April 2, 2014 · 6:51 am
- I was randomly in Antwerp last weekend.
- There is in fact no other way to be in Antwerp.
- I have this weird fascination with places that are local tourist attractions, but not quite stellar enough to attract international visitors.
- Antwerp is firmly within that genre. Lovely, but like 53rd on most peoples’ ‘Must See in Europe’ list.
- Not that it matters. I was in a trying-to-finish-an-essay fugue state, and I barely did anything I couldn’t have done at home.
- I got up at five every morning, wrote for like seven hours, then ventured out, ravenous for breakfast and scenery.
- Antwerp has a surplus of both, though if you bike far enough in any direction, it starts to look like True Detective.
- But I sort of like that, how Antwerp goes all ugly at the edges.
- It’s a reminder that European cities, no matter how pretty they are in the center, need cranes and shipping containers and rusty train tracks to keep them that way.
- Antwerp got rich after WWII, it was one of the only ports unbombed during the war. This is where a lot of the Marshall Plan donkeys came in.
- Now the port host a different kind of donkey, tourists like me, our dangling cameras, our insipid questions, our temporary interest.
- I realized as I was on my way to the airport that chatting with my AirBnB host was the longest conversation I had all weekend.
- ‘What are you doing here in Antwerp?’ she asked. ‘As little as possible,’ I replied.
- ‘Well you’re in the right place,’ she said, and handed me the keys.
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