It took us four years, but we’ve finally done it – Andrew and I have joined a gym. And you know what? I actually like it.

Let me begin by saying I am not a sporty person. Normally, my most intense physical activity is walking around with my camera gear strapped to my back. I believe, if we were meant to jog, God would have given us built in sneakers. That said, I’ve known for quite some time, I needed to change my immobile ways.

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Saint-Josse-Ten-Noode – the most densly populated commune in Brussels.

97.4% of Belgium’s population live in urban centres; I was shocked to learn today. Expatify had an interesting post listing countries with the highest percentage of their population living in urban areas. Belgium came in at number 6.

It’s true that Belgium is a small country that doesn’t have a lot of wide open spaces. However, with the fields of Flanders and hills of Wallonia, I would have never guessed that it would beat out countries like Kuwait and Quatar in terms of urbanisation.

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All of these signs indicate who has priority at an intersection. Nary a one is found in our neighbourhood.

When your door buzzer shrills loudly at 8 o’clock on a Sunday morning, it can never be good news. As I rolled over groggily I realised the bell-buzzer could only be one of two people – a drunk or a cop. I was hoping for the drunk.

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When people ask me what it is I love about living in Europe, I'm hard-pressed to put my finger on the answer. Usually I reply with a catchall phrase like the "life-style" or "quality of life." A recent study, released by the Organization for Economic Co-Operation and Development (OECD), shows...
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Thursday night - 11 pm Location: The sidewalk outside our flat Andrew (looking slightly concerned): Um, you have your keys right…? Me: blank stare…What?… Noooo… Andrew: Shit… Earlier that evening: I look at the tiny, impractical (but very cute) evening bag I recently purchased in San Francisco. This will go perfectly with my...
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After three years of dealing with Belgian bureaucracy, the uninitiated might think that things would get a little easier. They would be wrong. I made an important discovery during today’s commune visit – workers are only permitted to give you one vital piece of information per visit. You must then continue to visit the...
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When I enrolled in French immersion in Junior High school, I never could have predicted that I’d be using skills learned then to translate rental contracts in Brussels at age 31. (For that matter when I took journalism in university I never expected to be writing articles about living in Belgium either.) The past...
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A few weeks ago, I wrote of the autumn expat migration. Since then, Andrew and I have been contemplating a migration of our own. It was about this time, three years ago, that Andrew and I decided to make our dream of living in Europe a reality. We were scrambling to get paperwork done,...
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Should Belgium remain a country? Unless you live in a cave, it’s a question you can’t avoid these days. As a Canadian, it’s a question that brings forth a strong wave of déjà vu. One of the things I first noticed when I arrived in Belgium was that there are more similarities to...
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