Tintin and the case of the pissy kid

Such a joyous title. But not quite a Tintin comic.

A recent trip to the earliest of Euro bloc political alliances called Benelux was the reason to run into the above mentioned art.

Benelux so named for the three countries that formed this union allowing free travel across their respective borders eventually merging with the EU and adopting a single currency circa 2000.

The Thanksgiving break is a good time for wife and I to hit the proverbial road not traveled and has happened each year barring covid. With no family or tradition to hold us to our base camp coordinates we have found this time works for us with generally mild climes across the planet and less of a crowd. Or so it used to be.

This time the crowds were out with a vengeance as witnessed by the clogged arteries of cities in the Benelux when we visited. So this Benelux is made of Belgium, Netherlands and Luxembourg.

Belgium is bigger in size and curious sights; Netherlands is a sinking ship - quite literally half the country is below sea level and survives using clever engineering; finally the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg is a goofy land locked region left behind after the Germans and French squabbled for centuries and gave up trying to win the childish pursuit.

Growing up in India, my favorite comic books were by a Belgian author/artist who went under the pseudonym Herge. Tintin's adventures along with a perpetually petulant captain Haddock and a white disheveled dog were my bedside companion and introduction to the idea called Belgium (when an atlas was a rare book to behold).

The tourist sights in Brussels, the capital of Belgium (spelled on train station signs in French and Dutch) include among other things random wall art depicting scenes from a Tintin story, as well as human sculptures of children and a dog taking a long continuous piss that pop up in the most unusual corners.

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