BrusselsLife with Aleksandra Paszkowska

Discovering European Capital

She was 20 year old when she discovered Brussels: one week for taking her designer exams at La Cambre. One week during which, there's no other word for it, she really fell head over heels. To such an extent that she decided to settle there to continue her training, and then to start her own business there. Today, she runs her little shop, Y-dress, Rue Antoine Dansaert, while selling her fantasies to the four corners of the world. She designs fantasies in droves: tee-shirts transformable into trousers, ready-to-wear except that you still have to sit on a pot of paint before wearing them, etc .In short, a very artistic approach, which suits her down to the ground. Living in the Parvis de Saint-Gilles, Aleksandra Paszkowska is truly in love with Brussels, a city easy to live in and with its inhabitants. A very open-minded population, with which she always relates with the greatest of ease? Matthieu Lethé

Tof or not?

Your tof café? I am an orphan of Walvis, then as second choice, I would say Chez Martine and Roskam (Rue de Flandre). Not forgetting, in Saint-Gilles, the Verschueren.

Your tof restaurant? The Japanese restaurant on the quays behind St Catherine's Church. And the Bar Sabir, in Rue de Flandre.

Your tof place for spending a good evening? The Central (for the DG), the Archduc (for the fauna of the night-birds).

Your tof place for spending a good Sunday? The Sunday market in the Parvis de Saint-Gilles, and then as always the Verschueren.

Your tof place for developing your culture capital (cinema, theatre, museum, show)? The Nova cinema, the Plaine-open air, the Brigitinnes, the Flagey.

Your tof district of Brussels? Everything I need for living: Dansaert, the Maroilles flea markets, the Parvis de Saint-Gilles, Flagey?

If you had to make a visit to Brussels with a foreign friend, where would you take him or her first? In the flea market, at the Café Chaff. It is that particular district that made me remain in Brussels when I arrived there, when I was 17. (Brussels was in competition with Berlin, Vienna and London!)

What's your tof thing about Brussels? What is that means that you would never move from Brussels? The network of friends! Brussels is the most social capital of the planet: both a big city with all that that offers, and at the same time "a village" when it is a question seeing the people you meet again. I also adore events such as cultural openings, those great private functions where one meets different circles and groups. In short, there are in Brussels both broadmindedness and generosity in the human contact!

What's really not your tof thing about Brussels? What you would make you flee from Brussels?The civil servant spirit and an onerous administration.

Tell us if this idea is Tof or not Tof. If you wish, justify your opinion.

• A floating swimming pool on the canal? TOO MUCH YES! I have tried that of Berlin Treptow, and that of Paris (furthermore, if my information is correct, the latter was built by a Belgian company?). I'm straightforwardly obsessed by water, and for Brussels, you have to drive 30km to have a dip in the open air! There's not another swimming pool open in the 19 communes (if one does not count the Heysel puddle). So it's high time time!
• Congestion tax for cars? NO. Instead of a ban, I think that it would be better to propose, for example, to develop more initiatives like the Cambio car-pooling (of which I'm a customer!), Cyclo-city, free shuttles, etc
• No smoking in restaurants and bars? YES, it works even for the Italians, who have a reputation of being the most anarchistic!
• A ban on chip shops? NO, that's part of an image of Brussels that's a little disjointed, provisional and so nice! (Even if I don't eat any!)