Brussels

So now I've got to try and catch up on what we have been doing. I've been a bit slack at blogging as it's a pain not having access to wifi in our rooms and it's difficult to find a place to sit and get things done. First world I know!

Last Wednesday we travelled to Brussels for a couple of meetings. The first one was with the teacher training college. It's a bit confusing how they work out their tertiary system but there are university colleges where you can do courses for training for professions or there are universities where academic studies are done, such as research, philosophy etc. Anyway, the staff at the College were very excited to have us visit and explained to us the training programs for nursery school - 2.5 to 5/6 year olds, primary/elementary school - 5/6 year olds to 11 year olds and then the secondary school which breaks into academic, vocational, arts and training facilities. The staff were very hospitable and we even had Australian wine on the tables.

We then visited the Cathedral of St Michael and St Gudula which was impressive and had beautiful stained glass windows from the 1500s!

Our guide Ann explained to us the symbol of the pelican which you often see in churches - people used to think the adult pelican coughed up its body and blood, instead of regurgitating its food, and so they made the link with the Eucharist. In the Mary chapel of the cathedral there was an amazing altar with the pelicans...

Our afternoon was spent listening to a member of the European Committee of Catholic Education talk about the 26 countries involved - there was a fear that he would read out the report from all 26 but thankfully he only read ten!