a suprise meetup for mandy in Brussels

highway in Belgium. Jos following us patiently

A few weeks ago we came up with the idea to suprise mandy when she comes back in europe with a meetup on her birthday. A lot of travbuddys where involved in this secret. Not one of us could talk normal on TB, because mandy was not allowed to sence anything of our secret. So only talking on pm and the phone or msn.  It started with Jos, because he did not have a meetup in may. So i said to him we can go to brussels together. And talking to Keiko she wanted to go as well. And if Keiko goes, Walter will come also. And than Devika invited me for a meetup and i told her we were going to Brussels. She liked the idea, and she agreed to come also.

So saturday may 9th we had to be at 10 o'clock at the central station in 's Hertogenbosch.

balloons for the birthday

So glad Walter called me on his celphone at 8.30 am ,because i did not hear my wake up call. So really had to hurry. No coffee no bread just driving! And lucky we arrived on time. There we were supposed to meet Jos and Devika, but we could not see Jos and Devika. They were driving in circles around 's Hertogenbosch. And walter and keiko they came by train on time.  Than off to Brussels. We arrived as sceduled in brussel at 12 o'clock. And mandy called again, where are you now??  Everybody had to be very quiet, because she was not supposed to know. I told her i was still in the car and had to walk for a while before we are able to reach the market. But in fact we were waiting for chokk (chris). We started walking towards the centre of Brussels.

walter and his hat (he thought i was wearing the hat also!! But i did not!)

There she was sitting, and we started to whistle!!! She was very suprised to see us. And than she saw the rest of the tb group. A big suprise for her!

We were all thirsty and hungry, so we tried to find a place to sit somewhere. We finally found something where we all could sit, this was at Le Roy on the Market. Chris joined us in the restaurant. After a good rest chris gave us a tour through Brussels. Places we have never been to. Really enjoyed the afternoon. Time really did fly! So it was time to have dinner.  We went to the food factory. Not very expensive but good food.  They had seen that mandy had her birthday and they could offer a special birthday desert, which included ice with fireworks on it, music and a lightshow. This was a good way to end this day and made it even a bit more special for mandy.

So in the end it was very late and we really had to hurry to collect mandy's suitcase and drive as fast as we could to 's Hertogenbosch again. Because walter and Keiko had to catch the train at 10.07 pm.  We arrived at the station at 10.01 pm. So everybody was home in time.

Jos has put up a very nice video on his own Blog!!!