Belgian Waffle in Belgium

While I wait for my boat to come in, I walk about in Antwerp, see sights and eat a waffle. I see that Antwerp is not Kraków owing to many small particulars, and yet, European cities are European cities in ways that American cities will never be—ancience, stone quotient, narrowness of streets—while at the same time, cities are cities in much the same way, and in the future, they will be almost indistinguishable. Their architecture and history are and will be preserved largely in the service of global commerce, especially tourism, with the shops offering more or less the same international brands. The local souvenir shops will vend almost identical T-shirts and key-chains, loving the place with stereotypical graphics and fonts. Better than Disney, but not history. I do not lament this homogenization, this hollowing out, this salting and drying; some preservation is better than no preservation, and modern preservation will be as good as preservation has been. We can at best cherish the past, even only its husks; we cannot live in it. It’s not a bad walk-through, though.

Hmmm, waffle.

Onze-Lieve-Vrouwekathedraal & Rubens Statue
 

OLV or Cathedral of Our Lady
 

Grote Markt/Great Market

Stadhuis/Town Hall

Street View from the Grote Markt