THE COUNCIL OF EUROPE, AN OFFICIAL UNO OBSERVER

Council of Europe, Strasbourg

Today, The Grandma has flown from Barcelona to Strasbourg to visit some authorities in the Council of Europe.

The Council of Europe is an international organisation whose stated aim is to uphold human rights, democracy and the rule of law in Europe and The Grandma is very worried about the repression that the Catalan population is suffering. Catalan people are European citizens and they must have their rights protected and guaranteed by institutions like this.

Self-determination is a right, not a crime and The Grandma wants to know which are the position and the opinion of the Council of Europe about Catalan issue. She has chosen a special date to her visit because the Council of Europe was founded following a speech by Winston Churchill at the University of Zurich on a day like today in 1946.

Before visiting the Council of Europe, The Grandma has studied a new lesson of her Ms. Excel course.

19. Sharing Documents (VII) (Spanish Version)

The Council of Europe,  Conseil de l'Europe in French or Europarat in German, is an international organisation whose stated aim is to uphold human rights, democracy and the rule of law in Europe.

Founded in 1949, it has 47 member states, covers approximately 820 million people and operates with an annual budget of approximately 500 million euros.

The organisation is distinct from the 28-nation European Union (EU), although it is sometimes confused with it, partly because the EU has adopted the original European Flag which was created by the Council of Europe in 1955, as well as the European Anthem. No country has ever joined the EU without first belonging to the Council of Europe. The Council of Europe is an official United Nations Observer.

More information: Council of Europe

Unlike the EU, the Council of Europe cannot make binding laws, but it does have the power to enforce select international agreements reached by European states on various topics. The best known body of the Council of Europe is the European Court of Human Rights, which enforces the European Convention on Human Rights.

The Council's two statutory bodies are the Committee of Ministers, comprising the foreign ministers of each member state, and the Parliamentary Assembly, composed of members of the national parliaments of each member state.

The Grandma visits the Council of Europe

The Commissioner for Human Rights is an independent institution within the Council of Europe, mandated to promote awareness of and respect for human rights in the member states.

The Secretary General heads the secretariat of the organisation. Other major CoE bodies include the European Directorate for the Quality of Medicines and the European Audiovisual Observatory.

The headquarters of the Council of Europe are in Strasbourg, France. English and French are its two official languages. The Committee of Ministers, the Parliamentary Assembly and the Congress also use German, Italian, and Russian for some of their work.

In a speech in 1929, French Foreign Minister Aristide Briand floated the idea of an organisation which would gather European nations together in a federal union to resolve common problems. But it was Britain's wartime leader Sir Winston Churchill who first publicly suggested the creation of a Council of Europe in a BBC radio broadcast on 21 March 1943, while the second world war was still raging. In his own words, he tried to peer through the mists of the future to the end of the war, once victory had been achieved, and think about how to re-build and maintain peace on a shattered continent. Given that Europe had been at the origin of two world wars, the creation of such a body would be, he suggested, a stupendous business. He returned to the idea during a well-known speech at the University of Zurich on 19 September 1946, throwing the full weight of his considerable post-war prestige behind it.

More information: @coe

The future structure of the Council of Europe was discussed at a specific congress of several hundred leading politicians, government representatives and civil society in The Hague, Netherlands, in 1948.

There were two schools of thought competing: some favoured a classical international organisation with representatives of governments, while others preferred a political forum with parliamentarians. Both approaches were finally combined through the creation of a Committee of Ministers (in which governments were represented) and a Consultative Assembly (in which parliaments were represented), the two main bodies mentioned in the Statute of the Council of Europe. This dual intergovernmental and inter-parliamentary structure was later copied for the European Communities, North Atlantic Treaty Organization and the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe.

The Council of Europe was founded on 5 May 1949 by the Treaty of London. The Statute was signed in London on that day by ten states: Belgium, Denmark, France, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Sweden and the United Kingdom, though Turkey and Greece joined three months later.

More information: CVCE

On 10 August 1949, 100 members of the Council's Consultative Assembly, parliamentarians drawn from the twelve member nations, met in Strasbourg for its first plenary session, held over 18 sittings and lasting nearly a month. They debated how to reconcile and reconstruct a continent still reeling from war, yet already facing a new East-West divide, launched the concept of a trans-national court to protect the basic human rights of every European citizen, and took the first steps towards what would in time become the European Union.

In August 1949, Paul-Henri Spaak of Belgium was elected as the first president of the Assembly, steering its early work. However in December 1951, after nearly three years in the role, Spaak resigned in disappointment after the Assembly rejected proposals for a European political authority.

The Grandma leaves the Council of Europe

Convinced the Council of Europe was never going to be strong enough to achieve his long-term goal of European unification, he soon tried again in a different format, becoming one of the founders of the European Union.

The Council of Europe's most famous achievement is the European Convention on Human Rights, which was adopted in 1950 following a report by the Council of Europe's Parliamentary Assembly, and followed on from the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR).

The Convention created the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg. The Court supervises compliance with the European Convention on Human Rights and thus functions as the highest European court. It is to this court that Europeans can bring cases if they believe that a member country has violated their fundamental rights and freedoms.

The seat of the Council of Europe is in Strasbourg, France. First meetings were held in Strasbourg's University Palace in 1949, but the Council of Europe soon moved into its own buildings. The Council of Europe's eight main buildings are situated in the Quartier européen, an area in the northeast of Strasbourg spread over the three districts of Le Wacken, La Robertsau and Quartier de l'Orangerie, where are also located the four buildings of the seat of the European Parliament in Strasbourg, the Arte headquarters and the seat of the International Institute of Human Rights.

More information: International Democracy Watch

The Council of Europe was founded on 5 May 1949 by Belgium, Denmark, France, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Norway, Sweden and the United Kingdom. Greece joined three months later, and Iceland, Turkey and West Germany the next year. It now has 47 member states, with Montenegro being the latest to join.

Article 4 of the Council of Europe Statute specifies that membership is open to any European State. This has been interpreted liberally from the beginning, when Turkey was admitted, to include transcontinental states, such as Georgia and Azerbaijan, and states that are geographically Asian but socio-politically European, such as Armenia and Cyprus.

Nearly all European states have acceded to the Council of Europe, with the exceptions of Belarus -human rights concerns including active use of the death penalty-, Kazakhstan -human rights concerns-, and the Vatican City (a theocracy), as well as some of the territories with limited recognition.

Besides the status as a full member, the Council of Europe has established other instruments for cooperation and participation of non-member states: observer, applicant, special guest, and partner for democracy.

More information: Europa

Europe destiny and the future of the free world

are entirely in our hands.

Simone Veil

PIERRE BEAUND: FOR EVERYTHING ELSE... PEDRO BOND

Pedro Bond with his cuckoo clock.

Pedro Bond. Watchmaker. France.

I'm Pierre Beaund, aka Pedro Bond. I was born in Strasbourg, Alsace. Time is my passion, perhaps, because of this I'm a watchmaker, a person who makes and repairs watches and clocks. I also sell Cartier watches. Tempus fugit, then I'm always on time. Although I'm French my culture is German because Alsace is a historical German land. I like History.

-Good morning, Pedro Bond, and thanks to attend us.

-Good morning. Thanks to you.

-Well, as I have seen you're a punctual person.

-Always. It's my character and I think being punctual is a signal of respect and education.

-When did your hobby about watches start?

-Mmmm. It's not a hobby. It's my work and I live it with passion. I'm Alsatian. In the past, we were closer to Switzerland and Germany than to France and although today the maps say we're French, we really have a German/Swiss mentality because culture is something that marks you a lot. My family came from Switzerland and time is something very important in this country. Swiss watches are the best.

-How's life living in a border?

-It's very interesting because you receive influences of both sides. In my case three sides: France, Germany and Switzerland.

-Then, you've a little part of all of them...

-Not exactly. I'm Alsatian. France is a big state with a lot of nationalities and we're one of them. Living in diversity is growing in knowledge.

-You were born in Strasbourg where the European Parliament is. You must enjoy diversity every day.

-Strasbourg is plenty of civil servants. It's an administrative place. Now, all the German countries (Alsace, Germany, Austria, Lorena, Liechtenstein...) have a good quality of life but it was very different only one century ago when a lot of German people emigrated to The USA. Take the story of Levi Strauss like an example. Levi created the jeans in The USA in 1850 with European materials. He must leave Germany to find a better future. Nowadays, lots of people are arriving to the German lands with the idea of finding a better future, in some cases only a possible future.

-How is the life of a watchmaker?

-A normal life. I must be very tidy and organized because is very difficult to make a good watch.

-Which is your favourite kind of clocks?

-I love all of them but I like cuckoo clocks. They have an interesting mechanism because it is not only a clock.

-How do you feel being a member of The Bond's family?

-It has been a pleasure. It's a fantastic family and we've spent unforgettable moments together.

-How is a normal day with The Bonds?

-The day starts with me. I'm the first person to wake up, get up and start to work. Later, step by step, the rest of the family starts to be ready.

-How long have you been studying English?

-Since I was in the school although studying English in the French educational system is not a synonymous of success.

-Why?

-I don't know but I think it's this Jacobean French mentality. French is a very important language of course. It was the diplomatic language during centuries but now is English the language of diplomacy, business and economy and I think that this is something that Educational French system doesn't realize. There are a lot of historical languages in France: Occitan, Breton, Alsatian, Lorrain, Basque, Catalan, Romani and French, of course. Moreover there's an incredible presence of Arabian because of the African colonization. It could be easy to a French speaker learning another language because the most part of the population, except the Parisian, speak at least two languages but the idea of parlez français–soyez propres is still deeply in the mind of the French speakers. It's a pity because this attitude only creates social conflicts and nowadays we have a lot of examples of it.

-Is English difficult for you?

-No, it isn't. English has its roots in German. I speak Alsatian which is a German language, too.

-What can you explain about your life with The Bonds?

-We're a great family with a great sense of humour, very hard workers and with a great idea of responsibility. It's easy to stay with them. 

-Which is your best memory with the family?

-It's difficult to choose one but I remember with special emotion when I was chosen as the Queen of Carnival. It was a great honour.

-You like History, don't you?

-Yes, I do. I like a lot.

-Explain me a story from de History...

-Well, I'm very interested in the Catharism, the community which lived in Occitania and influenced all the European cultures in a way that nobody can imagine. We're all Cathars although we don't believe in it. Talking about the Catharism means seeing the History from another point of view and destroying lots of official stories. History is written by winners and Cathars were killed and prosecuted. They couldn't offer their vision of historical facts and they chose literature and art to keep alive. It's amazing.

-Offer me an example of official story...

-There are two ways of changing History. One of them is creating another one that was useful for your own interests, for example Christopher Columbus. The official story says that he discovered America when a sailor saw a bird in the island named San Salvador in 1492. Then, he confirmed his belief that Earth was round. America already existed and some communities lived there, then Columbus didn't discover anything. This is an example of History written from the point of view of a European citizen. For other hand, you have the possibility of taking real stories and change them to legends, for example, blood legends like Jack The Ripper, Vlap Tepes, Enriqueta Martí and Elizabeth Báthory serial killers who were, possibly, haemophiliacs. 

-Tell me a historical slogan...

-Tempus fugit. The expression comes from line 284 of book 3 of Virgil's Georgics, where it appears as fugit irreparable tempus: it escapes, irretrievable time.

-Thank you very much, Pedro Bond.

-You're welcome.

Download A spectacular dream by Pedro Bond

Ten, nine, eight, seven, six, five, four, three, two, one...

We're leaving together,
but still it's farewell.

[...]
Will things ever be the same again?

[...]
It's the final countdown.

Europe

THE SONG OF THE SIBYL: THE DAY OF JUDGEMENT

The Grandma in the Airport of Strasbourg

The Grandma has finished her travel on The Orient Express. This morning she has arrived to Strasbourg where she has taken a plane to Barcelona, via Palma.  

The Orient Express continues to Paris, Calais and London but The Grandma has returned to Barcelona because today is Christmas Eve and she has a meeting in the Church of Sant Gervasi i Protasi in Bonanova in Barcelona. She's going to listen The Song of the Sibyl sung by Maria del Mar Bonet.

The Song of the Sibyl, in Catalan El Cant de la Sibil·la, is a liturgical drama and a Gregorian chant, the lyrics of which compose a prophecy describing the Apocalypse, which has been performed at some churches of Majorca in Balearic Islands, Alghero in Sardinia and some Catalan churches, in Catalan language on Christmas Eve nearly uninterruptedly since medieval times. The Song of the Sibyl is also sung in Naples in Campania and Marseille in Provence. It was declared a Masterpiece of the Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity by UNESCO on November 16, 2010. 

More information: UNESCO

Several versions, differing in text and music, exist:

-Latin Sibyl, from 10th-11th century, which incorporates fragments of The City of God (XVIII, 23) by St. Augustine.

-Provençal Sibyl, from the 13th century, reflecting influence of troubadour poetry.

-Catalan Sibyl. The latest and most ornamented version. Incorporates popular traditions of Balearic Islands. Refrain of this version is sometimes written for three or four voices.

Delphic Sibyl by Michelangelo

The author of The Song of the Sibyl is unknown. The prophecy was first recorded as an acrostic poem in Greek by bishop Eusebius of Caesarea and later translated into Latin by Saint Augustine in The City of God. It appeared again in the 10th century in different locations across Catalonia, Italy, Castile, and France in the Sermon contra Judeos, later inserted into the reading of the sixth lesson of the second nocturn of matins and was performed as an integral part of the liturgy.

This chant was originally sung in Latin and under the name of Judicii Signum, but from the 13th on, versions in Catalan are found.

These early Catalan versions of the Judici Signum were not directly translated from Latin. Instead, they all come from a previous adaptation in Provençal, which proves the huge popularity this song must have had in the past.

More information: The Song of Sibyl in Barcelona

Amongst the Catalan texts which come from this common root, there is a 14th-century Codex kept in the Archives of the Majorcan Diocese, which was rediscovered in 1908. Oral transmission and the lack of written scripts has caused the various old texts in the vernacular to suffer many modifications over time, which has led to a diversity of versions.

The Song of the Sibyl was almost totally abandoned throughout Europe after the Council of Trent, held in 25 sessions from 1545 to 1563, declared its performance was forbidden. Nevertheless, it was restored on Mallorca as soon as in 1575.

The Grandma in Sant Gervasi i Protasi, Bonanova

Originally, The Song of the Sibyl was sung in a Gregorian melody and, as it can be seen in the codex previously mentioned, the musical accompaniment that was played in Majorca, with the exception of some variations, was the same documented in other places across the Iberian Peninsula. Today, it cannot be ascertained when The Song of the Sibyl was sung to this Gregorian melody, but most likely until the 16th or 17th century. 

Oral transmission of the song caused, as it did with the text, the birth of different variations and models. The interest this chant produced amongst early Musicologists and Folklorists of the 19th century led to the transcription of the different known versions of the song. The versions still played nowadays take these transcriptions as model.

More information: History Learning Site

In the Renaissance, the Gregorian melody of the Song was set to polyphonic music by various composers, a common practice during that period. Two of these works, both for four voices, can be found in the Cancionero de la Colombina, a Spanish manuscript from the second half of the 15th century. The text in them is an abridged version of the Song, in the Castilian language.

The song was originally sung by a Presbyter, although this figure was later replaced by a boy. Even though the Song is supposed to be sung by a Sibyl woman, prophetess, for many centuries women were not allowed to sing in church.

Maria del Mar Bonet & Lautaro Rosas

Today, in most temples in which the song is interpreted, it is still sung by a boy, although in some cases it is sung by either a little girl or a woman. In the performance, the singer walks up to the Altar escorted by two or more altar boys carrying wax candles. Once there, the singer greets the crucifix, turns around, and begins the song. The song is sung a cappella and in a solo voice. In some churches, organ music or either modern choral interludes are introduced between one verse and the next.

The costume used to perform the song is rather similar in all churches, at least around Majorca, where it is performed. It consists of a white or coloured tunic, sometimes embroidered around the neck and the hem, and usually, a cape, which is sometimes replaced with a second tunic. The head is covered with a cap of the same colour. The singer holds a sword in his hands, which is held erect during the whole song. Once the song is over, the singer draws a cross in the air with the sword, turns around to the crucifix once again, usually bows, and afterwards is escorted away from the altar by the same boys.

More information: Maria del Mar Bonet

The song starts with an introduction, the melody of which differs from the rest of the song. In some performances, the song ends with the introductory melody as well.

The text is not standard, but late Medieval Catalan. Some verses are attributed to the 14th-century Mallorcan writer, Anselm Turmeda, who translated into Catalan the Judicii Signum, Book of the Final Judgement, on which the composition is based.

A Catalan version was recorded by Maria del Mar Bonet in 1979 on her album Saba de terrer, and by the vocal ensemble Obsidienne in 1995. 

 Great fire from the heaven will come down;
seas, fountains and rivers, all will burn.
Fish will scream loudly and in horror
losing their natural delights.

The Song of the Sibyl

POIROT & THE GRANDMA ON THE ORIENT EXPRESS

Poster of The Orient Express

Autumn is here and The Grandma has decided to go on holiday. As you know, she doesn't like crowds and this is the main reason because of she prefers travelling in this season.

She wants to stay some months travelling around Europe and Asia and she has chosen The Orient Express, the famous train. 

First of all, The Grandma has arrived to Milan where she's going to take this historic train accompanied by an old friend Hercule Poirot, a Belgian detective.

Let's go to join them in this unforgettable experience...

The Orient Express was the name of a long-distance passenger train service created in 1883 by Compagnie Internationale des Wagons-Lits (CIWL).

The original route, which first ran on October 4, 1883, was from Paris, Gare de l'Est, to Giurgiu in Romania via Munich and Vienna. At Giurgiu, passengers were ferried across the Danube to Ruse, Bulgaria, to pick up another train to Varna. They then completed their journey to Constantinople by ferry.

The route and rolling stock of The Orient Express changed many times. Several routes in the past concurrently used The Orient Express name, or slight variants thereof. Although the original Orient Express was simply a normal international railway service, the name has become synonymous with intrigue and luxury travel. The two city names most prominently associated with the Orient Express are Paris and Constantinople (Istanbul), the original endpoints of the timetabled service.

More information: Venice Simplon-Orient Express

The Orient Express was a showcase of luxury and comfort at a time when travelling was still rough and dangerous. CIWL soon developed a dense network of luxury trains all over Europe, whose names are still remembered today and associated with the art of luxury travel – The Blue Train, The Golden Arrow, North Express and many more.

Schedule of The Orient Express

In 1977, The Orient Express stopped serving Istanbul. Its immediate successor, a through overnight service from Paris to Vienna, ran for the last time from Paris on Friday, June 8, 2007.

After this, the route, still called The Orient Express, was shortened to start from Strasbourg instead, occasioned by the inauguration of the LGV Est which affords much shorter travel times from Paris to Strasbourg. The new curtailed service left Strasbourg at 22:20 daily, shortly after the arrival of a TGV from Paris, and was attached at Karlsruhe to the overnight sleeper service from Amsterdam to Vienna.

On 14 December 2009, The Orient Express ceased to operate and the route disappeared from European railway timetables, reportedly a victim of high-speed trains and cut-rate airlines. The Venice-Simplon Orient Express train, a private venture by Orient-Express Hotels Ltd. using original CIWL carriages from the 1920s and 1930s, continues to run from London to Venice and to other destinations in Europe, including the original route from Paris to Istanbul.

In March 2014 Orient-Express Hotels Ltd. was renamed Belmond.

Download Murder on The Orient Express by Agatha Christie

Who knows who will be on board? 

A couple of spies, for sure.  

At least one grand duke; 

a few beautiful woman, 

no doubt very rich and very troubled. 

Anything can happen and usually does 

on the Orient Express.
 

Morley Safer