Guess Who's Coming For Dinner Tonight?

OK, the title of this post is not great, but this is what I thought when I saw this picture in my album. This is the Rancor, a creature that we see in Star Wars – Episode VI: Return of the Jedi, which wants to eat Luke Skywalker, sent to death by the sluggy-shaped Jabba the Hutt (Tatooine's greatest gangsta). In fact, this is the puppet which was used to shoot the seen: it's only 30 cm high!
I saw this puppet at a Star Wars exhibition in Paris: yes, once again, I went to Paris, but just in the suburbs. It was round the beginning of March, I think. You won't get other picture, because I find them terrible: fearing not to have enough power in my batteries, I had switched off the flash, so that my pictures were ruined, in the end. This one is just correct. But going to Paris, that is to say 500 km from my home, was worth the trip, because my family and I saw many actual suits used in the 6 films (Darth Vader, Amidala, the Wookies, R2D2, Anakin, Jango Fett, etc.) and many other stage properties.

L'Aile ou la cuisse

This is one of my favourite movies, which means that it's quite unusual, because I usually loathe French movies. But some of those with Louis De Funès were really good. In this one, he plays the role of the Chief Editor of the Guide Duchemin (instead of the famous Guide Michelin) who goes himself testing the restaurants in order to give marks for his guide. This one satirizes the typical French provincial restaurant. Enjoy!


— The toilets, please.
— Au fond du couloir à gauche. Suivez les mouches.

Another Day of Great Fun in Brussels

I see that the time goes by pretty fast: we are, with this picture, in January 2006, in Brussels. We were on another school trip (don't assume that we were always doing it: it was only once in a blue moon, but I talk about that here because it was special) whose goal was to see the exhibition "Made in Belgium" for the 175th anniversary of the independence of Belgium.
In the morning, we took the train in Verviers (the nearest station): we were 150 students and a dozen of teachers. An hour later, we arrived in Brussels Central and we walked to the Grand-Place, where a man (a retired one) took care of us: he was going to show us the most famous places of Brussels—strange that some of us had never ever come to Brussels… We went in front of the Manneken Pis (hence the photo) and walk towards the Royal Palace (how original), then the Royal Library, and back to the Grand-Place. Pretty boring when you have already seen that 100 times.

But wait a minute… This sightseeing took place two years before, when I was in 4th year… Oops. Actually, on 13 January 2006, we didn't get any sightseeing, but we went directly to the exhibition. Fortunately, I was in the last part of the group, and I was staying close to M. Kuta, our History teacher, one of the most funny guys I know: that's him on the picture. Instead of looking carefully at the things exposed to our eyes about the history of Belgium, the books, the medals, the suits, the statues, the pictures, the paintings, etc., we couldn't help criticizing everything and make silly comments about whatever we saw. For example, we were talking about the building of the Caroline Europe, with Charlemagne dividing his kingdom between his four (!) sons: John, Ringo, Paul and George.
Later, we arrived in the Hall of Inventions, where we found this splendid ancient engine in front of which M. Kuta stands on the picture. We were kidding by saying that it was his first car's engine. At school, he was talking of his car being a Kutamobile or Fardier de Kuta (after the name of the first steam engine), and we tought it had to be precesely that. We also found his first wheels, as you can see.

Then, we had a one-and-a-half-hour (?) break during which we could do whatever we wanted (except from robbing a bank or something mischievous), so I decided to walk towards the Friterie Jourdan, a chip-shop. (Crap! I can't even find a picture of this worldly-famous institution on Google!) That is to say that, from the Grand-Place, we had to walk for 2,5 km in order to get our fries, and back again to the Grand-Place: another 2,5 km! We did it within an hour! (Needless to say that we walked really fast.) But it was worth the effort: those fries were my favourites at that time (now, I've definitely found better).

In the afternoon, we had to see another exhibition about Russian paintings in the beginning of the 20th century in the Beaux-Arts/Bozart Museum. Pretty boring. I was still with M. Kuta, but due to the guide's presence, we didn't dare saying silly comments (even though there was enough material for doing so).

Afterwards, we had another bunch of free-time, so we went walking not too far from the Grand-Place, and I remember having been to the Quick to eat (yes, I have a healthy life). We took the train in Brussels Central Station round 7 pm and we went back to Verviers. No one was injuried during this trip.

Never Defy The Train-Crossing Redlights

This should be shown to people who learn how to drive.



I'm sure the train didn't get any scratch or anything.
Always wear a high visibility jacket: that's the message

Annual Visit in Brussels

Each year, my parents, my brother and I go to Brussels just to have a walk. Our tour starts with a cup of coffie on the Place des Palais, just in front of the Royal Palace, where there's a huge Christmas tree coming from Norway or something like that—it's sad to think that these trees are 60 or 80 years old, had overlived the War and end up to be cut and (what a glorious end) be shown to thousands of indifferent citizens.
Then, our tour brings us to the Grand-Place, the most beautiful in the world, as they say.There again, you find a giant Christmas tree and also a living barn with real sheep. We walk along the famous statue of de T'serclaes (you'll get to see a picture of it with several of my English teachers in a later post) and we continue up to Brussel's most famous statue(tte): the Manneken pis. Usually, the statue is bare, but sometimes it wears specially designed costumes (e.g. Santa Claus). And everytime I go in front of the Mannekenpis, I have to take a picture of it, just like that. So, you'll get to see other pictures that look exactly the same. By the way, a couple of weeks ago, Mr Bean came to Brussel for the advertising campaing of his new film (where he makes fun of those frog-eaters Frenchies), and of course photographers were there to immortalize this moment.

Jeremy Clarkson's Best Of Destruction

Jeremy Clarkson is a holy man: he does to cars what we're longing to do!!!
Warning! Before watching this hell of a video, go to the toilet, otherwise you'll do in your pants.



Oh! It's already finished?! I want more of it! I have a thirst for car destruction now…

Who Would Like To Crush A Lada?

A Lada is THE example (should I say: the epitomé?) of a crappy car. Check this out:


Another crappy car, which we can see by the way in Die Hard III, is the Yugo:


This Jeremy Clarkson is a genius, and also probably a maniac (like Benjamin).

PS. The other day, I was making fun of cats. Click on the link "Batman Returns" on the left of this blog (section Favourite Films) to see what happens to a cat if it gets to close to a penguin. Check out the sound (or screem) it shouts: universal, isn't it?

Goodmorning, Middelkerke!

We used to have a week of holiday on the first week of November. It's no more, because the "great" university wits think that we don't need these those days off. Enough criticism for now. As I was just saying, we used to go spending one day or two at the seaside in a really small flat of Middelkerke that my uncle (the minigolf freak) had rented from a guy that he knows, M. Haverlant. This time, I think I was with my parents and my brother, and we got up so early that we managed to watch the sun going up on West Vlaanderen. Nice, isn't it? Normally I should go back to the seaside one day during the Easter (so-called)break, just the time to take a deep breath of the coastal air, eat a half chicken, walk and go back to where I live, a village where it never snows and where Dutch farmers throw their manure… (Poetic).

Why Don't We Take A Revenge On Cats?

Once again, as I found these gems on YouTube, I wanted to share it with you. These are other commercials that were parodied. These spoofs by Les Nuls are about those "useless-cats-that-don't-do-anything". You find the French transcription and the English translation.

Le coup de pied au cul… // The ass-whipping

Pour les chats qui en ont jusque là des pâtés pour chats, Fido a créé le coup de pied au cul. Miaaaaaaaawwwwwww!!!!. Et voilà le travail. Le coup de pied au cul : goûté et approuvé.

For cats that are fed up with cat food, Fido developed the ass-whipping. Miaaaaaaaawwwwwww!!!!! And that's it. Ass-whipping : tasted and approved.

Kwiskas - Message du CCC (Comité Contre les Chats) // Kwiskas - Message from the ACC (Anti-Cats Comity)

Votre chaton est plein de vie, et ça, Kwiskas l'a compris. C'est pour ça que Kwiskas chaton est plein des bonnes choses qui sont bonnes pour votre chaton qu'est plein de vie. Ça a l'air dégueulasse comme ça à première vue, mais c'est plein de bonnes choses qu'on peut pas comprendre, nous, humains. Mais si on leur demandait, aux chats, les chats, ils achèteraient Kwiskas : ils se lèveraient sur leurs petites pattes, ils se bougeraient le cul et ils iraient acheter du Kwiskas. Au lieu de ça, les chats, ils dépensent leur pognon au baby-foot, ils passent leur temps à fumer des pétards et à grimper au platond. (Miiiaiaiaaaiaawwwww !!!!!!!) Les chats, c'est vraiment des branleurs. C'était un communiqué du CCC (le Comité Contre les chats).

Le Chat machine (washing powder)

Parce que la nature est belle, le nouveau Le Chat machine contribue à une meilleure protection de l'environnement.
Encore moins de les phosphates (sic) ,encore moins de la lessive : le nouveau Le Chat machine, c'est rien que du naturel. (Miaaaiaaiiiiwwiiiiaaaiiiiuuuwwwww!!!!!!!!!!!!!)
La preuve : … aïe !
N'oubliez pas de faire bouillir votre chat. C'était un conseil du CCC (le Comité Contre les Chats)

As nature is beautiful, the new Le Chat machine helps getting a better protection of the environment.
Even less of the phosphate, even less of washing powder : the new Le Chat machine, it's 100% natural. (Miaaaiaaiiiiwwiiiiaaaiiiiuuuwwwww!!!!!!!!!!!!!)
Let's show evidence of it: … aw!
Don't forget to boil your cat. It was a piece of advice given by the CCC (Comité Contre les Chats)

Disgusting, Wretched Pidgeons of Paris

I know I already said that I went to Paris in April 2005 with the school, but I went there again in August. Apart from being a special trip during the holiday, this would give the opportunity for me to show to my family a shop not so far away from Notre-Dame, a real "Cave of Ali-Baba" (if this rings a bell, because I don't know if this idiom is correct) in which you find all sorts of collectibles over Star Wars, the Lord of the Rings, comics, mini-figures, books, cards, etc.
Anyway, our day started by the visit of the Arche de la Défense, a huge square building with a hollow in it (google it). As we were having a break, eating bread, pidgeons came to us, begging us to give them some of our food. They were so wretched that I couldn't resist. And I took these pictures, where you can see some of the most ugly pidgeons in the world. (I know, it's silly to take photographs of that, but still.)

Gamel Trophy

Les Nuls were a group of 3 French comedians (Alain Chabat, Dominique Farrugia and Chantal Lauby) who had a TV-show with each week a special guest. In that program, you had several sketches which made fun of the news, of other programs or of ads. One of these parodies is this one, "Gamel Trophy" instead of "Camel Trophy". "Gamel" refers to se prendre une gamelle, which means "to come a cropper". Here's the video, and you find the transcription below.

Chaque année, des hommes avec des grosses voitures partent à fond les bananes sans prendre de carte routière.
Résultat : ils prennent les routes les plus mal entretenues et se plantent comme des grosses otaries bourrées à la bière.
Ensuite, ils sont comme des cons avec la bagnole en rade et les sacs de couchage tout trempés.
Et une fois qu'ils ont fabriqué un pont à peu près correct, ils reprennent un chemin pourri, comme s'ils cherchaient volontairement à se prendre une gamelle.
Ces crétins-là, ils existent, ils sont plusieurs, et en plus, ils se réunissent pour faire une course.
Le Gamel Trophée : pour les crétins qui aiment bien se prendre des gamelles.

Each year, men with big cars go riding fast and furious without taking care of bringing a road map.
Result: they take the most badly-kept roads and crash like fat, beer-plastered sea lions.
Then, they look like jerks with an out-of-order car and soaked sleeping bags.
And once they've built somewhat of a bridge, they take once again a crappy path, as though they voluntarily wanted to come a cropper.
These nerds, they exist, they are several, and besides, they gather to take part of a race.
The Cropper Trophy: for nerds who like to come a cropper.

21 July 2005 in Brussels: The Atomium

As of 2004, we decided to go to Brussels every 21 July. And so, in 2005, we were back. The day usually starts with the going to Brussels with the car (about 75 minutes), then we stop not far away from the Atomium in order to buy fries at the well-known chip-shop (or as we say in Belgium "fritkot"). The fact is that you've got to be there at 11.30, otherwise there's a queue of 30 people (quite often Chinese or Italians) waiting for their "authentic Belgian fries". The best part of it is that we eat in the car, while seeing ravens which come, hoping that we give them something—if not, they eat trash from the chip-shop.
As to the Atomium, it was still being repaired in 2005, but the next year, it'll be brand new, as you will see in a next post. A mending was highly necessary for this (other) Iron Lady of 1958.

Ace Ventura: World's Best Driver

Man, I wanna sit next to Ace Ventura (Jim Carrey) in this car…

Why don't we learn how to park this way during the driving licence classes? It would be sooo much easier…
Notice that Ace sings "Bang-Bang, Chitty-Chitty Bang-Bang", whereas in the French version, he says: "C'est ma belle toto vroum-vroum, c'est ma belle toto vroum-vroum ! C'eeeeeeeest maaaaaaaaaaaaaa baaagnooooooooooole !" ("toto" is the diminutive and puerile form for "auto"-mobile).

Fort Boyard

While we were in the North-West of France, we decided to go to La Rochelle, and more particularily the little town of Fourras, where a company organises trips to go round the well-known Fort Boyard. It was really interesting to see for real something that you saw about 100 times on TV. When you are close to it, you recognize those places where the candidates dive in the water, etc., or you can figure out the size of this peculiar building on the sea, which was meant to be a marine defensive point in the time of Napoléon's.
On the left of the picture, you have the "dark side of the Fort" (because you never see it on telly, with a platform where the candidates and filming crew arrive.

Harry Potter is Luke and Voldemort is Vader???

When things get mixed up – and in this case Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire with voices from Star Wars – Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back – you get little gems like this:

Le Mont-Saint-Michel

In July 2005, my parents, my brother and I went to the North-West side of France, just to see how it looked like. So we went to see the beaches of Omaha, etc., then to the West. We arrived at this well-known place, the Mont-Saint-Michel, an island (sort of) on which a monastry is set, in addition to thousands of shops for tourists coming from all over the world in order to see this curious city which gave the inspiration for the visual look of Minas Tirith in The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King.

JAADTOLY (J'Aime Autant De T'Ouvrir Les Yeux)

Frederic Jannin and Stefan Liberski are two Belgian comedians who make sketches like this one:

Or this one:

(Nondedjeu !)
Silly, wasn't it?

Help This Man!

Oh no! A skydiver is hanged on a church… But… Wait! He's got an old American uniform… A G.I.? In France, in Sainte-Mère-l'Eglise?
No, of course. This is just a fake one. This is a reference to what happened on 6 June, 1945: the American forces started their invasion (I think it is) of Normandy in order to kick the German's asses out of France. Skydivers were part of the "show", and one of them, probably blind, didn't manage to avoid the church—there was room everywhere, but still. Being hung there during the whole fight, this soldier became deaf due to the ringing bells (I'm not sure this word is appropriate). This anecdote was reported in the film The Longest Day, with (among others) John Wayne, Sean Connery… and Bourvil (for the local colour).

My Uncle, Great (Mini)Golfer

Once again a photograph taken on holiday, in Westende. This is (again) my uncle posing as a specialist of minigolf. Usually, when my uncle, my brother and I go and have a game of minigolf, my brother wins the first holes, but gets 7 points for the other, so that he always loses—and my uncle wins, of course. This minigolf of the center of Westende is quite good, in comparison with that in Oostende, in the park, where the little houses have burnt or are movable, or the holes are filled with grass, etc. Anyway, it's always great fun to go to a minigolf with my uncle.

The Black Knight Gets A Twist

In the movie The Holy Grail, the Monty Pythons make fun of the Arturian motif, hence this legendary fight between the King of the Britons and the Black Knight—source of this famous sentence that we keep saying in Namur: None shall pass!.




And this is the same sketch but the Black Knight's line have been replaced by dialogues spoken by Darth Vader… And the sound effects and the music.

Star Wars in… Walloon?!?

Ah! YouTube! Never out of silly things like these famous scenes, dubbed in Walloon! It seems awkward, but this is a perfect translation of the original text—even if it's a little bit more humorous, but don't forget that the Walloon are cheerful and like laughing.
Scene I (from: Star Wars - Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back): I am your father = Dji so to pa


Here's an approximative transcription of the Walloon text:

Vador : Tu n'pou nin vayer vôye. Ni m'tchouk nîn. Dji'n vou nîn t'maquer. Luke, tu n'séé nîn co t'es un'as. Ti c'mînce to juss' ) save si-k-ti pou fê. Dimîn avou mi, et d'ja termin'rai ta formatiauuu. Et quand on s'ra tous les deu, (??????), et ce s'ra un'pay, del' nouvel galaxie.

Luke : Soula t'est pou'l'rovî !

Vador : Si seulmînt tu (???) lé nwèr côté del'fwess. Obi-Wan ni t'a rîn dit de c'qu'il est arrivé à ton poupa.

Luke : Ah d'ji'l'sais bien… Vo l'avez maqué to dreu…

Vador : Nauu. D'ji seu t'poupa.

Luke : Noo. Nauu. C'est nîn possip' ! C'est-s-t'une boûûte !

Vador : Puiske d'ji te'l'dis, d'ji va nîn fé l'bièss !

Luke : Noooo ! Nooooooooooooooon!

Vador : Luke, ti peux pitter l'emp'reur fou, il sééé bîn. C'est-s-crie. Va avou mi, et nous s'rons les plus fwèr di vîn l'galaxie… Comme i poupa et son p'tit gamîn.


Scene II (from Star Wars - Episode IV: A New Hope):


I'm gonna try and transcribe it, and put the original (English) version with it (so that you understand it…) later on (takes time, you know).

PS. It seems that I will not be able to post a picture and a comment on it: Blogger refuses so. Curious… I guess you gonna have to wait.

The Monty Python's Silly Walk

The title is self-explanatory, isn't it? Or shall we just watch the video…?


They're brilliant!

My Brother Buys My Uncle A Drink (Extraordinary)

My brother is pretty cheap. So, when he finally decides to (generously) buy us a drink after we accomplished a 10-kilometres walk, I decided to immortalize that event. In fact, he had just enough coins to buy a drink to me and to himself, and not my uncle… Hence the ironic comments…

The Jawas Strike Back

On YouTube (again), you can find wonderful videos made by genius, who make such editings as what you're about to watch. Here, it's a mix between Indiana Jones and the Lost Ark and Star Wars - Episode IV: A New Hope. You shouldn't mess with Jawas (little droid and junk sellers of Tatooine), if not they're going to bump you in…


Wasn't it wonderful? (It's even better if you know the movies…)

My Uncle's Car

If you walk around in Oostende, when you're on vacation, you're likely to see some expensive cars (don't forget that we're in Flanders, the richest part of Belgium—even though I must admit that rich Walloons do exist) like this red Ferrari. My uncle was fascinated by this car, of which the number plate was VDW-333, for which the owner had paid 620€… Unfortunately, there was a big hole in the body of the car, on the left side: maybe the owner couldn't drive very well, so that it was badly damaged. Unlucky.
Anyway, my uncle's car (back in that time, because now he's got a Berlingot) was fine: a Seat Toledo, a car with which he rode 400,000 kilometres!

Arrival at the Seaside

As I come from Liège, we've got to take the freeway and ride for two hours and a half to get to the coast. When the freeway ends in Oostende, with the famous John Kennedy roundabout, you still have to ride a few more kilometres to Mariakerke, and then you can see the sea, at last! Usually, on this road which links Mariakerke to Middelkerke, you have wormen that repair the rails for the tramway or anything else. If you take the same way when you are riding your bike, you're likely to be blown away due to the wind coming from the sea or caused by the speeding tramways… So, if you're planning to go to Oostende or Middelkerke, just do it only if the wind is with you; otherwise just stay home.
Apart from that, when riding on this road, you pass along the Prins Karels Koninklijk Domein, in Raversijde, a old military domain that was taken (like Belgium…) during the Second World War by the Germans to shoot the English ships… Interesting to visit, if you have two hours to spend. And it's even better if my uncle is around to make (silly) comments.

My Brother Wants to Smash Félix

When you get bored, you can do all sorts of things (like spying on the naked teachers in Paris). This time, during the Easter holiday in 2005, my bro (Robin) and I were outside, for no reason. In the garden comes pretty often Félix, the cat of our German neighbour. This cat likes hunting the birds, but we don't let us killing those creatures. And if Félix disobeys us, we know how to chatise him: you just throw a big stone on him so that he faces reality… Crual, this photograph? No, because my brother never threw a stone on Félix. Even if he had a strong wish for doing so… I think that this time, we was pooing in the sandpit (or sandbox, if in which we used to play when we were young (not so many years ago, I must admit). It made my brother angry… "Something is rotten in the sandbox of Danemark, and Robin is taking up the trash…".

Michel Feys, the Weatherman

This is (again) a picture taken while watching TV. This is Michel Feys, who sometimes (and rarely, I shoudl say) presents the weather. This man has a peculiar hairstyle, a little in-between the combover and the wig. When he presents, he does it in the old fashion way. Impossible to describe, but still. It's a shame that we don't see him very often. Notice that he's a member of the Belgian Air Force: once, he presented the weather, wearing his uniform.

Bouboule, Evil Cat

Meet another monster in my family: Bouboule, my grand-mother's cat. He is evil. I mean it: he is evil. Look in his eyes, and you'll see that he would like to eat your face. Fortunately, this cat is not one of the most vivace in the world: he spends the whole day (and sometimes week, or month) lazying in a box. He only moves a little to get his food, that my grand-mother bought for him. He has nothing of a hunter.
Roughly one month ago, my grand-mother didn't see him in the house before she locked it. For once, he had to be outside. The days passed, and one week later, she thought he had been smashed by a car, and now rotting on a road, eaten by the flies. But no! This cat is evil! He came back! An aura of evil, I say. Normally, we say that a cat's got 9 lifes, but this one not only lived these 9 lifes, but also another 10, I think… My mother says that he was part of the cast of The Pet Semetary (sic), a film from a horror book by Stephen King, in which two childs bury a cat in an ancient Indian Cemetery, and then the cat comes back—with a vengence… Wicked.

The Trinity

School trips are typically the place to have fun. Even in Notre-Dame de Paris, just in front of the cathedral. Our teachers agreed to take part in a photo shooting in which they pretend to be saints. At the left, my French teacher Mlle Simonis, then M. Simar (aka Rainman) and M. Jacquet. That's one of the best memories I keep from secondary school. In fact, all my good memories from secondary school are linked to a school trip, because you're more likely to have fun when you are not at school. For that matter, the school trip we did one year later for our last year at secondary school, in Greece, was also great fun. I'll talk about that later, trust me. I've got really interesting anecdotes to tell.

M. Simar Being Spied On

As I was too lazy to write a full description of a picture from my collection the last few days, you had to undergo these silly videos from YouTube that I love. I edict a new rule: whenever I want to put a video on this blog, I first have to describe a picture. And as I've got plenty of videos on my account, I've got to write a lot more on this blog. (Don't worry, I've a bunch of photographs. If you don't like that, don't hesitate to react by posting a comment.)
Good riddance. Now, as far as this particular picture is concerned, it also comes from this school trip in Paris, in April 2005. That one was taken in the morning, when we were waiting for the teachers to call us. From my bedroom in the Formule 1 Saint-Denis, we had a view on the teacher's room. It was sooo funny because we could spy on them and see them in underwear, and thus make several picture to make fun of them later on. (It's done, now!) Of course, we had to do that seriously—we didn't want to get caught due to the flash or sth. Here, you can see M. Simar (French teacher) wearing a vest (if it's the right word to characterize what we call "marcel" or "singlet" in French); to figure it out, just look Die Hard with Bruce Willis: he only wears this kind of clothing, or see the other picture. I have other views of M. Simar and his colleague M. Jacquet (Latin teacher), but they are not as neat as that one (difficult, I was saying, to take a picture under these conditions), and we were thinking that they had an affair… This is what we do when we're getting bored.

The Powers of the Ark of the Covenant

The other day, I was talking about the famous Ark of the Covenant, because we see it in Indiana Jones and the Lost Ark. Here's an extract from the movie that explains its power and why it is sought by the Nazis. In this extract, we can see, besides Harrison Ford (Dr. Jones), Denholm Elliot, whom we saw this afternoon by watching a film version of the short story The Signalman by Charles Dickens.
(Unknown undertitling.)



The music is terrific. Thank you, John Williams!

Darth Vader Calls

This masterpiece is supposed to be taking place just after the movie Star Wars: Episode IV – A New Hope, when the Rebel Alliance has just destroyed the Death Star, and Darth Vader (the Bad Guy) managed to escape. Then he calls his boss Palpatine. (Notice the sound of the phone, taken from the series 24.)

Isn't the last sentence wonderful?

Arnie is Hamlet!!!

This is terrific! If only we had movies like that, instead of those boring versions! Scene taken from Last Action Hero.

And because I really love the French version, here it is:

The Ark of the Covenant

This is the Ark of the Covenant as it appears in Indiana Jones and the Lost Ark. I really like this film. I must say that I'm a big fan of trilogies—all sorts of them—but for the Indiana Jones Trilogy, I think that the second movie has to be forgotten… It's just too much. Difficult to believe that it's a movie by Steven Spielberg… But anyway, the two other Indies are terrific. As to the Ark itself, it was accompanied with a kinda Middle-Eastish, soft music theme by John Williams that gives you a weird feeling.
On the picture on the left, you see the Ark that they used in the movie, probably in an exhibition. On the right of it, you can see the Holy Grail of Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, the fake one (in gold) and the "real one", a wooden cup.

Government Warehouse

While making a reseach of a picture of the Ark of the Covenant in "Indiana Jones", I found this picture, which we can actually see in the last shot of the movie, after the FBI took the Ark to hide it in one of these huge warehouses. Freaking: I'm sure that such things exist—keeping alien spacecraft or maybe Jimmy Hoffa's body… (who knows?).
This is what I found on Wikipedia about governmental warehouses:
Government Warehouse – From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia:
The Government Warehouse is a plot device used in movies, television series, and novels, a scenario used in role-playing games, and a belief of some conspiracy theorists. The concept is that there is a secret government warehouse where various items are stored of whose existence the government wants the general populace to remain ignorant.

A Meal in Paris

When you have walked for a whole day in Paris, when your feet are burnt and that you are about to go to the hospital, the best solution is to go to a restaurant. Being (still) on a school trip, the budget for eating was really limited, which almost obliged us to take a steak with French (!) fries two days in a row. On this picture, I'm on the left side, at the back. Next to me, with a surprised expression on his face and about to eat some fries, my good friend Alexandre. At the front, Cyril, who's currently studying law in Liège. In front of him, Mickaël, who now studies veterinary medicine in Namur. Next to him, Marc, also a law student in Liège and finally, in front of me, Nicolas, who's known for drinking a lot on certain occassions…

The Birds of Paris Eat in Your Hand!

When you go to Notre-Dame, in Paris, there's a large area in front of the cathedral. There are bushes with hundreds of these little birds, sparrows. If you have a particular kind of sugary bread, the birds fly to your hand to eat it! Pigdeons do it too, but they are less friendly-looking… especially if they leave a trace on you, if you knoiw what I mean. Anyway, it's really exceptional that sparrows get so close to humans.

A Shop With Displaying Fake Guns…

In Paris, you can find really amazing things, such as this shop, which was full of fake guns, what we call in French "pistolets à billes". You could find all sorts of guns in there, from the little and crappy Colt to the AK-47… Everything was fake, but this was amazing! I'm not for guns, but this kind of stuff just make me laugh because they exist: how did it come that someone, someday, just got the idea of making fake guns that shoot small plastic balls?

"Portrait du Docteur Gachet" by Van Gogh

I also took this photograph during our visit in the Musée d'Orsay: this is a painting by Van Gogh, "Portrait du Docteur Gachet". I don't know who this man was, so click on http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portrait_of_Doctor_Gachet. They say there are two versions of it. Curious. Anyway, I like this picture because we see it (well in fact a copy of it) in Mel Brooks' film "Life Stinks" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Life_Stinks), one of my personal favourites. In French, Goddard Bolt (Mel Brooks) was shouting "Mon Van Gogh !". Obviously, it doesn't appear to be funny when you read it, so just watch it.

Whistler's Mother

"Whistler's Mother" or, as it reads on the picture in the Musée d'Orsay, "Portrait de la mère de l'artiste", by James Whistler. This painting was made famous the catastrophical movie "Bean", where our favourite Brit destroy the painting and tries to replace it… by a poster… (This film is one of my favourites.) In the French version, Bean says: "C'est le portrait d'une vieille peau, d'un débris, qu'il aima par dessus tout"… Brillant!

The Choice of a Hotel is not Easy

Again a picture taken while being on a trip in Paris. We were all walking in the streets, going from famous place to famous place. Here, we were in front of the Ritz, on the Place Vendôme, probably the most expensive area in Paris, where the biggest jeweleers must have a shop. On the picture, you can see M. Jacquet (on the left), my tutor and Latin teacher, and M. Simar, French teacher. They look as if, while pointing the Ritz, they think they'd better have chosen this hotel instead of the inexpensive (but comfortable, though) Formule 1 in Saint-Denis.

Visite du Louvre (April 2005)

When I was at secondary school, 5th year, we all went to Paris as a cultural trip of three days. On the first day, we went to the Louvre to see the most famous items of the collection, including the Venus of Milo, Samothrace's Victory, the Mona Lisa, the "Radeau de la Méduse" and also "La Liberté guidant le peuple" by Eugène Delacroix, where you see this allegory of France personified as Marianne, who leads the people (and Eugène Delacroix—hidden self-portrait) half-naked with the "bleu-blanc-rouge" flag. On that third picture, you can see one of my favourite teachers, namely M. Christian Jacquet, with whom I studied Latin during three years.

Blast from the Past

Can you believe it? Snow? In Belgium? Yes. But it was two years ago, on 27 February 2005. This view was taken from the window at the front of my house, in Aubel. The garden and the trees are snow-covered. It would be unrealistic, over-optimistic and naive to believe that such a layer of snow will ever fall on Belgium. It's more likely to snow on the beach than where I live… At yet, we're at 300m over the sea.

A Rainy Day in Seraing

Four pics instead of one! I took them the day Guy Mathot, a maffia godfather and mayor of Seraing (a derelict, polluted, post-industrial area in the suburbs of Liège), was buried. It was rainy, lots of people in the streets were walking towards the church—strange, because as a socialist, he shouldn't have gone to a church… Anyway, this day (26 February 2005) was a red-letter day (again, for a socialist, all is well that ends well…) because it was the end of the egemony of Guy Mathot. But guess what? he was succeeded by his son, Alain Mathot, who since then has been elected as mayor of Seraing. Result: the Godfather's aura is still there.
On the pictures (that I took from the back of my car), you can see a steel factory, a animal-food shop, the logo of a supermarket and Seraing's main mall (it's crappy, I know), and I haven't shown you the worse of Seraing!

Coco, My Grandpa's Parrot

In the world, you can find really bizarre creatures. Coco is one of them. It's a parrot, namely a "Gris du Gabon". It's a she in fact, but we always refer to it by the pronoun "il" (don't ask why). My uncle got it from a woman who wanted to get rid of it round 25 years ago. She had got that parrot—who's got a really original name by the way—when Coco was a small bird. Now, that beast must be 45 years old (thus she's nearly as old as my uncle) and can live 20 more years! Coco can't fly (she has never learnt how to) and likes eating meat, including chicken and eggs (and preferably egg yolk), which may seem to be cannibalism. Here, she's eagerly eating a ribbone. (Click on the picture to see the details. I'll show more picture where she looks surprised or angry, etc., just with her eyes (because she can't smile or anything). I just love the way she can grab something just with her claws, while standing on one "foot" (or how do you call it).

Pierre Istace, RTBF Journalist

Pierre Istace is my favourite journalist. He's got such a voice! Unfortunately, he's gone and retired now, but sometimes reappears to make a report of a new painting or sculpture exhibition. In fact, his main domains of investigation were finance, economy and arts (especially paintings of the 19th and 20th centuries).
Here again, we can see him in Rome after the pope's death. It was one of his last great reportages abroad.
Note that he wears a red jacket provided by the RTBF. He was also a union representative for the FGTB (socialist union).