Scene in a Belgian Cafe

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXVI, Issue 23507, 18 November 1939, Page 6 (Supplement)

Scene in a Belgian Cafe

By C. COMBER

THIS morning I am late for breakfast —so late indeed that I find myself in competition with the morning tea brigade and the early lunchers. My place by the window is safe, however, and I, a New Zealander, have a good opportunity to study everyday Belgian life and people under normal everyday conditions. As I instal myself, Madame, a well-favoured curvilinear personage, bustles in importantly. "You aro the last this morning," she says good-liumouredly. "The very last." Presently she reappears, carrying all at once, as if by a superhuman juggling feat, the teapot, hot water jug, butter, plate of rolls, cup and saucer and knife. "I think your tea must be weak onough this, time," sho says, sighing heavily. "But I got into trouble yesterday with some other English who didn't like it like that at all. They said it was baby's food. I don't know, I'm sure, what people expect from tea. I've never tasted it myself." All around me loquacious Belgian women with kerchiefs on their heads are rending th e ' r rolls to bits, scattering the crumbs lavishly over the tablecloth and into their coffee. Some go further and soak the chunks of bread too. Then in a careless absent-minded way they bedaub the soggy result with butter and wash it down with draughts

of strong black coffee from cups as big as basins. Except in cafes catering especially for the English and American tourists, with prices to match, bread and butter plates are not part of a table's equipment. The crumbs on the table-cloth are simply shaken on tb the floor and a wholesale swecping-up indulged in, just as the cafe begins to look like the desert after the'manna had fallen' from heaven. Tea an "Unknown Quantity" In Belgium, as in France, tea is much more expensive than coffee, which ranks with beer, wine and mineral water as a national beverage. But tea is. a strange*unknown quantity for the brewing of which there seems to be no standard recipe. Every addict has' his or her own idiosyncracy on the subject, and it is impossible to please a single one of them. So, while Continental caterers oblige by putting it on the menu, they compensate themselves for their pains at the cash desk. By having breakfast "on pension," however, you evade this extortion, for breakfast to a boarder costs the same, whether ho drinks ono cup of coffee with his rolls or live cups of tea.

They are a cheerful, colourful lot, these Belgians who make up tho cafo life which forms so picturesque a characteristic of Continental towns. They come more for the chit-chat than the food, and often sit for hours, laughing, drinking, reading the paper, and watching the crowds passing and repassing on the streets. Over by tlie door are two German girl-hikers 011 their way to La Panne. Opposite is tho smiling little darkhaired cyclist who informed me last night, "i am a Dutch, moi." At the tablo next to mine three young girls in closo conference are giving the Belgian version of that timeless, nationless topic—the mother-in-law; and from tho extracts that I overhear, thenviews on the subject appear to correspond fairly closely to our own. Four girls in the early twenties, go up to the counter and select their own cakes be-

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fore ordering coffee. This is the usual practice all over Belgium, arid a much more satisfactory 0110 than merely calling for "tea and cakes" and trusting to luck that the waitress Will bring something not entirely poisonous. Suddenly' tlic cafe is startled by the hilarious entrance of five young frenchmen and four French girls, all in coloured artists' smocks. They swarm over to the farthest corner of the room, drag three tables together, and annex tho required number of chairs and nearly .all the menus in the place to an incessant accompaniment of noise and witticisms. They call for wine and coffee, and the girls go over to the counter to select the pastries, froifl time to time referring stridently to their male friends at the other end of the rooni. A news-seller comes in with Lo Matin, and they howl for that too, and upbraid him for having nothing else. Une paper!" they cry scornfully. What 8 the use of that? Only one kind of political opinion!" Evidently they are frequent customers, for the proprietor tolerates all their sallies with mild good-humour, ,-vnd the buxom waitress switches a dutiful smile over her rather bored square countenance every time she moves in their direction. An artistic argument ensues, during which a plump blonde pirl wearing slacks hits a bronzed, idealistic, wide-eyed youth over the knuckles with a saucer. "Don t be a fool!" she cries. "Bruges is the Mecca of artists. It is the most pamtable city in tho world f" The young man sucks his hand and his oj'es light up with the fervid gleam

of the fanatic. "You are wrong!" he cries. "There is 110 city in the world but Paris. It is the beginning and the end of art. There is more worth painting from my attid'window than in a hundred miles anywhere,else in the world." "Pah!" says the girl, "you are crazy!" "No, Mathilde, he is not," puts in another quietly. "There are many lovely spots 011 earth, and Bruges is one of tlie loveliest of them all. But ,Paris is unique, in a class apart from all other cities. She is the first sweetheart of every Frenchman, and for most, the last." The , Schoolboy Airs His French

And now, in sharp contrast, there enter five pale, quiet, well-behaved tourists, complete with maps and guidebooks. They are English—father and mother, two daughters, and a high school son. "You order," they all urge the boy. "Yes, let's hear your French," the girls taunt him. "Come on, do your stuff." The boy blushes. "Qu'avest-vous?" he demands with the ferocity of painful shyness, when tlie waitress smilingly comes to take his order. A look of consternation overspreads her countenance. Why should the young man ask her so crossly what is the matter? As far as she is' concerned, there is nothing the matter She tries again, this timo not so smilingly. Tho two schoolgirls giggle; the boy scowls. "I asked her what she's got, and she only keeps on saying what do I want," he complains indignantly.

"Well," said the father, "wo know what wo want, don't we?" Raising his voice to a terrific boom, in the altogether too common English belief that defective hearing is the solo reason why foreigners cannot follow an English order, he thunders, "Tea, miss! And cakes —plenty for five," holding up five fingers encouragingly. "Tea?" says- the girl gratefully. "And cakes," repeats the father, rising from his seat and pointing vehemently at some ten of tho more highly-coloured confections.

The tea and two plates of cakes duly make their appearance, and tha, quintette settle clown at once into a quiet, subdued, suburban English family. But before long, a discussion arises. s Their idens of sugar for fivo and those of 'the waitress do not coincide. Accordingly the boy is once more invited to "do his stuff."

"Mademoiselle," he v stammers thickly. "Encore.de la sucre, s'il vous plait." The girl hesitates. "Do l'eau eliaude?" she asks. The boy nods.uncomprehendingly. But neither he nor the waitress is prepared for the volley of mirth that greets the steaming jug of hot water which the girl places 011 the table. "Ha! Ha! Ha!" "roars the father. "You asked for sugar and she brings hot water! You're a fine French scholar, you are! Now try asking for hot water and maybe she'll bring sugar." ' The boy scowls, red to the tips of his ears.* "I did ask for sugar," he snaps angrily, and lapses into an almost tearful silence. The father waves the sugar basin above his head. "Ah, slicre," says the girl, who throughout this domestic byplay has stood near, mystified but hopeful. When she returns with the sugar, the father triumphantly proclaims, "There you are. my boy, she understands my, parlez-vous better than yours, for all your education. Don't you, lassie?" ho demands, beaming joyfully upon the waitress. But the girl only shakes her head, smiles upon all five impartially, and withdraws.