A few days ago we visited Gent - a beautiful city that deserves a post of her own.
In one of our tram rides we saw a (supposedly) Flemish girl (circa 20 years old) who converted to Islam (our guess) and had her head covered with a scarf. I couldn't keep thinking about it for a while.
She was sweet, talking to a couple of northern African ladies (also head covered) and was making her best to be nice and polite to them as they were older than her. Not something unusual in Israel.
Eventually, I understood why it kept me so bothered. First, it mentioned me of the social tensions back at home. Second, I can guess and I can rationalize what makes a young girl to cover herself - but I'm not sure I can really understand it. Understand the unhappiness that made her do so, or the happiness that was caused to her following doing so.
I think that being in Leuven, in almost totally secular society and away from home made the contrast more crystallized and that it is when it struck me.
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