The Fat Lady Sang

For the past two weekends in a row Andrew and I have actually been in Brussels. This has been a welcome change from the massive amount of traveling we've done so far in 2008. I figured it out the other day, and at least once a month since December we've made an international flight (Impressive, but not mind-boggling, when you consider that you literally cannot take a domestic flight in Belgium -- the country is too small... You can drive across it in under three hours).

In addition to alleviating my guilt at our carbon footprint, letting our bank account climb (sort of) out of the red, and giving us a well-needed rest, sticking around Brussels has allowed us to explore our city a little more. Contrary to what some people might think, I don't do a lot of swanning around Brussels during the week. Mostly I'm glued to my computer, staring out at my square, procrastinating, and occasionally writing something down. Anyway, the weekends are a nice break from all of that.

So, last weekend we experienced a frenzy of culture. .. We went to a play on Saturday afternoon, then hit the Couleur Café, which was a huge outdoor weekend-long festival of world music on Saturday night and went to the opera on Sunday. Madness.

I was quite excited about the opera -- Years ago when I was in Australia I'd seen a performance at the Sydney Opera House. While the venue was very cool and I had felt very sophisticated, my enjoyment had been hampered by a number of factors. Firstly, I was backpacking across Australia at the time and had nothing nice to wear. I ended up improvising a skirt out of a sarong and tugging it down all night so that it concealed my bright green flip flops.

The other problem was that the opera was Romeo and Juliet and I HATE that story. I hate it because I know how it ends, and from the story's first words I am just waiting for Romeo to drink the damn poison and Juliet to stab herself. It's funny, but I don't feel that way about other books/movies/plays that I've read/watched many times. I mean, I've read Pride and Prejudice and Jane Eyre easily ten times, I've watched Dirty Dancing more than once and I have seen the Anne of Green Gables musical so many times I can sing every single song, from the chirpy "Where is Matthew Going" number when he rides off in his buggy to pick up his "boy" orphan to the heart-wrenching "I Can't Find the Words" that Marilla sings to Matthew's empty (sob) chair. Anyhoots, I can stand repeats, is what I'm saying, but for some reason Romeo and Juliet just drives me bonkers... The whole time I sit there watching the play-movie-opera version, I am thinking "Die already, die!!!!."

The other reason I'm not a fan of Romeo and Juliet is because of my traumatic experience as the First Night Watchman in Massey Vanier High School's production of the play. That experience can be saved for another blog entry, therapy, or any time I've had one too many glasses of wine.

So, first opera experience, wasn't the best, but then Andrew and I went to see a couple of popular ones in Ottawa -- La Bohème and Carmen and I really enjoyed them. You know, lots of catchy tunes, fun costumes. Good times.

Ever since moving here I've been sporadically trying to get us tickets to the opera. Brussels Opera House is called La Monnaie and it's what you imagine an opera house should look like -- lots of red velvet, gilt, brocade and crystal chandeliers every time you turn around. It's got an interesting history of its own, because the Belgian Revolution (and yes, there was one) began amongst the audience of a play there in August, 1830. The Belgians got riled up by the performance, took to the streets and eventually kicked their Dutch overlords out. Anyway, I managed to secure us tickets to the very last performance of the season.

It was a matinee, so Andrew and I were a little uncertain how to dress. We didn't want to go too glitzy, because we didn't think sequins and tails were called for, but we didn't want to look like bums (i.e. wearing improvised beachwear) so I settled on a red-checked summery skirt and top, and Andrew went for a shirt and pants that were nice without being over-dressed... I didn't notice until we were actually half way to the Opera and could not turn back that we had ended up looking like one of those weirdly synchronized couples.

I made Andrew pose for this when we got back:

We're such dorks

(And no, before anyone --mum, Cait's friend Brenda-- gets excited, I'm not pregnant in this photo. My hand is like that because I'm trying to keep my wrap-around shirt thing wrapped.)

Also, for the record, I put my on red-checked skirt BEFORE Andrew put his red-checked shirt on, so despite what everyone might think, I am obviously the style-leader in our relationship.

Now, back to the opera itself. We saw the La Forza Del Destina, by Verdi. It was good, but didn't have any of the crowd pleasing numbers that Opera idiots (i.e. me) need in order to really engage with it. I have to say that my mind wandered and I spent a fair amount of time reading the Dutch sub-titles projected on the screen and trying to figure out what they meant before turning to the French. This lack of attention did lead to some issues... Turns out the whole plot hinges on the first scene, in which the very large, middle-aged "girl" tries to elope with her very large, middle aged lover, but gets stopped by her very large, middle-aged-but wearing-a-bad-white-wig father, who is waving a gun. The lover pulls out a gun and the two face off until the lover dramatically throws his down, saying he can't kill the girl's father, only to have his gun misfire and, well, kill the girl's father.

Unfortunately, I was conducting a self-imposed eye exam at that point, because I had noticed, whilst reading the subtitles, that my left eye seemed weaker than the right. So, while the all-important action was taking place before me, I was covering up alternative eyes and squinting at the sub-titles, trying to decide if I needed to change my glasses prescription. Anyway to make a long story short, thanks to my important opthamalogical research I missed the crucial accident-scene and had to lean over and loudly ask Andrew above the bellowing singing, who had killed the father. Needless to say, the extremely keen opera buff sitting next to me did not appreciate my question (or my eye exam) and shot me a murderous look.

The fact that Andrew and I appeared to be wearing matching red gingham uniforms probably did nothing to bolster my credibility as a serious opera fan... The guy probably thought we were employees from the nearby Hector Chicken franchise, who had snuck over on a (3 hour long) smoke break.