My Innate, Old School Grasp of Romance

A burst of sodium orange signals the return to England. My iPod celebrates with a version of Cradle’s Second Nature sung in French – its usual irony clearly intact. Within seconds it is hard to distinguish between the blackness of the Chunnel and the darkened Kent countryside.

I did not achieve frites or a decent croissant while in Brussels. However, as the Eurostar rolls across South East England with the speed of a getaway driver hyped to the gills on dexedrine, the amount of chocolate I was importing made my trip feel like a partial success. The fact it was even bought at the shop previously specified reassured me that Surreal Girl would be pleased to see me when I arrived at St. Pancras.

Of course, as I had promised to buy her a glass of fizz at the station’s champagne bar she already had a good reason to be happy to see me safely return from the continent. Surreal Girl might be my best friend, but if the finest Belgian chocolates and a drink at the world’s longest champagne bar does not demonstrate my innate, old school grasp of romance, I am not sure what does. Not that it takes something similar to woo me. I am wowed by a crème brûlée gelatai or a poke of chips to be shared on the beach at Leigh-on-Sea.

Not Everyone's Idea of Fun

Tomorrow – if I can find my passport – I am leaving England for a few days. It is strictly business. Having dinner with members of the European Parliament and chairing discussions with officials from the European Commission is not everyone's idea of fun. In fact, many people would rather drink their own urine than have to go to Belgium and engage with the politicos of Brussels.

When glancing through a city with an agenda not of your own making, your relationship to it changes. I will be unable to navigate by my usual personal landmarks. There will be no dizzying, childlike glee from a visit to Brüsel, a comic book shop whose range and unstuffy attitude shames the likes of Forbidden Planet. There will be no supping in the history of four generation of the Vossen family along with a beer and the Art Nouveau décor at À la Mort Subite (which I think translates as 'Instant Death'). No half-en-half with Belle Époque temporal refugees at Cirio.

Dislocated from my map of the city, I will look for moments of personal pleasure in the simplest of things. A decent croissant and coffee, successfully finding the shop Surreal Girl wants chocolates from and maybe if I am really lucky, getting some perfect street frites.