Quand a Liege...

When in Liege, do as the Liegoise. Peket is dangerous. There is no other way to say this. Went last night to the House of Peket and now I see why Tchantches has a wooden head because I have one too. Oufti.



Meanwhile, the child is drifting far away from me and I needed to find something to try and bring her back. She’s just a little kid with a lost father and I am not getting support here so I have to try something.

I looked all over town but there are just not any Mexican people or stores here. So there are not Mexican stores either. Finally I found these at the supermarket.

Mini taco tubs! I cannot take the child to her father in Guadalajara but perhaps I can bring a little of Mexico to the child.

My search took me to a neighborhood across the river, where most everyone seemed Arab, with all the ladies in their hijabs and the butcher stores advertising halal products. I found a fantastic supermarket, named Ali Baba which had an incredible selection of all things North African and Arab and Mediterranean.



The cheese department covered cows, goats and sheep and sold yogurt in buckets of 10 kilos. We just don’t have that in America.

I came here with the idea that it was going to be all frites and chocolate and beer and waffles and chicons. And all of those things are here of course, but goat cheese in a can? Fantastic!



Then I found a tidy Spanish market and poked around. The woman that owned the place was very friendly with me and patient with my terrible French.









She told me her family moved her from Asturia in Spain when she was a little girl so that her father could work in the mines. She said that the mines are what brought the Italians, the Polish, everyone. Except the Chileans, who came to get away from their bad government and by that time, the mines were mostly closed. Even with the mines shut down, the people come anyway, looking for a better life. It has always been so.

This is Deb in the City, traversing the diasporas, saying adios, au revoir and farewell from the glowing city of Liege.