A week with two distinct highlights: a brief trip to Brussels for a meeting we were hosting there, and then paella at home for some visiting relatives from Puerto Rico.
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I start with a couple of photos from my neighbourhood, taken while out shopping and running errands. The first is one of the inhabitants of a large vacant lot across the street from our supermarket:
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This is the river that runs through the northern suburbs of Alicante, appropriately called Río Seco, since there is only any kind of water in it after a heavy downpour:
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Later in the week I met my ex-trainee Antanina for a drink in the centre. She now teaches economics at London Metropolitan University but was in Alicante for a few days:
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On Wednesday morning I flew to Brussels for a short, one-night trip. On arriving at Brussels airport, we saw a large group of Turks, very excited. It turned out that the Fenerbahçe football team was arriving shortly to play against a Belgian team in the Europa League a couple of days later, and the local fans (Brussels has a sizeable Turkish population) turned out to greet them:
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I was travelling with our director Patricia and with Kasia, our Polish assistant who was in charge of the organisation of next day’s meeting. We took the train from the airport to the EU quarter where we were staying:
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I went for a walk in the afternoon. I actually enjoy the modern architecture around the Schuman square:
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In the evening, we went to Grand’ Place, beautiful as always:
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Dinner at ‘t Kelderke:
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Thursday morning, we woke up to a foggy EU quarter:
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We were holding our meeting at a rather obscure EU institution called the Committee of the Regions. They have nice meeting rooms, and we were allowed to use one of them. Kasia is putting the finishing touches on things:
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The meeting is about to start, and Kasia is very concentrated:
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Patricia, opening the meeting:
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During the lunch break, I went for a walk in the nearby Parc Leopold, a wonderful urban oasis that has always been one of my favourite places in Brussels:
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I flew home Thursday night. On Saturday, we were visited by some relatives of my wife from Puerto Rico, who were touring around in Spain. My wife decided to treat them to a proper paella de mariscos:
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I love documenting my wife’s paella production. Here, she adds the onion and garlic to the seafood:
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Grated tomatoes:
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Adding the rice, in the traditional cross pattern:
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Stirring the paella after adding the broth, the most important ingredient, homemade of course:
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A dried pepper for decoration:
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And finally, almost ready to serve:
More of my Brussels photos can be seen here, and the paella is further document here.