Where oh Where Wednesday: the town where we live

When I put my return address to paper or answer someone as to where we live, I name the town of Lanaken. But Lanaken is actually 7 different towns or villages all combined back in the years just before we moved here. The largest town is Lanaken itself, a town of some 11,000 inhabitants. But we actually live in the small village of Neerharen. 

Neerharen is the opposite village of “Opharen” on the other side of the river which is a short 500 meters from our back door. The river has ever been the border between the Netherlands and Belgium - at least as long as Belgium has existed. “Op” means above and “Neer” means below. So our village was the vial leg below the river. The other one received a castle at some point and so has become “Borgharen” and is a neighborhood of the city of Maastricht now. 

Our village can be found on maps of Napoleon when he was taking parts of Europe over, bringing some semblance of formal administration with him. The house across from us is from the 19th century and the castle to which our street would lead (if the canal did not cut across it) has elements from the 13th century. So this place has been around for some time. 

The village north of us, which is still part of the conglomerate of Lanaken, is called “Rekem”, although it used to be “Reckheim”. It had even been its own little city with city rights. The castle which housed the lord at the time has been a psychiatric hospital and now serves tourists. The village south of us, Smeermaas, is where the border crosses in fromt of the river bringing everyone into the next country. Both of these villages are where the stores are situated that we use in our daily lives. Our village has a butcher and some restaurants, but no real stores. 

Neerharen does have what some call the Gold Coast. As I explained recently to a visitor from Kenya, it is along this Gold Coast, on the other side of the main road splitting the village, that the truly rich people live. Of course, even the houses on our side of the village were more than large enough to count as a Gold Coast for him. 

The canal behind our house, built in the 1920’s, has bunkers from WWII as a reminder of a more terrible time. The canal itself carries boats ferrying goods from the harbor of Antwerpen to the harbor of Rotterdam and everywhere in between. The provincial road which cuts through the village used to be a tramway carrying passengers and goods from Maastricht to Maasmechelen and further. 

We are thankful for the place we have been able to live and bring up our family while also sharing the truth and joy of living with Jesus. We have good neighbors in a quiet neighborhood full of history. It is a small place surrounded by busy life on all sides. 

(The picture is of our boys, when they were boys, playing in our street.)