Must sees in Ostend

"With the train to Ostend" is a sentence I hear a lot in Dutch. It is a famous Flemish song from the year 2004 that is known almost everywhere in Fl[anders](https://www.livetheworld.com/post/walking-between-west-flanders-hidden-fields-belgium-osj3). As I live in a different city while studying, it is a typical conversation starter to ask where someone is from. The three things that I affiliate the most with Ostend are listed below.

What I think of when I hear the word Os[tend](https://www.livetheworld.com/post/tips-before-visiting-ostend-zn8u) is the train station. It is an old beautiful building and looking at it while walking between the boats is another one of my favorite views in Ostend. I look at it every Friday while sitting on the bus going home and every week again I love it.

Something else I always think about when I hear Ostend being mentioned is a simple activity that is almost exclusive to Ostend. Shopping on a Sunday. I never noticed that it was exceptional in Belgium to be able to go cloths shopping on a Sunday until I tried it in a different Belgian city. That day ended in me and me friends standing in a street with shops that were closed.

Another place I think of is the Wapenplein with the Kiosk in the middle and the clock tower with the carillon. Sometimes the carilloneur still plays songs on it. I was able to enter the building when I was twelve years old and was allowed to play "Brother Jacob" on it. Maybe that is the reason I always think about this building. The clock on the building is also very nice. Since every sign of the zodiac is on there I used to play this game when I was younger to say the time with the animals. For example: it's a quarter past Taurus.