Ieeeeeper!!!

Yes, yes, YES, I have FINALLY gone to Ieper.

Again.

Ieper rocks.

Now, please sit back and relax while we take you on Brennan's Tourism Ride Ltd. Remember to keep your hands inside the ride at all times. Europeans are dangerous. Especially to loud people like me who keep making french jokes which people don't realize are about Quebecios french, and not THE French. My bad. This trip happened on the 22 of October, 2005.




Ieper has an ENORMOUS number of chocolate shops. It should be noted that almost every one of these shops nearly FORCES pieces of Belgian chocolate into your mouth. All the samples you can eat until you literally start bleeding chocolate. This here is a picture of a chocolate fountain. One must constantly remind oneself in situations like this that you're not allowed to bathe in public fountains, no matter how chocolately they are.




This, my friends, is the best Cathedral you wil ever see in Belgium. Well, maybe. It's the nicest one I've ever seen, and all the aaaaammmmmaaaaaazing pictures I have of the inside of the cathedral still gives me the chills like I am actually there. And, no, I'm not going to show you the amazing pictures of the inside. I forbid you to live vicariously through me--at least in this case.
This part of Brennan's Tourism Ride Ltd. only occurs in real time. And I don't do programming, so don't even try and make the obvious pun out of that one.





This is a big mouldy stone with a cross on it. We (My group of friends that went with me to Ieper) played anthropologist for about five minutes trying to decide what it was. Then we debated whether it was ok to touch the green stuff. Then we looked around at the stalls selling t-shirts and jeans for 5€. Then we went into the war museum.





This is the stone carving that was in the enterance to the Flander Fields war museum. I gotta tell ya, it was a heck of way to start off a museum. The quote, in case you can't read it, is by H.G. Wells, and says, "Every intelligent person knew that disaster was impending and knew no way to avoid it."



When you walked into the Ieper museum, you get to take a little randomized card that you put into a telescreen terminal, and it showed you a random person from the War. My guy was a kid named Alfred Caenepeel. I decided that he was too sad looking for me to read on and so I didn't wanted read the rest of his three page mini-biography. Everyone else got war criminals or famous unknown soldiers or other people who sounded cooler than my person. In the war, however, it was painfully obvious that no one was pretty. Most people looked like they had a bad bout with the Ugly Stick. Also, I have just realized that my radomized dude's is rather funny. Can-a-peel??? Yikes. That must have earned him some childhood scarring.






This was the FABULOUS group of people I went with. From the left: Sean, Sarah, Corey, and Maria. They're all absolutely hilarious people and a great bunch to be around. And, best of all, they laugh at all my jokes. How sweet is that???? I have a captive travelling audience. We're probably going to tour again sometime soon. Muhaha. More joking for Brennan. People will laugh. I pay them to do that.



This is a picture of Corey holding one of the cushions in the war Veterans museum which is in an Anglican Church. Comparitively speaking, it's certainly not as nice as St.Maartens/St.Nicholas Church (The Church in the other picture) which caused Sean to make a crack about Anglicans that was CERTAINLY non-ecumenical. I'm attributing this to the fact that Sean is from Notre Dame, the uberest of uber Catholic schools in the US. Also, he's a theology major, so...I think they all make religious cracks like that about other religions they're not studying, I don't know. I'll have to look into it. In other news, the cushion that Corey is holding is one of about a hundred or so that are present in the church, and overall it's really cool to see how many war regiments are represented in the Church. VERY cool.





This was one of the unmarked graves from one of the many cemeteries in and around Ieper. Unfortunately, the best grave site that you can see by train is located 25 kms OUTSIDE of Ieper. Rough. However, the cemeteries here are beautiful. I saw several Canadian graves, and many, many graves that were marked unknown. It was disquieting in a way, but it was certainly one of the better experiences I've had all the same. Generally, graveyards seem to me to be very good places, very calm and very peaceful. If only war hadn't happened. Hm.






And now for something completely different. No, I'm not joking with you, this is an actual waste bin in downtown Ieper. Ieper used to be famous in the Middle Ages for their "Cat Throwing Festival" where they would literally throw cats out their second story windows onto the streets below. The reasoning behind this was that cats would keep the mice at bay (Re: eaten) during the winter months, and that once spring hit and people didn't have to be cooped up inside all the time, POOF! Out the window you go, Fluffy! As we can see in this photo, the good natured citizen is throwing away poor Fluffy into her proper receptacle.

While this festival is still practiced in Ieper, they now use stuffed cat dolls instead of real cats. I suppose there's a reason behind this. We may never know.



And, that, good friends, was a short-ish tour through Ieper. I recommend you go there, visit the war museum, buy some expensive chocolate, listen to the Last Post at Menin Gate (Which I unfotunately don't have pictures of, sorry) and visit the Cathedral. All in all, it was a very good use of my travel money.

I have more stories, but I will save them for later. Keep on rockin'.