by Michael J. Griffin

It was the spring of ’95 and I found myself sitting in Logan’s International Airport, waiting to go to Brussels.

The first inkling that this wasn’t going to be an ordinary trip entered my brain when I saw former New York Giants linebacker Lawrence Taylor stride by in the terminal. He was wearing an all-leather ensemble outfit, leather jacket, leather pants. Apparently no one had the balls to tell him that he looked ridiculous. I wasn’t going to be the first one to try, though.

The second inkling was the very attractive Canadian girl sitting next to me waiting to go on her flight to another place. We started talking, and we really seemed to hit off. So much that I momentarily convinced her to come to Belgium with me. Of course I didn’t think that far in advance of how my friend Duncan was going react if I came with a girl in tow. After some thinking though, she decided to go on her trip anyways. Alas.

So, I landed in Brussels, sans girl, and also sans luggage. Apparently while we were in the air, the luggage handlers in Belgium had gone on strike. This was apparently a routine occurrence, as people didn’t seem so miffed. I was miffed. My luggage was still on the plane and I was half jet-lagged out of my mind. After finding Duncan in the waiting area, I brought him back into the passenger area, because after a few minutes of talking with the security guard, I finally convinced the guard that je ne parle pas francais. Oui?

The kind person in charge of luggage told me to put my name on a waiting list and that I would be contacted when the strike had been resolved. Since I was so tired, Duncan suggested that we go back to his family’s place so that I could sleep a little bit of sleep before having to go back and get the luggage. I thought that was a splendid idea and we got in his car. He got onto the expressway, and I happened to glance at the speedometer.

120?

He saw me looking at the speedometer.

"That’s kilometers per hour…"

Ah.

We arrived at his place, which was a nice European-looking building, with a row of identical looking buildings along the same street. It was a two level apartment, with a kitchen and living room on the bottom and the bedrooms upstairs.

After resting for a couple of hours with his furry cat sleeping on top of my head, the airport called and notified me that my luggage had finally been retrieved. We drove back to the airport, and I noticed that while we were in the middle lane, a police motorcycle was riding along our left. In the fast lane. We were going around 85 miles an hour and he was passing us. I did not want to think about riding a motorcycle at that speed.

The weather was very dynamic there. One evening, we were going to go to a club. It seemed like a nice early spring evening, with a slight chill in the air. I went to the room that I was staying in to change into my club outfit. I looked outside. It was snowing. Snow? I got my heavy jacket out. I looked out again. It was now sleeting. I got my windbreaker out to put on under my heavy jacket. I looked out again… it was raining. I was going to stick to my heavy coat/windbreaker combo since I didn’t want my hearing aid to get wet. I clomped downstairs to find him standing there in a light jacket and a puzzled look on his face at my appearance. I looked out the window and it was a crystal clear night. I sputtered about the snow, sleet and rain.

"Oh, it does that for nearly five minutes every night here," He said.

I sighed and clomped back upstairs to get my lighter jacket.

Another thing about Belgium is that they like beer. A lot. They have many different flavors of beer. I had cherry-flavored beer. I had a beer called "Mort Subite." Sudden Death. I managed to not keel over dead. I also had to be careful drinking the flavored beer, because it seemed to taste like soda, and I didn’t want to drink it too fast. It seems that there are almost 800 kinds of Belgian beer. Too bad I didn’t have enough time to sample all of them. Another trip.

One thing that I found of interest is that European men have no problem displaying affection for each other, openly giving hugs, and they even kiss each other on the cheeks when saying goodbye. American men would rather be burned alive then to be seen doing something like this. One time my friend was driving me to another sightseeing locale, and he had to drop another friend of his off. I was sitting in the front passenger seat and his friend was sitting behind me. We reached his friend’s stop, and he and his friend exchanged cheek pecks and then his friend stuck his head next to mine for me to kiss. I had to fight the urge to widen my eyes and back away, thus revealing my uncivilized Americanness in the process. Many different responses swirled in my brain in those milliseconds before I made my decision. I awkwardly leaned forward and gave him a quick peck on the cheek.

The rest of the trip was a blur of touristy things, where I saw things like the Atomium, which was built for the World Fair in 1958. It’s a big structure shaped like an atom that people walk around in. I also saw one of the largest movie theaters in the world, which had originally been designed to be a parking garage. Another stop was a neighboring town, called Brugge. It’s a small place, with canals. Duncan and I were walking along the streets, and I looked at the numbers on the houses.

"These numbers aren’t sequential," I said.

"That’s because those aren’t the house numbers," he said. "Those are the years they were built."

Interesting. I found a couple of places built right before the American Revolution and also found a few from as far back as the 1400s.

Also I found that American restaurants that bill their waffles as Belgian are grossly lying.

The trip was over before I knew it, and I found myself back in the airport to go back to the United States. Alas, I could not get any beautiful Belgian women to come back with me to America, but I did manage to get my luggage immediately upon landing in America.