A VERY SPECIAL SCHOOL

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FRIDAY FEAST : Sorry I got the menu far too late, only this morning and had already published my post. Time difference should be considered although this is the very first time this happened.

I told Pookie that today I would write about my school in Brussels, therefore she turned her eyes fearing the worst !

When I arrived in Brussels, I were 15 years old and didn't speak a word of french. So my father had to put me in the German School of Brussels.

I were the 199 pupil and not the 200 as a normal person would have been. The school was located in an old beautiful manor surrounded by a nice little parc.

Of course I had never seen a school like that nor did the other students. To arrive at the entrance door, we had to climb large stone stairs with a beautiful handrail of cast iron. The entrance hall was enormous and a large wooden staircase let to the first floor. This floor was like a gallery and from there you could enter the rooms.

Our class was located in the former living room. There were a wonderful marmor chemney with half dressed greek or roman women on both sides, the mantelpiece was out of wood. Above had probably hung a mirror because there were an empty spot without wallpaper, but had been removed. Otherwise we would have looked more to ourselves than to the teacher !

The windows were very huge and the ceiling very high. The old wall paper was still there and showed a pattern of stripes, pink roses all in silvergray and pink. Of course it was not very fresh anymore and some assidunous students had pulled off parts of it.

English and french lessons were given in the ancient dining room which was a little smaller but looked very much alike. Only the wallpaper had changed, here there were yellow roses.

A small room where probably the plates coming from the kitchen were set, was used by the concierge who played a very important role, because he had all the keys and was responsible for cleaning, gardening and shouting at the students.

Our director had his office in the old bedroom and the annexed bathroom with toilet and shower was used as storage room for his files. On the toilet were a comfy cushion, so he could sit down and look through his documents. His secretary sat in a small dressing room, where cloths of the former occupants had hung.

The nicest place was the doctor's room. It was the old bathroom and over the bath tube lay a wooden pannel with a white cloth and served as examination table. The toilet had also been transformed into a seat. So when you had to wait, you just sat on the toilet.

The around located bedrooms with chemneys served as classrooms.

Chemistry and physics classes took place in the old kitchen, located in the basement. This was a huge green tiled place with wooden oak working tables (to cut meat) and an enormous oven. There were also a chemney to roast. On the walls were still shelves were cooking pots and plates had been. It was a really funny place with our schoolbanks and seats in there. In a corner stood a skeleton, which we called Mr. Smith, and served for the biology courses. Mr. Smith were bewitched because sometimes he were dressed with an old raincoat and a hat or he suddenly had hidden himself in a locker and mostly felt in the arms of our english teacher when she wanted to take a book out. Which usually was followed by a loud screem and unladylike words.

Sport was done in the old horse stables, the boxes had been removed but you still could see the traces. On the wall there still were some of the horse equipment and I remember it was freezing cold in there during winter.

The small park was for recreation purposes and whatever had been in there was stamped down, only a few bushes and a little lawn had survived. We enjoyed this very much as there were also romantic corners and banks. Even a few statues of roman godesses.

I never have seen such a school again in my whole life. And tomorrow I will write what all happened in there.