Things started off in minor though: along with lifeguard friends Steve-O, Ducktales and Bakerman, I attended the funeral of the father of a good friend of ours. The man had gone way before his time, at only 53 years of age. We didn't know him, but we hope to have supported Justine and her brother Nicolas a little bit by showing them our sympathies.
It had been a long time since I attended a church service - be it on a regular Sunday, a wedding or a funeral - and it didn't take me long before I remembered why I generally stay away from Catholic rituals. With all do respect to the people who find peace and comfort in prayers, sermons and chants, but I do not, not for one bit, connect with ramblings about Jesus and his father. So I kind of sat through the initial part of the funeral.
The testimonies did strike a chord though: it was moving to hear the memories people had of the deceased. And when a Raymond van het Groenewoud song played, I actually had to fight some tears.
After the funeral service, Bakerman and me popped down to Zeebrugge, a port town right next to Knokke-Heist, where we enjoyed a meal at The Boat House. The Boat House is run by 'Schele Moens' ('Cross-eyed Moens'), an ex-fisherman who spent well over thirty years of his life out on the sea. We always crack up when we hear his fisherman's banter, delivered in a juicy West-Flemish dialect.
(I got to know my buddy Bakerman at the lifeguard service in Knokke-Heist. He's kind of like the night mayor of the town, having had a very popular bar there for about seven years. Bakerman knows every living soul in both Zeebrugge and Knokke-Heist, and I thoroughly enjoy my nights out with him because you meet a whole bunch of new people each and every time.)
After dinner, which consisted of cod with potatoes for Bakerman and shrimp croquettes for me, we headed out to the magnificent surf club Surfer's Paradise - a beautiful wooden house in the middle of the dunes, near the Dutch border.
As beautiful as the surfer's lodge looks from the outside; wait till you see what it hides in the inside.
(The guy who runs the place, Frank, used to be a famous wind surfer, back in the eighties. Frank competed on European level, then went on to introduce kitesurfing in Belgium at the beginning of the nineties and ultimately founded Surfer's Paradise.)
During his many surf trips around the world, he brought home a fine collection of souvenirs, which he used to decorate his clubhouse. The walls and ceiling of Surfer's Paradise are littered with Hawaiian oars, exotic fish and Australian roadsigns - but my favourite item remains the drawing Keith Haring once made for the club, back in the eighties when he came to Knokke for work.
(On this picture, you see a container which Haring painted for Surfer's Paradise. It has become a precious art object since then.)
It's a magical place and if you ever get the chance, don't miss out on a visit.
Anyway, that's where Bakerman and me, plus some other lifeguards, get together during the wintertime to take a weekly dive into the freezing sea. It's a ritual called 'icebearing'. It sounds and looks crazy, and it undoubtedly is, but the rush you get by throwing yourself into ice-cold water is amazing.
I have no idea what the long-term consequences of limbs and joints making sudden contact with freezing water, but I do know that my body pleasantly tingles afterwards, every time out. Plus, it's a chance to run over the beach, screaming and yelling and getting rid of most of the past week's stress. It's a catharsis.
After our weekly icebear session and a drink at the bar, plus a rendez-vous at the Belle Vue in Duinbergen where we played some pool, we attended the annual New Year's Party Knokke mayor Leopold Lippens throws for the people who work at the municipality.
Functionaries, they're called, and us, lifeguards, were invited as well. Which was nice.
We tipped over a number of Brugse Zot beers (literal translation 'Bruges Madman'), got together with some colleagues we hadn't seen since the summertime and then continued the festivities at bar Dino's, the Sapinière and ultimately the legendary Kitsch Club at the Casino.
I think I can say I lived every damn second of that Saturday to the fullest and I'm even happier to state that I don't regret a single one of 'em.
Though when my alarm clock sounded off this morning, at 7 am, I did realize that I could've used a little more than the mere three hours of sleep that I managed to get in...
Right, this should do for now - catch you guys tomorrow with my 'Green Hornet' review.
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