Manneken Pis

©Analia Glogowski/Lonely Planet

Manneken Pis

Brussels


Rue Charles Buls – Brussels’ most unashamedly touristy shopping street, lined with chocolate and trinket shops – leads the hordes three blocks from the Grand Place to the Manneken Pis. This fountain-statue of a little boy taking a leak is comically tiny and a perversely perfect national symbol for surreal Belgium. Most of the time the statue’s nakedness is hidden beneath a costume relevant to an anniversary, national day or local event: his ever-growing wardrobe is displayed at the Maison du Roi.


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