THE BULLETIN
October 2010
10 there to here
Orthodox
Brussels identities from A to Z
Brussels is Belgium’s most devout city: whereas in the rest of the country no more than five percent of the population regularly attends a religious service, in Brussels that figure is fifteen percent. Canadian English teacher Caroline Smilne is one of them: every week she goes to an Orthodox mass twice. “It’s pure fun,” she says
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“I
first came to Brussels for my studies in international politics. These studies provided me with the perfect excuse to get out of Canada. I had been living there all my life, and I was eager to meet new people, in an international environment. Along with forty other students, I stayed in the capital of Europe for an intensive course, including a visit to the EU institutions. Just prior to that, we had spent a week in Paris, and I expected Brussels to be just as pretty. When I arrived here at Midi Station, I couldn’t believe my eyes: so much dirt and so much grubbiness. I couldn’t believe that this was the capital of Europe. It wasn’t as nice as I had expected, but I immediately liked the atmosphere. I found it easy to meet international people in Brussels. My first few weeks here gave me an artificial impression of the city: the European Commission, the Parliament, the Metro, Café Delirium with its hundreds of types of beer. I didn’t get to know the city very well... I saw how people were dressed on Avenue Louise and I imagined that this was how all Belgians dressed. On my second visit to the city, this ‘Spirituality is image was adjusted. Then I bullshit’: Caroline began to wander through Smilne at the Brussels. That way I learned entrance to the what this city is really like. Orthodox church As a Canadian, I am (26 Rue Paul familiar with the sort of Spaak), where she community tensions which attends mass twice exist in Belgium. Quebec a week province will always be separatist but is never going to separate. Where I come from in Vancouver (British Columbia), many people got away with not learning French – I finally studied it at university. It’s just like the francophones in Belgium who hardly learn Dutch. So living in Brussels, where everyone is a polyglot and where no single language takes precedence, is bliss. It’s enormously enriching. Very different from Quebec, where some people refuse to learn the other community’s language. That is also the case in the rest of Belgium, but Brussels, fortunately, has passed that stage: here, it’s the exchange which is important. Brussels is an easy city to live in: affordable, close to everything, low rents. I really like the social atmosphere: not cliquey at all, people are open and want to meet each other. Very different, again, from Paris, which might be more grand and more beautiful, but which is much more difficult to feel at home in. My boyfriend is Parisian, and when we go to visit his
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friends and family, it always strikes me how much stricter the social mechanisms are: you have a clique mentality there. In Brussels I feel completely at ease; in Paris I will always remain an outsider. The only thing that really bothers me about Brussels is the dog shit everywhere. People don’t take care of the city, there’s a lack of respect. Please clean up after yourself! Twice a week, I go to the Orthodox church in Ixelles. I sing there, meet people, and my boyfriend is an acolyte there. It’s an open environment, where everyone is welcome. The Orthodox church in Brussels is very ‘Brussels’, by which I mean very international: mass is read in no less than six languages. The priest is a Belgian of Italian-Greek descent and a polyglot, and the faithful are from every I love the bookshop Nijinski where. Such a multilingual mass can (15 Rue du Page) near Place du take a long time – on Easter they go Châtelain: you’ll always find interesting books there, the on for three to four hours. And you atmosphere’s cosy and they play have to know that usually we spend jazz. I love to sit and read there. the entire mass standing up – the That, to me, is a perfect day. chairs are for old people. But I think Brussels has some lovely it’s pure fun. I was raised in Canada patches of green where you can in a protestant household – when I hang out on sunny days. Right told my parents I was going to join near where I live there are the the Orthodox Church, they thought ponds of Ixelles. I also like the I would end up in a sect. Nothing of Bois de la Cambre, Woluwe Park the kind, of course: the Orthodox and the Royal Park. faith is the purest one there is, and Brussels markets: you’ll find it fits me perfectly. The protestant food from across the globe there. community at home I found moralMy favourites are the Châtelain istic and extreme; as a child it would market on Wednesday and the always give me a bad, clamped-down Midi Market at the weekend. feeling. Later on I would rebel against religion. But one day I had a hangover, and with a friend I walked into an Orthodox church, just for fun. It turned out to be a revelation, a very profound experience. But all this stuff about ‘spirituality’: what bullshit! You know, these people who say ‘I’m a very spiritual person’... How can you isolate that? There is no place for spirituality in orthodoxy: it’s about body and soul together, a holistic approach. And we focus on the good: you won’t see a crucified Christ with us. To me, faith is something entirely natural – I can’t imagine that life would simply stop at death. We all have this urge to live on, to conquer death, so I think death is a step on the way to the next stage.”
In praise of:
Interview by Veerle Devos & Kristof Dams Image by Veerle Devos
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