Red Ball @ Leuven

Yesterday was the first day of Red Ball Project in Levuen, so I walked downtown with my camera to see what it was all about...

The Ball will be in a different location in town every day for the next week.  It started out at the main square in the center of town and when I got there, they were just getting ready for the official opening, so I got to hear the artist, Kurt Perschke, speak about the project.  He is an American artist who has taken his Red Ball all over the world (most recently in London during the Olympics).

He said that the main idea behind Red Ball is bringing people together, as "a catalyst for new encounters in the everyday".  I definitely saw more smiling (than is usual here in Belgium) going on between strangers as several of us took pictures of the school children who were being patiently lined up by their teachers in front of the ball. 

I have the list of locations where the ball is going to be this week and I am going to do my best to get to as many of them as possible, by foot or by bike.  So I guess you could say my exercise this week will be Red Ball Workouts!  Hmmm...it does kind of look like a giant Swiss ball, doesn't it?