Pukkelpop Music Festival

Trip Start Apr 01, 2008

Trip End Oct 05, 2008

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Where I stayed

camping

(Hasselt hotels)

Flag of Belgium Hasselt, Limburg, Belgium
Saturday, August 16, 2008

I arrived at the music festival and went to set up my tent. Everybody around me was from Belgium and they were very curious about me. Next to me was a great group of young Belgians from the Flemish part of the country; Belgium is divided between Flemish people who live mainly in the north and speak dutch and Walloons who live mainly in the south and speak French. The Flemish and Walloons keep to themselves and do not really mix or communicate, it is a very strange, divided country.
On the first day, Thursday, I saw Dropkick Murphys, Pendulum, Roisin Murphy, Flaming Lips and the Killers. The Flaming Lips put on an amazing show! At the very start the lead singer came out in a giant hamster ball and started rolling around on top of the crowd. On stage they had many people dressed up in a variety of costumes from tele-tubbies to aliens. From the roof they constantly dropped down giant balloons, stuffed full of confetti which flew everywhere when they burst

dropkick murphys

. The killers were also very good. It was the third time I had seen them. Previously I had not been impressed by them, but this time was different.
The next day I met a group of Walloons who were camping on the other side of me. This is when the Flemish and Walloons started competing for my attention; they constantly asked me "who do you like better, Flemish or Walloons?" I always laughed and said I just like the Belgian people. One thing I did notice is that the Flemish generally spoke much better english.
On Friday, Spearhead played! Spearhead is one of my two favorite bands (the other being Ratatat). I felt so blessed to see both of my favorite bands in Europe, in such a short period of time! Spearhead was fantastic and the lead singer Michael Franti came out into the crowd singing, so I was able to get some fantastic, close-up pictures. Next I saw Arsenal (one of the most popular Belgian bands), Diplo, Metallica and Boys Noize. That night I stayed up quite late with some new Belgian friends wandering around the campsite meeting many new people and dancing until the sun came up the next morning.
On Saturday, I saw Yelle, Anti-Flag, Bloc Party but then I took a nap because I was so exhausted from the entire weekend. Luckily I woke up in time to hear Soulwax spin a great DJ set but I missed Sigur Ros. Spent the rest of the night with my Walloonian friends chatting and laughing.
Woke up the next morning, packed up and then it started raining. I think I was very lucky with the weather for that weekend. Belgium has notoriously bad weather. It rained the night before I arrived and as I was leaving, but not for the three days in between. I think that may have been the only three days in a row that it did not rain in Belgium!