Brigitta Callens talks about new love Filip for the first time: “A warm family man”

“I draw a full line under the past and I don’t want to be associated with it anymore.” That past: that is especially the period after her election as Miss Belgium. She was in a relationship with Zillion boss Frank Verstraeten and they were on all the front pages after a homejacking in 2000. Last year she refused to participate in the film about the Antwerp discotheque. In recent years she lived far away from the spotlights abroad.

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But Brigitta Callens is back home in the Flemish Ardennes. “The most beautiful region in the world”, she calls it herself. “My dad passed away in 2020. That incredibly sad moment has resulted in something wonderful. I saw Filip again for the first time in a very long time. He got on very well with my dad. He talked to him a lot in his last months and assisted my mom. Still.” After the funeral, the two, who have known each other since childhood, kept in touch. “But that was not physical, because I lived abroad.” What she did there: she leaves that in the middle. “It can all remain a bit mysterious. My life is a bit of an enigma to the outside world, and I want to keep it that way.”

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When she returned to our country last year, contact with Filip intensified. Tsjoen is an entrepreneur from Oudenaarde. He does plumbing, bathroom renovations and installs heat pumps. “I really admire his entrepreneurship. Work work work. But above all he is a very warm family man. Having breakfast together, sitting at the table together in the afternoon: things like that are very important. Very faithful and very loyal.” And he has a great sense of humour. “We are constantly teasing each other. That keeps our relationship alive.”

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“I now live life as it is. Fortunately with more ups than the downs I’ve known. Filip and I have both gone through a journey of difficulties. Like everyone else, and that’s okay. This ensures that we can have very in-depth conversations. They are the key to our relationship. That is only possible between people who have a lot of life experience. The fact that we can also enjoy life next to it only makes it more beautiful.” Along the Leie, on the boat for example.

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What the future brings? “Don’t know. Who would? We live in the now. I certainly don’t actively seek out the spotlight anymore, but you never know what’s going to happen. In recent years I have refused a lot of things. I am always a creative bee. I’m working on a life project, which I can’t tell you about yet. It’s about talents that people don’t really know about me yet.” In the meantime, she also thinks along with Filip’s company: “Through my many travels, I have been able to become acquainted with so many different bathroom rituals. There is also a lot to do here.”

Filip Tsjoen has two beautiful teenage girls. A child together? “Who knows? But I’m also already 42. You may know: underneath my brown locks is actually completely silvered hair. (laughs) I can put it all into perspective: I am gray and wise.”