It's good to be a cheesy European tourist - prost!!
Jaimey and I drove to Ghent to meet Steven, a colleague of Jaimey’s and some sort of art historian/film critic. I never get all the credentials on these intellectuals, but I couldn’t imagine a better guide to Ghent. Or perhaps I should call it Gent since we learned it is more of a Flemish than French city. Steven has the uncanny ability of inserting docent-like information into casual conversation. I felt like I was living in the WG Sebald book I’ve been slogging through all summer, replete with dependent clauses, sometimes, Austerlitz said, lasting pages upon end as the thoughts, jamming together like gears of a turn of the century Flemish millhouse, such as the one he visited when last wandering the solitary marshes just south of where he would occasionally summer when the Picardian geese would migrate to the lush forests in southern climes where one could languish long in the fading rays of a Mediterreanean sun. Such like that he spoke, Sebald I mean, not Steven. Steven would interrupt his musings upon Hitchcock, having recently completed a book concerning the directors’ single-set films (which struck me as an arbitrary distinction but this is perhaps why I am not a film critic), with historical insights. For example, “especially in Rear Window as the façade was made in three months by 50 workers, not unlike the former distillery on our left, finished in 1887 in the baroque-gothic post-renaissance, pre-Victorian, pseudo-Eduardian, rococo, pre-Modernist style with flaunted buttresses and enervated gaulicées. OK, so maybe that was some Sebald seeping in. But people talk like that I tell you!
In any event, Steven took us around town. It was quant, lovely, charming, and packed. It was a beautiful Saturday and everyone was out on the main streets and canals. Having not eaten since our Knusper fix that morning, I began to characteristically bitch and moan in a loud whining, nasal voice, not unlike the braying of a donkey, long tethered to a yoke he neither understands nor supports in any spiritual (although in every physical) sense. Well, I mentioned I was hungry anyway. Secretly I was just angling for some beer. My tactics paid off and we were all the better off. We sat in one of those it-would-be-cheesy-if-it-wasn’t-an-incredibly-quaint-medieval-European-town-square restaurants and ordered Croque Monsieurs. Well, that’s what I had anyway. If you want to know what they had, you have to read their damn blogs because I don’t remember. But Steven recommended us some kick ass beers. I think it’s easy to be a Belgian tour guide and to recommend beers. It’s like telling tourists in San Francisco to dress in layers – you’ll always look like a genius! Jaimey sat back after a particularly long sip and said, “See Mark, Paul only takes your to Belgian cafés, with me, you actually go to Belgium.” Paul, I think the gauntlet has been thrown down. Let this also serve notice to other readers with unusual travel plans: you might be able to convince me to accompany you. And, if it’s in Europe you might even get me to drive – a skill Jaimey has honed for nearly two decades.
As the afternoon wore on, and I’m sure we began wearing on Steven’s patience, and the pleasure of his girlfriend’s company awaited him, he wisely and politely bid us adieu, leaving us to wander the streets by ourselves, searching for some item for Jacqueline (that would require more taste than Jaimey and I had) and some amazing beer. Eventually we settled on a place where I had my traditional northern European favorite, steak tartare (the sushi of the Atlantic), and Jaimey had a salad with some incredible cheese wrapped in speck that we both salivated after for the next two days. Naturally, we had some obnoxiously great beer. I took a picture with my cellphone and sent it to a few people who either didn’t receive it or could find no suitably brilliant reply. This happens to me a lot.
Steven recommended that we should return through Brussels as it was shorter. Unfortunately, we later discovered, it’s only shorter if you’re headed to Köln, but not so useful if you’re headed to Düsseldorf. As we were getting gas and deciding to head back to Antwerp, a strange song came on the gas station radio. It started like Werewolf In London – Warren Zevon, but the chorus had Sweet Home Alabama – Lynyrd Skynyrd sampled. Jaimey and I laughed about it as we got back in the car. I have since heard it many many times on the radio. I had only not heard it before because Friday was Michael Jackson’s 50th birthday and everyone was playing the extended 12 minute dance version of Wanna Be Startin’ Something as a tribute. Anyway it turns out this rehashed 70s classic rock scramble is actually All Summer Long – Kid Rock. It figures I’d have to go to Europe to acquaint myself with the latest American popshit. Has anyone in the US heard this song? Why are Europeans so obsessed with sampled old American hits? Heed me now, future rock stars: if you want to make a ton of money get the rights to a slightly off the beaten track 80s hit like say In a Big Country – Big Country or something by Bronski Beat, sample it, and add some mediocre rapper who doesn’t sound angry, and you will have a Number 1 hit all across Europe. You mock or ignore my words at your peril. If you don’t have as much money or fame as you want, you only have yourself to blame – I can only lay out the recipe.
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