Belgian, Australian, Vegan.

By Chris Delcourt

The author explains the different stages of her life as an animal lover, having lived in two very different countries, Belgium and Australia.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BookBaby
• Release date: Dec 15, 2017
• ISBN: 9781543920116

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© 2017 Chris Delcourt. All rights reserved.

No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

ISBN (Print) 978-1-54392-010-9 (Ebook) 978-1-54392-011-6

"Waking up to the animal holocaust is deeply painful.

Not only are you confronted by the sheer size of it all, 10 billion land animals in the US,

58 billion globally each year, but when you share what you have learned with your friends and family members, who you deeply respect and love, they show indifference at best.

You feel like you have come upon a genocide that everyone is trying to hide and ignore.

And you can no longer participate.

And you can no longer keep quiet.

And then you are painted as militant, extreme, judgmental, etc.

It is deeply painful on so many levels."

-Gary Smith.

Table of Contents

Foreword

Part 1: Belgium Then

Part 2: This Wide, Beautiful Sunburned Country

Part 3: Belgium Now

FOREWORD

Sharon and I were talking, discussing a book she had lent me, titled A Round-Heeled Woman, the said book being about a sixty-six-year-old woman who wants a lot of sex with a man she likes before she turned sixty-seven! She, Sharon, was mucking out her mare’s box, and I had just finished giving the horses hay before going home. I had told her about my latest date with this young man, when she compared me with this lady (age aside, of course!) and said jokingly, ‘Well, you should write your life story and make money out of it!’

I replied, ‘I’m sure if it’s about sex, it’ll definitely sell!’ (Not that there was a lot of sex in my life—at that moment—but I intended to change that pronto.)

Anyway, that’s what started it, and once home, I thought, Why the hell not? I decided that I’d like to try my hand at this, not to make money— I’m sure I’m not that talented—but more as a clear and neat report of where I am with my life. You know, a bit like if you were to lie down on an analyst’s couch.

So, here I am!

Let’s see. I think my life has three distinct parts. The first one: from birth until marriage at the tender age of nineteen, in Belgium. The second one: my twenty-three years in Australia (I will include in this the two times we had come back ‘for good’.) And third and last but not least (drum roll, please): the return to the roots.

PART 1

BELGIUM THEN

I grew up a happy, well-balanced girl surrounded by a happy, normal family, something which is—you must admit—highly desirable but unfortunately not as common as it should be. My parents loved each other, and my sister Anne-Marie (‘Annie’ to me), who was four and a half years older than me, was the typical big sister, talking to me about periods, boys, and sex. I was grateful for the information because my mum never talked to me about anything like that.

My mum was very modest about all that stuff. She was quite naive as well, and that’s what made her special: she never saw the bad in someone but always found them an excuse. And no matter how plain—or, frankly, ugly—someone was, she always said they ‘had beautiful eyes’.

You know, genes are funny things because I find myself saying the same thing, and my son laughs at me!

The way I saw my dad was with a loving little girl’s eyes. I was my father’s daughter alright: we had the same cheekiness and loved making jokes. And I know that my father was proud of his wife and two beautiful girls. (Let’s not be falsely modest here; we were quite different but both cute.)

My dad worked as a typewriter maintenance technician for Remington, going to offices, schools, and everywhere typewriters were needed before they were replaced by computers. My mum was a secretary in a hardware shop owned by Monsieur Cohen on the Place Jourdan. My sister was a model student, and I was often compared—to my disadvantage—to her!

We lived in Brussels until I was thirteen. I clearly remember the Etterbeek house, where we lived on the third floor.

It was a very modest setting: a kitchen big enough to eat in, where, over and between rooftops, we had a view of the neighbouring park; a lounge; a dining-room; and only two bedrooms. My sister and I had bunk beds, and I slept on the top bunk! We had to go down a little flight of stairs for the toilet, where we kept the washing machine as well. We had our baths in the kitchen in a big iron tub, and it was an exciting event when, one day after work, my father installed a portable shower, complete with a big white plastic base to stand in, a foldable curtain, and a plastic hose to connect to our kitchen tap! What an upgrade! What a luxury!

The lounge was warmed up by a coal heater, and my dad had to carry the coal all the way from the cellar (four flights of stairs, mind you); I can still see those black lumps with little grooves on them.

Above us were the attics—three of them. Blessed with a vivid imagination, my heart always beat faster whenever I visited them. I invented many exciting adventures there by pretending to be an explorer, a pirate, or a dashing young fortune hunter.

Funny that—my characters were always male. I wonder if there’s something to be read into there. I even made myself fake ID cards by copying mine exactly, replacing my photo with one of an attractive boy I’d have cut off from a magazine! One particular character that stands in my mind is the famous Vasco da Gama, picked just because I liked the name; I thought it sounded very noble and mysterious!

I also spent many happy hours in the courtyard, alone (well, with my imagination) or with the kids living in the other apartments. To get there, one had to go stairs through the caves stairs, and I was always scaring myself while accelerating the pace, telling myself what kind of monsters were lurking in the dark. We disguised ourselves with some of my mum’s old dresses and played ‘Princes and Princesses’. We rode our bikes, skated, jumped ropes, and of course, quarrelled quite a bit.

In that courtyard were about half a dozen garages rented out to different tenants; my father had one for his car and our camping gear, and next to it was a smaller old shed nicknamed ‘Le Kot’ which was used to shelter pigeons and rabbits. Thankfully, those poor animals didn’t stay there long—I can still remember the scream of the rabbits when Mr. Finnez, one of our neighbours, killed them by slamming them on the wall. How awful!

After that, we kids took the kot for ourselves, and it became just another one of our play settings.

At that time, at about the age of ten, I was already crazy about horses, having learned to ride during Easter holidays in Middelkerke, where, my grandmother stayed with Annie and me in an apartment rented by my parents each year.

My uncle Georges, my mum’s younger brother, being kind of an artist in his spare time, built me and my cousin Patty a wooden horse! It consisted of a broom stick topped by a cleverly cut and painted horse head. I just loved it to bits! I made a noseband with the leather straps from one of my roller skates and attached suitable reins to it. I even toyed with the idea of gluing wool strands as a forelock, but after trying it on, I finally decided against it. It was too childish!

I think I had two of those lovely companions. I definitely remember a bay and a chestnut, Patty having had the privilege of picking the dashing black one! But guess what? I ended up having the real-life version later on in life—my beautiful 1.7 m tall, glossy black mare, Kyla.

We had the tremendous advantage of living next to an ice-cream parlour owned by Mme Di Vito, and needless to say, I took full benefit of that situation. In summer, every day after school, I climbed the stairs, dropped off my bag, and flew back down with my change to treat myself to a double mocha with fresh cream. Back up with a Bob&Bobette in my lap, it was absolute heaven!

My grandmother on the maternal side, whom we called Mémé, lived in the same neighbourhood, and to help my parents out, cooked for the four of us every day at lunch time. This represented quite a big saving; firstly, time wise for my hard working parents and then money wise, as she never accepted anything for the lovely meals she prepared us. Though she was a simple, uneducated woman who couldn’t write or read, she had a heart of gold, and I remember her fondly, having been one of her favourites.

I was the first one to arrive from school to Mémé’s house as it was within walking distance, and I used to come in without her knowing it, hide under the table, and jump out at her like a jack-in-the-box! Of course, I realise now how unwise it was to do that to an eighty-year-old! My parents usually picked Annie up from school and joined us some ten minutes later.

A few metres from her place was a lolly shop—you don’t find those anymore—which, in true Brussels speak, was called a bollewinkel. You could spend your modest allowance on boules de neige, têtes de nègres (so NOT politically correct as it means niggers heads—sorry!), black and red liquorice laces, hard-candy bracelets, little waxy red envelopes filled with sour powder you sucked with a straw and a tiny toy, cuberdons, etc. These are the main goodies I remember, and it was always exciting when we pushed the door and made the bell ring.

One of my childhood friends lived next to that shop. Her name was Ghislaine Henrard.

In those days, you just had to eat the fat off your meat. I hated it, so I used to cut the fat strips off, leave them on the side of my plate, and look soulfully towards Mémé. It always did the trick as she pleaded my cause to my parents!

Yes, despite the relative modesty of it all (I went back to check the neighbourhood later and realised what a dump it was), I’m lucky to enjoy, even to these days, really fond memories of my childhood in Brussels.

Another recollection I treasure is of those times when I went along with my father to work in his friend Gaston’s woodwork factory. As my father did small jobs during the weekend, the building was always empty and I roamed freely in the deserted rooms populated only with silent, inactive machines. There is always that feeling of eeriness whenever you tread vacated places that are supposed to burst with human life and mechanical vibrations. And this was another excellent outlet for my imagination, which saw itself stimulated by atmosphere, dead silence, and most of all, the wonderful scent of freshly cut wood.

As for our yearly holidays, we generally spent them in France with mon onc’ Georges, tante Lulu, and Patty, my cousin, who is the same age as me. Year after year, we discovered the different areas of this lovely and versatile country, and these too offered me many treasured reminiscences.

My mum loved her younger brother dearly, and although she got along fine with her sister-in-law (it was hard to pick a fight with my mum), she suffered to see the way in which Lulu treated Georges; she was quite bossy with him and belittled him too often.

So, for her—as for my father, who wasn’t as tolerant as Mum—three weeks together were quite enough.

The men had a good system for keeping everyone happy: one day, we explored the area and went on excursions, and the day after, we had a quiet day at camp, reading, swimming, shopping—very important to tante Lulu—and lazing around.

One year, when I was probably around nine, during a mountain hike, we were coming downhill on our way back to the car in three pairs. Uncle Georges and Patty were up ahead, followed by my dad and me, while the two mums brought up the rear. I suddenly decided to catch up with my cousin and started to run. Carried away by the steepness of the hillside, my little legs pumping faster and faster, I couldn’t stop myself, and gravity being what it is, I fell heavily forwards, knocking my head on one of the sharp stones. You should have seen the blood spurting!

My dad was the first one to be by my side. He picked me up, and his white singlet was instantly red. He, himself, had grown quite pale! Everyone gathered around us, with my mum being the most concerned, of course. They washed my head with the cold water from the stream running along the path, and although the cut was more impressive than deep, they still had to find a doctor to stitch me up.

Another year, we were camping in a semi-wild site in the Jura, next to a windmill where we had to dig our own ‘forest toilet’ and where we had the visit of a shabby little circus. One night, when we were cooking potatoes wrapped in aluminium foil in the embers of our campfire, we saw funny-looking lights moving irregularly in the starry sky and wondered whether they were UFOs.

Anyway, I have so many golden images engraved in my mind: the yummy French apple turnovers I couldn’t get enough of; the seal in an animal exhibition that bit me (ok, not exactly a fond memory); the abandoned little village we spent the night in (how exciting!); the grass snake slithering from under another uncle’s tent; the many animals I was so attracted to; the funny shadows dad was making on the walls of our tent with the flashlight at night; the song book my mum kept from her youth, from which she often sang Don’t Fence Me In because I liked it; the deflating of air mattresses my sister and I were still sleeping on the day we had to go (another not-happy one!); the lakes and rivers; the typical French viaducts; the meals; the markets; the apéros; the smell of freshly baked croissants; the picnics with wine and cheese; the ‘canons’ (table wine with water and sugar) for the kids; the togetherness, laughter, and discussions; the 21st July restaurant outings; the many horses I rode once I had discovered my passion; and finally, the boys I met!

It’s in France that I had my first boyfriend at the age of thirteen, and funnily enough, his name was Ben, the same as my husband to be. My cousin Patty was always looking after the little kids as opposed to me, who spent my time with the boys; what else could I do when they were seeking my company, eh?

It was at the start of my teenage years, as I was due to change school to commence secondary education, that my parents took the big step, realised their dream to leave Brussels, and built their own home in Braine-l’Alleud. I went to live with tante Zoë (mum’s older sister) in Waterloo for the beginning of the term because the house wasn’t finished yet.

My dad put a lot of time and efforts into the house, and with help from some friends, he installed the heating system and the electricity. When we finally moved in, it was a far cry from our Brussels lodging with our modern bathroom, central heating, brand new appliances, open fire, and our very own bedrooms.

After a while, we knew all our neighbours, and to my delight, I was able to take the dog of one of them for walks whenever I wanted; I even had a house key. The dog was a German Shepherd, and his name was Duc. I also made friends with a girl named Cecilia from down the road, and we used to take Duc for walks together after school.

Cecilia had very strict parents. Her dad was Italian, but it was her mum who gave the most trouble, being a very intolerant and quite old-fashioned woman. So, when Cecilia came to visit me and we were busy doing what teenage girls usually do, I think she found a breath of fresh air! One of those things was listening endlessly to George Harrison’s Give Me Love, which we adored, with my bedroom window wide open.

I was enrolled at L’Immaculee, in Braine, an all-girls school, formerly a convent set in beautiful surroundings. There I made friends first with Fabienne Cheront and later with Marianne Lacroix.

There were other popular girls as well, such as Carine Lebfèvre, Sophie Smeyers, and Monique Stoquart, whom I looked up to because they seemed worldly to me. They knew boys, they could dance and organised boums, and they were driving scooters. I got invited to those private parties; it was the fashion at the time and the parties generally happened on Sunday afternoons at the house of one of the girls.

Carine lived in a castle. I kid you not. I think her high-earning parents were renting the place, but it was really a cross between a castle and a mansion. For little, sheltered, timid me, it was really impressive.

Thanks to these girls, I met Raphael, a Basque boy who seemed very exotic to me; Didier Sobleyn, who was going out with Sophie; and his best friend, Patrick Legrand, whom I ended up going out with during one of those boums.

Didier, Patrick, and Patrick’s brother, Michel, were doing judo together, and we went to see them practicing more than once. I met Ricardohard there; he was 24, and I was 15. All these encounters were harmless flirtations, nothing serious. Even when Ricardohard hinted that he wanted to sleep