The sky's the limit

After a Friday night with some Couchsurfer locals which involved something called an "absinthe pipe," followed by something else called a hospital, I decided to take it easy on Saturday and make the most of the sunshine with another trip to Brussels' main landmark, the Atomium. Whereas other cities have bombastic icons which are either timeless (Eiffel Tower) or cutting-edge (London Eye), Brussels has retro kitsch: a 102m-tall iron crystal built at the height of the Space Age.

The Atomium - considering its monumental status and tourist appeal - is relatively far from the centre of Brussels; it's the last remaining element of the 1958 World's Fair, which was held on a patch of land to the north-west of the city. Still, it has a metro connection, and the area will soon be given a new lease of life thanks to Neo, a new town project which will feature the monument as a focal point in tandem with a new national stadium.

I quite admire the Atomium - not only is it structurally impressive and far bigger than you expect, it's a tribute to a time when science and technology were put on a pedestal for their own sakes, not simply as means to an end. Like the World's Fairs themselves, the Atomium's space-age optimism seems a little naive in hindsight, and it has quite literally seen a more idealistic vision of the future crumble around it. I'm heartened that it's still here and will shortly be the centre of attention once more.