Toy Museum

I've been getting some mild ribbing for letting Dan do all the posting on this blog (with a very recent and some past posts by Jenee) but I've also been getting lots of compliments on the quality blog in general. Well, that's all about to change because here's a post from me!

Today is May 1st, which, as we were informed by the Fulbright folks "brings with it two traditions in Belgium and Luxembourg. The first, far older, one is the offering of muguets or meiklokjes to a loved one. Not too long ago children sold huge bouquets for next to nothing and women sometimes received them anonymously, like mysterious Valentines!" Hey! No one bought me any flowers! But, this is quite true. Nearly every other person on my trains yesterday or that I saw about and about today had single flowers, elegantly wrapped.

The second May Day tradition, La Fête du Travail or Arbeidsfeest, "actually had its origin in the United States, where an intensive campaign in favor of the 8‑hour working day was launched on May 1, 1886. The holiday is still celebrated in many countries but has been replaced in America by Labor Day in September." So, it's an official day off. I asked my colleagues in Ghent if BBQ-ing was traditional and they said no, the main thing is to do no work. :-) I couldn't even get into the University today to show my parents around (who are visiting). It's all locked up.

So that explains why I'm blogging today. What am I blogging about? Well, there was one outing last week that Dan did not join in on, so he can't blog on it and that was our visit to the Brussels Toy Museum. You really have to see it to beleive it! (see slideshow, right and maybe up). Jenee was off with her friend Heather so my parents and I took the girls on the bus -> metro -> walking to this hole-in-the-wall museum that was listed as "good for kids" in the Fodors. The exterior was extremely unremarkable. I saw the address but couldn't imagine there was a museum inside.

Turns out it's a very non-American type museum. First, you can touch nearly everything: old plastic things, balls with shoots, riding donkeys (electric and not), toy soldier sets, castles, puppets, play kitchen, etc. etc. While that may sound pretty cool, it also means nearly everything is broken and/or filthy. Even the platform that some of these things were displayed on had nails sticking out, cracks, or were just thin plexiglass. For example, the old-style foosball table was sitting on top of a plexi display case. As a consequence, kids were sitting on the case to play the game. Crazy!

You won't be surprised to learn that the girls had a great time. They rode the donkey, played in the kitchen, and fought with other kids about the ball-and-chute sets (Josephine's French is really improving!). As a parting gift, I bought Josephine a lion-handle jump rope (she's been wanting one) and bought Amelia a lion that, well, how do I describe this? You push a button on the bottom and the thing kind of collapses. Let it go and it stands up again. Remember those? Anyway, very popular gifts courtesy of Mom (i.e., me, not my mom)!

Also, by the time we left I realized we only had to take one tram to get nearly home so that was a bonus.