OUR FIRST STOP in Belgium was Antwerp, known as the capital of the world's diamond trade. No, I did not go shopping for diamonds there, and we didn't even visit the Diamond Museum.
A local guide led our walking tour. From the ship, we walked into the city, through the Red Light District. Everything was legal there. The women were on display in their spaces. Police patrolled the area and there was even a doctor's clinic for medical and psychiatric help. "Sleaze" was minimized and it seemed to be all business. We had also visited the Red Light District in Amsterdam, and it was the same sort of thing - women displayed in their show rooms, and everything transactional. We were not allowed to take pictures of the Red Light District in Antwerp.
We had read that the seventeenth-century Flemish artist, Peter Paul Rubens, had paintings on display at the Cathedral and so we spent some time there.
The Rubens in the Cathedral of Our Lady were the: the Raising of the Cross, the Resurrection of Christ, Descent from the Cross, and the Assumption of Mary.
It is amazing to me to find these great paintings hanging on church walls, accessible to all who care to visit the church.
Right outside the Cathedral was an interesting statue of a sleeping boy and dog (Nello and Patrasche). Despite the whimsical quality of the statue, it depicts the sad story by Marie Louise de La Ramee in 1872 of a Flemish boy and his dog who were homeless and froze to death on Christmas Eve in front of Rubens altarpiece. Pretty grim. The Japanese readers apparently love this story more than the Flemish do.
Here are more pictures taken at Antwerp.
Stay tuned for more writeups about our River Cruise to the Netherlands and Belgium.
Read also:
River Cruise of the Netherlands and Belgium - Bruge or Brugge
River Cruise of the Netherlands and Belgium - Bruge or Brugge
River Cruise of the Netherlands and Belgium - Hoorn and Arnhem
River Cruise of the Netherlands and Belgium - Amsterdam Canals
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Tags: #rivercruise #europeanrivercruise #Amsterdamcanal #Europeantravel #Europeanholiday
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