Belgium

Interesting to see it really seems like everyone across the board used less and less energy.

What did you all change? Any specific tools or tricks?

Personally I didn't even change my heating level but just used the timers a lot more with sharper cutoffs. And I did use smart plugs between my media appliances and my pc to make sure they are off when I leave the house, as well as being less casual about turning off the lights in rooms that I'm not in. Compared to 2019 (so before more WFH) that's like a 20% savings on gas, and 15% on electricity for me.

I suggest to keep the slowchats weekly until there's need for more. (but feel free to disagree here!)

r/belgium reopened yesterday and I made a post inviting people over to our community here. It turned out to be a lot more controversial than I expected but I hope we can build our own community, not as rivals but as (distant) friends.

I have been considering starting higher education studies in Belgium (mainly in Flanders) due to several factors such as low fees, its central position, the opportunity to speak English (nonetheless I want to study the local language), the fact that Flanders is a rich region, etc.

Is it a good move (I come from southern Europe), considering also the quality of life and job opportunities?

Now that a lot of 3rd party apps for reddit have shut down there have been loads of new users joining the various Lemmy instances. So who got here today and what has been your experience so far?

I'm here to help should you have any questions about Lemmy, lemmy.world or life in general (I can not really recommend that last one).

Anyway, welcome! Hope you enjoy your stay 😁

EDIT: I created seperated threads for this not too long ago but I think it's useful to post them again.

• Some things might still be confusing to people, I read a comment below about someone not knowing how to browse content from different instances for example. I really suggest you read this post by lemmy.world admin @ruud which does a wonderful job to explain a lot of it.
• If you're wondering what 3rd party apps there are available, this thread seems to list them all!

"Vias analyseerde 100 pv's van ongevallen met gewonden in Brussel (2020). Het aantal ongevallen met elektrische step verviervoudigde, van 409 in 2020 naar 1.748 in 2022. Zowel in 2021 als in 2022 waren er vier doden bij de gebruikers."

Translated intro: Vias analyzed 100 PVs of accidents with injuries in Brussels (2020). The number of accidents involving electric scooters quadrupled, from 409 in 2020 to 1,748 in 2022. There were four fatalities among users in both 2021 and 2022.

Yes plz.

It's friday already so let's start discussing something that hasn't been done here and discuss a couple of important questions. (or whatever else you want it's the chat topic after all)

• What day is the correct day to eat fries from the frituur and why is it friday.
• What do you order at the frituur?
• Why are people who use frikandel weird and people who say lange hamburger clinically insane? Civilized folk use curryworst after all.

So who else is going. I'm too old to meet up with strangers. I used to be with it, but than they changed what it is. It'll happen to you!

What are you going to see and what gem do you recommend?

The post about waffles reminded of the frustration of not finding any recipe online, is it a regional secret? I would love to make some at home.

NB: more specifically the crispy (croquante ?) sort

Good morning everyone,

My girlfriend and I are renovating our first house.we are busy with demolition and cleaning stuff right now, but we are also planning out our entire budget and getting offers for a new bathroom and such.

I hear all the time what a cost difference building and renovation is, but I can't see how it works in practice.

If I go on a webshop to buy dust masks for example, I am charged the full VAT. International companies like Conrad won't gave an option for less tax, but it would make sense to get it there if it is already 25% cheaper than a store here, all tax excluded.

If I go to something like SACK, they give one price that includes whatever tax they choose it to be (then pocket the difference, we actually had it happen where we got an offer, we said it was above our budget, and they said "oh I spoke to my manager and just for you we can give you a 15% discount" within 10 minutes of the email. Sure...)

If I go to a bouwmaterialen store or a groothandel for electrical, do I have to specifically tell them that I am doing a verbouw?

I am not sure how this works in practice.

Thanks guys!

It's been a while since my regular group got together and I was wondering whether anyone here is also looking for the same around Leuven. I'm open to GM or not, system also doesn't matter too much.

So, are we or are we not taking the slowchat trend with us from Reddit?

And why is it samurai?

Since we have quite a few new users, not everyone might be familiar with how Lemmy and the instances work. So I'm gonna link @[email protected]'s excellent guide to Lemmy here also.

If you have any questions you can always post them here or you can post them in the lemmy.world !support community.

Two quick-tips:

• if you want to tag a user, start by typing an @ and the first letters of the name and you will be presented with a drop-down menu to select users.
• if you want to link a community, start with an ! and the first lketters of the community name and you can choose the community name from a drop-down list.

These 2 features don't work on all mobile apps (yet).

Honestly, I can imagine that happening on lijn, their drivers are just... different

I just bought the sugar pearls. Now looking for a good recipe. I hope my simple waffle iron is good enough.

I just found Liftoff! and I have to say I like it so far. It still has some issues but I see the devs are on it so for now this is the one for me.

But that might change once Sync For Lemmy comes out :)

So what are your plans for the week? how are you feeling?

Reddit used to have those threads, I figured I'd get them started again.

Twenty-five sand sculptors from across Europe spend 10 days creating a fairy tale world on the Belgian beach of Middelkerke for the annual sand sculpture festival, which opens to the public on July 1st. "We bring in about 5,000 tons of sand" explains Peter Monbailleu, the festival's organiser.

"We try to stay attractive for the people. We try to stay really relevant by including more and more interaction, by not just showing sand sculptures, but also including a storyline, showing the people around, having little walkthroughs for the children. Surprises left and right."

Let's talk about organizing a Belgian community on the threadiverse (the reddit-like side of the fediverse).

Right now, the community isn't coordinated, there are multiple spaces that popped up after the blackout. There's this one, there's @[email protected], there's c/belgique, I think there's one on lemmy.ml too?

What do you guys think we should do? How should we reach out? Discuss!