The Journey -The Start

If you were thinking of visiting me in Gent, it's too late, I've gone.

Just before I left I sat in the shop of Jeff the Book, whilst he went off to do some shopping.  Mary came in.  Mary is 65 or 70 years old.  What happened to her husband I don't know.  I assume he either ran off or suicided.  She is a North Country lass, who has lived in Belgium for quite a while and speaks quite good Belgium - at least I assume it's quite good - it's fluent and sounds entirely foreign!!  A while ago she had a stroke.  She now has a limp, and needs a stick to help her walk and she 'forgot' everything.  Things she used to know she has had to re- learn.  Whether this includes her English and Belgian language skills I don't know.  The position now is that she keeps announcing new things that she has learned - like that a definitive history of the Boer War was written by the eldest son of Lord Longford.  Wow!!!  But Mary - nobody else knows that either!!  'But' says Mary 'I used to know that - it's one of the things I've forgotten, and now I know it again.'  Get that.  She can't remember things that she used to know, but she can remember things that she used to know but has forgotten.  In other words, she can remember what she's forgotten!!  No.  I don't get it either.  Funny old world, innit? 

Anyway, she came in, sat down, and started going through all the things that she has recently learned.  Then she said something in Belgian, and was waiting for a reply from me.  I said that I didn't speak Belgian.  She said 'Well, you want to learn!'

Now she might be a 'difficult' person, and I've had to deal with difficult people both professionally and voluntarily, so I know that I can, BUT I have to breathe deeply, and get into the right frame of mind!!  Whereas she just appears, and assumes that you have hours and hours of time set by to listen to her witterings.  So I was bit brusque.

I said that I was pretty much in touch with what I did and did not want to do, and that I didn't want to learn Belgian.  She then gave half a dozen reasons why I SHOULD learn Belgian, and I told her that I gave up doing what I SHOULD do some few years ago, and, as a result, had become a much happier and contented person.  A long silence whilst she looked at me quizzically.

Enter Helen.  The same age as Mary I think.  Helen is married to George, who, when he is not working is generally drunk.  Helen is, as they say, very well spoken, and bubbles over with her news and doings, which I find very interesting, as she and George run a working peniche (a 375 ton barge) with which they deliver cargoes all over Europe.  They've just got back from Avignon, where they had a mishap, and will be stuck in Gent for a week whilst their rudder (or, rather, the rudder of their peniche) is repaired.

Mary then sighed deeply and left, and then Jeff came back.  In the evening I had a lovely meal out - duck.  Then onto a pub.  It's pretty small.  6 is a good crowd.  It is full of all those bits 'n' bobs that look interesting, but you wouldn't necessarily want at home - cases of mounted beetles and locusts on the wall, cinema posters, salt and pepper sets (like 2 slices of bread in a poster and Mickey and Minnie Mouse), Dinky toys etc. etc.  Good beers too.

Anyway, the next day I left Gent, and cruised down the River Leie to Dienze.  The River is very pretty - in a Thamesy sort of way.  Lots of meanders, very smart houses and manicured lawns.  One had some deer in the garden, and another some sheep.  One lawn sported a pair of Milton Keynes style concrete sheep.  On another lawn, laid out as a croquet lawn, there were four live flamingos - did they realise their fate? - and next door there were some peacocks.

One of the advantages of Dienze is that there is a supermarket next to the moorings, so I stocked up with beer.  I also had to get some petrol, and in cycling around found that Dienze has a feature not mentioned in the guide books - windows.  Amsterdam type windows, of the sort behind which sit scantily clad (naughty) young ladies.  The guide book did mention the clarion in the church which leads to sleepless nights.

The next day (Friday) it took us 6 hours to cruise up to Kortrick (a.k.a Courtrai) which last year we did (in reverse, downstream, in the autumn storms) in about 3 hours!! 

The mooring here in Kortrick is pretty ghastly.  It's free, with free water and electricity, but a sewer empties into the river and it pongs a bit.  I've not seen any lumpy bits in the sewerage, but you have to be suspicious in Belgium.  Brussels pours its untreated sewage into a river.  A few years ago, it got so dreadful that they had to make a decision as to what to do.  Result?  They paved over the river to hide it!!  The EuroCzars have now discovered what is going on, and are creating such a fuss that the Brussels Town Council is beginning to think about about a sewage treatment works.  Note the word 'think'.  The immediate problem is that there is no where to put it!!  Anyway, here in Kortrick I've already seen one of our fat, brown, furry, four legged friends - the ones with the beady black eyes - who took no notice of me at all, but merely checked the weather, and trotted back up his drain!! 

I'll wait until Mon or Tue, and then set off again - on to waters new - through Tournai, Cambrai et la France!! 

Toodle pip!!

Bill