There is a small university town in Belgium called Louvain-la-Neuve (LLN) that I added to my itinerary. Solely to pay my respects at the Hergé Museum 🙂 After all, these are my strange & curious adventures.
Getting to LLN was a bit crazy for me. The German DB dropped me with all punctuality and railway-waffles at Bruxelles South. However at the station I missed the connection for reasons I still cannot fathom. Long story short, after much self-blame and dumbfounded staring on windy platforms, I finally reached the town. It was early May and a cold wind that any tropical person would call ‘an Arctic wind’ swept into my face.
The town is built around the main square, and I was struck by the fact that this entire area has been built on the principles of New Pedestrianism. An ethos that sounds like it sprang from the social-democratic values that are still, thankfully, visible across northern Europe. New Pedestrianism gives priority to low-impact transportation: walking and cycling. Houses are built with easy and scenic access to footpaths. Cars are driven below the ground level with almost camouflaged parking lots. The world needs more of this. Unfortunately the world swings more and more to the other extreme.
LLN is small and it’s pretty. There are apparently other interesting places to visit here and I would have loved to see the student life. The accomodation I took was a self-sufficient apartment very close to the main square. (What more does one want than a bed, a kitchen, a toilet and.. peace and quiet?). It was in one of the Student Project flats, possibly with rent control.
I was beginning to journey into places where capitalism had made inroads. Places where capitalism had also continued to encounter institutions with dreams that were more than simply commercial. Places that I hope survive into the next mutation of our times.
My Little Travel Diary 