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Article: Seeing Belgium as a destination
- Article from:
- Chicago Sun-Times
- Article date:
- July 28, 1996
- Author:
CopyrightCopyright 1996 Chicago Sun-Times. (Hide copyright information)
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Each time I've been in Belgium I've been en route to someplace else.
Amsterdam, say, or Paris.
Belgium is accustomed to this, to people hurrying through.
"If It's Tuesday It Must Be Belgium," as the movie was titled. That
has been a virtual litany in this land.
It all comes from being so central, from being so small, from
being so . . . well, apologetic. You'd never catch a Frenchman
praising his homeland by pointing out that "it's close to so many
other countries," as a Belgian tourist official noted at dinner one
night.
Tour guides in Belgium are in a constant state of comparison.
The Prime Minister's office in Brussels is "just like 10 Downing
Street in London." (It isn't, ...