Hi Jacqueline, I live in northen Flanders, above Ghent near the Dutch border. My daughter lived on the border when she first got married, her front door was in Belgium and her back door was in Holland. She had to go to Holland when she needed the loo or take a bath!
We are 40 miles from Ostend, about 25 miles from Brugge, 40 miles from Brussels, 30 to Antwerp, 10 to Ghent, 120 from Amsterdam and 160 miles from Paris, so good central location. Ghent is the best town in Belgium, like brugge but bigger and not so touristy. We have a 18 hole golf course and yacht haven on our doorstep, just over the border there is another fantastic golf course and airstrip in the middle of it, for gliders.
Wonderful food in Belgium, better even than the French. I cook a lot myself and can get lovely fresh meat and veg, very few young Belgians are over weight as in the USA and UK.
Yes people under 21 get a full wage, none of that silly poverty wage like in England when you leave school. At the moment early retirement can be taken at 55 years old, and many do! I stopped working at 58 because I felt too young to stop at 55. Most Belgians are home owners as the price of property is very low, but going up quickly now. I had "Homes Worldwide" here to interview me earlier in the year because of the cheap good living here.
Just to stay on this theme, crime rate is very very low here.
There I'm going on again. Love, Graham.