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What’s up, docks?

Free bus tours of port of Antwerp have proved an unexpected hit

It sounds like the nerdiest day out you could imagine: four hours on a bus touring the container terminals and dry docks of the port of Antwerp. But that’s exactly the attraction the city is offering this year, three days a week from now until the end of September. Is it as dull as it sounds? Well, last year 3,500 people didn’t think so. I was one of them, and I’ll be signing up again for this year’s edition.

The city of Antwerp goes to great lengths to publicise its port, and with good reason: It’s Europe’s second-largest port, and one of the world’s most important for container traffic. It’s also a crucial factor in the economic life of Flanders; the region’s gateway to the whole wide world, and vice versa. And not just Flanders: Freight entering the port of Antwerp goes on to make its way to the whole of the continent.

Alan Hope
(May 15, 2013)

Silence is golden

Bessst is promoting the art of silence in Brussels, while the Ancienne Belgique is applying it

It’s no contradiction anymore to go looking for silence in a bustling city like Brussels, though silence for many is more than just the absence of noise. It’s a way of life. A new project called bessst helps people discover silence in the city; music venue Ancienne Belgique is one of its partners and presses home the message with the concert series Silence is Sexy.

The rector of Saint Peter’s parish in East Blatchington, a coastal village in England, must have been surprised earlier this year when he heard that the first release of the CD The Sound of Silence had quickly sold out. After a short introduction, the album is filled with 30 minutes of ambient sounds, recorded in the 12th-century church.

Christophe Verbiest
(May 8, 2013)

Dusk 'til dawn - Fade In Festival

8 May, from 20.00 - Tour & Taxis, Brussels

During the month of May, most of us get treated to a few official holidays. There’s May Day on the 1st, Ascension Day on the 9th and Pentecost Monday on the 20th. A mid-week day off allows for a mid-week party, don’t you agree? If you’re into electronic music, you’ll love the new Fade In Festival at Tour & Taxis in Brussels.

For the electronic music festival, German techno festival Time Warp teamed up with Brussels best-loved club Fuse for a night “focusing on the essence of underground electronic music”. Time Warp has been hosting such parties for nearly 20 years now, with festivals across the border in Italy and The Netherlands.

With the Fade In Festival, they’re looking for some Belgian attention, too. One glance at the line-up, and it’s more than clear that they’re trying their very best to make a good first impression.

Katrien Lindemans
(May 1, 2013)

If I could turn back time

Heritage Day in Flanders and Brussels invites visitors to stand still and look back

If the heritage industry is about one thing, it’s about time: bringing the past to the attention of the future, stopping and – if possible – reversing the ravages of time. The theme of this Sunday’s annual Erfgoeddag (Heritage Day) is Stop de tijd!

Brussels and Flanders have teamed up for this year’s Erfgoeddag, or Heritage Day, so they are both on the same day. The slogan of this 13th edition is Stop de tijd!, or Stop Time!, which is “more than ever an invitation,” according to Flemish culture minister Joke Schauvliege. “It’s an invitation to step outside the daily race against time, stand still and enjoy the work of the many thousands of heritage workers, both volunteers and professionals, who fight that fight against time day after day,” she says.

Alan Hope
(April 17, 2013)

Valley full of life

The river Maas sheds its polluted past to provide fertile grounds for the Maas Valley River Park

In the east of Flanders, the river Maas forms the border with the Netherlands for 46 kilometres. It’s now also the backbone of the RivierPark Maasvallei, a 2,500-hectare nature park co-created and maintained by Flemish and Dutch organisations that cleaned up the region after decades of mismanagement and pollution.

On a tour of the RivierPark Maasvallei (Maas Valley River Park), project leader Lambert Schoenmaekers points out how the area has been redeveloped in the last five years. Negotiations with farmers and gravel companies have already led to a park of 650 hectares in Flanders, and the goal is to return an area of about 1,100 hectares on this side of the border to nature.

Andy Furniere
(April 10, 2013)

Limburg in bloom

Haspengouw’s annual spectacle of colour will help you forget the long, cold winter
© photos: Toerisme Sint-Truiden/Toerisme Limburg

Every year in April, the Haspengouw area of Limburg comes alive in a riot of colour. It really is spectacular: Millions of apple, pear and cherry trees blossom simultaneously, washing virtually the whole of Haspengouw in swathes of pink and white.

Whether it happens early or late in the month depends on many factors – principally the temperature in March. And, well, we all know what that was like. So a sensible guess would be to make your trip later rather than sooner.

The duration of the blossoms is also weather-dependent. A cold, windy spell can bring the spectacle to a sad, early end, but so too can extremely hot weather. On average, a fruit tree flowers for around 12 days. However, your window of opportunity is much wider: Cherries bloom first, followed by pear, then apple.

Denzil Walton
(April 3, 2013)

Community spirit through sport

“Sports streets” are popping up in Antwerp, as part of the European Capital of Sport

Living in a city, it’s common not to know your neighbour on the other side of a shared wall. But in Antwerp, some communities not only know their neighbours, they also play football and learn tai chi with them.

As a result of Antwerp’s title this year of European Capital of Sport, neighbourhoods may apply to become a “sports street”. They receive equipment from the city for all ages and even a visit from dance, fitness and martial arts instructors. The Sporting A initiative is working with Opsinjoren, an organisation that helps residents close their street for community events and provides financial support and assistance.

Angela Chambers
(March 27, 2013)

Babel

A biblical story reclaimed
© The Wind, 2010 / Du Zhenjun / Galerie RX, Paris

Where better than Brussels to put on an exhibition about the Tower of Babel? All those languages! All that confusion! And at Botanique as well, in the shadow of the Finance Tower. Perfect!

But I’m getting carried away with the old version of the Babel story as it appears in the Book of Genesis. This goes as follows: After the Flood, the survivors decided to build a city with a tower high enough to reach the heavens. They spoke a single language and worked effectively together, so God punished their presumption by mixing up their languages and scattering them across the face of the Earth.

Ian Mundell
(March 20, 2013)

A night to remember

History lessons have never been so engaging as during Flanders’ annual Night of History
© Courtesy Mostaard Wostyn

One evening a year, people in Flanders have the chance to immerse themselves in the past and learn about their local history. De Nacht van de Geschiedenis, or The Night of History, finds more than 240 events spread across the whole of Brussels and Flanders in such diverse places as castles, bakeries, artists’ studios, town halls, farmhouses, breweries and churches.

Every year, The Night of History is organised around a different theme, and this year it’s Craftsmanship. Craftspeople, historians and storytellers will give lectures and demonstrations on a rich array of trades practised in bygone times and today. Glass blowers, chocolatiers, bookbinders, auto mechanics, luthiers, stone carvers, master brewers, cheese makers, surveyors, blacksmiths, art restorers, puppeteers ... a dizzying array of experts wax poetic about their vocations.

Diana Goodwin
(March 13, 2013)

Axelle Red: Fashion Victim

A hometown girl and her wardrobe

Most of us know Axelle Red as the Flemish singer of French lyrics with dreamy tunes. But the 40-something redhead also has a keen sense of fashion and an impressive wardrobe, full of Belgian and international designers.

So impressive that the Fashion Museum in Hasselt (where Red is from) dedicated an entire exhibition to her clothes, including both her stage outfits and daily wear.

Red was born Fabienne Demal in 1968 and earned a law degree in Brussels in 1993, the same year she released her first album. She’s been on stage for more than 20 years now, and besides a record collection to be proud of, she’s gathered a wardrobe that would be envied by many, too.

Katrien Lindemans
(March 6, 2013)