The heart of Europe - 1 of 2

Europe is an anatomical miracle. For, wherever you come between Brussels and Prague, you can read brochures telling you you've just landed in "The heart of Europe" or "The centre of Europe", if not simply "The capital of Europe". Where does the heart of Europe lie, really? And who can call themselves 'the capital of Europe'?

As a Swede, and without a map in front of you, if you hear that Prague is the very centre of Europe, and that Stockholm, for example, lies east of Prague, you might think someone is having you on. But that's the way it is. Have a look. Helsinki is more of an eastern city that either Warsaw or Belgrade. Stockholm lies about 400 km east of Prague.

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The fight to be the capital of Europe is fought hard between several towns. Brussels claims the title simply because that's where both the head office of the European Community and the headquarters the western defence alliance NATO are.

There is only one reason why these important centres of power lie in Brussels and nowhere else. It's because Brussels is NOT Paris, not Bonn and not London. And it's not even Rome. On the other hand it's rather close to most of all these capitals from Brussels. In that way the French, the Germans and the English were able to accept the compromise of Brussels, simply because at least the arch-enemy didn't get to have "the capital of Europe."

Someone who comes to Brussels for the first time, and does so with the expectation of meeting the capital of Europe and believes this will be the sum total of what Europe can offer, is surely bound to be deeply disappointed. Unless you're a Swedish financial journalist, of course. They love Brussels.

It's they who in latter years have written lyrical articles about something they call 'Belgian cuisine', and about Brussels as the food capital of Europe, and a lot of other nonsense.

Of course you can imagine paradise as a Belgian kitchen, full of mussels cooked in wine and chips. But in the long term it would be a bit monotonous. Even if you had unlimited access to Belgian beer, with or without strawberry taste.

The truth about these fantastic Belgian cuisine and landlords in Brussels is that these articles have usually been written by Swedish journalists who don't speak French and have therefore felt themselves quite simply inferior in Paris. But it's hard to feel inferior in Belgium, so they were able to step into any old pub in Brussels, order food in English and be served with reasonably good French grub. This their culinary discovery has then resulted in euphoric descriptions of "Belgian" food. Which was usually French.

Even without experiments with different kinds of Belgian beer, the meeting with Brussels can be disturbing enough. One might quietly wonder whether the chairman of the town's beauty council has been given permanent leave and whether the town architect was dismissed in the same clean-up. An uglier town hardly exists. High-rise office buildings alternate with beautiful baroque structures, which might have their antique façades smartened up with luscious pink neon lights advertising a disco in the cellar, beside a pit which never gets filled in, alongside a house which looks like it's never been repaired since the first world war, alongside a modern shopping centre in glass and marble, right opposite a renovated 1700-century house, which stands next-door to a multi-storey car-park, but where there are cars on only the top three floors. The first three are offices, of which two are for hire, which fact is advertised on big signs which may be hard to read where they are in the windows, for those are just as impenetrably dirty as all the other windows in town. Anywhere there aren't cars parked in the narrow streets, there are big plastic bags of rubbish instead.

It's like that over the whole of Brussels. Fortunately there often lies a mist like a merciful veil over the whole appalling mess.

As a shop-window for Europe this "capital" is a disaster and can give anyone coming from outside completely the wrong impression of Europe's future. On the other hand it works well for all those Swedish study-delegations who already start off with a negative attitude to the European Union, they only need to take a walk round the hotel to decide that there's not much for Sweden to learn here. Which is absolutely right. Your refill cup of coffee isn't free either, like it is at home. You have to remember that Europe has several capitals like this which aren't even representative for their countries, like Bern, Bonn and the Hague.

Of course Brussels has its bright spots too. The old square really is one of the whole continent's special points, and the two museums, one for modern and one for older art, are among the best in Europe.