The Feel Good Way

It’s May 1st. National holiday in Belgium. And you know what that means.

Everyone -and I mean absolutely everyone– is heading to the coast.

I live right on the highway that connects the inland to the seaside. It’s like having a front-row seat to Belgium’s collective decision-making every time the sun decides to show up. And today? The sun is absolutely showing off. Blue sky, nice temperatures, the kind of day that makes Belgians lose their minds and immediately think: beach.

So there they are. Bumper to bumper. Crawling westward at the speed of a very tired snail. All 60 kilometers of Belgian coastline calling to them like a siren song. Never mind that our coast is basically a concrete wall of apartment buildings with beautiful sandy beaches trapped underneath. We don’t care. We see sun, we go to sea.

It’s predictable. And absolutely the last place I want to be today.

So I’m going east. To Antwerp.

I get in the car -top down, obviously, because what’s the point of good weather if you can’t feel it?- and I head in the opposite direction. While the rest of Belgium inches toward the North Sea like lemmings in swimwear, I’m flying down empty roads toward my favorite Flemish city.

I don’t call myself an Antwerpenaar. To the great annoyance of my parents, I refuse the label, even though I was born there. My roots are there — okay, maybe not mine exactly, but my ancestors’. And more importantly: my Boma lived there.

My grandmother was the most significant person in my life when I was growing up. And the older I get, the more I hear her. In a mystical way, yes, but here : literally. I hear her voice. Her cadence. The way she used to explain locations to my mother with that typical Antwerp emphasis on the “wrong” syllables.

Not wrong. Just different.

You can tell who’s from Antwerp by how they pronounce the street names. The emphasis shifts. The vowels stretch or tighten in places that don’t make logical sense unless you were born there. My Boma had that, my mom has it. That unmistakable sound. Naturally, I pronounce it correctly. And I find myself correcting anyone who says it wrong, irritated, as if they’re idiots. 

I spent countless weekends and holidays in Antwerp as a child. I grew up in the countryside, and the city had something magical. The tram. The bustle. The houses packed together, tall and close, like they were guarding secrets. It felt like the center of the world to me back then. Just me and my Grannie.

And honestly? It still does.

Most people have a dream location. You know the ones. A beach apartment with a sea view. A little house in the south of France where the sun always shines and the lavender smells like a postcard. Somewhere warm, somewhere bright, somewhere that screams vacation forever.

Me? I dream of Antwerp. Specifically, I dream of living here. Of wintering in Antwerp. Which, I realize, makes me sound completely unhinged.

But hear me out.

Would I have preferred Buenos Aires? Yes. Or Rome? Absolutely. But in Belgium? Antwerp is the best we’ve got.

I don’t want a sunny balcony overlooking turquoise water. I want a view of the Scheldt on a grey November afternoon. I want to walk through the city in a coat that’s actually necessary, with the wind coming off the river and the streets slick with rain. I want to sit in a brown café with a coffee and a book while the world outside is cold and moody and perfect.

I want the city in winter. When it’s quiet and serious and itself.

I want a buitenverblijf here. A little place to escape to. A second home. A pied-à-terre with character and creaky floors and a window that looks out onto something beautiful. Somewhere I can hear my Boma’s voice in the way people say the street names. Somewhere that feels like home even when it technically isn’t.

Is that weird? Probably. Do I care? Not even a little.

When I arrive, the city is relatively empty. Just locals, mostly. People who actually live here doing their normal Friday things. I find a small coffee shop -one of those places that’s been here forever, where the owner knows everyone’s order before they ask- and sit down with an espresso that costs twice what it should and tastes exactly right.

The Dutch tourists haven’t arrived yet. Or maybe they’ve all gone to the beach too. Maybe today, everyone who would normally flood the city is sitting in traffic heading west, and I’ve accidentally stumbled into the one perfect moment when Antwerp belongs to the people who actually love it.

I open my laptop and start writing. Inspiration flows while I catch fragments of conversation in that unmistakable accent. The one my Boma had. The one my mom still has.

There’s something deeply satisfying about being exactly where you want to be while everyone else is somewhere else. It’s not rebellion. It’s just knowing what you love.

Today I’m going east while everyone else goes west. The city over the sea. The sounds of the city over the sound of the sea.

The coast can keep its crowds. I’ll take my empty streets and my perfectly pronounced syllables.

That, right there, is a delight.