If Someone Knocks On Your Door

"No one is perfect. That's why pencils have erasers." - printed on a piece of eraser at the Stadel Museum shop.

Ah, I spoke too soon. The temperature plunged overnight from an agreeable 10 degrees to a bone-chilling zero. Fans of cheap thrills - i.e. me - have fun making clouds each time we breathe with our mouths.

I am the only person in the group still here. The sensible thing to do would be to order room service. Crossing a Frankfurt road at night, it seems, is only second in risk to crossing a Shanghai road. It means being at the mercy of countless Mercedes- and Audi-driving speedsters doing their best impressions of Michael Schumacher.

In a situation like this, what does a starving, chilli-deprived girl do? She braves the elements and the Schumachers to walk to what is reputedly the best Thai restaurant in town. Turns out that the tom yam soup at the Rainbow, a ten minute walk away, is really quite authentic. Bliss.

Our bunch of journos has done its fair share to advance the prosperity of Belgian and German breweries. But last night topped it all.

Dinner was a traditional German feast of such huge and carnivorous proportions, it is not to be repeated for the sake of our health.

Fifteen of us squeezed onto long benches in a crowded century-old tavern in the Sachsenhausen restaurant district. This establishment is known for the local brew, ebbelwoi, or apple wine. Hmm. It tastes neither like apple nor like wine. More like vinegar. We quickly switched to the excellent beer, and lots of it.

I had ordered the pork knuckle, a dish as German as it gets. It was gigantic, even by my standards. The knuckle was covered with a layer of crispy skin, and underneath, the most sinfully indulgent pork fat that melts in the mouth. As my knife and fork prise open the meat from the huge bone, smoke escapes, and each bite is tender and soft.

Frankfurt food is like its people. Straight, unembellished and clearly not in a popularity contest, with food names such as "blood and liver sausages".

I offered 10 euros to any person who can eat a "liver dumpling". One brave Japanese guy took up the deal. When the ping-pong sized boiled meatballs arrived, he took one bite, made a funny expression, then decided there are easier ways to make 10 euros.

Even when some locals aren't gruff and are even borderline friendly, shopping is not a strong point of Frankfurt's. So on our free day this morning, the Thai girl and I walk across the romantic Main River to visit Stadel Museum.

It is a jaw-dropping treasure trove of Renoirs, Rembrandts and Monets, but that's not the point. It also has a collection of incredibily life-like portraits from the 14th and 15th century. The Dutch masters, in particular, kicked some 16th and 17th century ass. That these fragile and unnecessary artworks were protected and preserved for up to 600 years says a lot about how much the people respect art. I would have stayed longer, except, yes, I was starving again.

Tonight, on returning to my room after the tom yum pig-out, I realise that my keycard failed to work again, as it does like clockwork everyday. This time, the receptionist offered to send a technician to check. "If someone knocks on your door at night, do not be alarmed."

It is approaching midnight. No one has turned up in the last few hours. It is a safe bet that no one will. Zzz.

For Better For Wurst

The weather is grey and rainy, but not freezing.

I am reading restaurant critic Ruth Reichl's memoir, Garlic and Sapphires.

I am craving chilli. Very, very, very badly.

Travelling to Brussels and Frankfurt in winter is quite the beer-fuelled odyssey I had imagined it to be. And you get the most awesome wurst and mussels to go with the 600 or so beers in the market.

Except for the rest of the time, my head swirls with countless back-to-back meetings with economists, journos, central bankers. Embedded in the latter's DNA, I reckon, is the ability to say in a hundred different ways "I cannot tell you the answer". The French just do it in a more witty and charming way. But still, no harm prying. The market mood is jubilant, and not just because Christmas is here.

Brussels, capital of Belgium, is a place you would bring your grandmother to. It has a Hansel and Gretel-like fairytale quality. In the old city, you see miles of charming little shops selling all manner of handmade chocolate truffles, lace and jewelry. You are greeted with a warm "Bonjour, Madame" as you enter.

You see couples huddle in moody, chandelier-lit beer cafes that look like they have been there for a few centuries. The cafes, I mean, not the locals - although one or two did look a bit ancient.

And there are no mammoth shopping malls. Only quaint little boutiques. It is like Wal-mart never happened. Even in the belly of the subway stations, you find fine chocolatiers such as Leonidas rather than newsagents. Heaps of 16th century buildings and stately 19th century townhouses too.

Where I stayed is pretty sterile. An administrative zone as anonymous as Canberra. No shops. No nothing. Only brand new glass office towers.

The Christmas fair at the old city square is quite something else. It is full of handicraft and food stalls. The rain was a good excuse to drink hot red wine (vin chaud) and a bowl of piping-hot and peppery escargot soup for 1.50 euros.

The super-luxurious ICE train takes you across the Belgian plains, a Flemish-painting landscape lined with bare trees. Three hours later, voila. It deposits you onto the grand old Haupt Bahnhof or Main Station in Frankfurt.

Germany's financial capital throbs with activity, with money running through its veins.

What it lacks in the adorable stakes, it more than makes up for in size and cache. Skyscrapers jostle for space with imposing old bank buildings - marble and chandeliered palaces of finance that dare you to trespass.

Coming from charming and civil little Brussels, one thing I found is that most people in Frankfurt appear quite sullen. And the speeding traffic waits for no man - or woman. I feel the wintery chills in more ways than one. The saving grace is however sharing meals, alcohol and laughs with journos from so many continents and of so many tongues. Everytime you sit next to someone new, you learn about an entirely different world. Salut!