I had a pleasant dinner with a bunch of people here at ESUG, and then took the metro back to Central Station. That's when things got odd. I walked down the street towards my hotel, the Royal Windsor, when I ran across a police cordon. It stretched from the Meridien Hotel around the block - it wasn't at all clear that I'd be able to get into my room. Apparently, there's a hostage crisis going on somewhere in or near the Meridien, and the block is cordoned off - which made my hotel problem seem kind of trivial.

I walked around the block, and got lucky - there's a restaurant attached to the hotel that's just outside the cordon, so I was able to get in that way. There were police and medical folks camped in the lobby here, along with a bunch of hotel security staff. Apparently, this stabdoff has been going on since a little after 7 pm local time - and with these things, there's no telling how long they'll last.

Oddly, I haven't seen anything about this on BBC world news or CNN International - I would have thought a hostage standoff in the center of Brussels would be pretty big news. On the other hand, there's the whole Gaza thing and a huge bomb report out of Baghdad, so I guess I can see how this fell under the radar. Still, I was a bit surprised to see no notice on any of the news websites I visited (and I only saw one local media truck sitting near the cordon). No idea what's up - I'll post more if I find out. If you look at this map, you'll get an idea of where the cordon is.