Bruxelles: A Mixed Bag of People and Government

Before going to Brussels and especially Belgium, I had known Belgium was a country in Western Europe near France and the Netherlands, that they were good at soccer, and had been a place with many battles in World War I. I did not realize that both Dutch (Flemish), and mostly French are spoken in the city and that Brussels was such a diverse place. Through two nights I have in terms of our official visit gone to Amcham EU, La Manufacture, and have gone on a walking tour of the city.
At Amchan, we listened to and asked questions to a lobbying group within the European Parliament which represents the American Department of Commerce in terms of what policy they push the EU to take. Two main points stuck out to me from this; Amchan supports a strong EU and itself, even though it advises on how to handle Brexit, seems to have been against it because it messes with the current EU. The other thing I learned is that American opinion within the EU is mainly facilitated by Great Britain due to the closeness in the allies between the two. With the future prospects of Britain being sovereign, it leads to more doors closing towards American influence within the EU leading to possibly more negative effects for American Business.
After this a few of us went to a local café on a nice 47 degrees day, and then met back up with the group for the tour of the EU Parliament and of the city of Brussels. On this tour we visited many sites including the St James Church and the center city square which can be seen in the pictures below. We had a great dinner at La Manufacture then made our way back to the hotel before the next day, January 7th where I had my 21st birthday.

On January 7th we visited Deloitte, by far and away the best learning experience on the trip. Deloitte was at the Brussels Airport and we gained much insight onto the readiness of certain industries in regard to Brexit. We later on wandered that night and bought chocolate and waffles across the city of Brussels by the Royal Square which looks beautiful at night.