BEWARE OF FALSE PROPHETS - namely those who believe in false prophets
I would like to draw your attention to some rather disturbing events that have come to light recently. It seems that the God botherers are on the march once more. It seems to come in waves, but this lot are a bit more organised and a lot less academic than the clergy. This makes them highly dangerous. The Jehovah’s Witnesses are what the average science fiction superhero would have as a worst enemy, because they keep regenerating and no matter how many you successfully wipe out, another one is being brainwashed elsewhere.
We firstly need to look at some behind-the-scenes detail – I have first-hand experience of the JWs as some are members of my own family – there is room for everyone who is a social outcast, bitter at society for its evils, fed up with failing politicians, but especially the vulnerable minded, who usually fall into one or other of their target categories. These are people who are looking for the reasons for their misery, or who are acutely aware of their own need for guidance, being unable to take decisions of their own without firstly consulting someone who they believe has authority.
This means, the ideal candidate for recruitment to the Jehovah’s Witnesses has everything to gain and nothing much to lose. In other words, they don’t have much of a life. Furthermore, there are some significant reasons for wishing to team up with the Jehovah’s Witnesses, the main one being that they provide continued support for their fellowship and thus to the needy individual who is unable to find his/her own source of solace. The final, and main source of recruitment, is amongst those who do not have such a high amount of education. By recruiting from this sector, the Jehovah’s Witness leaders are able to airbrush, manipulate and modify any fact they wish to purvey, dressing it up as “education”.
" Christians should regard education as a means to an end. In these last days, their purpose is to serve Jehovah as much and as effectively as possible. If, in the country where they live, minimal or even high school education will only allow them to find jobs providing insufficient income to support themselves as pioneers, then supplementary education or training might be considered. This would be with the specific goal of full-time service. "
--Watchtower 11/1/1992 p.18
POWERS OF PERSUASION - conspiracy theories are just the start
They have extremely potent powers of persuasion. By dressing up a scientific fact with religious implications, they are able to find God’s (or Jehovah’s) work in everything. Or indeed the devil’s. I am quite sure that a thousand Jehovah’s Witnesses will now condemn everything I say as being the work of the devil, and to be honest, if I believed in anything of what they spew out as their “Truth”, I still wouldn’t be quaking in my boots. We have to put everything into perspective here, and the fact of the matter remains that they are able to quote any verse of the Bible at will to counteract most signs of disobedience. This seems like a great skill to the great uneducated masses, longing to be led, but it is more evil than anything else I can think of. If I were given the choice of spending an hour in a room with either a Jehovah’s Witness, a possible Islamist terrorist or Stalin himself, I think I would be far more scared of the JW’s effects on my psyche than the other two, even though I am educated enough to realise that the Jehovah’s Witnesses’ view of life is so addled, warped and beset with flaws that I could pick it to bits in an hour if I were allowed a word in edgeways.
You see, the other way they drag you in is by pressing the buttons that are most appealing to you, and then if you are making your own point, they interrupt you to continue bombarding their views upon you. By continually showering you with their notions they are slowly breaking down your barriers of defence and without you knowing you find yourself either agreeing wholeheartedly or admiringly saying, “well, I never thought of it like that”. And once you say that, they’ve got you hooked. They can feed you with other misguided pieces of recruitment jargon skilfully wrapped up in an appealing package and float it out into your waters, where the under-educated or weak-minded will pick open the ribbons and from then on you’re forever in their service.
Oh yes, you will praise them, you will sing their glories. You will tell everyone that they are the happiest, most well-balanced and caring group of people you have met. But let us face facts here: it is a well-known actuality that strong, close-knit religious groups of all kinds, whether fundamentalist or puritanical, liberally or directly commanded, provide the most amount of well-mannered and obedient people. That is a cunning way to disguise the fact that this is also because they are the most heavily manipulated people.
ONLY MEN ALLOWED - women aren't to be taken seriously
The leadership of fundamentalist groups is usually full of men and the Jehovah’s Witnesses are no exception. One of the earliest beliefs of the ecclesiastical setup was that women were inferior to men. I remember going to one Witness wedding, where the presiding minister said, in his sermon, “the man is the head of the household and what he decrees will be done. He should consult his wife, but he has the ultimate decision”. He said that because of women’s monthly cycles and common hormonal chaos, men were the only ones who could provide stability. And people sat there taking this without a single eyebrow raised in disbelief. Now dub me a feminist or a traitor to my sex if you wish, but I think there are just as many intelligent women about as men.
The Judaeo-Roman belief that strength is more important than method, which led to the macho concept today, is looking increasingly tired and worn out in the 21st century world. Women have kept their lights under bushels for centuries in most parts of the world, deferring to men and all our exigencies. But when I confronted a Jehovah’s Witness with the idea that there have not been enough women leaders, he said that Margaret Thatcher was a good enough reason not to have any more. And Pol Pot? And Benito Mussolini? And Josef Stalin? What about them then? Honestly, I kid you not, the Jehovah’s Witness idea of counteracting opinions against their beliefs is as old and as worn out as the Patriarchal society which has led us to wars and economic turmoil, rich-poor divisions and the materialism they so long to rid us of. A piece of good advice: no, we don’t want Thatcher back, and that’s why ALL women should not become leaders. What utter rubbish.
I have barely broken through the surface of their religious beliefs – I will leave that to other people, as I have much more work to do with the temporal side of the Jehovah’s Witnesses’ attitudes. Let us also take into consideration their own future council, the 144,000, who will take over the earth’s governance at the End. How many are women? None. Oh yes, and what about the palace that was built for the Second Coming in a push suburb of California’s largest city, Los Angeles? It was to welcome the arrival of the heavenly hosts who were to stay there when they came to take back the earth. When they so rudely didn’t show up at the predicted time, the worldwide leader of the Jehovah’s Witnesses moved into it to personally welcome their late arrival. They still haven’t turned up, and the house has since been sold and the details covered up.
"Treat Him Respectfully ... a woman should not cower in fear and permit a rapist to intimidate her, at the same time she should treat him understandingly as a fellow human."
-- Awake! 22/2/84 p.2
KEEPING YOU ON SIDE - disfellowship
Oppression of the people is easy if you withdraw the one thing they came to you for, and this is how they skilfully keep you on side: by threatening you with a return to normal, you will hang on to every tether of support they provide you with. If, once you become a member, you step out of line, or disagree, or even decide to go to a non-approved university to do a non-approved university degree, you will be shunned, ignored or even mocked. Yes, they will provide you with ways back, but that is hardly good enough if once you get there you will be carefully scrutinised, and your deeds placed on file for future reference if you dare do it again.
By leading exemplary lives and doing exemplary deeds, the outer surface of the Jehovah’s Witnesses is whiter than white, but underneath there is a huge amount of dexterous, cunning and experienced manipulation to keep you on-side and on-message.
One deviation from the idea and your perfidiousness is dealt with by the council, all men, and all capable of making your life miserable. I heard of one particularly bad case of a woman who was not a JW and a man who became one. As the patriarchal nature of this relationship took hold through his belief of being superior, she was slowly wound down by his gradually destructive behaviour as the household self-designated leadership: banning Christmas for the entire family, not co-operating in schemes not organised by him, and eventually she caved in and joined up, for the sake of the family, who had all been coerced into becoming members. That too happened to an elderly lady I know who once she had joined up, decided it was not for her and upon stepping out of the organisation was spurned by that part of her family for ever more after that.
We must also not forget one of the “principles” upon which a Jehovah’s Witness builds his/her life: that all other religions are false and there can only be one truth. Who says? Can anyone provide me with a statistic that says this? Can anyone prove all other religions wrong? I am not a betting person, but I would put a great amount of money, pride, self-worth and even my own reputation on the line in my total conviction that the whole charade enacted by the Watch Tower, its society and council, its people and their “benevolence” is nothing more than a money-spinning ploy with serious Big Brother overtones, where they gauge the “faith” of their subjects through distressingly clandestine methods of indoctrination.
HANDS OFF MY BLOOD - gauging your faith
Let us take the old cliché itself, blood transfusion. This is one of the definitions of Jehovah’s Witnesses, that they will not “eat blood”, because it says so in their version of the Bible. If a family member is in hospital and needs a blood transfusion, they are supposed to refuse it, as human blood is sacred, according to them, and should not be mixed. Sounds a lot like something Adolf Hitler would have gladly said, but it means that you cannot dilute it with others’, even if it means you’ll die. This is because your heavenly life is more important and of course more permanent than your earthly one, according to them. Now call me a nasty old cynic, but if a family member of mine were going to die, I don’t think an unverified principle like this is going to stop me from saving them. Indeed, if the spiritual life is more important, then a silly little blood transfusion isn’t going to stop my ascent into the afterlife. So the fact that you let a family member die due to your refusal to allow a long-established scientific marvel get in the way of your religious beliefs will give you extra status in religious circles. The eye of the needle is surely opening up for you because you let someone die. How nice for you – I’m sure Jehovah will fast-track you into His Kingdom. The fact that human life is sacred has no importance compared to allowing the death of an innocent victim of circumstance.
"The blood in any person is in reality the person himself. ... poisons due to personal living, eating and drinking habits ... The poisons that produce the impulse to commit suicide, murder, or steal are in the blood. Moral insanity, sexual perversions, repression, inferiority complexes, petty crimes - these often follow in the wake of blood transfusion." (Watchtower, 1/09/61 page 564) [Remember that JWs believe man is monochotomous, wholly physical]
COMMITMENT OR ETERNAL DEATH - well I'll take the chance thanks
And that is how they gauge your faith: if you so blindly permit the unnecessary death of a member who needs a blood transfusion, you must be committed. There are other little assessments like these, all which go on file and, like a spiritual credit rating, permit you to ascend the ranks of their society. But I am sure if there is someone up there, they've got paper party hats and red noses on and are having a real laugh at the gullibility of these individuals.
The chances are high that I am now to be condemned as a heretic and a disbeliever. And that I am also proud of, because it means I at least have a mind of my own, able to make up my own decisions without wondering what the leaders will say about it. And moreover, I am probably to be condemned to the eternal suffering the Jehovah’s Witnesses profess we disbelievers will end up in. Well I’ll tell you here and now – I am so convinced in my unreserved scepticism of any of their immoral and misguided ideals of the fate that awaits us after death that I am unequivocally willing to take that chance and lead a wholesome, secular and worldly life to the full here and now. We only have the one life and it should be spent very wisely indeed.
"Without religion, we'd have good people doing good things, and evil people doing evil things. But for good people to do evil things, that takes religion" - Stephen Weinberg
Just remember one thing, and this is from me, a person who has renounced all of this science fiction and moved on to other things: if you are a Christian, the will of the God of Abraham, Jesus and Mohammed will NEVER take you where the grace of God cannot protect you.
Sunday 28 December 2008
Tuesday 29 July 2008
News from the country
THE FRONT OF OUR HOUSE
In Kaufland nobody can hear you scream
Let me take you on a journey to a place so remote that there isn’t even a signpost to it. A place so out-of-the-way, that it is unreachable by car. A place so far from everything, that the only way to get there is on foot. A place so distant from anything else that you wouldn’t know it were there had you not been told of its existence. But when you arrive, you will be so overwhelmingly rewarded that the extensive time spent looking for it will be instantaneously forgotten. No, I am not talking about the Grand Canyon or Stonehenge: for one thing there are enough signposts to the former to almost block it out and there is very little reward when arriving at the latter. I am in fact talking about the fruit juice section at Kaufland supermarket in Konz.
Boy, do they know how to make you work for your reward. You need to trudge a very long way to find the fruit juice section, which is only slightly smaller than the VAT office in Luxembourg. In all honesty, Kaufland is simply a million miles away from anything remotely associated with the average Belgian supermarket. The word “supermarket” in Belgium is a bit misleading. For one thing, it is hardly a market. And it is by no means super. It is more like a cartel of bad quality consumer products giving you a choice of one, and if that happens to be bad or out of stock, well, you’ll just have to wait for the next delivery. In Kaufland, there is everything. You want a barbecue? It’s near the front. You want milk? There is a four-metre-long fridge containing a dozen sorts, all stocked up. You want a satellite dish? It’s on the right just next to the customer services department. Orchids, did you say? They’re next to the fresh yoghurt and the milk, just by the fruit and veg.
In Kaufland nobody can hear you screamLet me take you on a journey to a place so remote that there isn’t even a signpost to it. A place so out-of-the-way, that it is unreachable by car. A place so far from everything, that the only way to get there is on foot. A place so distant from anything else that you wouldn’t know it were there had you not been told of its existence. But when you arrive, you will be so overwhelmingly rewarded that the extensive time spent looking for it will be instantaneously forgotten. No, I am not talking about the Grand Canyon or Stonehenge: for one thing there are enough signposts to the former to almost block it out and there is very little reward when arriving at the latter. I am in fact talking about the fruit juice section at Kaufland supermarket in Konz.
Boy, do they know how to make you work for your reward. You need to trudge a very long way to find the fruit juice section, which is only slightly smaller than the VAT office in Luxembourg. In all honesty, Kaufland is simply a million miles away from anything remotely associated with the average Belgian supermarket. The word “supermarket” in Belgium is a bit misleading. For one thing, it is hardly a market. And it is by no means super. It is more like a cartel of bad quality consumer products giving you a choice of one, and if that happens to be bad or out of stock, well, you’ll just have to wait for the next delivery. In Kaufland, there is everything. You want a barbecue? It’s near the front. You want milk? There is a four-metre-long fridge containing a dozen sorts, all stocked up. You want a satellite dish? It’s on the right just next to the customer services department. Orchids, did you say? They’re next to the fresh yoghurt and the milk, just by the fruit and veg.
THE HORSE PADDOCK
A little salute to Luxembourg
Most people when thinking of Luxembourg either comment on it as a tax haven, a banking paradise and a money launderer’s boudoir. Having spent some time there, I can certainly see this is but an urban myth. It is a triumph of small government over burdensome red tape with added anti-corruption airbags equipped as standard. It is very hard to fool the system there although I am sure some do. But this is not my reason to salute Luxembourg.
I wish to tell you about the most picturesque country in continental Europe. Luxembourg is God’s own country, and probably the reason why a little flat in the middle of nowhere costs 250,000 euro. I understand why: there is no place on earth which has been blessed with such an aesthetic landscape; sanctified with such lush greenness and consecrated with herds of such exquisite cows, all mooing in perfect harmony. The fact is, even the urban areas of Luxembourg are pleasant places. Grevenmacher reminds me of a typical Mediterranean village, bordered by wine groves on steep hillsides, even though it is on the Mosel facing Germany. Roodt sur Syre is a splendid town encircled by hills, forests and farms. The industrial zones near Münsbach and Wasserbillig have an cleanliness about them which makes you want to spend a day cycling over there to see them in more detail.
All-in-all, a marvellous country to live in. Except....
Well, you know that joke where God is asked by the angels why Canada seems to have been granted too many good things by God, and they ask him why, whereby he replies “wait until you see their neighbours”, well that seems to be little Luxembourg’s lot too, although even worse, because the country is overrun by them too, bringing all their bad habits with them. This is one of the reasons why the Luxembourgish language has taken off in a big way recently: they need to keep secrets from the French, who seem to have imposed themselves heavily on the place. Bad driving, sloppy customer service and a hierarchical system only found in the Hexagon are highly prevalent. They even force the language on the people. Where there are a hundred Germans, fifty Brits, twenty Dutch and one French person, the language of Dumas and Descartes will take precedence, in order to, as the official line goes, preserve the French tongue. Rubbish! If there was any danger of French dying out, imagine poor Luxembourgish: a couple of hundred thousand speakers and it still has only semi-official status in its own country.
A little salute to LuxembourgMost people when thinking of Luxembourg either comment on it as a tax haven, a banking paradise and a money launderer’s boudoir. Having spent some time there, I can certainly see this is but an urban myth. It is a triumph of small government over burdensome red tape with added anti-corruption airbags equipped as standard. It is very hard to fool the system there although I am sure some do. But this is not my reason to salute Luxembourg.
I wish to tell you about the most picturesque country in continental Europe. Luxembourg is God’s own country, and probably the reason why a little flat in the middle of nowhere costs 250,000 euro. I understand why: there is no place on earth which has been blessed with such an aesthetic landscape; sanctified with such lush greenness and consecrated with herds of such exquisite cows, all mooing in perfect harmony. The fact is, even the urban areas of Luxembourg are pleasant places. Grevenmacher reminds me of a typical Mediterranean village, bordered by wine groves on steep hillsides, even though it is on the Mosel facing Germany. Roodt sur Syre is a splendid town encircled by hills, forests and farms. The industrial zones near Münsbach and Wasserbillig have an cleanliness about them which makes you want to spend a day cycling over there to see them in more detail.
All-in-all, a marvellous country to live in. Except....
Well, you know that joke where God is asked by the angels why Canada seems to have been granted too many good things by God, and they ask him why, whereby he replies “wait until you see their neighbours”, well that seems to be little Luxembourg’s lot too, although even worse, because the country is overrun by them too, bringing all their bad habits with them. This is one of the reasons why the Luxembourgish language has taken off in a big way recently: they need to keep secrets from the French, who seem to have imposed themselves heavily on the place. Bad driving, sloppy customer service and a hierarchical system only found in the Hexagon are highly prevalent. They even force the language on the people. Where there are a hundred Germans, fifty Brits, twenty Dutch and one French person, the language of Dumas and Descartes will take precedence, in order to, as the official line goes, preserve the French tongue. Rubbish! If there was any danger of French dying out, imagine poor Luxembourgish: a couple of hundred thousand speakers and it still has only semi-official status in its own country.
A RIVER RUNS UNDER MY TERRACE
There be dragons...
Although I live in the most marvellous of places, there are a couple of things which get on my nerves, and following the theme of the previous section, it’s the neighbours too, which are causing great chagrin on this side of the stream flowing past our house. On our farm complex there are nine or ten families, all living in this little corner of paradise amongst the fruit trees, the vineyards, the horses and the forests. The people immediately next door, the Weingut Schmitz-Simon, are prone to holding parties on their property. I wouldn’t mind, considering I lived in Paris, Prague, Moscow and London, but now that there is a smoking ban, people come outside for a puff, end up taking their drinks with them and produce a lot of noise through incessant laughter and loud chatter. Some even keep the doors open so they can listen to the music.
One weekend a camper van with Luxembourg plates pulled up in our parking area and remained overnight, taking up three parking spaces. The next morning the occupiers poked their heads out and announced they had been at the wedding – wasn’t she so sweet in that gown? I hadn’t noticed, because this has nothing to do with next door – oh, said he, whereby he said I should have come and found him. How could I when I didn’t know who or what he was doing in the area. Yes, but the flowers on the wing mirrors, said he, should have made me realise he was with the wedding. To which I replied “yes, but lots of gypsies have flowers on their camper vans”. I think I upset him a bit...
This weekend was the worst of the lot. They not only kept the doors open, but they started group singing at midnight. I witnessed one guy throwing an empty bottle into the river. I told some guy I would call the police if they didn’t calm down and it did some good... for a while. A lot of disco music and empty bottles later, and one of my co-inhabitants went over to complain. It was half past four. No apology ever comes from them, no solution is ever suggested. So I have decided to call them at 2 in the morning to see if they like being disturbed at that hour. I intend to tell them that I will call the police to come round and close their parties down. I will also ask the police to stand guard at the end of the street and breath-test everyone exiting that property: I think they will get a lot of money in fines. Finally I intend bothering them as much as I can, because it is obvious that their only interest is money, to the detriment of the neighbours.
They should also be aware that I am filming them and recording the noise at different times and days. In any case, this lack of neighbourly behaviour is very rare here, and all the other people in the area are so civilised, so practical and so community-minded, that it puts the Schmitz-Simon firm to shame. If anyone is reading this, and they want to book a stay at Schmitz-Simon, may I recommend they look around first, because their wines are at least a euro over the price of other winemakers in the area, and that’s just their take-away produce.
There be dragons...Although I live in the most marvellous of places, there are a couple of things which get on my nerves, and following the theme of the previous section, it’s the neighbours too, which are causing great chagrin on this side of the stream flowing past our house. On our farm complex there are nine or ten families, all living in this little corner of paradise amongst the fruit trees, the vineyards, the horses and the forests. The people immediately next door, the Weingut Schmitz-Simon, are prone to holding parties on their property. I wouldn’t mind, considering I lived in Paris, Prague, Moscow and London, but now that there is a smoking ban, people come outside for a puff, end up taking their drinks with them and produce a lot of noise through incessant laughter and loud chatter. Some even keep the doors open so they can listen to the music.
One weekend a camper van with Luxembourg plates pulled up in our parking area and remained overnight, taking up three parking spaces. The next morning the occupiers poked their heads out and announced they had been at the wedding – wasn’t she so sweet in that gown? I hadn’t noticed, because this has nothing to do with next door – oh, said he, whereby he said I should have come and found him. How could I when I didn’t know who or what he was doing in the area. Yes, but the flowers on the wing mirrors, said he, should have made me realise he was with the wedding. To which I replied “yes, but lots of gypsies have flowers on their camper vans”. I think I upset him a bit...
This weekend was the worst of the lot. They not only kept the doors open, but they started group singing at midnight. I witnessed one guy throwing an empty bottle into the river. I told some guy I would call the police if they didn’t calm down and it did some good... for a while. A lot of disco music and empty bottles later, and one of my co-inhabitants went over to complain. It was half past four. No apology ever comes from them, no solution is ever suggested. So I have decided to call them at 2 in the morning to see if they like being disturbed at that hour. I intend to tell them that I will call the police to come round and close their parties down. I will also ask the police to stand guard at the end of the street and breath-test everyone exiting that property: I think they will get a lot of money in fines. Finally I intend bothering them as much as I can, because it is obvious that their only interest is money, to the detriment of the neighbours.
They should also be aware that I am filming them and recording the noise at different times and days. In any case, this lack of neighbourly behaviour is very rare here, and all the other people in the area are so civilised, so practical and so community-minded, that it puts the Schmitz-Simon firm to shame. If anyone is reading this, and they want to book a stay at Schmitz-Simon, may I recommend they look around first, because their wines are at least a euro over the price of other winemakers in the area, and that’s just their take-away produce.
MY TERRACE
Perfect cycling territory
This year I will not be going to my usual haunts, Venice and Prague, because there is just too much to see and do around here. So I bought a bike. Here are some tips:
TRIER
In the valley of the Mosel, surrounded by forests and streams, lies the oldest city in Germany and a beauty. Roman ruins, a hilltop monument and UNESCO World Heritage sites all over the place, Trier is outstanding. It has a unique atmosphere and an area offering a more enjoyable shopping trip than the average town. One thing I love about Trier is its mix of old and new. Kaufhof sits in the street to the Roman-built Porta Nigra. The open air museum at the site of the Roman ruins has been subtly modernised to make the experience more pleasurable without destroying the ancient structure.
For walking and eating, I can recommend two areas of the city: firstly work up your appetite by taking a walk from the Roman ruins to the embankment and following the path along the side of the river under the trees. When you arrive at the river cruiser area just past the bridge towards the motorway, there is a line of restaurants all offering good, wholesome local food with a smile. If you were to cross the bridge and head up towards the city forest, there is the Gillenbach stream, also a delightful walk. Just in there is also a well-hidden restaurant with an excellent atmosphere and decently priced menu. The other area of the city is the centre itself. Full of all kinds of eateries, it is difficult to choose, but if you are there in winter, go to the Frankenturm restaurant. The produce comes from a butcher in the Hunsrück National Park and it is all freshly delivered.
NITTEL, GREVENMACHER AND WINCHERINGEN
Just a 25-minute ride from Trier is the natural amphitheatre housing the delightful villages of Nittel, Grevenmacher and Wincheringen, with a Mediterranean feeling all of its own. The views are spectacular from any angle and the places to stop off on the way numerous. In fact, this part of the Mosel is without rival. Temmels, Oberbillig, Nennig and Perl are all worth a visit. I recommend cycling – there are cycle paths everywhere and you get really up close to the environment. I suggest stopping off at the Mühlenbach in Nittel, a palatial guesthouse with a tremendous front veranda for eating amongst the pot plants and a cosy back garden for relaxing with a glass of Spätlese and a book.
THE LOWER MOSEL
Bernkastel-Kues, Piesport, Longuich, Traben-Trarbach, Koblenz... So many places to visit. Again, bike is the best way but I could imagine doing it in a convertible MG sports car. Just do a search on these places and you’ll see why they deserve a visit.
THE RHINE VALLEY: KOBLENZ TO BINGEN
This is where I intend spending at least a week of my summer holiday – cycling and boat trips along the UNESCO-listed valley of the Rhine. More castles than villages, more history, more nature and more dramatic scenery than anywhere else I can think of.
SAARBURG TO KONZ
Saarburg: if you like castles on craggy hilltops and villages nestling in perfect harmony with the surrounding nature, this is where you should come. With a delightful waterfall in the centre of town and a cable car to the top of the largest hill, you are going to enjoy yourself whatever. In fact, as I live six minutes away by train, I spend far too little time in this delightful town.
Schoden: a perfectly situated village on the junction of the Saar river bend and the straight Saar canal. In the village you will find some little streets and alleys making you wonder if you had just made it to a Tuscan mountaintop hamlet until you see the German street signs. There is more atmosphere in this little village than in all the villages in Flanders.
Ockfen: find a T-shaped valley, hone it until it curves like a bobsleigh course, put a village at the point the two lines of the T meet with chocolate box houses and that is Ockfen.
Wiltingen: the village where I live is the jewel in the winemakers’ crown. The wine made in this area is some of Germany’s finest. Although the railway line runs straight through the middle of town, there is a certain rural charm about Wiltingen. Rosi’s Weinstube is a good place to sit admiring the valley opposite, or take a walk along the riverbank. The vineyards rising up at the back of the village lead up to the majestic monument at the Galgenberg, a place you can see for miles. I often go up there to watch the birds of prey swoop down upon their victims; to listen to the unmistakable sound of the cuckoo; to catch sight of the reclusive rabbits and the majestic deer, the animal I hold most in esteem. One night I accidentally ran into one, frightening it, and me, almost to the point we both ran off in different directions.
Kanzem: is this the real location for The Wind in the Willows? Set on the most rapid part of the stately Saar, this village has won numerous in-bloom prizes. At the river bank is a pleasant eatery, stocked up with local food. It contains a few streets of the most desirable houses in the region. I wish to retire here!
Konz: although heavily criticised for its nondescript centre and charmless urban features, there are pockets of Konz which are underestimated. Roscheid, straddling the top of the hill, is full of the most imaginative architecture in the region. Every house is different. Further down, the Russian shop Julchen sells some fine Russian food and drink. The town hall square is always full of parents with their kids playing in the fountains and the town hall itself has a wine cellar and restaurant whose terrace occupies the front of the building.
Perfect cycling territoryThis year I will not be going to my usual haunts, Venice and Prague, because there is just too much to see and do around here. So I bought a bike. Here are some tips:
TRIER
In the valley of the Mosel, surrounded by forests and streams, lies the oldest city in Germany and a beauty. Roman ruins, a hilltop monument and UNESCO World Heritage sites all over the place, Trier is outstanding. It has a unique atmosphere and an area offering a more enjoyable shopping trip than the average town. One thing I love about Trier is its mix of old and new. Kaufhof sits in the street to the Roman-built Porta Nigra. The open air museum at the site of the Roman ruins has been subtly modernised to make the experience more pleasurable without destroying the ancient structure.
For walking and eating, I can recommend two areas of the city: firstly work up your appetite by taking a walk from the Roman ruins to the embankment and following the path along the side of the river under the trees. When you arrive at the river cruiser area just past the bridge towards the motorway, there is a line of restaurants all offering good, wholesome local food with a smile. If you were to cross the bridge and head up towards the city forest, there is the Gillenbach stream, also a delightful walk. Just in there is also a well-hidden restaurant with an excellent atmosphere and decently priced menu. The other area of the city is the centre itself. Full of all kinds of eateries, it is difficult to choose, but if you are there in winter, go to the Frankenturm restaurant. The produce comes from a butcher in the Hunsrück National Park and it is all freshly delivered.
NITTEL, GREVENMACHER AND WINCHERINGEN
Just a 25-minute ride from Trier is the natural amphitheatre housing the delightful villages of Nittel, Grevenmacher and Wincheringen, with a Mediterranean feeling all of its own. The views are spectacular from any angle and the places to stop off on the way numerous. In fact, this part of the Mosel is without rival. Temmels, Oberbillig, Nennig and Perl are all worth a visit. I recommend cycling – there are cycle paths everywhere and you get really up close to the environment. I suggest stopping off at the Mühlenbach in Nittel, a palatial guesthouse with a tremendous front veranda for eating amongst the pot plants and a cosy back garden for relaxing with a glass of Spätlese and a book.
THE LOWER MOSEL
Bernkastel-Kues, Piesport, Longuich, Traben-Trarbach, Koblenz... So many places to visit. Again, bike is the best way but I could imagine doing it in a convertible MG sports car. Just do a search on these places and you’ll see why they deserve a visit.
THE RHINE VALLEY: KOBLENZ TO BINGEN
This is where I intend spending at least a week of my summer holiday – cycling and boat trips along the UNESCO-listed valley of the Rhine. More castles than villages, more history, more nature and more dramatic scenery than anywhere else I can think of.
SAARBURG TO KONZ
Saarburg: if you like castles on craggy hilltops and villages nestling in perfect harmony with the surrounding nature, this is where you should come. With a delightful waterfall in the centre of town and a cable car to the top of the largest hill, you are going to enjoy yourself whatever. In fact, as I live six minutes away by train, I spend far too little time in this delightful town.
Schoden: a perfectly situated village on the junction of the Saar river bend and the straight Saar canal. In the village you will find some little streets and alleys making you wonder if you had just made it to a Tuscan mountaintop hamlet until you see the German street signs. There is more atmosphere in this little village than in all the villages in Flanders.
Ockfen: find a T-shaped valley, hone it until it curves like a bobsleigh course, put a village at the point the two lines of the T meet with chocolate box houses and that is Ockfen.
Wiltingen: the village where I live is the jewel in the winemakers’ crown. The wine made in this area is some of Germany’s finest. Although the railway line runs straight through the middle of town, there is a certain rural charm about Wiltingen. Rosi’s Weinstube is a good place to sit admiring the valley opposite, or take a walk along the riverbank. The vineyards rising up at the back of the village lead up to the majestic monument at the Galgenberg, a place you can see for miles. I often go up there to watch the birds of prey swoop down upon their victims; to listen to the unmistakable sound of the cuckoo; to catch sight of the reclusive rabbits and the majestic deer, the animal I hold most in esteem. One night I accidentally ran into one, frightening it, and me, almost to the point we both ran off in different directions.
Kanzem: is this the real location for The Wind in the Willows? Set on the most rapid part of the stately Saar, this village has won numerous in-bloom prizes. At the river bank is a pleasant eatery, stocked up with local food. It contains a few streets of the most desirable houses in the region. I wish to retire here!
Konz: although heavily criticised for its nondescript centre and charmless urban features, there are pockets of Konz which are underestimated. Roscheid, straddling the top of the hill, is full of the most imaginative architecture in the region. Every house is different. Further down, the Russian shop Julchen sells some fine Russian food and drink. The town hall square is always full of parents with their kids playing in the fountains and the town hall itself has a wine cellar and restaurant whose terrace occupies the front of the building.
THE SUNSET OVER OUR VALLEY
Saturday 10 May 2008
A million miles from reality
After a rather traumatic period in my adventurous life,
I have reappeared in Germany.
Vineyards at the edge of the property
Wiltingen village from the other side of the river
Greetings from Wiltingen!
I send you all my most charismatic greetings from the Saar valley in south western Germany! What a difference from the previous place, whose name I shall avoid writing for fear of a Pavlovian attack of depression and angst...
Moving was a real ordeal: I asked a friend to drive a hire van with all the stuff in it and got some neighbours’ youngsters to help me load up. However, on closing up the back, it was noticeable that there were three flat tyres. On going to the hire company, they accused us of driving over stones or some other objects and refused to co-operate because we had signed the contract. When I pointed out that their contract was not totally legal due to the overuse of small writing, and that the truck had not been properly checked when they gave it to us, he got on the phone to his boss and had a ten-minute complaining session about us using expressions like “yeah, I know...” and “but they just don’t want to”. At the end of his rant, he handed us some more keys to a different truck, checked it over properly and shook our hands as if to capitulate to a higher psychological power. It helps when the person accompanying you to the hire shop used to be one of the leading experts in European consumer rights, often appearing on television channels all over Europe...
In any case, the last person I spoke to in Belgium (there, I finally got the courage to write it) really confirmed my decision to leave: in the petrol station on the E40 just before Liège, we pulled in to fill up. A stupid argument ensued because the cashier didn’t want to accept that my card was rejected by his machine. I told him he was a first class imbecile and asked him if the glass screen was to protect him from gunmen or the wrath of his clients. He told me from gunmen, who come from time to time, upon which I told him they had my full support and next time if I were there I’d tell them to wait in the car while I did the ******* job myself.
This lack of community spirit and utter contempt for one’s fellow human being went into total reverse upon crossing the frontier into Germany. What a total irony, verging on the paradoxical. When we arrived at my new place, we were just wearily bringing in the last few items when a neighbour came to greet us and immediately offered his assistance. He even offered to cook us a meal. The weekend after, some other neighbours invited us to join their barbecue having only said hello once before. Her husband works in the same area of Luxembourg and offered me a lift to work.
Greetings from Wiltingen! I send you all my most charismatic greetings from the Saar valley in south western Germany! What a difference from the previous place, whose name I shall avoid writing for fear of a Pavlovian attack of depression and angst...
Moving was a real ordeal: I asked a friend to drive a hire van with all the stuff in it and got some neighbours’ youngsters to help me load up. However, on closing up the back, it was noticeable that there were three flat tyres. On going to the hire company, they accused us of driving over stones or some other objects and refused to co-operate because we had signed the contract. When I pointed out that their contract was not totally legal due to the overuse of small writing, and that the truck had not been properly checked when they gave it to us, he got on the phone to his boss and had a ten-minute complaining session about us using expressions like “yeah, I know...” and “but they just don’t want to”. At the end of his rant, he handed us some more keys to a different truck, checked it over properly and shook our hands as if to capitulate to a higher psychological power. It helps when the person accompanying you to the hire shop used to be one of the leading experts in European consumer rights, often appearing on television channels all over Europe...
In any case, the last person I spoke to in Belgium (there, I finally got the courage to write it) really confirmed my decision to leave: in the petrol station on the E40 just before Liège, we pulled in to fill up. A stupid argument ensued because the cashier didn’t want to accept that my card was rejected by his machine. I told him he was a first class imbecile and asked him if the glass screen was to protect him from gunmen or the wrath of his clients. He told me from gunmen, who come from time to time, upon which I told him they had my full support and next time if I were there I’d tell them to wait in the car while I did the ******* job myself.
This lack of community spirit and utter contempt for one’s fellow human being went into total reverse upon crossing the frontier into Germany. What a total irony, verging on the paradoxical. When we arrived at my new place, we were just wearily bringing in the last few items when a neighbour came to greet us and immediately offered his assistance. He even offered to cook us a meal. The weekend after, some other neighbours invited us to join their barbecue having only said hello once before. Her husband works in the same area of Luxembourg and offered me a lift to work.
View of the Saar valley from Saarburg castle
Where did all the energy come from?
I get up at 5.45am to go to work, although I only work Monday to Wednesday. However, on my days off I get up relatively early and 8.00am is positively a lie-in for me. I do so much more in one day that I’m starting to wonder how I could have wasted seven years of my life shut away in that other place. The difference is overpowering: I step out of the door and I am immediately confronted with nature – hills with vineyards rise up in a stately fashion for miles around, interspersed with woods, meadows and rivers. Villages with local shops, guesthouses and inns play a major part in the local fabric of life. Events are often looked forward to as they don’t bombard people’s lives each week with something new. The village May fair takes place this weekend, and I have already been invited to participate by setting up my own stall. I politely declined, as I am not ready with the new photos for this year, but it really made me feel like I belong, something which took over a year in Belgium. Who wouldn’t want to get up early to squeeze every last drop of enjoyment out of the place?!
Where did all the energy come from?
I get up at 5.45am to go to work, although I only work Monday to Wednesday. However, on my days off I get up relatively early and 8.00am is positively a lie-in for me. I do so much more in one day that I’m starting to wonder how I could have wasted seven years of my life shut away in that other place. The difference is overpowering: I step out of the door and I am immediately confronted with nature – hills with vineyards rise up in a stately fashion for miles around, interspersed with woods, meadows and rivers. Villages with local shops, guesthouses and inns play a major part in the local fabric of life. Events are often looked forward to as they don’t bombard people’s lives each week with something new. The village May fair takes place this weekend, and I have already been invited to participate by setting up my own stall. I politely declined, as I am not ready with the new photos for this year, but it really made me feel like I belong, something which took over a year in Belgium. Who wouldn’t want to get up early to squeeze every last drop of enjoyment out of the place?!
Our paddock
Nobody wants my money
People here are so civilised and trusting. On Tuesday evening I went to one of the local vintners and asked to buy a few bottles of wine. I said I only had a fifty euro note and she couldn’t change it but when I was passing next time I could drop it off. How refreshing, I thought.
It didn’t end there: the next morning I arrived at the station with the aforementioned fifty euro note and tried to purchase a €2.25 ticket with it. The stationmaster said not to worry as he couldn’t give change but if I were to meet with a ticket inspector I should just mention the fifty euro note. Remarkable, I thought. Then a lady sitting on the bench said she had seen me before and she said she could lend me a couple of euro until next time and so I could buy my ticket. Extraordinary, I thought.
When I arrived in Konz, the town where my bus to Luxembourg leaves from, I walked with the lady who lent me some money to the bakery, concluding our chat, and I got a coffee and a cherry Streusel (Germany’s best kept secret is the cakes) for breakfast. I proffered the fifty euro note and the lady behind the counter said she couldn’t change it but I could pop in over the next few days and give her the cash. Not to worry, she said, these things happen. Quite amazing, I thought.
I went over to the bus stop and awaited the bus to the Luxembourg border where I had to change buses. My German colleague was there and we exchanged early summer salutations before the bus’s arrival. When I offered to driver the same note, he told me tongue-in-cheek that he was not an exchange bureau and told me I’d have to unfortunately go free of charge to the Luxembourg border that morning. Fortunately my German colleague came over to me and lent me three euro or I would have suffered the ignominy of repeating the conversation with the driver of the bus to the European Quarter in Luxembourg. Utterly astonishing, I thought.
And then I thought No, it’s actually quite normal. It’s just that I haven’t had that kind of experience since I left the UK.
Nobody wants my moneyPeople here are so civilised and trusting. On Tuesday evening I went to one of the local vintners and asked to buy a few bottles of wine. I said I only had a fifty euro note and she couldn’t change it but when I was passing next time I could drop it off. How refreshing, I thought.
It didn’t end there: the next morning I arrived at the station with the aforementioned fifty euro note and tried to purchase a €2.25 ticket with it. The stationmaster said not to worry as he couldn’t give change but if I were to meet with a ticket inspector I should just mention the fifty euro note. Remarkable, I thought. Then a lady sitting on the bench said she had seen me before and she said she could lend me a couple of euro until next time and so I could buy my ticket. Extraordinary, I thought.
When I arrived in Konz, the town where my bus to Luxembourg leaves from, I walked with the lady who lent me some money to the bakery, concluding our chat, and I got a coffee and a cherry Streusel (Germany’s best kept secret is the cakes) for breakfast. I proffered the fifty euro note and the lady behind the counter said she couldn’t change it but I could pop in over the next few days and give her the cash. Not to worry, she said, these things happen. Quite amazing, I thought.
I went over to the bus stop and awaited the bus to the Luxembourg border where I had to change buses. My German colleague was there and we exchanged early summer salutations before the bus’s arrival. When I offered to driver the same note, he told me tongue-in-cheek that he was not an exchange bureau and told me I’d have to unfortunately go free of charge to the Luxembourg border that morning. Fortunately my German colleague came over to me and lent me three euro or I would have suffered the ignominy of repeating the conversation with the driver of the bus to the European Quarter in Luxembourg. Utterly astonishing, I thought.
And then I thought No, it’s actually quite normal. It’s just that I haven’t had that kind of experience since I left the UK.
Saarburg waterfalls
Becoming a local
Signing into a local community is sometimes quite a hassle. Having lived in a lot of places I think one of the worst countries to legalise your status is Belgium although France comes out top of that ignominious list. The Czech Republic is also not particularly good. I remember going to register in Leuven for the first time at the foreign nationals desk, which was one of the most visited council services and yet the least staffed. I arrived first thing in the morning at 8.45 and along with thirty other people from Congo, Japan, the USA, Ivory Coast, Algeria, Sudan and Indonesia, ran forward as fast as possible to grab the queuing tickets, being threatened with a fatal stabbing by one menacing brute. I waited three hours and at the end was told to come back because I didn’t have all the required documents.
In France, I had to get my landlady to come to the local town hall to register me because in France you can’t get a job without the residence permit and you can’t get a residence permit without a job. No wonder why there are such a lot of people who feel disenfranchised from the French way of life there. In Prague it was a similar story, but fortunately that seems to have changed now they are part of the EU.
On the contrary, upon going to the local council building in Konz, I walked into a virtually empty room with more staff than visitors, I signed two pieces of paper (address) and put two crosses on the questions of my religion (church subsidies) and my tax status. I didn’t have to show any proof of contract, I didn’t have to show any proof of address, I didn’t even have to bring a photo. Nope, I don’t have any ridiculous carte de séjour like in France and I didn’t have to humiliate myself by showing my private affairs like in Belgium.
As I walked out of the council building, I felt quite overwhelmed by the whole experience. I became a little lightheaded by the simplicity of everything in Germany; that nothing was too difficult for people; that things which take forever elsewhere only take a few minutes here; that you can keep your dignity in the local government offices; but most of all, that you feel part of the community from the moment you arrive.
Becoming a localSigning into a local community is sometimes quite a hassle. Having lived in a lot of places I think one of the worst countries to legalise your status is Belgium although France comes out top of that ignominious list. The Czech Republic is also not particularly good. I remember going to register in Leuven for the first time at the foreign nationals desk, which was one of the most visited council services and yet the least staffed. I arrived first thing in the morning at 8.45 and along with thirty other people from Congo, Japan, the USA, Ivory Coast, Algeria, Sudan and Indonesia, ran forward as fast as possible to grab the queuing tickets, being threatened with a fatal stabbing by one menacing brute. I waited three hours and at the end was told to come back because I didn’t have all the required documents.
In France, I had to get my landlady to come to the local town hall to register me because in France you can’t get a job without the residence permit and you can’t get a residence permit without a job. No wonder why there are such a lot of people who feel disenfranchised from the French way of life there. In Prague it was a similar story, but fortunately that seems to have changed now they are part of the EU.
On the contrary, upon going to the local council building in Konz, I walked into a virtually empty room with more staff than visitors, I signed two pieces of paper (address) and put two crosses on the questions of my religion (church subsidies) and my tax status. I didn’t have to show any proof of contract, I didn’t have to show any proof of address, I didn’t even have to bring a photo. Nope, I don’t have any ridiculous carte de séjour like in France and I didn’t have to humiliate myself by showing my private affairs like in Belgium.
As I walked out of the council building, I felt quite overwhelmed by the whole experience. I became a little lightheaded by the simplicity of everything in Germany; that nothing was too difficult for people; that things which take forever elsewhere only take a few minutes here; that you can keep your dignity in the local government offices; but most of all, that you feel part of the community from the moment you arrive.
View from hillside towards my house on the right
Getting used to the new surroundings
Some of the changes, though, have been more difficult to come to terms with. I live in a village with no buses and a train an hour in both directions and I don’t have a driving licence. You are probably asking yourself why on earth I chose to come here in the first place. I start work at 8.30am in another country, for Pete’s sake: I must be off my tree. But no, I just have to get up that bit earlier. 5.45am as I said. But it’s worth it: I get the train at 6.29am to Konz, arriving at 6.35am, where I walk seven minutes to the bakery at the bus stop, have a coffee and a cake or two, get the 7.00am bus to Grevenmacher, change to the bus to Luxembourg, arriving at 7.50 in the European Quarter of the city. I have my second coffee, make my photocopies, chat to a few colleagues and await the arrival of my participants. But considering the place I live in, it is a sacrifice worth making.
Another disadvantage is that the baker and the butcher’s shops in the village are only open in the morning from 6.45am to 12.30pm. They only sell basic provisions apart from their usual fare so I need to get food on my way home of an evening. Even that is no trouble really, because I buy my food in Knospe in Konz, a typically German shop, selling organic food from local producers. I could also visit Kaufhof, Lidl, dm or Rewe in Konz depending on the amount of time I have before the train. If it took my fancy, I could stop off at the Ratskeller restaurant for a giant Schnitzel or a truly filling salad. I could hop off the train at the next stop in Kanzem and head for the Saarterrasse, a delightful riverside eatery. However, the greatest pleasure is arriving in Wiltingen where I live and heading for Rosi’s Weinstube for a glass or two of their grape juice. No, I mean it. It’s not a euphemism for wine, it’s really juice although not out of a carton but straight from the grapes. It is the taste equivalent of being caught in a vineyard in a sudden heavy shower.
Getting used to the new surroundingsSome of the changes, though, have been more difficult to come to terms with. I live in a village with no buses and a train an hour in both directions and I don’t have a driving licence. You are probably asking yourself why on earth I chose to come here in the first place. I start work at 8.30am in another country, for Pete’s sake: I must be off my tree. But no, I just have to get up that bit earlier. 5.45am as I said. But it’s worth it: I get the train at 6.29am to Konz, arriving at 6.35am, where I walk seven minutes to the bakery at the bus stop, have a coffee and a cake or two, get the 7.00am bus to Grevenmacher, change to the bus to Luxembourg, arriving at 7.50 in the European Quarter of the city. I have my second coffee, make my photocopies, chat to a few colleagues and await the arrival of my participants. But considering the place I live in, it is a sacrifice worth making.
Another disadvantage is that the baker and the butcher’s shops in the village are only open in the morning from 6.45am to 12.30pm. They only sell basic provisions apart from their usual fare so I need to get food on my way home of an evening. Even that is no trouble really, because I buy my food in Knospe in Konz, a typically German shop, selling organic food from local producers. I could also visit Kaufhof, Lidl, dm or Rewe in Konz depending on the amount of time I have before the train. If it took my fancy, I could stop off at the Ratskeller restaurant for a giant Schnitzel or a truly filling salad. I could hop off the train at the next stop in Kanzem and head for the Saarterrasse, a delightful riverside eatery. However, the greatest pleasure is arriving in Wiltingen where I live and heading for Rosi’s Weinstube for a glass or two of their grape juice. No, I mean it. It’s not a euphemism for wine, it’s really juice although not out of a carton but straight from the grapes. It is the taste equivalent of being caught in a vineyard in a sudden heavy shower.
Galgenberg
Walking in the hills
There are tracks everywhere through the vineyards along the Saar valley. You can walk for a whole day without ever standing aside for a car. I like to go up to the top of the Galgenberg, our local prominent hill and scene of witch executions in the Middle Ages, and watching the sun go down and the moon rise. I am so fortunate that I am the only person for at least a kilometre to be up there after dark. You can admire the three rivers, wonder at the shape of the sheer valleys and listen to the trains, cars and pedestrians going by below without them ever knowing you were there. You can hear a lot more up there than down on the ground level. There is a spot, through a grove of trees that obviously very rarely gets visited, where you feel like you are hovering above the earth. The only sounds are of local birds, and after dark the sky is covered with stars as though the Almighty has dropped a glass on the floor, shattering into millions of pieces. At the Galgenberg summit itself, there is a statue of some steps leading to nowhere, a symbol of the executions, and a lookout parapet with railings and a telescope. I often go up there to feel totally at one with my surroundings and look down upon the wonders of Mother Earth.
Walking in the hillsThere are tracks everywhere through the vineyards along the Saar valley. You can walk for a whole day without ever standing aside for a car. I like to go up to the top of the Galgenberg, our local prominent hill and scene of witch executions in the Middle Ages, and watching the sun go down and the moon rise. I am so fortunate that I am the only person for at least a kilometre to be up there after dark. You can admire the three rivers, wonder at the shape of the sheer valleys and listen to the trains, cars and pedestrians going by below without them ever knowing you were there. You can hear a lot more up there than down on the ground level. There is a spot, through a grove of trees that obviously very rarely gets visited, where you feel like you are hovering above the earth. The only sounds are of local birds, and after dark the sky is covered with stars as though the Almighty has dropped a glass on the floor, shattering into millions of pieces. At the Galgenberg summit itself, there is a statue of some steps leading to nowhere, a symbol of the executions, and a lookout parapet with railings and a telescope. I often go up there to feel totally at one with my surroundings and look down upon the wonders of Mother Earth.
Home, the Kochsmühle
To conclude
With all these possibilities, there is not even a stampede of wild buffalo or a plague of dung beetles that could force me to leave this corner of earthly paradise. I came here to restart my own business in a less stressful environment and to work at the European Institutions in Luxembourg, giving up a more high profile career amongst the politicians and powerbrokers of the EU in Brussels for a statelier pace of life albeit not such an intriguing, exciting and vibrant place to work. And I don’t regret it for one minute.
To concludeWith all these possibilities, there is not even a stampede of wild buffalo or a plague of dung beetles that could force me to leave this corner of earthly paradise. I came here to restart my own business in a less stressful environment and to work at the European Institutions in Luxembourg, giving up a more high profile career amongst the politicians and powerbrokers of the EU in Brussels for a statelier pace of life albeit not such an intriguing, exciting and vibrant place to work. And I don’t regret it for one minute.
Tuesday 18 March 2008
Bye Bye Belgium
I have had to make a very difficult decision these last months. I have become less and less at ease with the country I live in. So for that reason, I have decided to leave Belgium on 15th April. There are a number of reasons, the main one being that I am being priced out of it.
On a recent trip to the UK, I also realised Belgium is not alone in its high property prices, but at least in the UK there are other ways of paying off larger mortgages. In Belgium you just have to make do with what you're given, which in many cases is a well-decorated garage; a place where you store yourself and your possessions; a sort of Menschenschrank. Well I don't really feel like that to be honest. I also do not believe in paying vast amounts of money to an overburdened and - dare I say unfair - welfare system which promotes unemployment and discourages people from seeking further than their "qualifications" will allow.
There is little or no proper infrastructure (it reminds me of the provincial architecture in the old Soviet Union in a town like Kaluga, Tula or Kazan) due to there being no university qualifications for town planner in Belgium. It is the local community politicians who decide what goes where, so you can find all kinds of "interesting" (in the Chinese sense) tram lines where one community doesn't allow them to pass through. Result? Lines which go nowhere. At least they get you nowhere fast. This lack of interest in having town planners also meant that when the politicians finally came around to designating green belt land and the like, nearly all of Flanders had been built on already. Walking through northern Belgium you can rarely find a place to feel utterly alone. This may explain why Flemish people are so uncommunicative - they have nowhere to go.
Let us dissect, little by little, what exactly the problem is with Belgium. I have done it in civil servant bureaucratic style to make it easier for any Belgians who may be reading this. The rest may need to read this two or three times:
1. WORK ETHICS
1.A. The mentality
In Belgium, when applying effort or imagination into work and explaining it mathematically, 2 + 2 = 3.6 and no more. This means nothing is ever done to its conclusion, lest it be seen as an invitation to be given more work.
For that reason, if you try to get ahead like you were taught to in your home country you will:
a. be taxed more heavily for it
b. be told that it will not be possible as a crucial part of your initiative will not be completed until the following year/month/season (delete as appropriate)
c. find that a law was passed while parts a. and b. were going on which makes your project either i) illegal or
ii) in need of some rigorous changes
SOLUTION:
Send all Belgians on a month-long training course with Polish people, where they will see how a proper entrepreneur works. They will learn that
a. Having a pain in the eyebrow is NOT an excuse for not going to work;
b. Charging 200 euro to fix a leaking tap is unacceptable;
c. They are not more important than everyone else;
d. It is necessary REMOVE THE POLITICIANS who caused this in the first place!
1.B. The cost of slow service
Considering the mathematical formula above, it makes it very important to look at workspeed - or lack of it. When going into a shop, for example to buy shoes, there will be only one person, maybe two if it is a Saturday, running the whole place - putting the shoes out, giving advice, stocking, working the checkout. Simply because it costs too much to take on staff in Belgium. Large enterprises are OK, but it is the small and medium enterprises which suffer. Belgium is already in an unemployment crisis. Charging small and medium enterprises over double the employee's net salary is not going to bring more people back to work.
SOLUTIONS:
a. It is remarkable that nobody has noticed. REDUCE EMPLOYMENT TAXES FOR SMEs, STUPID!
b. And while you're at it, REMOVE THE POLITICIANS!
1.C. Helpdesk or No-help-desk?
When you require some technical assistance in Germany or the UK for example, you call up the desk and they do everything physically possible to put the problem right. So you sit in a queue for a while - there are 60 million people in the UK, 25 million more in Germany - big deal. In Belgium if you are not in possession of all of your faculties, you may find your life here intolerable. You need to realise that you bought their product, therefore they fundamentally still own that product. Therefore they believe they own you too.
Having a contract with one of Belgium's leading (or should I say, one of Belgium's only) mobile phone companies should mean that you get the same privileges enjoyed in all countries in the EU. Nope, sorry. You need to buy your phone for its cost price in Belgium, because - and here's the punchline - it's anti-competition. Well if it wasn't so damn sad, it would be hilarious. And on top of that your phone is not locked to the SIM card, meaning if it gets stolen, there's no way of stopping the thieves from using the phone again unless you know the unique code of your phone. They just remove your SIM card and re-sell your phone in another place.
It wouldn't be anti-competition, in fact it would be pro-competition, if they gave you a choice, but that's not the Belgian way. It's all laid on for you. Nobody is allowed to use their imagination to such an extent. Let's not forget that this is the land where autism is an art form, not a sickness.
And the postal system leads the way in the race. Two examples:
One of my neighbours bought the terraced house directly attached to his about 20 years ago. The number on his house, 24, also counts for 26, which after all these years, has become amalgamated with his. There is only one post box and his name, and that of his wife, are both written clearly above the post box. Despite this, several letters, including some important bills, were re-routed back to the post office sorting office as the post deliverer couldn't find the number of the house and didn't take the names on the door into consideration. I saw him yesterday morning painting numbers on his house. In red, just in case.
An Australian friend coming to live in Belgium from China asked for her boxes to be delivered to my place as she had no address yet. The post deliverer asked me for an extra 140 euro for delivering them to my house, despite there being no toll to pay. I called the post office and told them to re-route the boxes to her new address, but to call 10 minutes before arrival, as she had no bell and she would be waiting outside by the time the deliverer arrived. The boxes never came and we received a letter telling us they had been sent back to China as nobody claimed them. I called to complain and I was called a liar and a charlatan by the guy on the other end, who refused to believe that I had called three times to tell the post what to do with the boxes. The person in question is trying to sue the postal service, but her lawyer, rather optimistic for a Belgian, said she should give up all hope. She has paid 600 euro extra for the non-delivery and the post refuses to acknowledge any mistake.
Easy money in a land of monopolies.
I had a problem with payment of my internet bill once (who am I kidding? I have this problem EVERY month!), because I am paid not on the first but about the 10th of the month. When I call to tell them, the job-student on the line says it is unacceptable and I am told I would receive a nasty reminder. I often have to pay small fines because the service provider puts the debit through too early, even though I have constantly told them I am paid later. I suppose it is their way of earning more money.
Nobody can do anything here, you see, because Belgium is still a land of monopolies. They are in control. They are a lot richer than you, they have more than one lawyer and would rather spend hundreds of thousands of euro on recuping unpaid debts rather than asking the question of themselves, "are we being fair to the customer?" In Belgium, there are no investigative TV programmes, there are very few rather weak, amateurish customer protection organisations but it takes ages to get anything done, by which time you're sitting in debt up to the second floor of your house.
1.D. Qualifications count for very little but don't tell them that...
One thing the Belgians are able to tell you is what they are qualified to do. You can find Belgians qualified in Physics who are working as admin staff. You can find Belgians qualified in logistics who are shifting furniture. In Belgium, most people have a job far below their qualifications. The job system works differently to other countries in that many people are unemployed because the employment offices are run by highly qualified, yet demotivated civil servants who aren't really able to work the software and in any case, theirs is a job for life so why should they do too much? They get about a week's training in PeopleSoft and the rest they do on their own. That is, if the office has the software yet...
Furthermore, there are real problems concerning qualifications for independent workers. In the UK, I know people who work constructing gardens, building pools, lakes and ponds, knowing which plants go where, setting the ground even, etc... Anyone can do work like plumbing, gardening, landscaping or decorating if they are properly shown the techniques and given long enough to learn the trade as an apprentice. But these people, who have built their own houses and have a flair for this type of thing despite leaving school as early as 16, would not be accepted in Belgium. My cousin earned £10 million in one year working on the Stock Exchange despite leaving school at 15. Qualifications mean nothing if you are good enough.
When I went to the Chamber of Commerce in Leuven to fill in my details in 2001 and open my business, I filled in the codes for the jobs I wished to do: translation, interpretation, language training and photography. The CoC wrote back and told me I couldn't put in photography because I didn't have a qualification in it. I only wanted to have a couple of exhibitions a year and earn some extra cash, but they said that was impossible.
And an even more extreme case:
A friend of a friend, who used to work for L'Oréal in Paris as their on-site hairdresser for the models for ten years decided to open up a hairdressing salon in Brussels. He was refused because he didn't have the right qualifications!!!! So he took his business to Budapest, where they didn't mind too much. So would I. Anyone see a link between Belgium and unemployment?
Belgians seem not to understand that just because you're qualified, it doesn't mean you're any good. Indeed, in my experience, those language trainers I have come into contact with who have no qualifications in the field are more enthusiastic than those who have them. Main reason? Those with qualifications are generally more complacent and feel less of a need to work for their title, as they feel they have earned it. Therefore the non-qualified are more passionate about it. Don't tell that to a Belgian Ministry of Employment officer, they'll investigate the entire language training market!
In Belgium, those with qualifications really take themselves far too seriously. Authors can't write ordinary stories, they need something eye-catching to hide their appalling storylines, like whole paragraphs without punctuation. Some sponging art-bozo without a real job called Herman Brusselmans, for example, thinks so damn highly of himself that he seems to think he's a comic strip figure brought to life. I don't even know what the narcissistic little creep does. All I know is he has appalling taste in everything from haircuts to music, from sport to literature and he thinks he's always right. He can't even put a sentence together without looking in the mirror. Still, this is the same everywhere. You have a qualification, you're OK.
Oh yes, and if you're Flemish you're OK. In fact no matter how wrong you are, as long as you're Flemish you're right. Flemish with a qualification? Priceless.
SOLUTIONS:
a. Job applicants should be vetted according to ABILITY and willingness to WORK, not QUALIFICATIONS. Honestly, you'd have thought they'd have realised this by now, but when you pick up the job ads, you realise just why this country has 10% unemployed. Everyone is doing a job below their own qualifications. This is no joke, but in Belgium, you need a DEGREE in COMMUNICATION or PUBLIC RELATIONS to be a RECEPTIONIST in a small company. In Belgium, you need a DIPLOMA in LANDSCAPING to be a GARDENER. I am telling you the truth. No joke. I mean, at least you don't need any qualifications in catering to work in a bar, but very often, there are mind-boggling rules which make you sit up and stare ahead silently, thinking Kafkaesque thoughts.
b. Oh yes, and REMOVE THE POLITICIANS!
1.D. Paying for someone else's incompetence
As is tradition in Belgium, you have to pay a very high amount of tax. This is due to previous governments' decadence and pandering to the electorate through grandiose and benevolent schemes which were destined to fail. Many of these are still in place, relics from the Cold War, aggravating the annual budget, and feeding the workshy population. You think I'm making generalisations? I challenge you to go to any café on the Ring around Leuven and count the number of fruit machine gamblers, beer drinkers and barside preachers there are at any time of the day or night.
In Belgium, in order to alleviate the tax burden, your income tax, hospitalisation fund and social security are all separate. And everyone has to pay all three whether they like it or not. You can take them off your taxes, but not all. Let me give you an idea of the breathtaking futility and mind-boggling ridiculousness of a tax bill in Belgium:
As a freelance plumber, for example, let's take one from round here. He came to look at a blocked sink this time last year. His first visit was made driving a silver BMW (new). His second visit of twenty minutes, when he carried out the works, he was in his US-size megatruck totally decorated with his logo, details and activities in his chosen colours. Three weeks later, he arrived in a minivan decorated in his colours and a bill for 140 euro. For no more than 15 minutes' work and 5 minutes' chat. He poured some liquid down my drain, which did the trick for 2 days before it got blocked up once more and I had to pay him 140 euro. No wonder why freelancers are charged a scandalous amount of tax. They think we're ALL able to name our own prices!
Let me tell you about another person I know who was a freelance day centre "hostess" for children in Leuven. She opened up her house for about 6 children, let them play in her garden, made them lunch, assured them of toys and crayons (risking the re-decoration of her house), changed the younger ones' nappies and stayed imprisoned in her own house until the last parent came to take his/her child away. She received about 45 euro per week from each parent, meaning she got about 1000 a month. She had to pay 200 euro a month social security, 650 euro mortgage (still fairly cheap for Belgium), 100 euro electricity costs, and not forgetting water, TV/internet, local tax, hospitalisation fund, food, etc... Putting it another way, she had more outgoings than income so she now works for the local electricity distribution firm.
SOLUTIONS:
a) Reduce the costs for hiring people for a start.
b) Introduce a scheme making it more unattractive to stay at home and the money you save plough it into training job centre staff to find jobs for unemployed people.
c) Stop generalising that people with diplomas know better. Very often they don't - they just think they do because they can form any opinion they like now they have a qualification.
d)In a country where you are punished for working, I think it's only right that you REMOVE THE POLITICIANS!
2.A. Getting ground down in the system
Belgians will defend their own country's little backwardnesses to the last drop of energy. And they will legitimise it, find reasons for it, or flatly reject any alternative as being incompatible for Belgians. It wouldn't be so bad if there were only a couple of these little anomalies, but there are quite a lot, and the main retort you are likely to hear is: "if you don't like it, go somewhere else!"
Well "WE WOULD IF WE COULD!" is my reply, but often we are stranded here because of the jobs we do. There are many European HQs in Belgium, both political ones and enterprises. It would be madness to leave without an anchor in another country, so often people end up here for years. And years and years.
2.B. What effect has this had on the people?
You don't need to go far to experience this knock-on effect created by years and years of political compromise, sourced in the federalisation of the country, bottled by the unyielding politicians.
You will notice that Flemish people are different to French-speaking Walloons. For one thing, they speak a different language which the people like to call Dutch. Each side tries so hard to be Germanic-acting or Latin-acting, but they just can't do it, however hard they try.
A Flemish person, trying to act Germanic, will for example stand in a supermarket aisle waiting for you to move out of the way without saying anything. They think this is being patient like a German or a Brit. Actually it is mainly because they daren't speak to the person blocking the aisle. The Flemish in public really don't like contact with strangers and try to avoid conflict at all times, even this type of conflict.
A Flemish person, trying to act Germanic, will tell you those are the rules without question to be obeyed at all times without right of reply. Well, that's what they think Germanics do... For example, I was carrying some heavy luggage last week back from a business trip and wanted to get the bus home. When it came in, I decided to enter where the mothers do, with their baby carriers once the passengers had got off, so I didn't have to carry the two wheeliebags any further. I then went to the driver and showed him my bus pass. He was furious. That wasn't the way it had to be done! So in an act of sarcasm I got off the bus with my bags and came in the front entrance. "Is it OK now honey?" I said to him. This is one of many examples I have come across over the years where Flemish people want to act decisive and Germanic but they simply cannot.
An average Belgian, trying to be avant-garde, rebellious or anti-establishment (in the 1968 way) will find reasons to say slogans like "down with the monarchy" or "ransack the parliament", but they just have no idea why. They often want to do things against the state, but they really don't dare go too far. For example, the average Belgian will show his/her rebellious nature through:
On a recent trip to the UK, I also realised Belgium is not alone in its high property prices, but at least in the UK there are other ways of paying off larger mortgages. In Belgium you just have to make do with what you're given, which in many cases is a well-decorated garage; a place where you store yourself and your possessions; a sort of Menschenschrank. Well I don't really feel like that to be honest. I also do not believe in paying vast amounts of money to an overburdened and - dare I say unfair - welfare system which promotes unemployment and discourages people from seeking further than their "qualifications" will allow.
There is little or no proper infrastructure (it reminds me of the provincial architecture in the old Soviet Union in a town like Kaluga, Tula or Kazan) due to there being no university qualifications for town planner in Belgium. It is the local community politicians who decide what goes where, so you can find all kinds of "interesting" (in the Chinese sense) tram lines where one community doesn't allow them to pass through. Result? Lines which go nowhere. At least they get you nowhere fast. This lack of interest in having town planners also meant that when the politicians finally came around to designating green belt land and the like, nearly all of Flanders had been built on already. Walking through northern Belgium you can rarely find a place to feel utterly alone. This may explain why Flemish people are so uncommunicative - they have nowhere to go.
Let us dissect, little by little, what exactly the problem is with Belgium. I have done it in civil servant bureaucratic style to make it easier for any Belgians who may be reading this. The rest may need to read this two or three times:
1. WORK ETHICS
1.A. The mentality
In Belgium, when applying effort or imagination into work and explaining it mathematically, 2 + 2 = 3.6 and no more. This means nothing is ever done to its conclusion, lest it be seen as an invitation to be given more work.
For that reason, if you try to get ahead like you were taught to in your home country you will:
a. be taxed more heavily for it
b. be told that it will not be possible as a crucial part of your initiative will not be completed until the following year/month/season (delete as appropriate)
c. find that a law was passed while parts a. and b. were going on which makes your project either i) illegal or
ii) in need of some rigorous changes
SOLUTION:
Send all Belgians on a month-long training course with Polish people, where they will see how a proper entrepreneur works. They will learn that
a. Having a pain in the eyebrow is NOT an excuse for not going to work;
b. Charging 200 euro to fix a leaking tap is unacceptable;
c. They are not more important than everyone else;
d. It is necessary REMOVE THE POLITICIANS who caused this in the first place!
1.B. The cost of slow service
Considering the mathematical formula above, it makes it very important to look at workspeed - or lack of it. When going into a shop, for example to buy shoes, there will be only one person, maybe two if it is a Saturday, running the whole place - putting the shoes out, giving advice, stocking, working the checkout. Simply because it costs too much to take on staff in Belgium. Large enterprises are OK, but it is the small and medium enterprises which suffer. Belgium is already in an unemployment crisis. Charging small and medium enterprises over double the employee's net salary is not going to bring more people back to work.
SOLUTIONS:
a. It is remarkable that nobody has noticed. REDUCE EMPLOYMENT TAXES FOR SMEs, STUPID!
b. And while you're at it, REMOVE THE POLITICIANS!
1.C. Helpdesk or No-help-desk?
When you require some technical assistance in Germany or the UK for example, you call up the desk and they do everything physically possible to put the problem right. So you sit in a queue for a while - there are 60 million people in the UK, 25 million more in Germany - big deal. In Belgium if you are not in possession of all of your faculties, you may find your life here intolerable. You need to realise that you bought their product, therefore they fundamentally still own that product. Therefore they believe they own you too.
Having a contract with one of Belgium's leading (or should I say, one of Belgium's only) mobile phone companies should mean that you get the same privileges enjoyed in all countries in the EU. Nope, sorry. You need to buy your phone for its cost price in Belgium, because - and here's the punchline - it's anti-competition. Well if it wasn't so damn sad, it would be hilarious. And on top of that your phone is not locked to the SIM card, meaning if it gets stolen, there's no way of stopping the thieves from using the phone again unless you know the unique code of your phone. They just remove your SIM card and re-sell your phone in another place.
It wouldn't be anti-competition, in fact it would be pro-competition, if they gave you a choice, but that's not the Belgian way. It's all laid on for you. Nobody is allowed to use their imagination to such an extent. Let's not forget that this is the land where autism is an art form, not a sickness.
And the postal system leads the way in the race. Two examples:
One of my neighbours bought the terraced house directly attached to his about 20 years ago. The number on his house, 24, also counts for 26, which after all these years, has become amalgamated with his. There is only one post box and his name, and that of his wife, are both written clearly above the post box. Despite this, several letters, including some important bills, were re-routed back to the post office sorting office as the post deliverer couldn't find the number of the house and didn't take the names on the door into consideration. I saw him yesterday morning painting numbers on his house. In red, just in case.
An Australian friend coming to live in Belgium from China asked for her boxes to be delivered to my place as she had no address yet. The post deliverer asked me for an extra 140 euro for delivering them to my house, despite there being no toll to pay. I called the post office and told them to re-route the boxes to her new address, but to call 10 minutes before arrival, as she had no bell and she would be waiting outside by the time the deliverer arrived. The boxes never came and we received a letter telling us they had been sent back to China as nobody claimed them. I called to complain and I was called a liar and a charlatan by the guy on the other end, who refused to believe that I had called three times to tell the post what to do with the boxes. The person in question is trying to sue the postal service, but her lawyer, rather optimistic for a Belgian, said she should give up all hope. She has paid 600 euro extra for the non-delivery and the post refuses to acknowledge any mistake.
Easy money in a land of monopolies.
I had a problem with payment of my internet bill once (who am I kidding? I have this problem EVERY month!), because I am paid not on the first but about the 10th of the month. When I call to tell them, the job-student on the line says it is unacceptable and I am told I would receive a nasty reminder. I often have to pay small fines because the service provider puts the debit through too early, even though I have constantly told them I am paid later. I suppose it is their way of earning more money.
Nobody can do anything here, you see, because Belgium is still a land of monopolies. They are in control. They are a lot richer than you, they have more than one lawyer and would rather spend hundreds of thousands of euro on recuping unpaid debts rather than asking the question of themselves, "are we being fair to the customer?" In Belgium, there are no investigative TV programmes, there are very few rather weak, amateurish customer protection organisations but it takes ages to get anything done, by which time you're sitting in debt up to the second floor of your house.
1.D. Qualifications count for very little but don't tell them that...
One thing the Belgians are able to tell you is what they are qualified to do. You can find Belgians qualified in Physics who are working as admin staff. You can find Belgians qualified in logistics who are shifting furniture. In Belgium, most people have a job far below their qualifications. The job system works differently to other countries in that many people are unemployed because the employment offices are run by highly qualified, yet demotivated civil servants who aren't really able to work the software and in any case, theirs is a job for life so why should they do too much? They get about a week's training in PeopleSoft and the rest they do on their own. That is, if the office has the software yet...
Furthermore, there are real problems concerning qualifications for independent workers. In the UK, I know people who work constructing gardens, building pools, lakes and ponds, knowing which plants go where, setting the ground even, etc... Anyone can do work like plumbing, gardening, landscaping or decorating if they are properly shown the techniques and given long enough to learn the trade as an apprentice. But these people, who have built their own houses and have a flair for this type of thing despite leaving school as early as 16, would not be accepted in Belgium. My cousin earned £10 million in one year working on the Stock Exchange despite leaving school at 15. Qualifications mean nothing if you are good enough.
When I went to the Chamber of Commerce in Leuven to fill in my details in 2001 and open my business, I filled in the codes for the jobs I wished to do: translation, interpretation, language training and photography. The CoC wrote back and told me I couldn't put in photography because I didn't have a qualification in it. I only wanted to have a couple of exhibitions a year and earn some extra cash, but they said that was impossible.
And an even more extreme case:
A friend of a friend, who used to work for L'Oréal in Paris as their on-site hairdresser for the models for ten years decided to open up a hairdressing salon in Brussels. He was refused because he didn't have the right qualifications!!!! So he took his business to Budapest, where they didn't mind too much. So would I. Anyone see a link between Belgium and unemployment?
Belgians seem not to understand that just because you're qualified, it doesn't mean you're any good. Indeed, in my experience, those language trainers I have come into contact with who have no qualifications in the field are more enthusiastic than those who have them. Main reason? Those with qualifications are generally more complacent and feel less of a need to work for their title, as they feel they have earned it. Therefore the non-qualified are more passionate about it. Don't tell that to a Belgian Ministry of Employment officer, they'll investigate the entire language training market!
In Belgium, those with qualifications really take themselves far too seriously. Authors can't write ordinary stories, they need something eye-catching to hide their appalling storylines, like whole paragraphs without punctuation. Some sponging art-bozo without a real job called Herman Brusselmans, for example, thinks so damn highly of himself that he seems to think he's a comic strip figure brought to life. I don't even know what the narcissistic little creep does. All I know is he has appalling taste in everything from haircuts to music, from sport to literature and he thinks he's always right. He can't even put a sentence together without looking in the mirror. Still, this is the same everywhere. You have a qualification, you're OK.
Oh yes, and if you're Flemish you're OK. In fact no matter how wrong you are, as long as you're Flemish you're right. Flemish with a qualification? Priceless.
SOLUTIONS:
a. Job applicants should be vetted according to ABILITY and willingness to WORK, not QUALIFICATIONS. Honestly, you'd have thought they'd have realised this by now, but when you pick up the job ads, you realise just why this country has 10% unemployed. Everyone is doing a job below their own qualifications. This is no joke, but in Belgium, you need a DEGREE in COMMUNICATION or PUBLIC RELATIONS to be a RECEPTIONIST in a small company. In Belgium, you need a DIPLOMA in LANDSCAPING to be a GARDENER. I am telling you the truth. No joke. I mean, at least you don't need any qualifications in catering to work in a bar, but very often, there are mind-boggling rules which make you sit up and stare ahead silently, thinking Kafkaesque thoughts.
b. Oh yes, and REMOVE THE POLITICIANS!
1.D. Paying for someone else's incompetence
As is tradition in Belgium, you have to pay a very high amount of tax. This is due to previous governments' decadence and pandering to the electorate through grandiose and benevolent schemes which were destined to fail. Many of these are still in place, relics from the Cold War, aggravating the annual budget, and feeding the workshy population. You think I'm making generalisations? I challenge you to go to any café on the Ring around Leuven and count the number of fruit machine gamblers, beer drinkers and barside preachers there are at any time of the day or night.
In Belgium, in order to alleviate the tax burden, your income tax, hospitalisation fund and social security are all separate. And everyone has to pay all three whether they like it or not. You can take them off your taxes, but not all. Let me give you an idea of the breathtaking futility and mind-boggling ridiculousness of a tax bill in Belgium:
As a freelance plumber, for example, let's take one from round here. He came to look at a blocked sink this time last year. His first visit was made driving a silver BMW (new). His second visit of twenty minutes, when he carried out the works, he was in his US-size megatruck totally decorated with his logo, details and activities in his chosen colours. Three weeks later, he arrived in a minivan decorated in his colours and a bill for 140 euro. For no more than 15 minutes' work and 5 minutes' chat. He poured some liquid down my drain, which did the trick for 2 days before it got blocked up once more and I had to pay him 140 euro. No wonder why freelancers are charged a scandalous amount of tax. They think we're ALL able to name our own prices!
Let me tell you about another person I know who was a freelance day centre "hostess" for children in Leuven. She opened up her house for about 6 children, let them play in her garden, made them lunch, assured them of toys and crayons (risking the re-decoration of her house), changed the younger ones' nappies and stayed imprisoned in her own house until the last parent came to take his/her child away. She received about 45 euro per week from each parent, meaning she got about 1000 a month. She had to pay 200 euro a month social security, 650 euro mortgage (still fairly cheap for Belgium), 100 euro electricity costs, and not forgetting water, TV/internet, local tax, hospitalisation fund, food, etc... Putting it another way, she had more outgoings than income so she now works for the local electricity distribution firm.
SOLUTIONS:
a) Reduce the costs for hiring people for a start.
b) Introduce a scheme making it more unattractive to stay at home and the money you save plough it into training job centre staff to find jobs for unemployed people.
c) Stop generalising that people with diplomas know better. Very often they don't - they just think they do because they can form any opinion they like now they have a qualification.
d)In a country where you are punished for working, I think it's only right that you REMOVE THE POLITICIANS!
2.A. Getting ground down in the system
Belgians will defend their own country's little backwardnesses to the last drop of energy. And they will legitimise it, find reasons for it, or flatly reject any alternative as being incompatible for Belgians. It wouldn't be so bad if there were only a couple of these little anomalies, but there are quite a lot, and the main retort you are likely to hear is: "if you don't like it, go somewhere else!"
Well "WE WOULD IF WE COULD!" is my reply, but often we are stranded here because of the jobs we do. There are many European HQs in Belgium, both political ones and enterprises. It would be madness to leave without an anchor in another country, so often people end up here for years. And years and years.
2.B. What effect has this had on the people?
You don't need to go far to experience this knock-on effect created by years and years of political compromise, sourced in the federalisation of the country, bottled by the unyielding politicians.
You will notice that Flemish people are different to French-speaking Walloons. For one thing, they speak a different language which the people like to call Dutch. Each side tries so hard to be Germanic-acting or Latin-acting, but they just can't do it, however hard they try.
A Flemish person, trying to act Germanic, will for example stand in a supermarket aisle waiting for you to move out of the way without saying anything. They think this is being patient like a German or a Brit. Actually it is mainly because they daren't speak to the person blocking the aisle. The Flemish in public really don't like contact with strangers and try to avoid conflict at all times, even this type of conflict.
A Flemish person, trying to act Germanic, will tell you those are the rules without question to be obeyed at all times without right of reply. Well, that's what they think Germanics do... For example, I was carrying some heavy luggage last week back from a business trip and wanted to get the bus home. When it came in, I decided to enter where the mothers do, with their baby carriers once the passengers had got off, so I didn't have to carry the two wheeliebags any further. I then went to the driver and showed him my bus pass. He was furious. That wasn't the way it had to be done! So in an act of sarcasm I got off the bus with my bags and came in the front entrance. "Is it OK now honey?" I said to him. This is one of many examples I have come across over the years where Flemish people want to act decisive and Germanic but they simply cannot.
An average Belgian, trying to be avant-garde, rebellious or anti-establishment (in the 1968 way) will find reasons to say slogans like "down with the monarchy" or "ransack the parliament", but they just have no idea why. They often want to do things against the state, but they really don't dare go too far. For example, the average Belgian will show his/her rebellious nature through:
- Crossing the road while the red light is still on (woah there, you'll get a reputation!)
- Cycling on the opposite side of the cycle path, or even more daring, cycling on the pavement
- Using English words or phrases when a Dutch one would do the job just as well
- Voting blank and telling everyone as though it was the most exciting thing you ever did (probably was...)
- Not using the indicator whilst driving (ooh, you daredevils!)
- Standing outside of the established queue in a shop (insurrection!)
- Putting their feet, still with shoes, or bags on opposite seats on public transport
- Going to live in another town
- Sitting in a first class carriage on a train with a second class ticket and then claiming they didn't see the huge "1" sign on the carriage door when the inspector comes (the worst kind of sponger)
They just can't do it. They don't have the willpower or the guts to do something truly outlandish. And if they do it is TRULY weird. Guess where the cream pie-thrower comes from who once got Bill Gates? Furthermore, you will rarely find a Belgian who wants to stand out from the crowd. Most Belgian public places are scenes of conventional clothes, hushed voices and underused smile muscles.
2.C. Being Germanic on public transport
This wish to try to be Germanic has also found a support base in public transport, where in the UK, Scandinavia and Germany one can find all sorts of stickers, signs and posters telling you what is and is not acceptable. "No smoking - penalty £40" for example, or this sign below from a German bus. It says plainly, "Don't make such a row with your own noise".
However in Belgian buses there is a horizontal poster no bigger than this one above which says "On which side are you?" And then it lists on one side the things you shouldn't do on a bus and on the other what you should so on a bus with an illustration in the middle. It is as big as this one above but with a whole load of guff on it that even patient readers with aircraft pilots' eyesight would find tough to read. Those with social problems need to have the rules laid out in front of them. What message are you sending out to people when even the bus company doesn't take it seriously? Furthermore, De Lijn, the Flemish bus company only brought out their "reizigerscode", or travellers' code in April 2007. Before then, anything was possible.
Germanic Ostriches
According to the book, if another passenger is getting on your nerves, you should firstly report it to the driver. So when there was a group of Neanderthals playing music through speakers on the bus, I told the driver. He replied, "what can I do about it? It's bothering nobody, is it? So I can't do anything until it does." I told him it was bothering me. The others were too cowardly to say anything. He told me to sit down. How, in the name of sanity, are you going to tell these "people" right from wrong if those in authority don't even want to deal with it?
2.D. Excuses as reasons?
A Belgian has an excuse for everything. The more you allow the average common or garden Belgian, the more liberties he/she will take. And they will try.
Never let a Belgian out of your sight for thirty seconds in these places:
- Shops where queuing is necessary. If you do, you may find that Belgian has found a shortcut to the front. And the excuse will be "I didn't notice you when I first came in". A good one is, "does it matter who is next?" Yeah, right... So remember, wherever there be a gap, the Belgian will fill it.
- In cafés or on trains alone. If you need to go to the toilet and you have nobody to look after your seat, put as much stuff on it as possible or you may find it taken when you come back. Excuses in this category range from "I saw this coat on the floor but I thought someone had gone off without taking their book with them" to "a person has to sit somewhere, eh?"
- Working on the commodities in your house. Never, ever, ever, ever, ever, EVER allow a Belgian into your home to fix the plumbing or the electricity. Firstly, it will take ages, be very costly and most importantly will need constant repair and maintenance. But secondly there will be forever interruptions. Belgians have habits of saying "I'm just off to get something for your radiator", and not reappearing for days. Excuses here could be, "they didn't have it in stock in the end so I ordered it and it only came yesterday but I've had the flu and my wife's got bronchitis, so I've been looking after her and then the holiday period started and blablabla..." or they could be, "it was fixed in the end, wasn't it?"
- Working on the street infrastructure. They have habits of going home for the weekend leaving paving stones where they were when they began the works, or leaving up diversion signs until someone realises that the works have actually finished. Last week they were working on the roads not far from my front door. They went home early on Friday leaving their no-entry barriers still in place and the buses had to continue on their diversion the whole weekend. Traffic on Monday morning was horrendous. Excuses here will be uninterpretable and generally menacing. This may include threatening to strike or not to connect your house/street properly to the infrastructure.
- Working in your office. Hiring Belgians is a serious threat to your business. For although I said earlier that there is little work going, those who have got it are seriously out to make sure they don't have their day disrupted by extra work. You see, this is why chocolate and beer are Belgium's greatest products. The average Belgian will go to hell and back naked to prepare for their free time and holidays, but woe betide anyone who puts a bit of hard work between them and a relaxing day at the office. Excuses in this category can be varied, but "I've still got to find a wallpaper for my desktop yet" is a popular excuse, as is "Can that wait until I've finished paying for this online concert ticket?" But the one heard the most is "Can a person not get any peace around here?" That covers all bases and people think you're REALLY busy, even when you're just reading the news!
2.E. Making sense of the more bizarre excuses
In Belgium, you will find people have:
a. No idea how to queue:
People walking into a shop, even a long, narrow one, will find ways of standing aloof so as to look like they're waiting - the problem is that the person serving does not keep an eye on the arrivals, so often these people get served first. When you try to say that you were in fact next, you are stared at by several others in the room who wonder how you dare to confront anyone in such an aggressive manner.
Getting on a train can be hell as many of the less cultured ones will barge in front, even trying to get on before the others have got off.
b. No idea how to start a conversation with a stranger:
You could stand at the same bus stop for years and years, and see the same people every day of your working life and still have never even exchanged looks.
There's a joke told by the expats in Brussels: what's the definition of eye contact on Belgian public transport? Answer: A married couple.
c. No sense of orientation on the pavements and also in buildings, lifts and cars:
Belgians spend most of their lives not only wondering why they exist, but also where they are. However one of the most infuriating aspects of not being a Belgian is having to accept their inability to walk in straight lines on pavements and their knack of blocking the pathways without realising it. On a recent trip to Saarbrücken, I came across a group of Belgians blocking the pathway in and out of Kaufhof. Telling them didn't help, they didn't understand what was wrong about standing there!
I once tried to move the moped of a teenager away from the enclosed area leading from the car park to the supermarket. I didn't notice he was behind me. He tried to hit me with his helmet and asked me why I was stealing his bike. When I pointed out that it was blocking the safe passage to the shop, he took a swing at me with his helmet. So I grabbed him and twisted him round in self defence, paying particular attention to his helmet hand. Along came some guy who told me to leave the kid alone.
Spatial awareness is a sign of empathy, understanding and community spirit. Which leads me on to section d...
d. No idea of charity or community spirit:
They don't tip for a start. They also don't thank people a lot for opening doors or giving passage in cars. But there is something darker here: charities are nuisances here who ambush you on pedestrian street crossroads or bombard your houses with adverts to send money. Nobody does any actual other charity work. In the seven years I have been here, not a single person has done anything sponsored.
In central Flanders there is the "Dodentocht", a yearly 24 hour walking event. People have to walk 100 kilometres in 24 hours in a circle. I know several people who did this. Now, in the UK or Poland for that matter people would use this opportunity to raise money for a local charity. When I asked one of my friends who was doing this what charity he was doing it for, he said "no charity - do you think I'm crazy?" Another one said "I'm doing it because you get free beer at the brewery". And yes, to answer your question, I really, sincerely do think you are crazy. Imagine walking 100 km and not bothering to collect cash for it!
2.F. However when there is a benevolent event:
A car-free day in Brussels is usually a sign that hypocrisy has finally reached new depths and the politicians think they should do something "green". But what if you need to take your spouse back to the airport? That was one thing a friend had to deal with. He walks to work every day, but uses his car only for travelling home to Germany or large assignments. Like collecting your wife and her things and putting her on a flight home to Berlin. So when he came out of his parking spot and reached the end of the street, he was mobbed by a group of part-time cyclists. You know, the type that has a car per family member, and thinks it's fun to get on a bike on car-free day.
Oh yes, and he lives in a flat below a woman who likes to vacuum her sofa in the middle of the night, have telephone arguments and walk around noisily in stiletto heels. But you see, nothing can be done by the police in Belgium, because she's not contravening the maximum decibels ruling. Quatsch!
3.A. Language and its uses
It is entirely possible that the Flemish have an exaggerated sense of importance of their language. And it is even more possible that the French-speaking Walloons are uninterested in learning their little lingo when they could be learning Spanish or English. The Flemish need to realise that even the Hollanders see the Flemish version of Dutch in the same way as the French look upon Créole. Get over it.
One little problem though: the Flemish think it's such a good idea to only allow people to join their civil service if they speak good enough Dutch and pass a language ability test. So what is happening in schools, colleges, universities and training facilities run by the Flemish government is that many Chinese, English, German and Spanish teaching jobs are going to Flemish people because the real native speakers have not mastered Dutch well enough. You need to pass a Dutch language test before you are allowed to work for them. OK, but what good is that to a Chinese teacher???
SOLUTION: The Flemish have a thing against the Walloons because they don't really try to learn Dutch, but they are missing the point. Nobody else does really, either. What use will Flemish Dutch be to anyone? I don't think the NATO translation unit will fall into chaos because nobody speaks it. So they need to be a little less exaggerative of people's needs to speak their rather sparsely used language.
3.B. Enjoying yourself the Belgian way
I remember the parties I used to organise in London and down in Kent. I would invite ten people and forty would show up. We had dancing on the tables; folk-style circles, lines and arches; we ran about in our underwear; we had midnight guitar sessions in the forest; we had blindfolded "guess the person" competitions, etc... Here in Belgium, I can't rustle up enough enthusiasm for a game of snooker once a month. I've been to "parties" where the host told me it was going to be a raucous affair with lots of drink and music, and we'd be finished at 5 and if you weren't tired yet we'd head off to the bar and blablabla... All lies. A Belgian "party" is as follows:
- Come in, hand over bottles to fridgekeeper
- Get a drink
- Stand in the middle and choose which group of semi-hypnotised emoes you want to speak to
- Notice how good the music is (usually unrecognisable café/lift stuff)
- Stand there, wait for snacks to arrive
- Pretend you're enjoying it
- Talk about something intellectual or something totally meaningless like your shopping bill
- After a few drinks, either go home or to a bar
- Once out of the door, wonder who those people were
- Go into a library to soak up a little more atmosphere
3.C. You will like what you are given
Go into any British or German supermarket and you will find four or five different sorts of everything to choose from. In a Belgian one you get what you are given. And if it goes off before you get home or it doesn't work properly, the following scenarios are possible:
"please fill in this forty page document and send it to this address. Oh hold on, your package has been opened. Sorry, that means you accepted this thing and it's not our responsibility any more. So go away please, I have to finish this crossword" or maybe, "I'll have to ask twenty other people and by the time I've finished you might be tired of waiting and have already lost the will to live."
3.D. What the Belgians do right
Not all of it is bad. Just what I listed above. Their TV is quite good (when it's on schedule - not the kind of country where a DVD recorder is of much use) and their food isn't bad (when served with a smile anyway). There is an expat joke: what's the best thing to come out of Belgium? Answer: The E40 motorway in either direction.
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I could go on, but I will stop here. I don't care what any Belgian thinks when reading this: I don't value their opinion very highly anyway. Not many Belgians have good judgement. In fact, ask directions to a group of them and they'd all have a different opinion of the way you should go, even to their own front door. One last thing: I often get told by Belgians: "if you don't like it, why don't you get out?" Well that is precisely what I'm going to do. So in the words of Filip De Winter, it's time for the three Bs: Bye Bye Belgium!
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