January 27, 2022 Page 7
Stella Cordova from front page
Travel from front page
consider that nearly all European fountains were
built to supply water for drinking and washing…
Off the Grand’ Place in Bruxelles, a life-size
brass wall inlay commemorates the death of an
obscure Brabantine patriot, Everard t’Serclaes.
In 1356, Everard led a daring assault on the
Flemings at the Bruxelles Hotel de Ville. Thirty
years later, he was innocently walking down
a peaceful street, when grudge-filled enemies
recognized and cut him to pieces. It goes without
saying, that the local guide books advise the
gullible to rub Everard’s arm for good luck!
So what do these statues say?
In 50 BCE, when Julius Caesar was driving
the Roman Empire up through Europe, the one
tribe he found nearly impossible to quell was the
Belgae. These uncouth, illiterate savages did
something no other tribe had managed, which
was to turn the fearsome Roman Legions leftward
toward the future British Isles. Yet some areas
of the globe are just destined for invasion, and
the tiny walnut-shaped wedge between France,
the Netherlands, and Germany seems to be one
of them. Over the centuries since the ancient
Italians, the Belgians have reluctantly hosted
Goths, Danes, Saxons, Austrians, Spanish,
French, British, Dutch, Germans, and Americans.
Each invader has tried to shove its One True
Religion down local throats, some with more
success than others. All have left traces, making
Belgium an authentic melting pot long before
the first passengers set off for the New World.
But none has entirely succeeded in breaking
through the defining characteristic—the “thing”
about Bruxelles and Belgium—which is a
healthy and persistent contempt for anything
that represents official authority. Rulers be
damned. The unit of social organization here
isn’t the state, the city, the neighborhood, nor
even the street. The only structure that really
matters in Belgium is the family.
In 2000, the US Supreme Court decided
an election in part because no one trusted the
country to go a day without a sitting government.
In 2010, on the other hand, Belgium set
a world record for surviving 541 days with no
government at all—and hardly anyone seemed
to notice. Belgian elections are lively, chaotic
affairs, with three or four strands of political
thought divided regionally into French, Flemish,
and even German versions. For a month or two,
everyone gets excited, posters splash across the
walls, demonstrators fulminate, and the timorous
US State Department issues an advisory.
Then, just as quickly, the citizens get back to
the business of living and ignoring city hall.
The longest-lasting and most successful invasion
of this tiny country took place in 1831 not
on the border, but in an obscure collection of
London drawing rooms. By then, all the crowned
heads of Europe had inter-married, rather than
tainting their blood with the rest of us. So along
with a hemophiliac gene, the European royals
all shared the same irritable German uncle,
Leopold of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld. If they all
sported unearned crowns, why shouldn’t he?
Eventually, the mighty gave in and—while
barely mentioning it to the locals—awarded the
German-English-speaking-Protestant Leopold
a French-Dutch-speaking-Catholic crown and
the title King of the Belgians.
And this in turn led to a much more serious
invasion, when Leopold’s son, by then King
Leopold II, complained that he’d been left out
of the race for imperial colonies in Africa.
Once again, at the 1884 Berlin Conference, the
European nations gave into Leopold’s grumbles
and awarded him the vast Congo River basin.
This led to one of the bloodiest, most horrific
scandals of colonial mismanagement in history—
so bad, that ten years before the King
died, obese and tired, in bed with his favorite
Bruxelles prostitute, the frustrated Belgian
government took away his prize.
The guilty secret, of course, is that the flood
of money from the Congo turned Bruxelles
into one of the most beautiful capitals in the
world. The usual monuments and palaces are
far less overbearing (and tourist-mobbed) than
other European relics—after all, imperial pretensions
only travel so far in a tiny populace that
treats tax evasion like a second religion. Yet,
Bruxelles sports the greenest park network of
any capital on the planet, with gorgeous spaces
ranging from the geometric Parc Royal and
Grand Sablon to sumptuous Botanical Gardens,
to the leafy sprawls of le Bois de la Cambre
and le Forêt de Soignes.
In 2016, when American journalists arrived
in Bruxelles to cover the terrorist bombings at
Zaventem Airport, they had a serious problem
fitting Belgian chaos into their preconceived
notions of how public life should work. They
described the city as thoroughly misgoverned
and segregated, and even declared our own
neighborhood of sixty years a “no-go zone”
for Caucasians. Every time a protest breaks
out, those same foreign news sources quake
and tremble—even though their own footage
might show bored café goers watching the
excitement from the fringes.
The ancient name Brosella refers to the
swamp along the Senne River with the evil air
that has produced some of the finest beers and
lagers in the world. Today, the swamp might
be filled in and driven underground, but the
notion remains of dragging great things and
great moments out of chaos, one puzzling,
anarchic lunge at a time. We’re guessing this
is why Bruxelles enjoys relatively few visitors,
at least from the US. Americans generally
head to Paris and London for pretensions of
aristocratic grandeur and to Amsterdam to
misbehave amongst the tulips. In Bruxelles,
you have a more subtle and polyglot reflection
of the progress of Europe that has always had
fans crowning it the best-kept secret in Europe.
And like most locals not involved in the tourist
trade, we don’t mind if it stays that way.
Next up: The Earth in the Palm of Your
Hand.
Ben & Glinda Shipley, published writers and
photographers, share their expertise and experience
of their many world travels. If you have any
questions or interest in a particular subject, please
email them at web@heraldpublications.com. •
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La Place Royale: Godefroy de Bouillon summons the faithful to
the First Crusade, then dies in Jerusalem.
La Grand’ Place: Rubbing Everard t’Serclaes on the arm might
bring you luck, but it didn’t help with his enemies.
Église Sainte-Catherine de Bruxelles: A demon gushes liquid venom
in agony at all our righteousness.
La Rue des Pierres: Le Cracheur spews his opinion of tourists
and officials alike.
Arc du Cinquantenaire: One King’s taste in art, another King’s
penchant for scandal.
to transcribe lessons for students who are hard
of hearing or learn better by reading
Cordova herself works for the county, mostly
sticking to a single court location. From civil
suits and divorce to felonies and dramatic
elevator rides between sessions, she has seen
(or heard) it all. Working in criminal court
requires having a tough skin and an ability to
remove oneself from the case. She says work
outside the courtroom could be as eventful as
what was happening on the stand, with fights,
kids, and a wide array of visitors.
Despite the schooling and the tough cases,
Cordova also describes court reporting as one
of the best and most rewarding things in her
life. Along with the darker stories, she gets
tales of levity, and no day at work is ever the
same. Cordova says a court reporter can’t leave
a session without having learned something,
listening to experts present evidence, and
lawyers deep dive into laws all day.
Court reporting work is constantly in demand
and faces a significant shortage, as less and less
it is advertised. Even with technology continu-
ally evolving, the need for accurate transcription
remains steady and pays well. A beginning
court reporter in California can expect to bring
in $99k and up in their first year of work.
Transcripts made outside the workday bring in
extra income above and beyond salaried work.
Court reporters working privately can make
as much or as little as desired, taking one of
many jobs available whenever time allows.
Cordova’s hope is that today’s burgeoning
adults learn about her line of work and keep
an open mind to pursuing a career like hers.
She’s spoken at high schools and job fairs,
though she says that most high schoolers are
more interested in being influencers and gamers
than transcribing court cases. In the future,
she hopes to talk to a younger audience who
may have a more open mind to outside opportunities,
perhaps speaking at middle schools
around the area.
Though court reporting can mean a major
exercise in listening, learning, and speaking
up, it also promises a life of stable income,
variety, and a lifetime of stories. •