BELGIUM. Banks and Boogy

BANKS... It's Friday night after work and I'm keen to get some cash out in order to fully enjoy the sites and sounds of "Liege Dance Party: Love is the Answer." However, Citizens Bank had other plans for me. My American, shortsighted bank, in their infinite wisdom has decided to shut off my card in order to "generate a call". For those who don't speak "Bank" let me translate for you. "Generate a call" is code for shutting off a customer's card in order to inconvenience them enough to force an irate call into your customer service center. Rather then contacting them using the myriad of contact information collected by you, their bank, they wait until you contact them in order to ask whatever question drove them to turn your card off in the first place. In my case it took three international calls and almost 2 hours to get a new card dropped in the mail and have my current ATM card turned back on. My call was "generated" because of my replacement ATM card failing to be forwarded causing the question regarding my whereabouts. I was scolded many times by my bank for not informing them of my travel plans. It seems that my itinerary needs to be forwarded to my bank as well as friends and family because, International Travel still holds an aura of mystique for the US Banking system.

While Monday was spent sorting out everything with my home bank, Tuesday was spend getting everything together to open an account in a Dutch bank. ING was the most impressive and most efficient at driving me out of a bank. At the time of the greeting, and finding out I was an English speaking American, was enough to start the grilling process on all of the documentation I would need to open an account followed by the dramatic search for an opening in their appointment book a sigh, and the revelation that there were no openings for a week.

Given this was the fifth country that I'd open a bank account in, I was not naive to the process. I knew the games to play in opening direct deposit accounts abroad. Rule 1: Never admit that you will be leaving the country permanently in a few short months and at which time you will immediately close your account a virtual guarantee that the bank will lose money on you. Rule 2: Use the receptionists to get you an appointment since they don't know that you are a money losing foreigner. Rule 3: Be Prepared.

In the US "Be Prepared" might merely mean brining your drivers license and a few dollars to open the account. Those who try that approach here are ushered out the door in minutes and told to make an appointment for the following week. To be prepared here requires all of the following in order to ensure the account is opened on the first try. Passport, letter from employer documenting your work, utility bills or better yet a lease documenting your address, your work permit, tax/social security number, and if you want to guarantee your success, bank statements from your home bank documenting your assets. If you follow these rules you to can get a bank account in a single day, even in Europe.

BOOGY ... The whole beginning of this saga started as a trip to get out of Maastricht for a weekend and enjoy a little time in Liege, a city that I had passed through on a number of occasions on the train, but had seen only the platform and construction surrounding the station to this point. The Dance Party was an annual event that turned this small city into an open air dance club with 35 rooms and all the same blaring techno.

The event was kicked off as a parade down the shore of the Canalise River. It was a cross between Mardi Gras and a slow moving truck convoy making its way to the city park. The Mardi Gras part meant that people were throwing things at you (in this case instead of beads there were club fliers), and some of them were naked, but that is where the two diverged. The truck convoy refers to the use of 35 Mac trucks to pull the floats. All of which were spewing diesel fumes, foam and water onto onlookers, and the scantily dressed teenage girls who jumped into the streets to follow behind. Our dedication to the event was significant. We stood and watched all 35 trucks go by and even managed to catch a few fliers. When it was over we were confused by a map printed half upside down and instead followed the crowd along the shore back to our hotel and a cool shower.

Walking along this huge roadway you felt a kinship for the many strangely dressed local Belgian teens, families and the rare tourist. When we arrived at the hotel to steal a bit of cool air before heading off to the next round of dancing we spent some time sitting on our tiny balcony watching the goings on below. While the largest part of the parades followers had long left the route and was in the park enjoying the next phase, there seemed to be an endless flow of parade refuges finding their way down the street. It soon became clear why some of them had taken so long to find their way here.

First came "Shopping Cart Guy" whose inventive friends were obviously torn between staying with an unconscious friend or moving down the parade route to enjoy the next wave of activities. His friends had found an ingenious way to achieve both. They had commandeered a shopping cart somewhere up the road and put the unconscious friend into it. Over the course of the journey they had also prevented more litter from building up on the street by piling their empty cans and bottles on his stomach giving the strange appearance of a homeless persons cart in NYC. They continued on, occasionally slapping their friend to ensure he was still with them and finally disappeared out of view.

Only a few moments later "Light Blue shirt guy" came weaving down the far sidewalk - a danger to pedestrians walking near him as he desperately tried to keep his balance. Unfortunately, for Light Blue Shirt Guy balance was not the only issue he was forced to confront with the pants that just would not stay up. It seems that somewhere along the way he had unbuttoned them and had never remembered to reverse the process. So he stopped to pull them up and together, seemingly to address the button issue but the concentration required for such high level function seemed gone. So he would let go again walk three paces until his pants were again around his ankles and then start the process anew. This continued for most of the time he was within view of our balcony seats. Until finally he seemed to get his pants fully under control (we cheered from our balcony seats) only to walk face first into the light pole bouncing of as if made of rubber.

We eventually found the energy to venture out into the quickly cooling evening air to enjoy the rest of the events planned. Now these weren't the most inventive events. Instead of the parade moving by the onlookers, now the parade trucks were parked and the onlookers moved by the parade. Again the music was mostly the same and the flows of people prevented creating enough space for really enjoyable dancing.

At 10pm ... the final phase. Now instead of techno music being played through speakers on a mac truck, techno music would be played from speakers attached to 3 fixed stages, where DJs could showcase their talents with the aid of a huge projection screen behind the stage. We stayed through 1 round of DJs, 3 rounds of frustrating drink lines, and 1 round of dinner lines. There were lines for everything, made only more complex with two forced currency systems that required the purchase of separately issued drink and food tickets with different values and lines. When it was finally time to leave at 11:30pm our nearly 30 year-old bones were aching and muscles were screaming for relief. It was a cool breezy walk back to the hotel were I washed my blackened feet and passed quickly into unconsciousness dreaming of ATM cards and disco balls.