Belgian Advent Calendar – Day 7 There are places in Brussels where the past doesn’t fade—it simply changes costume. The Galeries Saint-Hubert, completed in 1847, was Europe’s first covered shopping arcade, a glass-roofed marvel that preceded Milan’s famous Galleria by…
Belgian Advent Calendar – Day 6 There are countries you love because you were born in their legacy. And then, there are the countries you choose to love with deliberate passion. I should know, since this is precisely my story.…
Belgian Advent Calendar – Day 5 It wouldn’t be December 5th at The Ritual of Reading if we didn’t speak of Saint Nicholas on the eve of his feast, but this year, since we’re traveling to Belgium, St. Nick offers…
On the eve of Saint Nicholas, Belgian children place their shoes by the fireplace, hoping to wake up to clementines, chocolate coins, and the spiced, crunchy cookies that define this winter celebration: speculoos. These aren’t just any biscuits. They’re the…
Belgian Advent Calendar – Day 4 “Every town is a state of mind, a mood which, after only a short stay, communicates itself, spreads to us in an effluvium which impregnates us, which we absorb with the very air.” —…
Belgian Advent Calendar – Day 3 I grew up in Europe’s Eastern-continental climate in the late twentieth century, which meant winters that were unmistakably, uncompromisingly snowy. For me, the spirit of the holidays has always lived in those white-washed days:…
Belgian Advent Calendar – Day 2 Have you ever watched a flame flicker and felt, for a moment, as though it were thinking?As though the darkness around it wasn’t an absence, but a presence—waiting, listening, opening a door ? Tonight’s…
Belgian Advent Calendar – Day 1 Welcome back, dear friends, to the fifth edition of our Advent Calendar—a tradition that has become one of the great joys of my year, and one I’m deeply grateful to share with you. After…
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My Parisian Ritual for Embracing Solitude
