Just to give you some reading

:
I live in
Ledegem <
West-Flanders <
Flanders <
Belgium <
Europe.
Ledegem is a quite little village (9300 inhabitants), but thanks to the high population density in Belgium, there are always people, shops, ... around (unlike a little village in say France, the US, ...).
In Flanders we speak the same language, Dutch, as our northern neighbours from The Netherlands. We have pretty much jokes about them, but the fact that have the same mentality as Belgians (democratic, active, progressive), speak the same language and such, we get along quite well

(as with all countries in the world, actually).
Belgium is "known" for the creation of the first synthetic plastic
Bakelite, the invention of the
Saxophone, the Belgian chocolate, the Belgian fries (yes, they originated in Belgium),
Tintin, to be somewhat the centre of Europe with precence of
European Union,
NATO, ... in capital city
Brussels (yes, Brussels is a city in Belgium, not the other way around).
I studied for 4 years in
Ostend and for 1 year in
Leuven.
There's much to say about how much I liked my great time in the beautiful Ostend, but with the Wiki article I'll leave that to your imagination.
My current job is about 10 minutes driving, in
Wevelgem.