It was the second of our two nights in this hotel in the French city of Lille, I’d been awake for around 2 hours in the night, had eventually got back to sleep, and it was about 6.45am, and was pouring outside, and traffic noise was extremely loud when I woke up again. Down in the hotel lobby at 8.30am, breakfast was laid out, and I tried to photograph it all….

A staff member briefly enquired about my notepad – in French, so I showed her my info card (which I made myself and always have in my bag – to explain what short term memory loss and encephalitis are – rather than trying to explain it myself in 1 sentance) and she said ‘oui’ several times; back at the table, Mum didn’t want to eat her boiled egg, I consumed some fruit salad, worked the coffee machine, and then I consumed a croissant (and may’ve consumed a couple of things I forgot), and saw a very chubby Corgi/Dachshund/a couple of other breeds looking dog snuffling around the floor by his or her owners table. I forgot when we left the table – because back upstairs, I tried to ensure I had everything necessary in my bag, and the room was exited again (with waterproofs on) at 9.37am.

Outside in the rain, the 2nd taxi Mum attempted to stop stopped, the bloke was smoking a cigarette, and we got in; a very long straight road that went under several bridges was gone down and gone back up again (he said something about the road, then said ‘je ne trompete ca’ (I think) and pointed at something I forgot); and we got out at La Gare de Lille Flandres and it was rapidly realised that that was the wrong station…

…a very nice station master (in very smart uniform, late 40s) pointed us in the right direction, and the Euralille station was found, it was 10.20am when a train to Brussels was boarded, Mum had a brief rant about being half blind, I tried to catch up with my notes; and 10 minutes later it moved.

Google Maps was tracking us, everywhere outside looked very misty, a man had dozed off with his head at what looked like a very uncomfortable angle to his neck, and I was attempting to research places to go – via exceptionally slow Wi-Fi, and I got confused; and it was looking very very misty outside as the station was approached. We disembarked in Brussels at 11.03am, announcements in the station were made in English (as well as French and something else), and there was a little The Body Shop in the station – among other stuff I forgot and tried to photograph; it was pouring outside, we were approached by a drunken bloke speaking in French, it kept pouring, trams were all over the streets, and we decided to walk.

After going under a graffiti covered bridge, we kept walking, I saw…

…and then I remained with my notepad stuck up my jumper and desperately trying to photograph everything; and when we found – after a lot of searching- a cafe (called The Panthenon), it got walked into. I didn’t sit down due to the soggy state of my jeans, Mum wanted coffee, and successfully asked the man and woman behind the counter in French, the rain stopped while we were in there, she asked for directions to somewhere, and sun was coming out while we walked there…