Ghent - Belgium
Ghent (Flemish: Gent, French: Gand) was just a small stop on my way from Brussels to Brügge. Since my time was limited and I didn’t book a night, I decided to go for a free walking tour from the Hostel Uppelink. If you’re short in time I absolutely recommend it. I did those kind of tours multiple times and my feeling is that since the guides are payed by tips their motivation to do a great tour is really high. I really enjoyed it this time as well. In the following you’ll see my impressions of Ghent. I really liked this cute little city and hope that I’ll make some more time at the next visit.
St Michael's Bridge.
Love is in the air ;)
Ghent Marriott Hotel.
The toilet of the Designmuseum Gent.
Gravensteen Castle.
Patershol - a really nice neighborhood.
Graffiti Street...
... free for everyone to explore your graffiti skills. Love the idea!
Belfort church.
NTGent - a theater.
Modern architecture, as the guide said, the ugliest part of Ghent ;)
Just a taco restaurant now adays, but a beautiful architecture!
Sint-Michielskerk
By far the longest feature I ever made to a church. Sankt Michael was the first and only church I have ever seen with so many female sculptures. I tried to ask employees of this church but they where not able to tell me the reason for this because their English was almost non existent. Too bad… It sounds weird, but in all my last journeys I was always looking for a nice church to honor my great-grandmother – the last member of my family that really considered herself a Christian and went to church on a regular basis. My parents and I are atheists or I myself would consider myself agnostic. Actually the 90th birthday of my great-grandmother was the last time I attended a mess. Still I found it weird to light a candle below a suffering Jesus and told myself that the next time I see a female in front of those candles I will light up a candle for her. I actually saw one in Maastricht in the Basiliek van Onze Lieve Vrouwe for the very first time, but I was out of coins and did not want to take a candle without paying for it. Ghent gave me the chance to do it. My great-grandmother was a loving lady I looked up to. Being over 90 she still lived in her beloved house and was able to take care of herself. There was this one time we went for a visit and my sister and I where fascinated by the nail polish she had but my mom didn’t want us to put some on our nails. She tricked our mom (well, nowadays I think she might have known but just let us) by painting our nails with transparent nail polish, so my mom wouldn’t notice. Sounds like a small thing, but I was the proudest girl for days and felt so grown up. It was the last time I saw her, because when she died, we were living in Spain. I must have been around 10ish, still I remember her very vividly and will always have a place for her in my heart. Not only having a beautiful angel where I could light up a candle for her, but a church with such a high female representation really made me sentimental but very happy. I know, talking about a religion that is not your is a thin line, so I’ll just leave it with that 😉 In the following you'll have my impressions.
Sint-Michielskerk - not very special from the outside, but at least to me from the inside.
