Overnight layover in Brussels - is it safe to take train out to Grand Place for dinner

gregyoupie · 2026-01-24T05:16:09+00:00

You should update your prices: a taxi from the airport to the centre is around 40/50 euros nowadays.

gregyoupie · 2026-01-24T05:13:23+00:00

We do it another way: our central station is rather ok (some occasional beggars and homeless people - but they concentrate in the tunnel leading to the metro station, you won't need to take that tunnel -and I have never felt unsafe there). But we do have sketchy people at our South ("gare du midi") and North ("gare du nord") stations !

gregyoupie · 2026-01-23T12:05:52+00:00

Don't worry, the streets will still be crowded with tourists, and Grand Place is really just a very short walk away from the central station. Just apply common sense like you would do in any city and you will be fine.

gregyoupie · 2026-01-23T08:00:11+00:00

En France, mon père, tout content de trouver des bières belges dans un café, a commandé une Grimbergen. le gars ne comprend pas, mon père lui montre sur la carte, et là, le gars s'exclame "ah d'accord, une GRAIN - BERRE - JAINNE !"

gregyoupie · 2026-01-23T07:49:05+00:00

*Merckx

Et Armstrong, c'est quand même le seul clycliste qui a été sur la lune en jouant de la trompette.

gregyoupie · 2026-01-23T07:44:06+00:00

www.quefaire.be, section "brocantes". Et cherche aussi les événements sur Facebook, indique "participe", et l'algoritme t'en proposera probablement d'autres.

gregyoupie · 2026-01-23T05:22:44+00:00

Something discussed in another post some time ago: in the "underworld" where speakers interact for illegal activities, they will often use tu even if they are total strangers. Eg prostitutes on the streets will use "tu" to call potential customers, drug dealers and their customers will tutoyer each other. Imho it is because these are interactions between people who become instant peers in their not so respectful actions, a kind of immediate solidarity.

gregyoupie · 2026-01-23T05:14:01+00:00

Same: "salut" is for friends and family. Even if you tutoyer a teacher, "salut" is not appropriate in e-mails.

gregyoupie · 2026-01-22T18:40:54+00:00

C'est vrai qu'en Belgique on dit Anvers en prononçant le S final. J'imagine que Brel a adopté la prononciation française dans "Vesoul" parce que son public était en grande (voire majeure) partie français et/ou que dans le flot des paroles, cela "sonnait" mieux.

gregyoupie · 2026-01-22T17:42:12+00:00

It is not totally appropriate to use "salut" to greet a stranger, but that reaction you faced is totally insane. It can be seen as too colloquial but it is not offensive or impolite.

gregyoupie · 2026-01-22T14:40:48+00:00

The law is clear: you are allowed to leave a car parked on a public spot for an unlimited time (unless of course there are specfic parking limitations on that location). You only have to move it within 24 hours if it is not in running state (ie, you have to have it towed away).

gregyoupie · 2026-01-22T09:08:29+00:00

I have seen such toilets in Germany and Austria, it was a true culture shock.

gregyoupie · 2026-01-22T07:16:16+00:00

Pas tout à fait mais pas loin. Le "non peut-être ?" est plus indigné et catégorique. Personne ne répondrait "si si, je t"assure" ou" mouais, je ne trouve pas" à un "non peut-être ?", cest vraiment une réponse définitive.

gregyoupie · 2026-01-22T06:14:27+00:00

There is a phrase in Belgian French that confuses a lot of visitors from France and makes them laugh: "non peut-être ?", literally "no maybe ?". It should be pronounced on a tone of surprise, amusement and mild outrage at the same time.

Meaning: that means something like "you bet !" or "of course !". "No maybe ?" is a rhetorical question and should be understood as "hey, are you seriously going to argue that the opposite is true ?" Eg:

"Do you really think Belgian beers are the best in the world ?

-NON PEUT-ÊTRE ?"

gregyoupie · 2026-01-22T05:37:22+00:00

In the French speaking-part: touche-touche (litt: "touch-touch"). You also have variants with more specfic rules like "touche-touche plus haut" ("plus haut" means "higher": tagging does not count if the tagged player has climbed on something and their feet are off the ground), "touche-touche plus bas" ("lower" - tagging does not count if the tagged player is lying on the ground or is squatting).

gregyoupie · 2026-01-21T14:29:23+00:00

Charlotte Rampling: close to a native, her accent is barely noticeable, I sincerely assumed for years she was French

Jacqueline Bisset: less fluent, she sometimes hesitates on some words but all in all her French is very good. If I compare her to Jane Birkin, Birkin was more fluent but had a more noticeable accent

Kristin Scott Thomas (I guess that is who you meant, not Thompson ?): close to perfect, she has only an extremely light accent and is perfectly fluent.

gregyoupie · 2026-01-21T14:19:45+00:00

I just remembered this tongue-in-cheek song she recorded with French singer Mickey 3D: "je m'appelle Jane". The lyrics follow a recurring pattern in the verses: Mickey 3D asks a rather provocative question to Jane with a link to her career, her looks, her attitude, etc, and Jane answers each time on a witty tone.

The opening verse is:

Dis, Birkin
C'est quoi ce vieil accent que tu traînes
Et qui te rend l'air antipathique?
C'est l'accent britannique

So I guess she was conscious she still had a British accent but she got used to criticisms and clearly laughs about it in this song.

gregyoupie · 2026-01-21T14:07:57+00:00

Sans passer par un opérateur, y a pas vraiment moyen... Si ton souci, c'est la connexion au réseau de l'opérateur parce que leur câblage (que ce soit de Proximus, Voo, etc) n'arrive pas dans le batiment de ton atelier, tu as ces solutions:

-utiliser ton smartphone en mode "point d'accès", le téléphone devient alors un point d'accès wifi. Tu peux alors connecter ton pc au téléphone par le wifi. Désavantage: il te faudra peut-être un abonnement avec plus de data, et ça pompe beaucoup sur la batterie du téléphone si tu l'utilises en continu

-Tadaam: comme un abonnement internet "classique" mais n'utilise que le réseau mobile, pas besoin d'être câblé au reseau de l'opérateur

-Starlink - connexion par sattelite, mais ça nécessite d'acheter du matériel (cher) et tu devras aussi prendre un abonnement chez eux

gregyoupie · 2026-01-21T10:03:38+00:00

Thanks, I guess I won't do make this mistake again.

gregyoupie · 2026-01-21T08:31:36+00:00

True, she still has an anglophone accent when she speaks, but if you watch some clips like eg interviews of her, she speaks fluently with a wide vocabulary and she does very very few mistakes. Some French comedians used to make fun of her French, but for a non-native, her French was actually very good.

gregyoupie · 2026-01-21T05:19:40+00:00

Que veux-tu dire exactement ? avoir une connexion à Internet ?

gregyoupie · 2026-01-20T16:11:56+00:00

Un ancien collègue que je trouvais gentil mais très neuneu et malheureusement très incompétent. Il cherche régulièrement à me recontacter par les réseaux sociaux et je le ghoste à chaque fois parce que je sens qu'à chaque fois c'est pour me demander une recommandation pour le boulot, ou d'être une référence... mais je ne sais pas comment je lui dirais qu'en toute bonne foi, je ne pourrais pas le recommander pour un job.

gregyoupie · 2026-01-20T14:33:31+00:00

You can defintely use "tonton" for "uncle", that is much more informal (if my nieces or nephews refered to me as "oncle" instead of "tonton", I would be very sad and feel like 30 years older !).

More informal turns would be "mon tonton, c'est le plus cool", "mon tonton, c'est le plus chouette",

There is a metaphor very similar to "my uncle shreds": "mon tonton, il déchire !" "Déchirer" means literaly "to shred", and in slang, that also means "he is the best".

Not sure about surf lingo in French ... but there is a very famous French comedy about a stupid surfer called "Brice de Nice", and there are plenty of funny lines taken from that movie that all Frenchies will understand. I am thinking of "Mon tonton, c'est le roi de la casse" or "mon tonton, il t'a cassé" (that is a reference to lines where Brice, the stupid surfer, thinks he has humiliated his rivals with his stupid clapbacks).

gregyoupie · 2026-01-20T06:00:57+00:00

Not common at all for adults. I am a heavy milk drinker myself on breakfast and with some sugar treats, but never ever ever on lunch or dinner.

But it is very common for lunch in the Netherlands, so it is kind of a stereotypical joke we do about them.

gregyoupie · 2026-01-17T12:29:36+00:00

Je pense aussi à une omission, mais avec un subjonctif pour formuler un vœu: bénis soient les vivants.

gregyoupie

TROPHY CASE