Today is Belgian National Day. It is July 21, 2008. I wore a turtleneck, raincoat and scarf to the parade. Belgium truly is a summer lover's paradise.Carson took a break from her studies to accompany me to the parade. Thank god she came with me cause the snark just wouldn't have been as fun solely in my head ... I needed someone to share it with.
The Belgian National Day parade consists of, from what we could tell, the entire Belgian military participating in a parade. It took about 10 minutes. No, really, we saw about 45 minutes of the parade, at which time it appeared they decided to divert the parade route down a different road. Who knows? Maybe we were on the French-speaking route and the second half of the parade had to go down the Flemish-speaking route? Good to keep the separation alive, otherwise they might actually form a functioning government!
So what did we see at the military parade? We saw the Belgian Navy's inflatable speed boat. We saw some military planes fly overhead ... which was actually pretty cool ... especially when a few of the fighters let out yellow, red and black exhaust. (Didn't get a picture, you'll have to look at the helicopters ...) 
We saw a dazzling array of military men and women in various colored dickies. I have no idea why, but every order of the Belgian military forces their people to wear a black, white, blue, yellow, white with emblem, etc. dickie.
We also saw some lovely plumed headgear. And because we are everywhere, of course there were was a small American military contigent in the parade. I think someone must have promised them free waffles and frites with real all-American ketchup at the end ... they looked extremely bored. 
After trudging home in the cold and rain from the parade, I cooked a lovely dinner, did laundry and discovered my new favorite TV show. On BBC Two, there is a show called "Dragon's Den." This may be my favorite reality show ever. Every day entrepreneurs pitch their ideas to five self-made multimillionaires looking to invest in new products ... and then the multimillionaires either tear the entrepreneurs to shreds or bid against one another to invest in the idea. This is what The Apprentice should be. Instead of a bunch of Trump-indulgent, marketing-focused "challenges," this is as close to reality as you can get to demonstrating the success or failure of entrepreneurs on TV. LOVE it. And of course, love the blunt British manner of the investors.
The festival was really great. You basically just walk the streets and everytime you turn a corner and come to a new square, there is another stage playing great music. The biggest stage ... sponsored by Pole Pole ... was constructed over the river. Rebecca and I had a few (too many) mojitos and danced for a while by this stage.
