https://www.dpa-international.com/trends-and-features/urn:newsml:dpa.com:20090101:250527-99-990667/
https://www.yahoo.com/news/bruges-dont-steal-cobblestones-locals-042429220.html
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/in-bruges-dont-steal-the-cobblestones-locals-say/ar-AA1FBPuw
Drugs, sex, murder, attempted murder – all are to be found amid the black humour and mayhem that is the 2008 film In Bruges, in which a pair of Irish gangsters hide out in the Belgian city famous for its layers of medieval-era heritage and old town.
But one thing the flick does not have is people stealing the city’s famous cobblestones, made from Wallonian porphyry, which has long been much sought-after for its durability. And, going by the antics of visitors, also prized as a souvenir.
According to city alderman Franky Demon, light-fingered visitors are helping themselves to at least 50 of the cobblestones every month, apparently to take home as keepsakes.
“At iconic sites such as the Minnewater, the Vismarkt, the Markt and the Gruuthusemuseum, an estimated 50 to 70 cobblestones disappear every month and the true figure may be even higher still,” Demon told Belga, the national press agency.
The number of stolen stones probably increases during the summer as visitor numbers soar, according to the official.
Not only does yanking the stones out of the ground undermine the city centre’s renowned aesthetic, it leaves pedestrians vulnerable to taking a tumble, particularly elderly walkers who can be frail or less nimble than others.
“Anyone that walks through Bruges is walking through centuries of history,” Demon said, exhorting would-be thieves to “leave the cobblestones where they belong.”
But perhaps it is not such a surprise that Bruges would be the setting for such acquisitiveness: after all, it was the home town of Doctor Evil from the Austin Powers film series, a character who described himself as the son of a “relentlessly self-improving boulangerie owner from Belgium with low-grade narcolepsy and a penchant for buggery.”
