10 things I'm looking forward to about my upcoming trip to Belgium

True.

I may be cutting back on drinking, but... the beer there is nice.

This is weird: As you may have guessed it, this means "American". It's... raw meat mixed with a raw egg and some herbs or whatever it is they put in it. It doesn't sound safe, does it? For some reason it's a perfectly normal thing. This is also called "tartare" in France and other countries, but it's particularly common in Belgium (often with fries or in a sandwich) and looks a bit different: it's often more orange. When you order it in France at the restaurant, they give you the separate ingredients that you mix yourself. In Belgium, they often prepare it themselves, and the result is an orangey mush.

I'm so grateful for my close friends. I don't actually have a lot of them in my home country, just two or three close friends plus some people I quite like. My best friend now lives in the countryside near the French border, though.

Brussels is not a particularly beautiful city, but I always enjoy seeing the main square.