X-Nico

33 unusual facts about belgium


11me Escadrille de Chasse

An overwhelming invasion by the German army left Belgium partially occupied by the end of 1914, with its preserved territory shielded by deliberate defensive flooding at Nieuwpoort by the Belgians.

2011–12 Belgian Hockey League season

The 2011–12 Belgian Hockey League season was the 92nd season of the Belgian Hockey League, the top level of ice hockey in Belgium.

2012 Spa-Francorchamps GP2 and GP3 Series rounds

The 2012 Spa-Francorchamps GP2 Series round and the 2012 Spa-Francorchamps GP3 Series round was a group of motor races held at the Circuit de Spa-Francorchamps near Spa in Belgium for the GP2 and GP3 Series championships.

Aba Dunner

After leaving school, Aba learned in yeshiva in Kapellen, Belgium, and then in Luzern, Switzerland, where studied under Rabbi Moshe Soloveitchik, with whom he maintained contact throughout the remainder of his life.

Alex Penkala

Alex Penkala was killed in action, just outside the Belgian town of Foy, by fire from German artillery.

Aston Martin 2-Litre Sports

This prototype was entered at the 24 Hours race at Spa in 1948 as a way of testing its durability, and the car won the race outright with drivers St. John Horsfall and Leslie Johnson.

Bas Leinders

Bas Leinders (born 16 July 1975 in Bree) is a racing driver from Belgium.

Bayan, Kuwait

Bayan also houses several international embassies, including that of the United States of America, Belgium, and Thailand.

Beringen

Beringen, Belgium, a municipality located in the Belgian province of Limburg.

Chattahoochee Hills, Georgia

The site (Bouckaert Farm) was chosen due to its resemblance to Boom, a Belgian town which traditionally hosts the Tomorrowland festival it was spun off from.

Claeys Formula

The Claeys Formula is used in Belgium by the practitioners of social law to evaluate the notice period that has to be respected when an employee is dismissed.

Count Harmel

The title was created by King Baudouin for Pierre Harmel, who was a well-known Belgian lawyer, politician and diplomat, and served for eight months as Prime Minister of Belgium.

Europay International

The merged entity was headquartered in Waterloo, Belgium, on the same premises as EPSS (European Payment Systems Services) and MasterCard EMEA (the MasterCard region comprising Europe, the Middle East and Africa).

Forest-East railway station

The Forest-East railway station is a railway station in the municipality of Forest in Brussels, Belgium.

Gaston-François de Witte

Gaston-François de Witte (1897-1980) was a Belgian herpetologist who discovered and described at least 24 different species of reptiles.

Hever

Hever, Belgium, a small village in the center of Flanders, Belgium

Highlands and Islands Fire and Rescue Service

It was the fire service covering the largest geographical area in the United Kingdom (its area is roughly equivalent in size to Belgium), and has its headquarters in the city of Inverness.

Hogeschool Gent

There are also campuses in the neighbouring cities of Aalst and Melle.

Jef van de Wiele

Fredegardus Jacobus Josephus (Jef) van de Wiele (Deurne, Belgium, 20 July 1903 - Bruges, 4 September 1979) was a Belgian Flemish Nazi politician.

Karl Heeremans

On his 40th anniversary as a painter, he was honored with a retrospective of 80 paintings at he Museum "Oud Hospitaal", Aalst, Belgium.

M1A1 Flamethrower

Used first in a battle on July 30, 1915 at Hooge in Flanders, the Germans surprised the British and French forces in an assault that inflicted almost 800 casualties.

Meix-le-Tige

Meix-le-Tige (Walloon MS-li-Tîxhe) is a section of the Belgian town of Saint-Léger, located in Wallonia municipality in the province of Luxembourg of Belgium.

Neumayer-Station III

The above surface construction of Neumayer III is predominant in the Antarctic, seen at other new stations such as the American Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station and the Belgian Princess Elisabeth Base.

Nuestra de Señora de Halle

Ribera named the fort for the city of Halle, in Belgium where he had previously spent many years in the war there.

Oberste Heeresleitung

For most of the war, the OHL was headquartered at Spa in Belgium.

Ransart

Ransart, Belgium, a former Belgian municipality and now part of the city of Charleroi

Remicourt

Remicourt, Belgium, a municipality in the province of Liège, Belgium

RV Belgica

Belgica was and is the name of two Belgian research vessels, with a name derived ultimately from the Latin Gallia Belgica.

SAMCEF

SAMCEF development started in 1965 at the University of Liège and is still developed and sold by SAMTECH, a Belgian company the HQ of which is located in Liège, Belgium.

Signal de Botrange

The average and extreme temperatures are usually lower than at any other place in Belgium: the minimum temperature recorded (-25.6 °C) does not, however, exceed the absolute record (-30.1 °C ), observed in the valley of the Lomme, at Rochefort during a temperature inversion phenomenon.

Uccle-Calevoet railway station

Trains calling at Uccle-Calevoet are local trains running from Nivelles to Leuven, Braine-l'Alleud to Brussels-North, Nivelles to Antwerp-Central, Châtelet to Schaerbeek and Charleroi-Sud to Antwerp Central.

Vanbreda International

In 1930 Jos en Maurice Van Breda, two brothers from Lier, founded Bank J.Van Breda & C°.

Warren Muck

Muck and his friend Penkala were killed from a direct hit in their foxhole from German artillery just outside the Belgian town of Foy.


Albert Vanhoye

Born on 23 July 1923 at Hazebrouck, France, Albert Vanhoye entered the Society of Jesus in 1941 and studied at Jesuit Scholasticates in France and Belgium, as well as obtaining a licentiate and doctorate in sacred scripture with a thesis on the Letter to the Hebrews, from the Pontifical Biblical Institute (the Biblicum) in Rome.

Amblève

Amel, a germanonphone town in Belgium, called Amblève in French.

Arthur Vierendeel

He obtained an MSc in construction and mining engineering in 1874 at the Université catholique de Louvain, after which he worked as an engineer for the company Nicaise et Delcuve in La Louvière, Belgium.

At Va'Ani

The song was performed twelfth on the night (following Belgium's Ann Christy with "Gelukkig zijn" and preceding Turkey's Semiha Yanki with "Seninle Bir Dakika").

Auseklis Limbazi Theatre

Production of Friedrich Dürrenmatt's Play Strindberg went to Belgium, Estonia and Lithuania, Sławomir Mrożek's At Sea travelled to Denmark, Iceland and Lithuania, Inga Abele's Dzelzzāle (Iron Weed) had its premiere in Copenhagen, Denmark.

Béco Dranoff

In 1998, Dranoff co-founded the modern Brazilian music label Ziriguiboom in association with Belgium’s Crammed Discs, launching the international careers of artists Bebel Gilberto, Celso Fonseca, Cibelle, Zuco 103, Trio Mocotó, Bossacucanova, Apollo Nove, DJ Dolores and the late producer Suba.

Belgian media

In Flanders, VRT channels (Eén, Canvas and Ketnet/OP12) had a combined market share of 42.0% in 2012, VMMa channels (VTM, 2BE, Vitaya and vtmKzoom) 28.8%, SBS Belgium channels (VIER and VIJF) 10.5% and Concentra (Acht) 0,5%.

Berendrecht Lock

In July 2009, it was announced that the Belgian dredging company Jan De Nul, together with a consortium of contractors consisting of the Spanish Sacyr Vallehermoso, the Italian Impregilo and the Panamanian company Grupo Cusa, had been awarded the contract to build the six new locks on the enlarged Panama Canal to accommodate larger Post-Panamax vessels.

Clare Benedict

The collection also includes photographs and autographs: an envelope addressed by Queen Victoria to the Queen of Belgium, letters by James Fenimore Cooper, Walter Scott, and Henry James.

CroisiEurope

In France, CroisiEurope sail on the Seine, the Rhône, the Saône, the Gironde, the Meuse, and the Rhine; in Italy, on the Po; in Spain, on the Guadalquivir; in Portugal, on the Guadiana and the Douro; in Germany, Belgium, and the Netherlands, on the Rhine; in Germany, Austria, Hungary, Serbia, and Romania, on the Danube; and in Germany, on the Havel and the Oder.

Dalen Hotel

After its opening in 1894, the hotel drew royal guests from all over Europe, playing host to the likes of King Oscar II of Sweden, Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany, King Leopold II of Belgium, King Haakon VII of Norway and his family, and several members of the British aristocracy.

Damir Lesjak

Damir Lesjak (born 31 March 1967) is a former Croatian footballer who played for Dinamo Zagreb, Israeli side Hapoel Haifa and Belgian club Mouscron.

Echo Eggebrecht

Eggebrecht has held solo exhibitions at Horton Gallery, New York; Nicole Klagsbrun Gallery, New York; Ter Caemer Meert Contemporary, Kortijk, Belgium; Sixtyseven, New York and Sixspace in Los Angeles as well as group exhibitions at the Brooklyn Academy of Music; ICA; Nicole Klagsburn; and White Box in New York; Groeflin Maag Gallery in Basel, Switzerland; Poets on Painters at the Ulrich Museum.

Filip Claus

He also made portraits of Belgian politicians such as former Prime Ministers of Belgium Jean-Luc Dehaene and Guy Verhofstadt.

Flemish Movement

During the existence of Belgium more and more Dutch-speaking regions have become French-speaking regions; for example, Mouscron (Moeskroen), Comines (Komen), and particularly Brussels (see Frenchification of Brussels).

George Ohsawa

They are, in particular, Herman Aihara in California, Roland Yasuhara in Belgium (where LIMA, the well-known manufacturer of macrobiotic products was born), Tomio Kikuchi in Brazil, Clim Yoshimi in France, and Michio Kushi in Massachusetts.

Greggs

Starting in 2003, in an attempt to test the foreign market, Greggs opened a total of ten stores in Belgium; principally in Antwerp and Leuven.

Hubert Detremmerie

Together with Wilfried Martens, Alfons Verplaetse, and Jef Houthuys, he met at Poupehan between 1982 and 1987 to discuss the social and economic situation of Belgium.

Hugh S. Gibson

He was thus present in the London office of American Ambassador Walter Hines Page when Page and representatives of Belgium persuaded Herbert Hoover to set aside his engineering activities in order to organize food relief for occupied Belgium.

International Meteorological Organization

Adolphe Quetelet, director of the Royal Observatory of Belgium and general secretary of the Academie royale des sciences, des lettres et des beaux-arts with Victor Lahure, navy captain and general director of the Navy, represented Belgium.

Interoute

Interoute's offices: Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Denmark, France, Germany, Hungary, Italy, Netherlands, Poland, Romania, Slovakia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, the United Kingdom and the United States of America, plus a Network Operations Centre in Sofia and a Customer Service Centre in Prague and Luleå.

Jean-Marie Dedecker

Dedecker became well-known first for his long career as a judo coach, with his judokas winning a for Belgium unprecedented number of medals (among them four times Olympian gold), and then for his politics.

Joël Prévost

Born in the Languedoc-Roussillon region of southern France, Prévost was adopted soon after birth by a family from northern France, renamed Jean-Luc Potaux, and grew up at Trith-Saint-Léger, close to the border with Belgium.

Joint Research Centre

The JRC has seven scientific institutes, located at six different sites in Belgium (Brussels and Geel), Germany (Karlsruhe), Italy (Ispra), the Netherlands (Petten) and Spain (Seville), with a wide range of laboratories and unique research facilities.

Joshua Fineberg

He worked on an evening-length modern dance/theatre piece with the Belgian choreographer Johanne Saunier and founding member of the Wooster Group Jim Clayburgh based on Nabokov’s Lolita.

Karl Heeremans

From this time on, numerous awards and recognitions were presented to him, such as the 1964 - price of Namur, Belgium 1962–1967 Italian Olivetti, Knokke and Ronse, Belgium and Cannes, France.

Keena Young

In 2007, Young had a short stint with Spotter Leuven, a professional team in Belgium, before joining Mobis Phoebus of the Korean Basketball League (in South Korea).

Keiji Ozaki

He lost to Jessy Petit-Jean in a fight for the WKN World Lightweight Kickboxing Championship on November 17, 2012 in Liege, Belgium.

La Caixa

At the end of 2007, La Caixa had 5,480 branches, of which 5,468 are located throughout Spain and two operating abroad (Warsaw, Poland and Bucharest, Romania), and 10 representative offices in Germany, Belgium, China, France, Italy, Morocco, Portugal and the United Kingdom.

Lorenz Kindtner

After playing at the AIS and Sunshine George Cross, Kindtner played almost a decade in Belgium, playing for a number of teams including Club Brugge and Cercle Brugge.

Macrodontopteryx

If Macrodontopteryx is indeed a distinct genus, perhaps some pseudotooth bird fossils found in Lutetian (Middle Eocene, MP11-13, about 45 Ma) deposits at Etterbeek (Belgium) belong therein.

Marc Goossens

Marc Goossens nicknamed The Goose (born 30 November 1969 in Geel) is a Belgian racecar driver who drove in Formula 3000 from 1994 to 1996 and part-time from 1999 to 2001.

Nabil Sayadi

Born in Lebanon, Nabil Sayadi was the director and founder of the European branch of Global Relief Foundation, centred in Belgium.

Nariné Simonian

She has also given concerts in Russia, Belgium, Switzerland (in Bulle, at Saint-Pierre des des Liens) where she has a recorded a CD, in Finland, at Kiev (Ukraine in 2003 with Dominique de Williencourt and in November 2008 at the Organ Hall), in North America (New York on 1 November 1998, at the Armenian Evangelical Church of New York, in Montreal and in South America in 1997, along with Olivier Latry (Argentina, Uruguay at the Festival Internacional del Uruguay Órgano,.

Norman Augustus Finch

On 22/23 April 1918 at Zeebrugge, Belgium, Sergeant Finch was second in command of the pom-poms and Lewis gun in the foretop of HMS Vindictive.

Oscar van Dillen

After studies of medieval and Renaissance music with Paul Van Nevel in Leuven (Belgium), he studied classical composition with, among others, Dick Raaymakers and Gilius van Bergeijk at the Koninklijk Conservatory in The Hague in 1990/1991 and with Klaas de Vries, Peter-Jan Wagemans and René Uijlenhoet at the Rotterdam Conservatory from 1996 to 2002.

PCC streetcar

The PCC technology was exported to Europe, with La Brugeoise et Nivelles (now the BN division of Bombardier) of Bruges, Belgium, building several hundred streetcars that saw service in Brussels, Antwerp, Ghent, The Hague, Saint-Étienne, Marseille and Belgrade (the latter city buying vehicles initially used by the Belgian Vicinal railways).

Quatre Bras

More specifically it refers to the crossroad of the Charleroi-Brussels road (currently named N5) and the Nivelles-Namur road South of Genappe in Wallonia, Belgium.

Raoul Weiler

Raoul Weiler (Anderlecht (Belgium) 20 October 1938) is President of the EU-Chapter of The Club of Rome.

Staf Van Reet

He obtained a degree of engineering in Applied Biological Sciences and a Ph.D. in Agricultural Sciences from the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven (Leuven, Belgium) and a Law degree from the University of Antwerp (Antwerp, Belgium).

The Mystery of the Blue Diamond

Tintin in India: The Mystery of the Blue Diamond, is a 1941 Belgian theatre piece in three acts written by Hergé and Jacques Van Melkebeke.

Theo Wharton

Wharton was first selected for the Wales Under-17 squad for 2011 Euro qualifiers where he start 2 games against Belgium and Denmark.

Touché Amoré

The tour started July 27, 2011 and finishing August 12 and coincided with both La Dispute's and Touché Amoré's appearances at Hevy Festival in the United Kingdom and Ieperfest in Belgium.

Vicinal

Vicinal tramway or Buurtspoor, a system of narrow gauge tramways or local railways in Belgium.

Wartenberg Trust

WartenbergTrust is a global multi-family office, wealth management and investment advisory firm established in 1921 to manage financial and other assets of the Wartenberg family in German-speaking Europe and from 1931 also in France, Spain, Portugal, Belgium, the US and Italy.

William Inglis

The same year, Inglis and his men were also briefly detached to a failed expedition to Brittany, but by the time the campaign had faltered in the winter of 1794, Ingis was back in Belgium.

Willy Polleunis

Willy Polleunis (born 27 December 1947) is a retired long-distance runner from Belgium who won the silver medal in the 3000 metres at the 1973 European Indoor Championships, behind his clubmate Emiel Puttemans.

Wu Qian

In October 2009, Qian represented China in the Europalia festival performing Frédéric Chopin's Piano Concerto No. 2 with the Brussels Philharmonic in a tour of Belgium under Carlos Kalmar.

Zakaria Bakkali

After Bakkali's superb Champions League-debut, Belgium coach Marc Wilmots selected him in the 25-man squad in the friendly-game against France.