DC: Belgian Embassy Open House

Every May in DC something awesome called Passport DC happens. It is a chance to explore other cultures by visiting their embassies! There are obviously tons of embassies in DC, and during May many of them put on open houses. The first weekend this year was for various countries in Latin America, Africa, and the Middle East, which I wasn't interested in, but the second weekend (Mother's Day weekend) was the European Union open houses. Count me in.

We didn't get to go last year, so I really wanted to this year. I had no idea what to expect, but I love culture and other countries (I've been to Russia, Austria, Germany, the Czech Republic, England, Ireland, Scotland, Canada, and the Bahamas). The original plan was to hit up Belgium, Finland, Denmark, the UK, Germany, and France.

Ha.

We made it to only Belgium. The lines for the shuttles were long. The line to get into the embassy was even longer. The embassy was completely packed with people squishing each other. In over 4 hours, we made it into one embassy...and the event is only 6 hours long. I don't know how people who had gone to multiple embassies did it.

In better news, we probably picked the best embassy to check out, in terms of gifts (definitely not in terms of building architecture - it's pretty darn boring). The tapestry below seemed like the only decoration in the whole place.

We received a box of Belgian chocolates (6 pieces), Belgian cookies, and a bottle of beer each. Nice beer. I got a Stella and Eric and his mom both got a Leffe - which we had somehow never had before, and which, on the next beer trip, Eric immediately bought for us. It's that good. You could also stand in another long line to wait for a piece of Belgian waffle, but we were tired at that point and left instead.

If we were doing this again next year, I would definitely drive to the embassy locations we were most interested in instead of relying on the shuttles. Also I would start waaaay earlier and get in line before they opened. It's definitely fun to go see inside places you wouldn't normally, so I think it's worth it, but it would have been better if we'd have known what we were getting into! :)