Yesterday I finally had the time to go through my photos of Brussels and Bruges/Brugge. Here is a random collection of some of my favorites.

And while I’m at it, I have a few recommendations for anyone visiting Brussels:

1. Thematic maps. Go to the Visit Brussels tourist office, which is not far from the central train station, and ask for their “theme” maps (cost: 1 euro each). We bought the Art Nouveau/Art Deco map and the Comic Art map (oh, and the food lovers’ map). These small, illustrated maps take you on a walking tour of Brussels, so you don’t waste any time, e.g., trying to find a specific Art Deco building or comic strip mural on your own. Very helpful.

We really enjoyed exploring Brussels using these thematic maps.  Without them, we might not have noticed the Tintin comic mural on our way to see the Manneken Pis (the small bronze statue of a little boy peeing into a fountain’s basin). I took a few photos of the Manneken Pis, but it’s so famous that I decided to post a photo of the Tintin mural instead (photo no. 3, to the left).

So yes, highly recommended. The maps, I mean.

2. Chocolate. In Brussels, everywhere you turn, everywhere you look, there is a chocolate shop. And I mean: everywhere! I have never seen–or smelled!–anything like it. A chocoholic’s idea of heaven. 😉

There are so many different chocolatiers that you wonder what to do, which chocolate to try. My advice is NOT to waste your palate on any of the chocolate created for the tourist market. Go directly to one of Pierre Marcolini’s shops (and no, unfortunately I am not getting paid in chocolate to write this recommendation, or in any other way for that matter!). Yes, true, Marcolini’s high quality chocolate is probably more expensive, but it’s so exquisite that you can eat less of it and feel completely satisfied…in chocolate heaven, in fact. Mmmmh. And even if you don’t like chocolate, walking into a Marcolini shop is like walking into a fancy jewelry shop…the chocolates are displayed like jewels…Many thanks to my gourmet friend Simonetta for recommending this chocolatier!

The day after we arrived in Brussels, it just so happened that Pierre Marcolini opened a shop devoted mainly to éclairs (photo no. 4, above). We went to the inauguration, of course!, and Stefano and I split an éclair–one of the most divine sweets I’ve ever tasted, and hey, let’s not forget that I live in Florence, which is full of amazing pastry shops! 🙂

3. Accommodation (etc.). Try to stay in a hotel or B&B in the center of Brussels. We did that and were able to walk everywhere…except for one rainy/overcast day when we decided to take the tourist sightseeing bus, which took us out to the Atomium where, in spite of the rain, the queues were impossible, so we just stayed outside and took photos. See photo no. 5. Another place I highly recommend is the Horta Museum. Note: the hop-on-hop-off tourist bus takes you close to it. 

4. Food. We didn’t eat tremendously well, I have to admit, in part because some of the recommended, family-operated restaurants were closed during part of our stay, but we did have delicious, organic breakfasts (in a café near our hotel…we went there every morning!) and one truly fantastic lunch…so if you are headed to Brussels, let me know, and I’ll tell you where they are. 

Bruges (starting from photo no. 9, i.e., the waffle photo).

Well, I don’t know if I would call Bruges a “Venice of the North” (!), but it is certainly a very very very pretty and lively town with many canals and photo opportunities…well worth a visit. Make sure you go on a canal boat ride!

I could describe Bruges in four words: canals, tourists, cobblestones and…swans. Yes, swans. Lots of them. The swans of Bruges are actually quite tame (I watched children petting one of them, something I would never do…). And I came across a Medieval legend connected to the presence of swans in Bruges.

As follows (my summary of the legend I found online):

Pieter Lanchals, whose surname means ‘long neck,’ was one of the town administrators at the court of Maximilian of Austria (15th century). He tried to seize power in Bruges but was imprisoned and forced to watch the torture of his supporters. Lanchals was then executed in the Bruges market square. According to the legend, Maximilian of Austria punished Bruges by obliging the population to keep ‘long necks,’ that is, swans, on their lakes and canals until eternity.

Well, whatever the reason for the presence of all these swans, I must say that they added beauty and elegance to our visit and photos. So do make sure to walk to the square where most of them gather…It’s quite a sight!

P.S. Hover over my photos if you would like to have a brief description of the places we visited. You can also make some of the photos bigger by clicking on them.

I’m posting just a quick note (if my computer lets me, that is!) to say that two days after we got back from Brussels/Bruges (btw, we had a lovely trip and some of the best chocolate I’ve tasted in my entire life!, but I’ll save that for another post… 😉 ), our British photographer friend PK, whom Stefano and I had met years ago via my blog, came to visit us in Florence. And so we have spent the past seven days with him, fantastic fun!, mainly photographing the birds at our bird reserve, the Parco della Piana, near Florence. We also accompanied PK on a weekend trip to southern Tuscany, in the area of the Val d’Orcia, where we photographed some of the most famous cypress landscapes in the world. Breathtaking. Gorgeous. Mmmmh.

Point is: I haven’t been spending much time online lately, as you can imagine!!! 🙂

But there is another thing. I have also been experiencing quite a bit of computer trouble in the past few days. Yesterday I couldn’t even log into my blog, which was very frustrating. Stefano seems to have fixed the problem today but…you never know with computers! Anyway, if my computer behaves, I’ll be sorting through my photos in the next few days and posting a few here. This one is a photo I took in Bruges, near Brussels, on Easter Sunday. We walked almost 18 kilometers that day…yes, eighteen kilometers…not bad, eh?

Belgium, Val d’Orcia, Parco della Piana: three very different places, but all very interesting! And lots of fun, too!

Take care, everyone! Ciao! 🙂

Stefano and I are going to be visiting Brussels during the Easter holiday, so today I decided to write a pre-Brussels post in order to ask my Belgian readers (or readers who have been there) for some tips on where to go, what to see, the best places to get a decent meal (Belgian food), etc. We’ll be there for four days, btw. Can’t wait!!!

I have already begun a list, which includes the Magritte Museum (we are both Magritte fans), the Manneken Pis (the bronze statue of a little boy peeing into a fountain’s basin…it’s famous), and, of course, the Grand Place. We have also planned to spend a day in Bruges, sometimes referred to as “the Venice of the North.”

As for eateries, well, it’s no secret that I’m a chocolate lover, so there couldn’t be a better place for me than the land of Belgian chocolates. 😉 We will definitely make a stop at one of Pierre Marcolini’s “haute chocolaterie” shops (see photo of his selection box), highly recommended by a chocolate-loving friend of ours. I hope we can afford his prices, though! I am also curious to visit “Mary,” the shop that supplies pralines to the Belgian royal family.

And, since Stefano likes a good glass of beer, I was thinking of taking him to the Cantillon Brewery, unless someone has a better suggestion…Of course, we will be eating regular food, too, so suggestions to that regard are most appreciated, too!

Thank you!!! Or rather, dank u!!! 🙂

Yesterday, as soon as we found out that a flock of flamingos had landed in our favorite bird reserve, Stefano and I got our gear together and rushed over there.

We arrived about an hour before sunset, so the light wasn’t great, as you can see. Plus the flamingos were on the other side of the lake, so please don’t look too closely at my photos. They’re terrible! But they do document the presence, for the FIRST time ever!!!, of 15 flamingos in this bird reserve. It’s a historic event! Amazingly exciting. 

I hope these interesting birds are going to enjoy the reserve and stick around for a few days, which would give us a few more opportunities to photograph them, perhaps under better conditions…But even if they fly away today, it won’t matter to me: I’m so thrilled to have seen them here in Florence (after seeing hundreds of them in Camargue, years ago).

Wow. Flamingos in Florence! 🙂 

Well, duuuuh, we already knew that, but this–that is, the fact that curcumin is a safe and promising treatment for most cancers–is the conclusion reached by a group of scientists who reviewed past clinical trials. So…hey…it’s official!!!

Here’s the direct link to the article: http://goo.gl/oupQwg

Oh, by the way, the article specifically mentions multiple myeloma (and pancreatic cancer) as a type of cancer that responds well to curcumin…Excellent news (again, nothing new for us, but…for me, a bit of vindication, I must admit…). 🙂

This post should explain, I hope, my absence from the blogging world and why I haven’t been replying to queries…

I came down with the flu about a week and a half ago. Wowsie. That February flu was the worst. My main symptom was a fever close to/equal to 40° C (104° F) that lasted for days. So I slept a lot. I’m okay now, but boyohboy I’m still tired most of the time–no energy, no appetite. All I really want to do is lie around and watch movies. 🙂 But I know this lack of energy won’t be a permanent state…like others who have been through the same thing, I just have to take it easy for a while, that’s all…

But that isn’t the only reason I haven’t been devoting my free time to research and blogging. We’ve just come out of a terrible period of worry and fear that began on January 20, when our eldest male cat, Piccolo, 11.5 years old, became suddenly and seriously ill.

It’s actually a long and complicated story, but the gist is that I saved my cat’s life by deciding to take him to the 24-hour animal clinic on February 6…I just had a very strong feeling that he was getting worse at home, under our family vet’s “supervision.” Turned out, I was right. My gut saved my cat…

The vets at the animal clinic ran some blood tests on Piccolo. The results showed that he had “acute kidney failure.” Noooo!!! Almost paralyzed with fear, I managed to ask the vet to tell me the truth. She answered that some cats live, some don’t, that it all depended on the individual cat’s reaction to treatment. Okay, Margaret, deep breath…

Piccolo was admitted immediately to the clinic where he stayed for more than 5 days. For the first 24 hours, we didn’t know if he would live or not…

Luckily for us, it turned out that his kidney failure wasn’t chronic but had been caused by an anti-inflammatory drug OVERDOSE (= a dose, mind you, that had been prescribed by our own family vet…well, now our former family vet…). I mean, Piccolo almost died because of a stupid limp (which, by the way, is gone now). Crazy. Absolutely crazy.

But the main thing is that Piccolo is okay now, thanks to the wonderful loving care he received at the clinic. He still hasn’t recovered 100%, but he’s back to his normal self, and his creatinine is almost back in the normal range now. We hope to get there next week, after finishing the I.V. therapy he’s been doing as an outpatient for weeks now.

Piccolo is an extraordinary cat. He is the only one who “skypes” with my parents, responding to their voices and gestures. And, like he did when he was a young cat, he still fills our bed with balls during the night. He won’t run down the stairs to retrieve them anymore, but he still brings them upstairs for us to throw (and for us to retrieve, too…!). He is very affectionate, loves giving forehead-to-forehead love bumps, and yes, he’s a chatterbox…he always has lots to tell us, especially when we’re driving to the animal clinic for his treatments (meowmeowmeow…aaaagh!). We love him to bits. And to think that, if I hadn’t had that gut feeling, we would have lost him…Scary.

The photos: 1. A miserable Piccolo in his cage at the clinic, with the torture collar around his neck (even with the collar, he managed to rip out his I.V. drip at least twice…bad boy!); 2. Piccolo on our bed shortly after we got home; 3. a more recent photo of Piccolo who is now not in any pain and able to curl up again…

Bottom line: every time I’ve followed my gut instinct, I’ve made the right choices. So here is my advice for today: always listen to your…gut!

This morning I read a very interesting “food for thought” article, just published in the “Oncology Times,” about the same old same old (question)…that is, should patients with so-called “high risk” smoldering myeloma be treated…or not? Here’s the link (you can download the entire article; look on the right, under “Article Tools”): http://goo.gl/MzG6mj 

I decided to publish the link without adding any comments, since, duh, you can imagine which approach I would choose…no mystery there. And my position in this matter is merely reinforced (in MY opinion, of course) by Dr. Berenson’s comments on the Spanish “high-risk” SMM chemo trial…for example, the “significant design problems” of that trial…hah, no kidding!

I thought it was noteworthy that Dr. Berenson mentions “curcumin” on page 25. Curcumin, as we well know, has  been totally ignored/dismissed/ridiculed/etc. by our specialists and only recently has managed to catch their attention…probably since so many of us take it…

Boy, sometimes it feels as though I’m beating my head against a brick wall…mamma mia.

Incidentally, I was surprised by the audience’s choice, in the end. Very surprised. Or was I, deep down? Hmmm…not sure. Oops, I promised NOT TO COMMENT. Drat. Okay, I will shut up now.

Anyway, whichever side you are on, this is an interesting debate…

If only we were disinterested spectators…

I don’t know where to begin…I read so many interesting articles today! Well, I’ll pick three of them, randomly, as follows…

• A group of Neapolitan researchers have created a new synthetic molecule that they’ve called DTP3, which kills myeloma cells effectively, without killing healthy cells at the same time. It’s as strong as bortezomib (!) “but more than 100-fold higher cancer cell specificity in vitro,” according to the abstract. Here’s the link to the full study, which is available for free online (I confess, I’ve only read the abstract at this point, though): http://goo.gl/AMk5Ro So here it seems that we have something that kills MM cells without killing the good stuff as well…if that’s not cause for celebration, I don’t know what is!!! And I’m excited also because this is an entirely “made in Italy” discovery. 🙂 The study was published, as you can see, in October of 2014, but today I read an article about it (in Italian) providing a bit more information. Here’s the link: http://goo.gl/wpzTto  The items of interest mentioned in the Italian article are as follows: 1. the concentrations of DTP3 needed to kill myeloma cells are very low (always a good thing, no?). 2. DTP3 blocks the activity of the myeloma cell helper known as GADD45beta, a protein that is over-expressed in myeloma cells but practically absent in healthy cells. 3. Phase I clinical trials are set to begin in the United Kingdom this year. I’ll be following DTP3, for sure…
• I also read a Scientific American article on a new study showing that our immune system is much more affected by our environment and life habits than by our inherited DNA: http://goo.gl/UmM6QK The study’s findings regarding cytomegalovirus and Epstein Barr are quite intriguing, by the way. It has always been in the back of my mind, in fact, that EBV had something to do with the development of my own MGUS, then SMM, and that is why the “evil virus” topic has always been of interest to me…Anyway, this is another highly recommended read. Oh, and it’s not too difficult to understand, either, which is always a big bonus!
• In 2008 I wrote a post on xanthohumol, a compound found in the hop plant ( = BEER!!!). In a nutshell, a study showed that xanthohumol has anti-inflammatory, antiproliferative and antiangiogenic properties. Mainly, though, it KILLED myeloma and leukemia cells. Here’s a refresher: http://margaret.healthblogs.org/other-alternative-treatments/xanthohumolhop-plant/ Well, today I read a Science Daily article on a new study showing that this compound may also slow the development of brain disorders, including Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s Disease: http://goo.gl/ghbss0 Very interesting. Too bad I don’t care much for beer…!!! Uff!!!

Thanks to a good friend, I was able to watch a wonderful video about Italy, produced by the Italian Ministry of Economic Development, which I hope will obliterate at least some of the amazingly dumb and ignorant stereotypes about Italians that have always driven me absolutely bonkers. It’s a short video that anyone with an interest in anything Italian should watch. Enjoy! 🙂