Belgian journalist working on Ghent documentary
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GHENT -- Wearing yellow-colored rim glasses and headphones while holding recording equipment and a Los Angeles Dodgers baseball cap on top of his head, Ben Van Alboom definitely stood out in the crowd watching the Rolle Bolle Calcutta held during Belgian American Days in Ghent Saturday.
Van Alboom is from Ghent, Belgium, and was in Ghent, Minnesota, to interview people for his upcoming book and audio documentaries on U.S. cities with the name Ghent and their historic links to Belgium. According to Van Alboom, there are nine U.S. cities with the name Ghent.
He said a combination of curiosity and a mid-life crisis motivated him to take on the project that is funded by the Belgian government.
"I used to live in New York for a couple years and that's when I found out there is a Ghent, New York,” he said. “That's strange. It's been in the back of mind for the past 10 years I wanted to do something with that at some point, I decided. I have a publisher right now. The whole process is funded by the government, so there is some money here to work with and I can do this."
According to one of his websites, Van Alboom has been working as a journalist for past two years with media outlets such as De Standaard, Knack, Humo, Vice, Klara, Radio 1 and De Morgen. He worked as a marketing manager for Visit Flanders in New York. He also worked as a communication adviser for a variety of clients from jazz and film festivals to energy drinks and tourist offices.
"I have been doing this for a couple months now. I have been to rural areas before, so that doesn't surprise me. What surprises me -- I've been to other places -- they definitely keep heritage alive here (Ghent, Minnesota). It's good to see there's still that connection to their roots," he said.
In southwest Minnesota, the roots go hand and hand with the sport of rolle bolle. But Van Alboom said rolle bolle is very limited in his home country.
"When it comes to migration, when people migrate, they take their traditions with them and they continue those traditions much longer than the people in the country. Because the people in the country, they evolve. They will start doing other things. Of course, the people that moved are unaware of that. They can stick with the traditions they know, even though in Belgium we moved on 100 years ago," Van Alboom said.
Ghent, Minnesota, is probably the rolle bolle capital of the world, he said.
"This is definitely one of the few places in the world that continue the tradition. Belgium might have been the capital of rolle bolle 100 years ago, today it definitely is Ghent, Minnesota," Van Alboom said.
He will continue to work in the U.S. before returning to Belgium and starting writing from September onward. He expects the book to be published a year from now. While it will be written in Dutch, Van Alboom hopes to find a company to make a limited English edition.
"So who I'm talking to here can actually read what I wrote about. But we are working on it. That's next year," he said.