For over twenty-seven years, one sound has announced a fixture on Belgium's coast: a small bell. According to Atlas Obscura, Johan Blanckaert has been selling soup from his grey van along the seawall in De Panne every single day since January second, nineteen ninety-nine. He rings the bell each morning, and customers—many with their own pots in hand—line up for fresh soup. In De Panne, a family destination on the Belgian coast, the bell and those patient customers have become as iconic as the sea itself.

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