Tintin rox my sox.

I am suddenly reminded of one more Belgian thing that I would add to Kunstemæcker's list. Exchange students.

Now, to the best of my knowledge our high school didn't do exchanges, because I certainly never heard anything about it, and if it had, I don't think it would have bothered with anyone from Europe anyways. Most of the foreign students at our school were from Hong Kong, Taiwan and South Korea, and they come here to learn English, even though if you really wanted to be immersed in English you'd be better off in a place like Winnipeg.

Our school was large, but the International Baccalaureate students were kind of an insular group, because for the most part, a lot of them were too stuck up to associate with anyone else. That meant that rumours flew fast.

One day the girls were all atwitter because apparently we were getting some exchange students from Belgium soon and, by default, all men from Europe are handsome, refined, dress well and have sexy accents. Unlike the cretins we have here, European men are natural born lovers, listen well, enjoy watching plays, the ballet and fine wine, and are far more at home at art exhibits than at sporting events.

I wasn't all that excited, to tell the truth, but needless to say, I got swept up in a wave of "The Belgians! The Belgians! The Belgians!" as it flowed down the stairs to meet them.

What can I say about them? Well, they were Belgian. They spoke French. They kept to themselves. Their appearances were so unremarkable that I can't honestly remember what they looked like. I never saw or heard of them again.

And in all honesty, what if they were goregeous? Were they honestly going to swarm them and impress them with their incredible knowledge of Tintin?