My First Trip Abroad since COVID-19 Pandemic

Bruxelles

We landed in Bruxelles.

Manneken Pis, the most famous landmark in Bruxelles:

We were not able to see the classic bronze skin. He was dressed in Easter Day attire. The most interesting part is that the souvenir shop nearby was selling Lukaku’s jersey.

I enjoyed waffles at its birthplace. The menu was in French and I wanted to order the “Trois Chocolats” (which means three kinds of chocolates) waffles. To practice my French, I decided to order in French. My French speaking successfully confused the waiter to the point that he switched to English to communicate😢.

Antwerpen

Museum Aande Stroom (MAS) is located on the banks of the Scheldt River:

There were many strange and funny exhibits:

Some exhibits there were only introduced in Dutch. I could barely understand partial descriptions if there were French versions.

Antwerp has many beautiful restaurants.

A bar with retro style:

A restaurant serving traditional Antwerp food:

Although the restaurants are cute, they did not satisfy my craving for Chinese cuisine.

Amsterdam

On the train from Antwerp to Amsterdam, I saw many beautiful windmills. Not sure if they were still in use. A little incident occurred as the train was delayed. I mistakenly boarded the previous train, which causes a loss of 85 euros😢.

Thanks Yixian Shen for his delicious laoganma noodles! Exactly the comfort food for a Chinese guy (especially a guy who had been eating western food for days).

The city center is filled with canals everywhere. Very beautiful.

This is a combination of toilet and urinal:

I met this installation in the Red Light District. Culture shock😆! (I stand against human trafficking.)