Before we moved to Belgium, the boyfriend and I lived in the centre of Amsterdam. And I owned a bike and I had a job. That means total freedom: to have some money coming in every month, a bike to cruise the city and trains, trams, a car to bring you everywhere the bike can't take you.
Then we moved, and in just one week I lost all my freedom. No city, no job, no self earned money, no bike and no public transport. Of course the new house is beautiful, the village looks like a postcard and the garden is lovely in potential. BUT I AM TOTALLY STUCK HERE. We had foreseen this and reserved some of the moving money to buy me a car.
We bought a car last year (technically last year, it was the 31st of December), and we still cannot drive it! The thing in Belgium is that you pick up your own licence plates first, but in order to do that you need insurance first, and in order to get THAT you need to be registered with the city first.... aha!
Well on friday I finally completed the registration with the city, it took them almost 2 months and the last step included the mayer to fill in some scrap of paper by hand and stamp it a zillion times and then suddenly it was done. I drove to Brussels to "pick up"my plates, boy was I optimistic. I waited for 2,5 hours with a hundred others, there were only three windows and another hundred people who came in and went straight to the windows (why bother taking a number and just wait like the rest of us?). But I was still very optimistic, after all I could pick up the car, my car, later that afternoon! Well...not really. In the two months time the registration process with the city took, the date on the piece of paper that said that the car is in good condition, expired. By not even a week. The car needed to undergo an extensive check up, afterall it moved a vast distance of...well... 10 meters in the last month!
The check up takes place as we speak, let's hope the car will pass and I can drive 100 kilometres to the guy who tested the car to pick up a piece of paper, then drive 100 k's back to Brussels again this afternoon to pick up the plates. Then drive the 100 k's back with the plates to the car with the boyfriend and drive the last 100 k's with two cars. PLEASE
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