of the ... OK, stopping now, I'll save the rest for another time.