{"id":48235,"date":"2023-10-30T22:22:44","date_gmt":"2023-10-30T22:22:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.museum-aarschot.be\/xxi-la-felure\/"},"modified":"2023-10-30T22:22:44","modified_gmt":"2023-10-30T22:22:44","slug":"xxi-la-felure","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.museum-aarschot.be\/en\/xxi-la-felure\/","title":{"rendered":"XXI La f\u00ealure"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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<< XX What on earth are we going to do with you<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n

“Es gibt wohl keine unangenehmere
Aufgabe f\u00fcr einen Autor, als objektiv
\u00fcber sich selbst zu schreiben.”<\/strong> – Sebastian Fitzek<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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“Ce qu’on te reproche, cultive-le: c’est toi.”<\/strong> – Jean Cocteau<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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God save the queer<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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At home with Richard, who lives in Highgate Cemetery in London <\/strong>(photo, 2002)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Pieter regularly stays with the photographer Richard Elliott, who lives right inside Highgate Cemetery. Richard comes to Aarschot several times and invites Frie and Mia to London. Frie, who has never been to England, takes a London-by-night ride on the back of Richard’s motorbike. Afterwards Richard says that through the motorcycle helmet intercom he heard Frie singing with happiness. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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from the book ‘De belevenissen van Wytze Russchen, Het Oliemannetje, Toplobbyist in Europa’ – 2014 – chapter 2.8 ‘Buitenwipper’ – pages 40, 41, 42 .<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n

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2.8 Buitenwipper<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

French was a hurdle, but Flemish was too.
I am not even talking so much about language, but more generally about integration in another country. Belgium is close by, but often felt very far away. During various adventures the song by Het Goede Doel played in my head: lk heb getwijfeld over Belgi\u00eb.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That homesickness slowly gave way to liberation. I began to feel at home with our southern neighbours. Stef Bos took over and from his most beautiful song came: ‘I come from a country of shouters, but I have learned here to be quiet, I only want to live here.’ The song is called De liefde hier gevonden. That applied to me with some regularity in those days.
My first love was a notary’s son. Pieter from Aarschot. Good against homesickness, he provided a ‘plezante’ (pleasant) culture shock. Because Pieter was a gourmand. He rode a motorbike and with him every day was a party. Now most Belgians are crazy about good food, but I was not used to much back then. Yes, in Drachten we went to the Chinese once a year or in later years a pizza was sometimes ordered, but otherwise it was mash and stamp. Always at home, around half past five. Farmhouse hotpot.
Pieter taught me to eat. And that was by no means a matter of money or luxury. But of tradition and taste, appreciating food, enjoying critically, in short something that in Friesland is not always standard in the baggage. ‘What do you fancy today?’ One of the most beautiful Flemish words, goesting. Pieter often had goesting. If I said spaghetti, I thought of having a bolognese at home or around the corner. Neither was an option for Pieter. The best spaghetti was eaten at the Heysel, so off we went on the motorbike to a suburb for a seven-euro pasta. Compromises were not allowed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mussel season? Hop, helmet on and off to Koekelberg. There, at the foot of the Basilica, Brussels offered its best shellfish.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Once in a while I was allowed to choose the restaurant. But by definition Pieter then felt unwell. How could I suggest such a bad establishment? Days of stomach ache! Dutchmen were culinary barbarians and I, yes, I was a DiepFries avant la lettre who needed a lot of upbringing, and Pieter was willing to provide it. Pieter was incidentally a regular at the gay bar \u2018Le CanCan\u2019. It later turned out that he had also \u2018worked his way through\u2019 the whole menu there.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He sometimes came to my little attic room but never stuck it out for long. Pieter was used to big villas with long driveways and lush gardens. Yet he had chosen me. At least that is what I thought. Sometimes we went on the Ducati to his parental home. Rose gardens, swimming pool and golden taps. … …Pieter also lived above the notary’s practice. That is where we mostly made love. With his father’s office or the piano as the top spots. I sometimes thought Pieter was taking revenge that way; later it turned out that his resentment towards his dad ran very deep, so often did Pieter have to take revenge. With or without me. …<\/p>\n\n\n\n

… It was a first lesson in a long Flemish integration course. This included in any case good food, chips included, drinking pints, and so also the language. In the end I threw him out, but I still benefit every day from what I learned from the Pieter from Aarschot, on many fronts. Moreover, it made me feel at home in Belgium even faster. Mercikes! – Wytze Russchen<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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“What was yesterday is over. What will happen tomorrow, we shall see. Most people think they have to do something with every emotion and thought. But that is not so. You can let things pass.” <\/strong>– Petra De Sutter<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Spieler (1979) Astrid Klein <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Joyride<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

1990, a bar conversation in the gay quarter of Antwerp with a certain Jan, manager of a large timber business. Jan wants to discover France, does not understand French and persuades Pieter to drive and guide him. The week after, Pieter races Jan’s sports car to the south of France where it rains, so Pieter keeps flat out until the evening and arrives in Barcelona with Jan. There it turns out that Jan wants more from Pieter. He spends the night on a blanket on the balcony of the hotel on the Ramblas. Pietertje is a hit in Catalan gay clubs. An angry Jan tips his whisky over Pieter, to the delight of Catalans who pounce on Pieter to taste the whisky. A depressed Jan photographs Pieter constantly and wants to go back to Antwerp after three days. In a car park in Lyon Jan thinks of suicide and stares at a bench. The moment to get rid of Jan. Pieter takes Jan’s wallet and asks picnicking Dutch people to give it to ‘that one over there’, and Pieter speeds on alone to Belgium. Arrived in Aarschot, Frie says with a cigar in his mouth: ‘Boy, boy, they phoned from the gendarmerie of Lyon that you pinched a car over there.’ The Dutch people had kept the wallet. Jan’s brother was able to pick it up in Lyon… A few weeks later Jan comes to Aarschot to apologise. He had assumed that Pieter was a gigolo. Afterwards a friend of Pieter’s, the decorator Pieter Porters, reports with a giggle that Jan organises slide shows in his home cinema about his trauma suffered with Pieter. Hundreds of slides of Pieter, even in the bathroom.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The boy’s name Pieter is slowly dying out <\/strong>(photo: 2003)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Wim Schoolmeesters <\/strong>(1975-2023) Between 1994 and 1999 Wim and Pieter became the Aarschot knights of the love romance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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