New Zealanders in Belgium

OSCAR NOMINATION

2012-01-24T19:11:00.000+01:00

LATEST: Flight of the Conchords' Bret McKenzie has scooped an Oscar nomination for his song Man or Muppet in the film The Muppets. See Bret's song here.

http://www.stuff.co.nz/entertainment/film/6308901/Conchord-nabs-Oscar-nomination

Whales stranding: Volunteers try to save whales

2012-01-23T18:26:00.000+01:00

NAOMI ARNOLD AND AAP Last updated 05:00 24/01/2012

SMALL CHANCE OF REFLOATING: A pod of 99 pilot whales stranded at Farewell Spit in Golden Bay on Monday. There were previous mass strandings in the area in January and November.

Volunteers have worked desperately to save a pod of pilot whales stranded in Golden Bay.
By last night 22 of the whales were dead, out of a pod of 99 that stranded just after midday yesterday.
Project Jonah chief executive Kimberly Muncaster said there was nothing more that could have done to save the whales yesterday.
Volunteers had spent the afternoon trying to keep the whales cool and upright.
Project Jonah marine mammal medics have also been called to give the whales first aid.
"It was very sad," she said.
Volunteers had begun leaving the scene for the evening about 8.45pm last night for safety reasons.
Ms Muncaster said although there was only a small chance the remaining live whales would refloat at high tide about 11pm, she remained hopeful.
Rescue efforts were due to resume at first light this morning.
Project Jonah volunteer Jo Woods, of Motueka, said it was difficult to leave the whales to their fate last night.
"It's hard to walk away. You get attached. My one had a big chunk behind his eye missing and every time we talked to him he'd would put his head up and shake it."
She spent the day laying wet sheets on the whales to keep them cool and using sandbags to keep them upright. She trained as a volunteer after seeing a previous stranding on the Spit.
"I realised I would have no idea what to do and I just want to be helpful rather than doing nothing," she said.
Nils Alke of Germany was travelling New Zealand and had come to the Spit to see some pictures and museum exhibits of past strandings. He found a real one instead.
"It was such a coincidence to see," he said. "It would be even better to see them swimming in the sea."
Farewell Spit EcoTours manager Paddy Gillooly has attended about 10 strandings in the 25 years he has been a tour driver.

"From what I understand some of the ones that are left aren't that flash. It depends on how high the tide comes tonight, which way the wind blows, because they are in a place where the tide will just float them. It depends on how strong they are when the tide comes in. You won't know anything until the sun comes up tomorrow morning."

It is the third stranding this year.
"This is the one that you would expect for the year," Mr Gillooly said. "The other two were the bonus, if you like to call it that."

"People put in tremendous hours, especially the local people who go year after year to sometimes spend three days out there in the wind and the heat, and they get all wet and cold and shivery at the end of it, they are the people who deserve the credit. All we do really is the logistics of moving the people around. That's where we're most useful."

"It is sad. You can't really get used to that sort of thing."
The spot where the whales were stranded is close to Farewell Spit, where 25 were stranded early in January.
Seven of those whales died, while 65 whales died after becoming stranded in the same area in November.
- © Fairfax NZ News
http://www.stuff.co.nz/environment/6302454/Whales-stranding-Volunteers-try-to-save-whales

Reburial of NZ Soldier: Friday, 3 February; 3pm; Messines Ridge British Cemetery, Nieuwkerkestraat, 8957 Mesen

2012-01-22T18:26:00.000+01:00

The remains of an unknown solider from the First World War were discovered during excavations of a building site in July 2011 in Mesen, West Flanders. Based on objects recovered with the remains including, unit insignia of the New Zealand Rifle Brigade as well as the location of the find, the remains were accepted in December 2011 as that of an unidentified New Zealand solider.

A reburial service will be held on 3 February 2012 at the Messines Ridge British Cemetery in Mesen. The service will commence at approximately 3pm. New Zealand will have a high-level delegation at the reburial. This will be led by Minister of Defence, the Honourable Dr Jonathan Coleman and includes Chief of Defence Force, Lt Gen R. R. (Rhys) Jones; Secretary of Defence, John McKinnon; and New Zealand's Ambassador to the European Union and Belgium, Vangelis Vitalis.

The reburial service is open to members of the public. Individuals wishing to attend are asked to advise the New Zealand Embassy of their intention in order to assist preparations.

When: Friday, 3 February at 3pm

Where: Messines Ridge British Cemetery, Nieuwkerkestraat, 8957 Mesen

RSVPs or queries can be directed to Mr Keawe Woodmore, First Secretary, New Zealand Embassy, Brussels (bruevents@mfat.govt.nz) or by phone on 02 512 1040.

2012-01-21T18:43:00.000+01:00

NZIB WAITANGI DAY EVENT IN BRUSSELS

FOR MORE INFORMATION PLEASE

HOW TO MEASURE WEALTH

2012-01-20T18:35:00.000+01:00

Off the Charts In Europe, Cars Stay in Showroom
By FLOYD NORRIS Published: January 20, 2012

THE new passenger car is becoming an increasingly rare item in some European countries.
Click on the graph below - see Belgium comes out top
Multimedia

Graphic

Off the Charts: New-Car Registrations Decline in Europe

Total new registrations of passenger cars in the European Union fell by nearly 2 percent in 2011, the European Automobile Manufacturers’ Association reported this week. It was the fourth consecutive year of declines.

The sales performance varied widely from country to country, reflecting the diverging economic fortunes on the Continent. New-car registrations set records in Belgium and Austria. German registrations were up nearly 9 percent, although they remain below their levels before the credit crisis.
But in troubled Greece, fewer than 100,000 new passenger cars were registered. That had not happened since at least 1990. In 2007, nearly 280,000 new cars were registered.
In Belgium, more than 50 new cars were registered for every 1,000 people. In Greece, the number was under nine. In Hungary, where new car registrations are less than half their level of four years ago, the figure is about half the Greek level.
New-car registrations in Europe provide an economic barometer of national conditions because no one really needs a new car. A family may need a replacement vehicle, but a used car can be purchased. Within the Common Market, it is easy to fill demand for used cars in struggling countries with trade-ins from customers in more prosperous economies.
The accompanying charts show the trends. Levels of wealth in the European Union were never close to equal, but the disparities have grown rapidly since the credit crisis began. Signs of a recovery in automobile demand in late 2009 vanished as the sovereign debt crisis emerged, first in Greece and then in other countries.
Over all, the 13.1 million cars registered in 25 members of the European Union was the smallest figure for any 12 months since data for the enlarged union began to be calculated in 2003. For the first 15 members of the European Union, data goes back much further. This was the lowest year for them since 1997, a year before the euro became the common currency for many countries.
The charts show the rapid decline in new-car registrations in the countries most hurt in the sovereign debt crisis. In 2007, Spain had 36 registrations per 1,000 residents, well above the European Union average of nearly 32. In 2011, the Spanish figure had dropped by half, and it was well below the European Union average. Ireland fell just as rapidly, although registrations did begin to pick up in 2011.
The figures reflect registrations of new passenger cars, and do not include small trucks. Figures for the United States, which do include such vehicles, are not directly comparable. But they showed increases in both 2010 and 2011.
All told, the countries in the European Union registered 15.8 percent fewer new passenger cars in 2011 than they had registered in 2007, the last full year before the credit crisis. The figure was up in seven countries, but down by 50 percent or more in eight nations.
Floyd Norris comments on finance and the economy at nytimes.com/economix. http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/21/business/global/in-debt-laden-europe-new-cars-stay-in-showroom.html?ref=business

IN AUCKLAND LAST FRIDAY

2012-01-20T17:02:00.000+01:00

7 Charged as F.B.I. Closes a Top File-Sharing Site

David Rowland/European Pressphoto Agency

From left: Bram van der Kolk, Finn Batato, Mathias Ortmann and Kim Dotcom appeared in court in Auckland on Friday.

By BEN SISARIO

Published: January 20, 2012

In what authorities have called one of the largest criminal copyright cases ever brought, the Justice Department and the F.B.I. have seized the Web site Megaupload and charged seven people connected with it with running an international enterprise based on Internet piracy.

Megaupload, one of the most popular so-called locker services on the Internet, allowed users to transfer large files like movies and music anonymously. Media companies have long accused it of abetting copyright infringement on a vast scale. In a grand jury indictment, Megaupload is accused of causing $500 million in damages to copyright owners and of making $175 million by selling ads and premium subscriptions. The arrests were greeted almost immediately with digital Molotov cocktails. The hacker collective that calls itself Anonymous attacked the Web sites of the United States Justice Department and several major entertainment companies and trade groups in retaliation for the seizure of Megaupload.
The case against Megaupload comes at a charged time, a day after broad online protests against a pair of antipiracy bills in Congress: the Stop Online Piracy Act, or SOPA, in the House of Representatives, and the Protect Intellectual Property Act, or PIPA, in the Senate. The bills would give United States authorities expanded powers to crack down on foreign sites suspected of piracy. But technology companies and civil liberties groups say that the powers are too broadly defined and could effectively result in censorship.
Four of the seven people, including the site’s founder, Kim Dotcom (born Kim Schmitz), were arrested Friday in New Zealand; the three others remain at large. Each of the seven people — who the indictment said were members of a criminal group it called Mega Conspiracy — is charged with five counts of copyright infringement and conspiracy. The charges could result in more than 20 years in prison.
As part of the crackdown, about 20 search warrants were executed in the United States and in eight other countries, including New Zealand. About $50 million in assets were also seized, as well as a number of servers and 18 domain names that formed Megaupload’s network of file-sharing sites.
The police arrived at Dotcom Mansion in Auckland on Friday morning in two helicopters. Mr. Dotcom, a 37-year-old with dual Finnish and German citizenship, retreated into a safe room, and the police had to cut their way in. He was eventually arrested with a firearm close by that the police said appeared to be a shortened shotgun.
“It was definitely not as simple as knocking at the front door,” said Grant Wormald, a detective inspector.
The police said they seized 6 million New Zealand dollars, or $4.8 million, in luxury vehicles, including a Rolls-Royce Phantom Drophead Coupe and a pink 1959 Cadillac. They also seized art and electronic equipment and froze 11 million dollars in cash in various accounts.
Mr. Dotcom and three others arrested in New Zealand appeared in court Friday afternoon and were denied bail. Extradition proceedings will continue Monday.
The police said the other three arrested in New Zealand were Finn Batato, 38, a German citizen and resident; Mathias Ortmann, 40, a German citizen who is a resident of Hong Kong; and Bram van der Kolk, 29, a Dutch citizen who is a resident of New Zealand.
The police said they were still searching Dotcom Mansion on Friday evening.
read more

The New York Times

Re:Start shopping centre - Christchurch

2012-01-06T08:41:00.000+01:00

DON SCOTT/Fairfax NZ

THE OPTIMIST: Paul Lonsdale in City Mall's Re:Start shopping centre, a project he and others achieved under great pressure.

Smile, though your heart is aching...

MARC GREENHILL

Last updated 05:00 06/01/2012

Paul Lonsdale could not believe the scene he was witnessing from the window of his High St office in central Christchurch on February 22 last year.
The sight of terrified residents and crumbling buildings was a far cry from the setting just 10 days earlier, when the Boxing Day replay sales he organised set tills ringing after trade was severely disrupted by strong aftershocks on December 26, 2010.
February's quake set the tone for a year that created many professional and personal challenges for the Central City Business Association manager, but which ended with an ambitious project credited with reviving the central city.
The City Mall's Re:Start shopping precinct – a collection of 27 temporary shops housed in brightly painted shipping containers – has been a hit since opening on October 29.
Lonsdale's first recovery idea, the Boxing Day replay sale, was an off-the-cuff remark that generated more than $1 million in sales.
He said his role changed drastically after September 2010 "in hours and in stress" as he sought to save businesses, many of which were in damaged buildings or behind cordons for several weeks.
"Waking up on September 4, you had two choices. You stay in bed or you get up and try to make a difference. I suppose I chose the latter," he said.
"The 22nd [of February] was personally very upsetting and obviously very upsetting for everybody in Christchurch because it is the day, I think, that Christchurch changed forever."
He would have been walking in the City Mall, Cashel St or High St that day had it not been for a back injury.
"I'd got up three or four times around that time to go for a walk, which I used to do on a daily basis, but I just sat down because my back was too sore," he said.
"The earthquake came and I went, 'Oh no'.
"I couldn't even get out of my chair and I was just watching my furniture dancing around the room."
Lonsdale looked up to see heritage building facades crashing down and immediately thought of his fiancee, Denise, who worked in Poplar St, off Lichfield St.
"I was very concerned about her because of the amount of bricks there," he said.
"I packed my computer up, knowing I wasn't going to get back into the city for a sizeable amount of time, and walking down the street I felt like an alien walking through a disaster movie.
"It was quite disturbing. I stopped to talk one of the guys working on a tram and asked if he was OK, but I couldn't actually get any sense out of him."
He joined a "rattled" Denise in Madras St.
The couple were due to be married on March 10, but their venues – the Arts Centre and the Twisted Hop – were damaged.
They wed seven months later in Templeton, two weeks before the Re:Start opening.
"It was certainly a lot more pressure," Lonsdale said.
"I would say I've had one to three hours' sleep a night for the entire time we've been working on the project because it was that stressful. I think it all does take a toll and there are times I know I became fairly frazzled."
Lonsdale said he never doubted the central city could be revived, even after quakes shut down the central business district three times.
Being an "eternal optimist" was his preference, he said.
"Some people say, 'you must be the only man smiling in Christchurch'.
"The last thing businesspeople want to see is someone like me looking down," he said.
"If you're leading in any respect, you've got to say, 'it's going to be good', and keep the smile on no matter what you're feeling inside.
"It's about keeping that stiff upper lip because there are no other choices."
Re:Start faced many hurdles, especially in securing funding.
Every problem seemed to have "10 other associated problems".
"There was a core group of people that worked on the project who never doubted it would get up and running on time," Lonsdale said.
"I don't think any of us stopped to think about the enormity of the project until it was over, but it's a good thing we did it.
"You've got to find opportunities to create something or do something that's going to make a difference to others.
"This project proves that by working together with a single goal you can achieve so much in a short space of time."
- © Fairfax NZ News
source

SHAKING FOR CHRISTMAS

2011-12-23T08:21:00.001+01:00

Quake swarm in Christchurch

LATEST: Sewage has contaminated the Avon River and 13,000 people are still without power after a swarm of large earthquakes hit quake-weary Christchurch this afternoon.
http://www.stuff.co.nz/

CHRISTCHURCH EARTHQUAKES CLICK HERE

New Zealand Ambassador in Belgium

2011-11-25T16:02:00.000+01:00

New Zealand Embassy & Mission to the European Union, Brussels, Belgium

Ambassador presents credentials to the European Council

Ambassador Vangelis Vitalis presents his credentials to the President of the European Council, Hermann van Rompuy

On 15 November, recently arrived Ambassador, Vangelis Vitalis, presented his credentials to the President of the European Council, Hermann van Rompuy. The ceremony included a discussion with President van Rompuy on a range of topics, including: the recent announcement that the EU and New Zealand would negotiate a Framework Agreement; New Zealand's enduring interest in an FTA with the EU; the evolving nature of Asia-Pacific regional architecture and Eurozone-related matters.
http://www.nzembassy.com/belgium/news/ambassador-presents-credentials-to-the-european-council

Those were the days

2011-02-28T14:31:00.003+01:00

Update: This shop has unfortunately been destroyed by the earthquake of February 22nd 2011.

Selling staples since 1911

The Press

Last updated 08:35 29/11/2010

5 comments

UNCHANGED: Colin Johnson of Johnson's Grocery.

Johnson's Grocery, in central Christchurch, is a cherished survivor.
Some things, thankfully, do not change, writes ROY SINCLAIR of a shop that is a tourist attraction.
Hundreds of items tumbled from the shelves of Johnson's Grocery, Colombo St, during the September 4 Canterbury earthquake.
The store was later closed for a fortnight, but since then, it has remained open. It was a matter of being knee-deep in stock, says grocer Colin Johnson, "but we had few breakages".
"Then a crack appeared across the roof during an aftershock and we were closed for two weeks until the veranda was removed."
Entering Johnson's Grocery is to delightfully step back in time, a century in time. This is how grocery shopping used to be.
Stilton cheese is sliced from the block with a wire for a clean cut. Sweets are weighed out from jars on the counter, and the grocer climbs up and down a ladder to locate something from the thousands of items neatly stacked on the floor-to-ceiling shelves.
But this attractive old- fashioned grocery also offers tempting items difficult to find elsewhere, including chocolate from Belgium, escargots and truffles from France, haggis and whisky marmalade from Scotland, pomegranate molasses from Lebanon, English teas and locally made quince conserve and lime pickle.
When customers enter the shop, carefully sidestepping stock stacked on the floor, they are greeted and served by the grocer. He wears the traditional white apron and holds a pen poised over a sheet of paper to total up the purchases.
Colin Johnson's grocery store is the last of six or more that existed along Colombo St between Peterborough St and Cathedral Square, and his is possibly the last remaining grocery shop of its kind in New Zealand.
The business opened in 1911 as Leigh and Co, according to the name on the old delivery bicycle. Leigh, Henry, Grocers' premises was in Colombo St, but mystery surrounds its exact location. Colin's father, Stan, bought the business at the present 787 Colombo St site in 1949.
Colin has worked in the grocery since 1957, and says he has enjoyed every day.
"I'm just finding out where all the things are," he laughs.
"We kept the shop in its old style and we have become a curiosity, even a tourist attraction. School children are often brought here to see how people used to shop."
He says he is lucky the grocery store has been able to survive. The reason is partly because of the abundance of speciality items sourced from around the world.

On the wall, a framed print is typical of old-style grocery stores. A kindly grocer is offering a lad a biscuit from an Arnott's tin.
It was given to Colin from a customer who found it in Australia.
Yet, with the tram going past the window, it might have been Johnson's in Christchurch.
"Yes, I remember the trams going along Colombo St when I worked for my father after school. We also had a black cat in those days. He had a really shiny coat. People would call into the grocery just to see the cat."
Colin enjoys meeting tourists - their different nationalities with their different accents. They are welcome to just take photos.
But who could resist buying something from a shop that everyday looks as if it has been done out for Christmas?
These days, Colin does not deliver groceries, although on the pavement outside he keeps the old delivery bicycle, reminiscent of one ridden by Granville in the BBC comedy Open All Hours.
Despite the appearance of the century-old grocery, Colin has made one concession to modernity - eftpos.
"Without eftpos and credit cards, a retail business would quickly go broke," he says.
He is wondering how to celebrate a centenary in the new year. He has suggested, facetiously, blocking off his section of Colombo St and offering free groceries. That, he admits, is unlikely to happen. He will announce a more modest commemoration soon.
http://www.stuff.co.nz/life-style/food-wine/4401258/Selling-staples-since-1911

Belgian Beers

2010-02-25T15:52:00.001+01:00

Photo: Tony Cenicola/The New York Times

By ERIC ASIMOV Published: February 24, 2010

A GOOD selection of Belgian-style ales is like the very best kind of buffet, offering an assortment of flavors, aromas, styles, strengths and types. You want strong ale, sour ale, sweet ale, dry ale, golden, dark, wheat, fruity and malty. When we set out to draw a stylistic standard for a planned tasting of Belgian golden ales, it seemed as if we’d taken on an impossible task. But glory does not come to those who quit easily.

So we forged ahead. We gathered Belgian golden ales and their foreign relatives as if they were snowflakes, aware that each was so unusual, and often so beautiful in a singular way, that it would resist any but the roughest categorization.

The blind tasting of these 20 Belgian-style ales was truly glorious, beer at its highest level. For the tasting Florence Fabricant and I were joined by Christian Pappanicholas, the owner of Resto, a Belgian restaurant in the Murray Hill section of Manhattan, and Richard Scholz, an owner of Bierkraft in Park Slope, Brooklyn.

Our efforts to categorize the beers withered in the face of diversity. Ostensibly, we sought strong golden ales, which at least suggests beers with a lot of alcohol and of a certain color, right? Well, not exactly. Of the 20 we ended up with, most were golden, but some tended toward amber and brown. And while some of the beers were strong, with alcohol levels of 9 to 13 percent, a handful were in the 6 percent range, about the strength of a typical pilsner.

But most were so good that we lost interest in whether they conformed to our parameters. We had beers that tasted of spices, like coriander and cloves, and those that tasted like fruit. Some were aged in oak barrels. One beer resembled the most exotic sort of lambic, a type of beer that is brewed using wild yeasts rather than those selected by brewers to produce predictable results. It had a sour funkiness that is a taste well worth acquiring. Another was so bitterly hoppy and dry that the beer seemed to have the texture of cotton, which was actually not unpleasant.

“The diversity is what makes them amazing,” Richard said. “Belgians go out of their way to make unique beers, different from the guy two blocks away.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/24/dining/reviews/24wine.html?em

A Guide to Classical Music Concerts and Opera in Brussels

2007-09-18T15:49:00.008+02:00

Now that the concert season is in full swing, here are some tips on how not to break the bank when going to concerts and getting the most out of your overseas cultural experience.

Listed below are some websites where you have information on free or low cost concerts.
As a general rule, people under 26 or over 60, are entitled to cheaper tickets. If you can plan ahead, season tickets bought before the beginning of the season e.g. in May or June, are also advantageous. Concerts during the day are also cheaper. Last minute bookings from the Arsene50 website are a good bargain.
For opera at La Monnaie, cheaper seats can be reserved if bought on the first day of ticket issue. Dates of the first day of ticket sales for each opera can be obtained from La Monnaie website.

Arsene50
Half-price theatre and concerts listed on website at 18 hrs the day before
http://www.arsene50.be/

BOZAR
– season tickets, under 25 over over 60, Sunday morning or lunch-time concerts http://www.bozar.be/agenda.php?lng=en
• BOZARABO & MYBOZAR : 10% discount on all BOZAR productions.
• BOZARSTART : 5 tickets for € 25 (under 26 only).
• Under 26, over 60, unemployed : 25% discount on presentation of relevant documents. Under 12 and people with disabilities : a single rate of € 5 applies.

Cinema
– half price with a student card

Cinémathèque Royale de Belgique
- cinema for 3 euros
http://www.ledoux.be/fr/Pratique.html

Carrefour
http://carrefourpromo.promo-sorties.com/

La Monnaie
–reduced prices via internet, subscriptions, under 26, under 15 http://www.lamonnaie.be/demunt-1.0/index.jsp?language=EN#

Conservatoire Royal de Bruxelles
– free concerts
http://www.conservatoire.be/agenda.html

Agenda.be
Lists all concerts for the coming weeks – incl. free or cheap concerts
www.agenda.be

Midi de Minimes
Daily lunch-time concerts in Brussels in July-August
http://www.midis-minimes.be/

Musées Royaux des Beaux-Arts de Belgique
Wednesday lunch-time concerts
http://www.concertsdemidi.be/fr/rensprat.htm

Quefaire.be
Listing of all concerts
http://www.quefaire.be/concerts/0_0_2_1_21.html

If you have any additions to the list or comments to make, please do not hesitate to send them to me at : nzersbelgium"at"gmail.com

Happy concert going!

Notice from New Zealand Embassy - REGISTRATION

2007-04-03T08:26:00.000+02:00

REGISTRATION OF NEW ZEALANDERS TRAVELLING OR RESIDING OVERSEAS

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade has developed a new online registration facility for use by New Zealanders travelling or residing overseas to record their contact details.

By registering you will help us to contact you in an emergency – whether it is a natural disaster, terrorist incident, civil disturbance or a family emergency. It will also help us to contact you with relevant information such as notice of elections, changes to passports legislation, relevant travel warnings.

You can register yourself via the link “Registration of New Zealanders Overseas” on the website www.safetravel.govt.nz or via the home page of the Ministry’s website www.mfat.govt.nz. Once you have registered, you will be able to access your information at any time (by using a User ID and password). Information included, and easily updated, includes:

· personal information
· information relating to family members accompanying you
· details for both long-term residence (this means your residential address in Belgium if you are here for longer than 90 days) and short-term trips (you can also register contact details for any number of holiday or business trips lasting less than 90 days)
· details for emergency and employer contacts
For anyone who cannot register online, we can provide a form to complete so that we can enter your registration on your behalf. However, this means you will not have the ability to access or update your own details on-line and will need to contact us if there are any changes to your registration details.

Personal information provided will be held, used and disclosed by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade and this Embassy for consular purposes only and in accordance with the New Zealand Privacy Act 1993.

New Zealand Embassy
Brussels
2 April 2007

Interesting secondhand bookshop in Brussels

2007-02-07T14:27:00.003+01:00

Secondhand books in the Pêle Mêle Bookshop http://www.pele-mele.be/ cost as little as 65 cents.

This popular, secondhand bookshop (French and Flemish books) in Brussels, has a wide collection of inexpensive books in English.

Pêle Mêle

Boulevard Maurice Lemonnier, 55B

1000 Bruxelles / Belgique

Happy reading!

Driving Licence Exchange for NZers Resident in Belgium

2006-09-24T17:16:00.000+02:00

I picked up this information sheet from the NZ Embassy recently.

The news is as follows: The Belgian Transport Authorities have agreed to exchange "full" New Zealand photo driving licences for "category B" Belgium driving licences.

Up until now, for New Zealanders resident in Belgium, the NZ driving licence has not been recognised by Belgian authorites and the NZers have had to sit the practical and theory tests to obtain a Belgian driving licence.

Now, it will just be a matter of exchanging the NZ driving licence for a Belgian one.

You should contact the driving licence desk in the Commune or Districthuis where you reside.

If you have any problems in doing this our contacts in the Belgian Ministry of Transport are:
Sylvain Moras: 022773867 - sylvain.moras@mobilit.fgov.be (speaks English)
Eric Polese: 022773864 - eric.polese@mobilit.fgov.be (speaks French)

If you ever need an electronic version of the NZ driving licence, this can be found at http://www.landtransport.govt.nz/licensing/docs/nz-driver-licence-guide.pdf

All papers relating to the exchange of driving licences are on the file BEL/NZ/1/6

Pam Stewart
First Secretary (Admin)
23 May 2006

A contact list for kiwis

2006-09-21T18:28:00.003+02:00

A contacts list (in pdf format) has now been prepared for circulating amongst those who have agreed to be listed on it.

If you would like to have access to this list then you must also be included in it.
For those interested, please return the following personal details to:

nzersbelgium"at"gmail.com

1. name
2. telephone
3. address (just the "town" will do)
4. e-mail
5. profession
6. interests

Of course, the details above are optional as you have the choice of showing as much or as little information as you wish.

Home sitting...a service for travellers in Belgium and abroad.

2006-09-13T22:20:00.001+02:00

Taxistop Homesitting writes: One of the many Taxistop services is the formula 'home sitters requested and home sitters offered'. Through this service, Taxistop will bring the home sitting requests and offers in contact with each other. Let us introduce this service to you. If you want, you can always ask for our brochure and subscription form without any obligation.

website

A useful tip for the Communal Elections in Belgium

2006-06-30T23:31:00.000+02:00

Did you know that non-Belgians voting in the forthcoming Communal Elections can remove themselves from the electoral roll afterwards? This option of de-registration frees you from the legal obligation to vote in subsequent communal elections if you do not happen to be around then and so avoid the fine for not voting.