POOR OLD BELGIUM...CHOP IT UP?

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CHAZ
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POOR OLD BELGIUM...CHOP IT UP?

Post by CHAZ »

Another European dilemma is the battle going on in Belgium...Living in Luxemburg I get to get quite close to the mess and yesterday the dear old King had to make a unifying speech to try and hold it all together...

What are oyur thoughts or what does Belgium evoke for you....apart from the choccies of course!
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Re: POOR OLD BELGIUM...CHOP IT UP?

Post by cstegerlewis »

No idea what you are talking about, and I am pretty well up on European Politics as I work for the Aerospace Industry (Airbus, A400M, Eurofighter etc.....)

Enlighten us all
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Re: POOR OLD BELGIUM...CHOP IT UP?

Post by CHAZ »

cstegerlewis wrote:No idea what you are talking about, and I am pretty well up on European Politics as I work for the Aerospace Industry (Airbus, A400M, Eurofighter etc.....)

Enlighten us all

Well in a nutshell the Flemish and the Wallons are battling it out for more autonomy in their regions. The French speakers (Wallonie) are fearing that if the Flemish (Flanders) have more autonomy then their region will become impoverished. One in seven Belgians lives under the poverty line according to a recent study and given the richness of its neighbours, for King Albert 11 this is inacceptable. I guess it's a little bit like the Quebec issue in Canada where the "French Canadians" were looking for independance.

I was wondering whether the issue was being followed in UK and what airtime it was getting.

The Flemish represent about 58% of the population so they are pushing for more autonomy in their region from local power.
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Re: POOR OLD BELGIUM...CHOP IT UP?

Post by Wuppertal »

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Last edited by Wuppertal on Wed Mar 22, 2023 2:11 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: POOR OLD BELGIUM...CHOP IT UP?

Post by CHAZ »

Brussels could become like Washington DC in some respects. Not sure that the French would want to take on their counterparts from Wallonie...bit liek the West germans having to accept the East and we know what happened there. Still worrying times for the country as they try yet again to constitute a Parliament. The king refused his PMs resignation so the poor chap has to start all over again.
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Re: POOR OLD BELGIUM...CHOP IT UP?

Post by Tim_MaA_MidB »

I went to Brussels once, but it was a friend's stag party so I don't remember much apart from it was the first time I ate chips with salad cream/mayonnaise.
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Re: POOR OLD BELGIUM...CHOP IT UP?

Post by Ajarn Philip »

Tim_MaA_MidB wrote:I went to Brussels once, but it was a friend's stag party so I don't remember much apart from it was the first time I ate chips with salad cream/mayonnaise.
I went to Amsterdam once. Can't remember a bloomin' thing!
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Re: POOR OLD BELGIUM...CHOP IT UP?

Post by Wuppertal »

Tim_MaA_MidB wrote:it was the first time I ate chips with salad cream/mayonnaise.
Me too, and I have had mayo with my chips every time since! Going off on a tangent, I was in France recently and I asked for some vinegar with my chips and they looked at me as if I was crazy...then upon asking other people it became apparent that vinegar with chips was a very British thing, I'd always assumed it was everywhere.

Back to topic, Brussels could be an independent country based on EU institutions in the same way as the Vatican is an independent country designed for the Catholic Church.
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Re: POOR OLD BELGIUM...CHOP IT UP?

Post by cstegerlewis »

Interesting state of affairs as it has exisited as a kingdom for a couple of centuries or so....

Not a huge fan of making brussels the EU version of DC, but would agree to it if they stopped going off to Strasbourg every month wasting money :evil: Personally I find Brussels itself one of the better EU capitals for a city break, not too big, quite a lot to do, but some of it is a bit dirty (but significantly cleaner than London)

What are you doing in the Grand Duchy then Chaz? BTW I though you were SG when I was a squit but the dates don't quite stack up, who was before you?
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Re: POOR OLD BELGIUM...CHOP IT UP?

Post by icomefromalanddownunder »

Wuppertal wrote:
Tim_MaA_MidB wrote:it was the first time I ate chips with salad cream/mayonnaise.
Me too, and I have had mayo with my chips every time since! Going off on a tangent, I was in France recently and I asked for some vinegar with my chips and they looked at me as if I was crazy...then upon asking other people it became apparent that vinegar with chips was a very British thing, I'd always assumed it was everywhere.
I have received the same reaction in NZ and Oz.

However, one of our students recently produced some nauseatingly salty wine (we're still not quite sure how he did it), and I had the bright idea of letting it oxidise and then selling it to the Poms as pre-salted vinegar.

Any takers?

xx
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Re: POOR OLD BELGIUM...CHOP IT UP?

Post by CHAZ »

cstegerlewis wrote:Interesting state of affairs as it has exisited as a kingdom for a couple of centuries or so....

Not a huge fan of making brussels the EU version of DC, but would agree to it if they stopped going off to Strasbourg every month wasting money :evil: Personally I find Brussels itself one of the better EU capitals for a city break, not too big, quite a lot to do, but some of it is a bit dirty (but significantly cleaner than London)

What are you doing in the Grand Duchy then Chaz? BTW I though you were SG when I was a squit but the dates don't quite stack up, who was before you?

(Our dates do match as I was SG in Lent and Summer of 1984 so you ywould have been a 3rd former or LE at the time. The guy that followed me for a term was Peter Cunningham for a term.

In the Duchy working for Villeroy&Boch, those fancy saniatary and tableware people. Looking after Asia operations with agents but not as exotic as the stories from Philip in Thailand!)

Back to subject. Yes I agree it's a very manageable city and of course with Brugge just a skip away, makes for a good break.
The amount of money wasted in EU is mond boggling. We have hundreds of Eurocrats strutting around here in Lux too and they have far too generous packages...private schooling for the kids, free housing etc etc :twisted:

The EU topic is worth a debate; pehaps a seperate subject header...
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Re: POOR OLD BELGIUM...CHOP IT UP?

Post by J.R. »

Brussel Sprouts.
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Re: POOR OLD BELGIUM...CHOP IT UP?

Post by jhopgood »

Wuppertal wrote:Purely an impulse idea with no expertise or thought, and easier said than done of course, but what about...

Wallonia becomes part of France, Flanders becomes part of the Netherlands, and Brussels an independent bilingual micro-state, remaining the political centre of Europe.
Having lived in the Netherlands for 4 years, I am not sure that the dutch would be happy to gain Flanders. There is/was already a north/south divide in the Netherlands, they have different customs etc, (North more protestant, south more catholic) and the number of detrimental jokes about the Belgium was legion.
For example, when it snows in Holland they have the roads cleared in about 2 hours. In Belgium, they wait for the thaw.
I played in a football match against a team from Belgium. of the match the British ref commented to me that he had thought that football was about getting the ball in the opponents net, and as a result of which, he missed most of the off the ball violence that went on. For the rest of the tournament, both teams had difficulty getting a full side out.
Good idea but you'd have to go back in history to see why Belgium was created n the first place, something I have not done.
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Re: POOR OLD BELGIUM...CHOP IT UP?

Post by Great Plum »

I've been to Belgium 4 or 5 times, including once for my stag do.

i have always found the Flemish people more friendly than their French counterparts...

As an aside, are the Belgian royal family Dutch or French speaking?
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Re: POOR OLD BELGIUM...CHOP IT UP?

Post by J.R. »

..... and Scotland want complete autonomy.

I rest my case !
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