Leo Cendrowicz

Insularity. The inability to conceive that other countries can have such a system without losing basic freedoms (cf Americans with gun laws).

Angela Dansby takes a weekend trip to the many-towered Tournai, Hugh Dow visits Ixelles cemetery, Breandán Kearney looks at some of the more obscure beers that deserve more recognition, and Geoff Meade grapples with post-Brexit pet bureaucracy.

This issue isn’t only about animals:

@goodclimate.bsky.social‬ finds out about recent archaeological excavations in Brussels.
Lisa Bradshaw talks to Maja-Ajmia Yde Zellama about her movie Têtes Brûlées.
Simon Taylor meets influential DJ Lefto.
And Colin Delfosse shows us real muscle building.

We also explore rescue pets, alpaca walks, cow cuddling and how Brussels deals with rats. Sometimes, wildlife is right under our noses. 🐀🦙🐄🐈
Beyond fur & feathers: medieval manuscripts show cheeky rabbits running amok in sacred texts. 📜🐇

Belgian zoos showcase creatures from faraway lands. 🐼 Pairi Daiza has pandas in a former abbey; Antwerp Zoo balances august heritage with modern needs. Both try to keep animals in a respectful living culture.

In this issue we check out:
🐕 🦮🐕‍🦺 🐩Malinois, Tervuren, Bouvier and bichon frisé dogs
🐴 Brabant draft horses
🐄 Belgian Blue cows
🐔 Mechelse Koekoek/Coucou de Malines chickens
🐇 Flemish Giant rabbits
🐦 Belgian canaries
It’s a true menagerie!

From parachuting dogs to musclebound cows, from mammoths to pig-sized rabbits, Belgian fauna tells stories of work, pride, art & survival.
We start off in the Institute of Natural Sciences. Among the dino bones are the remains of (perhaps) the world’s first dog – and he’s Belgian!
🦖🦣🦴

The latest @BrusselsTimes.com Magazine is out now
🇧🇪🐾 Animals – wild, domestic, mythical – have always been part of the Belgian story. For this issue, we hear them bark, purr, moo and tweet.
Cover art by @lectrr.bsky.social

Robert Redford, 1936-2025

In this chaotic and scary world, we need good news stories.
Today, US Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem was at the Port of Antwerp, with Belgian Prime Minister Bart De Wever.
Noem was introduced to one of the port's Malinois dogs.
The good news? The dog still lives.

France’s government is about to collapse - and the UK will pay a price Prime Minister Francois Bayrou is a 'dead man walking' in confidence vote, and President Emmanuel Macron is imperilled

The French Revolution perfected the art of swift political justice with the guillotine. The blade is parliamentary rather than steel, but France’s embattled PM Bayrou will feel it on Monday when he face a confidence vote in the National Assembly: inews.co.uk/news/world/f...

Until the next time, #Tirana

Rock on Ksamil beach in Albania looks like a face

Smoke from wildfire in Delvina, Albania rising behind Saranda. Corfu is on the left.

Smoke from wildfire in Delvina, Albania rising behind Saranda. Corfu is on the left.

Fires spread across the mountains near Saranda, Albania

Fascinated by the relief carvings - attributed to Renaissance sculptor Tullio Lombardo - around Saint Anthony’s tomb in Padua

Love the paving stones in Rovinj

Charming Ljubljana’s quirky architecture

Science is never just about equations.
It's a conversation across borders, and across time.
It’s about who we become when we unlock the atom – and what we choose to do next. Sometimes the quietest rooms – like those of Solvay – echo the loudest truths. 🇧🇪💣🧠

From bomb-builder to philosopher of science, Oppenheimer’s Solvay appearances traced the arc of a brilliant, conflicted life.
His legacy wasn’t only written in New Mexico deserts. It was debated in Brussels’ salons - in the magnificent Solvay library, where minds shaped the modern world.

His final Solvay visit in 1964, which he chaired, was entitled ‘The Structure and Evolution of Galaxies’. Photos from that year show a man aged by politics and illness, yet still commanding attention in that year’s event

The 1961 conference, on quantum field theory was quieter, more reflective. Oppenheimer’s contributions weren’t about building weapons, but about understanding the universe. In Brussels, he found space to think, not defend himself.

Then came 1961. By then, Oppenheimer was both revered and controversial. In the US, he was under suspicion, his security clearance revoked. But at Solvay, among European physicists, he remained a respected intellectual.

1948’s Solvay was about quantum physics and the new frontiers of atomic science.
Imagine Oppenheimer debating with titans like Einstein, Heisenberg, Lawrence Bragg, Paul Dirac, Erwin Schrödinger as well as father of H-bomb Edward Teller (who would later testify against him).

Oppenheimer’s first Solvay appearance was in 1948. WWII had ended, and the father of the atomic bomb was returning to Europe, where he had studied — not as a wartime figure, but as a scientist seeking dialogue in a fractured world.

The Solvay Conferences — founded in 1911 by Belgian chemist, industrial tycoon and philanthropist Ernest Solvay — were (and still are) where the giants of physics and chemistry gathered at his stunning Art Nouveau library.
Einstein, Curie, Planck, Heisenberg, Fermi. Bohr… and Oppenheimer.

Two years ago, Oppenheimer hit cinemas like an atomic blast.
But did you know the man behind the Manhattan Project came to Brussels not once, but three times for the world’s most elite scientific gatherings?
(Today is also 🇧🇪 national day)
🧵

Putin’s puppet says he's changing. Belarus’s leader-in-exile says we're being fooled Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya warns the West not to be taken in by the Belarussian dictator after he freed her husband in a prisoner swap last month

Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya's husband was just freed after five years in jail, but Belarus’s leader-in-exile is still fighting inews.co.uk/news/world/p...