Kryzys tozsamosci

It's been ages since I wrote anything. So I should write. Since I live in a francophonic country - or at least a francophonic region of a tri(at least)lingual country, it should have distinct existential leanings.

Ever since I left Poland - the first time around - I've been looking for an angle for the blog. It's clearly not about a British expat learning Polish in Poland any more. It's about a British expat, who is (still) learning Polish, but in a different and equally strange country. But should it be about learning Polish? Or about coping with the surreal/endearing/at times utterly frustrating experience that is life in Belgium? Or about being a - more or less most of the time - single woman in her (very) early thirties (Bridget Jones-stylie)?

Someone I spend a lot of time with recently quoted at me: 'I don't want to be a character in a movie of your life'. But that's not why I write. It's not supposed to be a blow-by-blow description of my rather dull existence. I write a blog because I like to write, because I feel that I might be good at it, if I did it enough, and because I do a job which is challenging and interesting but - in theory - not creative and I want to be able to form something which is my own, and writing a blog is a series of exercises preparing for what one day might be an article, or a short story, or even a very modest novel. Maybe. One day.

But maybe it is all just vanity. Maybe this is just one more thing that I'm not good at - except that there's no-one around to tell me to pull my socks up.

It's October, so there is a lot of work, and for this I am grateful. I am living by the skin of my teeth: running to work in the mornings usually almost late (or almost on time), with messy hair and smudged mascara, looking like a cross between a dressed-up schoolgirl and a nervous breakdown waiting to happen. On days when I'm not working, I sprint across Brussels trying to organise appointments and administration and learning of various sorts. My fridge is more or less permanently empty and I need to borrow an electric drill to fix a mirror, a row of coat pegs and a Japanese print to the wall. My flat still looks as though I moved in yesterday and I still haven't bought a bed, or a dining table. Through the bathroom skylight, I can watch the sun rise while I shower in the morning. Occasionally my hormones short-circuit my brain and I spend the whole day thinking about babies, although I'm nowhere near responsible enough to look after one. I've managed to divide all my paperwork into 'in' and 'out', in two big piles on the coffee table. I'm secretly pleased my boyfriend is away at the moment, because I will be able to spend the whole weekend asleep, or being quietly and unashamedly crazy by myself, or out with friends, hoping to forget everything.

I love late autumn and winter for no reason: for the coolness and freshness and crispness of everything, even in the city. I'm happy to change my life for three months and run in the dark and drink mulled wine in the kitchen instead of cold beer on a terrace.

There we go. A whole post of 'I'. Selfish? Indulgent? And wrong for these reasons? You decide.

Rainy days and Mondays

I must have written a post with this title before. I'm sure I have. It's actually not rainy at all but brilliantly sunny, and has been for the past few days.

Here are some random observations about Monday, in no particular order.

- today I sat in a meeting almost entirely in English, German and - a surprise late entry - Polish, which I am fortunately not yet qualified to do. I switched the microphone on a grand total of once and thus escaped a quality control report due to scarcity of evidence.

- the fates were clearly on my side with the quality control thing because I had finally rolled into bed the night before at about 2am. Please don't think that this is because I had anything particularly exciting to do: I've simply discovered that having to climb up stairs to go to bed when you are even only slightly tired is hardly worth it when you could just doze on the sofa in front of BBC3. My evenings involve messing about on the interweb, tinkling away at the piano, flipping channels, occasionally doing something vaguely productive like reading a book or writing a blog post (rarely).

- I ran around the park three times instead of two (in the dark you can be tricked into thinking you haven't run as far) and had a bath for the first time in over a year. Please note that I have washed myself by other methods in the meantime. I reckon that since I'm here on my own and I've already cleaned the bath at least twice since I moved in* it's probably relatively hygienic. Also, I finally have a bathroom which has a window. I've always found it singularly dreary to sit in four inches of tepid, scummy water in a windowless box room, but the fact of being able to lie back and look up at the sunset reflecting off the clouds through the skylight is somehow much more appealing.

- I bought shoes. I can't decide whether I like them or not. I am fed up with the ubiquitous ballet pump slipping off my feet all the time so I bought some rather flimsy tan leather plimsoll-type things - as unlike a trainer as I could possibly find without risking toe cramps. I have not yet paid my accountant. Accountants, since I actually have two, one in Belgium and one in the UK. I owe money to both, but not as much as I would owe to the respective revenue and customs services if I did not pay an accountant to do it all for me.

- I am unable to organise a piss-up. It's meant to be at my home, not in a brewery, but since I live in Belgium I'm sure there must be a suitable brewery relatively near by. This is partly social ineptness, more than partly shyness and a large helping of anxiety, plus I don't really understand how these things work. Do people really want to come and drink wine at my flat? Do I have enough chairs? I certainly don't have enough wine glasses. If people don't have fun, is it my fault?

- I am in the throes of a crise sentimentale, which pretty unclear to both of us. I think at the moment it is back on, largely due to the soothing influence of gorgeous autumn sunshine for the whole weekend and a long, slightly hungover romantic walk in the woods. Maybe Belgium and its meteorology are on my side after all.

- I keep forgetting to water the plant. He gave it to me. I only have to water it once a week. The designated watering day is Wednesday and I keep missing it (Wednesday is an easy day to overlook, with all those other things going on to distract you, like Tuesday and Thursday). He says that this is ironically symbolic, or symbolically ironic, or something like that.

Right. Time to tackle those stairs.




*nearly two months ago, so not so good after all.

Evensong blues II

Singing today, I realised what it is that gives evensong its melancholy edge. The dimly-lit chapel late on a Wednesday afternoon, the shadows drawing closer, the few hardy members of the austere Scottish congregation hugging their winter coats around them as the dark falls ever earlier and we slip into the gloomy tunnel that is November. The wind howls around the stone walls and sheets of rain dash against the windows.


Turn not thy servants empty away, for we have thee as our only hope


Defend us from all perils and dangers of this night


Save us, O Lord, while waking and guard us while sleeping


The night creeps closer and the candles flicker and sputter in the draft - an echo of the gale whipping up the waves outside.

Bare branches rattle against the panes, trees are stripped and contorted as though with grief.

At this time of year, we are alone - deep in the night we listen to breath coming in gasps and cannot reach out to comfort the sleeper. We are the wrong person in the wrong place at the wrong time and the dark is all around and winter is coming.

Sofa, so good

The sofa has become the central focus of my indoor life. It's a good place to flop down and pass out after work, it's the best place to sit and eat breakfast in front of the BBC (actually the only place, since I don't have a proper dining table yet) and it also doubles as a handy filing cabinet and coat stand.

As you can see, there's still a little way to go on furnishing the flat. Currently life is full of boring adult responsibilities, such as trying to work out how to do last year's UK tax return. Since I'm not very responsible and have trouble remembering that I'm supposed to be an adult, this has been a bit difficult to take on board.

Instead, I've been exploring the various procrastination options. Such as cooking.


Here's my recipe for vegetable soup. Don't thank me now.


- scrape together all the leftover vegetables from the bottom of your fridge.
- cut and/or peel off the slimy bits.
- heat some oil in a pan and add garlic and lots of chilli (to hide the taste of the vegetables)
- add veg and pour stock over the top - preferably Oxo veggie stock, for that authentic Pot Noodle flavour
- turn up the heat, and go and watch ER on Vijf TV until you hear the saucepan lid rattling as the stock boils over.
- turn down the heat and leave to simmer until vegetables have lost all shape and consistency or until the Flemish news comes on
- turn the heat off, get out hand-held blender, and blitz until mushy.
- add a bit more stock to make it look more like soup and less like baby food
- add generous helpings of strong cheese.


Smacznego!

Aux petits riens

An ambivalent weekend full of showers and flashes of sunshine. In Schaerbeek last night there was a huge explosion that demolished three houses and killed three people. My first thought was 'but for the grace of God', and my fear of leaving the gas on is back with a vengeance, even though I've lived with electric cookers for over a year now. The iron is also a serious cause for concern.

I'm more or less settled in the new flat now. It finally has a sofa (after a very long Saturday afternoon in Ikea with the new boy, culminating in a desperate stress-binge on Swedish cinnamon rolls), as well as television, wifi and a tumble dryer. My happiness is complete. I can look forward to long afternoons spent sprawled across my sofa in front of Grey's Anatomy on Vijf tv, with the blogosphere at my fingertips and the sweet scent of freshly-tumbled towels in the air.

However, I should probably get some grown-up furniture. By grown-up, I mean sensible things that you can store stuff in. Store as in 'put away in a tidy manner' as opposed to 'leave in the box it came in and pretend it doesn't exist let alone need to be filed'. Specfically a sideboard, a chest of drawers and a dining table with chairs. With this in mind, I set out towards Porte de Namur as soon as the rain held off for a few moments and was very quickly distracted by shoe shops and Fnac.

Eventually I managed to steer myself down Avenue Louise, past Place du Châtelain and onto Rue Américaine.  This is home to Les Petits Riens - essentially a five-storey jumble sale.
Now, I always thought that St Andrews was the undisputed capital of charity shops: all those rich kids casting off last season's Armani or last term's ball dress translates into some serious bargains. But Petits Riens is on another scale entirely. Once I'd wandered around two floors of furniture and got bored I found myself climbing up to the top floor: crockery, old toys and electrical equipment among other things. It's like my parents' loft on speed.
You can browse through shelves and shelves of highly useful objects, such as...

... Irish coffee glasses ...

 ... elderly (and therefore extremely romantic but highly unsuitable for blogging) typewriters...

 ... record players like my Mum and Dad used to have in the eighties...

... and things like this that I can't even identify.

It even has a book store section. All it needs now is for Costa coffee to move in and the rainy Saturday afternoon experience will be complete...

Evensong blues

Apart from the fact that it can be typo-d into 'evensnog', which is intrinsically, childishly amusing, autumn evensong (nearly did it again) is a melancholy time of day.
Late September to early October is a time for sitting in church organ lofts, watching specks of dust suspended in the fading rays of the autumn sun. It's a minor key time, slipping back into the vaguely-familiar cadences of liturgy and response, soft notes glowing faintly like the cooling embers of the dying year. Outside, the waves break unseen against the rocks in the dark and we huddle in the empty chapel, cold shivers mimicking a frisson of anticipation: for what? The cool touch of salt-soaked grey stone, the scent of old oak, distant woodsmoke and freezing mist. Darkness falls and the sea cradles the town in huge grey oblivion.
The cycle ride downhill in the blackness, no lights, no helmet, slicing through the searing air to burst into the house tingling in the sudden warmth.
It will be several weeks before Christmas music begins, and the perils of this night are still all too real. And yet - somehow - you wake with a feeling of boundless possibility: a hot shower, a walk to lectures in the fresh, early morning air. You are not yet set in stone, you stand poised to ride whatever wave may carry you: life is a vast ocean of limitless potential.

Transitions

This month, I have two houses (and so far no plague on either of them - the intervention anti-cafards seems to be holding plagues at bay for the moment).
I'm moving endless boxes and cases between them via a combination of borrowed parental cars and a half-walk, half-scurry through Parc Leopold. From tomorrow onwards, I will be able to use car-sharing (technical term 'Cambio'). This means I will be officially able to drive in Belgium, whenever I like*. I suggest staying off the roads tomorrow.
The new place has the advantage of space, a bigger bathroom and (as of yesterday) my own duvet. On the other hand, the old flat has a sofa, hot and cold running Telenet and a washing machine (I have one coming in the new flat but not for another two weeks). There's also rather a lot of useless clutter silting up the old place: I've been contemplating it in despair and wondering just how much I can get away with simply throwing in the bin**.

Moving, proszę państwa, is apparently a learning experience, helping you to develop many useful skillz which can transferred to other areas of your life. In terms of numerical reasoning, I've learnt - for example - that it takes more than two people to lift an electric piano up six flights of stairs where the console of said piano weighs more than one of those two people. Regarding cultural diversity, I have discovered that buying frites in Brussels after nightfall during Ramadan is a task that requires a great deal of patience, good local knowledge and a fast car.

Teambuilding is another valuable competence often learnt in house-moving. Especially where this involves the lifting of heavy objects.
We all know about teamwork: we all use our skills to communicate effectively whilst at the same time taking time to listen to others; we are all highly motivated and welcome the opportunity to pass on our enthusiasm to others; we are all able to cooperate but not afraid to take a leading role and convince others of the plausibility of our ideas. On paper anyway.
I recently discovered what role I really take on when trying to solve a complex problem - such as extracting a 160 x 200 cm sprung mattress from its position wedged in a tiny attic stairwell. I play a very important part: in fact I'm the one collapsed in the corner, giggling helplessly, liable to say things like: 'ok never mind, let's try Ben's idea now', 'yep, that sounds good to me' or 'does anyone want another beer?' I see it as a motivating, cheering role. In other words, largely useless...




*Subject to availability, terms and conditions apply.
** note to self, file glossaries before going away for the summer, while I can still remember the name of the meeting.