Tuesday, Brussels.
In the morning we took a train to Brussels and I surprised myself by making it almost the whole way there without having to go. When we arrived we dropped our bags at the hotel (room wasn't ready yet) and I beelined it to a pharmacy next door. I managed to convey to the French-speaking proprietor that I had squirt-ass and he gave me some pills for nausea. Which did nothing to help, by the way.
From there we wandered around and noted, with curiosity, razor wire barricades everywhere. We thought them odd but didn't think too much of them. Anyway, at this point my pledge to eat only what the locals eat was shot right to hell and we stopped by a McDonald's. I wasn't hungry but I knew that I had to choke something - anything - down, and I knew what rotten ronnie's food was like. I didn't manage to choke everything down without having to go again. The attendant (virually all washrooms in Europe have an attendant) ushered me into the women's side. I wasn't about to argue - this was urgent! On the way back to the hotel we stopped for an authentic Belgian waffle from some hole-in-the wall vendor. If you've never had one, you have no idea what you're missing. Go out of your way to find one if you're in Belgium.
We got back to the hotel where I stayed. Nicole explored Brussels all by herself. I was too sick/scared to be more than 3m from a toilet.
Tuesday night I literally soaked the bed and covers with sweat - no lie, I could wring them out. During the night I also started passing blood and I decided that in the morning I had to be hospitalized. I've had food poisoning before, but not like this. In the morning Nicole went down for breakfast and she asked the front desk attendant how to say food poisoning in French. Empoisonement if you're curious. He gave us a map with the location of the nearest hospital, only about 15-20 minutes by foot. We set off about 8:30am and I managed to make it there without having to go. I still don't know how, but I wasn't about to look a gift horse in the mouth.
We went through the nearest door and there happened to be an information desk right there. The lady behind the desk spoke a little English, but she waved down a different lady who spoke much more English than she did. She escorted us to the emergency admission desk and explained to them, in French, what was wrong with me. They took us in no more than 20 minutes later and a parade of doctors and nurses (every one of them female - I've never seen so many women doctors in my life) examined me and got my story. Tiny bits at a time, mind you, because not many of them speak English and I don't speak French so this experience was interesting.
5 hours later and an English speaking intern (perfect English) and another doctor (French only) give me the verdict. It's an extremely severe case of gastroenteritis (blanket term for food poisoning as they didn't know the bacteria responsible just yet), and it's migrated to my bloodstream already. They were surprised I was still able to walk. If we weren't going to be traveling to Amsterdam the following day, they wouldn't have let me go. They prescribed horsepill antibiotics and another pill to relieve squirtass and sent me on my way.
Now it's time to pay. Nicole and I are counting our cash and if it's less than 300 euros we'll pay cash, and if it's more I'll put it on my mastercard. The total? $24.01 euros. Expensive.
So we exit the hospital. This is a totally different side than the one we entered and we're a bit lost, so we just started walking counterclockwise around the hospital, looking for a landmark we recognise. As we're walking we're hearing drums, whistles, horns, and firecrackers. And they're getting louder. Then we round a corner and we're in the midst of all these orange jacket wearing assholes carrying plackards and hollering, blowing whistles and horns, beating drums, and throwing firecrackers. We can't get away from them - they're on the same street we need to take back to our hotel. Then the razor wire made sense. Now accompanied by riot police. And those really cool water cannon armoured tanks.
About a block after joining these people, there's a pharmacy and luckily for us the demonstrators crossed over to the other side of the boulevard just before that. Even more lucky for me, the pharmacist spoke perfect English. Another $33-something euros for the meds and we were off.
We made it back to our street and it's naturally blocked off by razor wire and riot police shoulder-to-shoulder and two deep. Across the street the jackasses with the horns and whistles are now tossing ******* mortars, not firecrackers, and the police are a bit on edge. Our hotel was just the second building in from the corner but we couldn't get to it. So we pulled out our passports and in our best (worst?) French managed to convey to them that 1) we were harmless and 2) we just wanted to get to our hotel. So they let us pass. We found out from the news that night that Brussels had 100,000 protesters from across Europe who were demonstrating their displeasure at government cutbacks.
Thursday we caught our final train to Amsterdam and even though I wasn't 100%, I still managed to enjoy our short time there. Friday we flew back.
A short trip, but the good parts, prior to getting sick greatly outweighed the crappy parts (sitting on a Belgian throne for 2 days straight). Germany was the most fun I've ever had and the locals were the best. If you make an effort to speak German, they'll bend over backwards for you. The beer was the best I've ever had, and if given the chance I'll definitely go again. Oktoberfest was an experience, but it's definitely meant for younger people. Not that 40 year olds aren't welcome, but I just don't have the energy of a 25 year old anymore.
Sorry for the long post. Hope you enjoyed reading about my misadventures! :beer:
