BELGIUM
Brussels and Bruges are as different as night and day. Brussels is a bustling center of international finance, where the ATMs dispense cash in two dozen currencies and one hears every language on earth. Brussels is a modern city in every sense of the word.
Bruges, on the other hand, is still (aside from the ubiquitous chain stores that have sprung up) a world of yesterday. Images I made along the canals match, brick for brick and stone for stone, images by anonymous photographers created in the mid-1800s in the early years of photography. I was charmed by the reflections of the stacked buildings in the canals that are constantly churned into wavy patterns in the wakes of passing boats. The dust of time that coats Bruges carries one back to a time when life was both gentler and more difficult.
Ghent too, is like a movie set from another time. The river and canals flow as they have always flowed, and the pace is the leisurely pace of a relaxed rural village.
