To wish I lived in the Netherlands (or Belgium)

[lucydogz]

A mildly pissed post here, but I'm just coming to the end of a week's holiday in Belgium/ The Netherlands (in Rotterdam tonight) and would love to live here. Are there any downside s that would cheer me up about returning to the UK? The people here just seem to get everything right. Plus no litter and not much graffiti.

I can feel the racial tension rising as we move towards Sinterklaas. Sigh... This will be our fourth. I'll be glad when we don't have to negotiate it anymore.

You can get to Calais and Dunkerque ferry terminals on public transport from Belgium, Calais is easier, I do it every other weekend as part of work by train, have done it in the past by car, it's now the same cost by train as it is by car using a very fuel efficient car too. I regret the times I've done it by car and I regret my carbon footprint doing it by car. It costs £35/€40 from Brussels to Calais by train, it's a standard price. Both ports of Calais and Dunkerque are actually in France however not Belgium. I don't do university runs, the eldest take the train to the UK or Flixbus via Calais/Dunkerque/Coquelles and sometimes gets tickets Brussels to London for €15, he's never paid more than €50 one way to London. That is cheaper than going from one point in the UK to another for many journeys. It is highly affordable. Eldest has been to far more places than me in Belgium and Netherlands and Germany, every Summer for the past 3 years he's bought an unlimited train pass for Belgium for 25 euro for the month. I think he is challenging himself to go to every municipality in Beligium.

Gastropod Thanks for that - I'll get dh to drive me in one day. He used to work literally up the road from Jack O'Sheas, so I could get him to pop down and bring home cheddar or bacon for me.

Sadly, nothing like that in Evere, or the part of it where he now works anyway.

Life that’s fine if your children can cope with the school system and therefore have time to do that. Mind didn’t as they spend all their time doing homework. Whatever school you choose, the system is basically the same unless you go to a method school of which there were few when my dss were little. You cannot escape the exams in secondary. The traditional approach is rife. The lack of creative subjects in schools is normal. The lack of sympathy for those struggling seems to be the norm (tough, you’ll have to redo the year). Of course there will be those who cope better than others but I am talking about the general system and there is no getting away from that. Great that yours coped. I wish mine had so that I hadn’t had to spend hundreds of hours helping them. I have so many friends, Belgians alike, who say the same thing.

Life How is the eldest? Mine has just finished his MA and is home again, whilst job hunting. Afaik, DFDS don't take foot passengers from Dunkirk, and I do the university run because I want to get out of Belgium and go to bookshops and Sainsbury, and Waitrose if I can get to the one in ds's uni town.

I block book the ferry so it's sub £60 return, and I go and see friends as well, so win win for me.

Ooh yes, customer service here in privately owned shops is ok but is generally pretty bad. I am always taken aback at how helpful people are in shops in the UK.

And here in Auderghem we have plenty of shops shut at lunchtime and on a Monday. ING next to Carrefour closes at lunchtime for a start.

I agree with every word scaryteacher wrote. I did 15 years across BE/NL incl. East Flanders, east cantons, Brussels, Limburg et al. Loved it for many years... But eventually was ground down. Back in the UK my passport expired and I've not renewed... Have no interest to travel again.

Major positive- very glad I had my kids there! Midwife continuity and "private" service.

Scary, will pm you

Great Longtime. How are you doing?

Each to their own Scaryteacher every country has it's good and bad points but (sorry!) I personally think it's a bit unreasonable to judge a country based on whether you can buy the spreadable butter or cut of meat of choice like you get "back home" (to use just a couple of examples). Surely the whole point of living in a new country is to try new and different things and adapt to where you are living; and you never know, you might like some of the new things better! It's all about the attitude you bring to it surely?

Butternut As I said, I've been here since 2006, so the little irritants such as the bank not changing my address til I could prove I'd told the Gemeente (the bank has no right to ask that); the constant omleggings and omleidings that just suddenly spring up; the closing of roads for cycle races, begin to add up.

I think you are misreading deliberately what I'm saying, as the request from the OP was for down sides, so I gave them. Had it been a list of good things then I could have provided one of those as well, but that wasn't the request. If I hadn't 'adapted', then I'd have gone home long ago. There is also a difference between judging and comparing. There are many positives about being here, but they no longer outweigh the desire to move home.

It made me laugh when I walked into Carrefour in Muscat, Oman, to be greeted by Lurpak in the butter aisle. If it can be sold there in Carrefour, why not here...after all it's supposed to be a single market, and Denmark is an EU Member State!!!

Mother Are you forbidden from hanging washing out on a Sunday? We were in Tervuren....not sure on the rules in the current Gemeente.