cafebabel.com

Paris: living cheaply in an expensive city

mary maistrello — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 17:00:00 -0000

The crisis is an opportunity of redeeming a more democratic economy, capable not only of satisfying the individual, but especially the community. Young people in Paris are finding solutions based on reciprocity and co-operation

From Bergamo to Laos: parkour with Gato, Italian traceur

Jude Lister — Wed, 17 Mar 2010 11:32:18 -0000

Federico, or 'Gato' ('Cat') as he likes to be known, is an Italian biologist. But his real passion is for parkour - or rather the art of moving, a discipline which allows man to discover his own body and its limits

On St. Patrick's day, drink Poitín, the world’s strongest alcohol

Tim Mac an Airchinnigh — Tue, 16 Mar 2010 15:30:00 -0000

You’ll often find it in a clear, unmarked glass bottle, innocently snuggled at the back of a neighbour’s fridge, but the real Poteen (pronounced 'putch-een') isn’t sold in any shop in Dublin. St. Patrick apparently brewed it, and few people in Ireland haven’t tasted this ultra-alcoholic brew, but the lethal concoction has been illegal here since 1661

European indie film: 'Sundance' in Paris

cafebabel.com — Fri, 12 Mar 2010 16:48:49 -0000

It's all eyes on the French capital's Latin quarter between 12 and 14 March 2010; the fifth edition of 'ECU', run by an Australian and supported by G-Technology by Hitachi, showcases 72 works from 28 countries across various categories. Here's our top five trailers

Agop J. Hacikyan: 'I don’t feel I am translating my culture into English'

renata burns — Fri, 12 Mar 2010 10:44:37 -0000

The playful Armenian-Canadian author talks his latest novel - hailed as a 'love letter to Istanbul' - straddling continents and his opinions on Turkey in the EU

Zaher Rezai: dead after eight kilometres of illegal immigration

jennifer o'boyle — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 11:48:04 -0000

In December 2008, the 13-year-old died under the wheels of a lorry after trying to evade Italian immigration officials. A year on, artist Gianluca Constantini's cartoon strip tells the story

Getting to grips with djembe, tro-tro and obronis in Ghana

Elaine Jordan — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 15:45:00 -0000

I was told before I arrived in Ghana that everyone wants to speak to the foreigner or the obroni (‘white person’) as they say in Twi, one of the main dialects of the forty spoken in Ghana. I had several on the spot marriage proposals; but that’s Ghana and its people for you

Europarl TV: 'technology is more fast-paced than the institutions'

cafebabel.com — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 12:15:00 -0000

In September 2008, the TV channel started streaming parliamentary sessions and news features on MEPs and their speeches on the European parliament’s webpage. The challenge is to give the institutions a human face - press service chief Jean-Yves Loog tells us how

UK to Poland via France: hitch-hiking Europe

Sara Szeremeta — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 13:21:01 -0000

You could stay in a hotel in Egypt for a week. Or you can spread the same amount of money over a month and a half for a trip of an alternative kind: hitchhiking Europe. Here’s one way to do it, which included 30 drivers, volunteer work and new friends

Krystof Hadek: 'foreign characters played by English-speaking actors? Disappointing'

sally harbinson — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 13:15:00 -0000

In the last month the 27-year-old Czech actor has picked up accolades at the Berlin film festival (one of the ten 'shooting stars' in Europe) and a Czech Lion for 'best actor'. We talk fame, acting genes and language in European cinema

Mrs, miss or ms?

Tim Mac an Airchinnigh — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 12:08:10 -0000

In the run-up to international women's day on 8 March, one of the debates rolling around the cafebabel circles cropped up - when on earth do English-speakers address a woman by Ms?

Women's day: Femibook, testosterone and internet

Sarah Truesdale — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 09:30:00 -0000

100 years after the first international woman's day was organised on 8 March in Copenhagen, a short statistical wonder on where the woman's place rightfully is

Fathoming the power of right-wing populist Geert Wilders in Europe

euro topics — Fri, 05 Mar 2010 15:31:36 -0000

If the freedom party leader is successful in the June parliamentary elections, Dutch politics will be destabilised and Europe will be forced to deal seriously with the man once nicknamed 'Mozart', write the Dutch, Swiss, Spanish and Slovakian press

The Europeans nominated for the more 'random' Oscars 2010

cafebabel.com — Thu, 04 Mar 2010 14:08:17 -0000

There's a tendency to focus on which Europeans snag the best film or best actress prizes - but here's a trailer run down of the less famed contenders vying for other Oscars from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, which takes place at the Kodak Theatre on 7 March

Italian, French and Bulgarian press vs genetically modified potato

euro topics — Wed, 03 Mar 2010 13:45:00 -0000

On 3 March the European commission gave the green light for the 'Amflora', used for the production of industrial starch. This was the first time since 1998 that it has approved a GMO for cultivation. Some commentators say Brussels has bowed to the pressure of agriculture companies; others claim this paves the way for a better future

Niang Mor: story of a Senegalese 'near-extradition' from Italy

mary maistrello — Wed, 03 Mar 2010 10:45:00 -0000

You'd hardly believe that he was 57 if you saw his papers. Mor moved to France in 1982, then Germany four years later, to finally settle in Ravenna in 1990. He has a regular trading licence, has always been in work and has never had any trouble with the law. The story of his incredible 'near- extradition'

Kinshasa Symphony: why is Mozart in Africa an alien concept?

Annie Rutherford — Tue, 02 Mar 2010 13:18:39 -0000

People passionately making music is always good film fodder. This German documentary offers a contrast to the conflicts and states of mind dealt with its 2008 predecessor 'Trip to Asia', which followed the Berlin philharmonic

Songbeat, Berlin: story of a German music start-up

Jude Lister — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 15:46:37 -0000

Philip Eggersglüß and Marco Rydman are two Berliners who launched an online music business at the age of 25. We discuss court cases, 'limited company' statuses via the UK and Hong Kong and the benefits of working in the German capital

PIIGS unwelcome in the EU parlour: war of words rocks Eurozone

naomi o'leary — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 11:00:00 -0000

Despite Silvio Berlusconi’s dreams, the next member of the Eurozone is unlikely to be Israel; even Croatia or Turkey have taken a back seat. The current pan-EU squabble is over who should have been admitted to the eurozone in the first place

Anderlecht, Molenbeek, Schaarbeek: spot the crime in Brussels

Thimi Samarxhiu — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 10:21:47 -0000

Petty crime and unemployment rates (17.6%) are high in inner city Brussels, which registers a low violent crime rate in Europe. Nevertheless, police arrested 12 Belgian Albanians linked to a crime gang on 15 February*, whilst certain districts remain dangerous. Is this down to the crisis?

How to make Polish potato pancakes

Paulina Dominik — Fri, 26 Feb 2010 12:30:00 -0000

It’s cheap and available, warm and nourishing, omnipresent in most traditional European cuisines – but the starchy crop only hit the continent from South America as late as the 16th century

Monetary union and media stress: young Greeks and Germans debate

Nabeelah Shabbir — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 14:30:00 -0000

This month, Greece was announced to be suffering a eurozone deficit of 12% - the maximum is 3%. The German media has called them the 'deceivers of the euro-family'. The Greeks respond that they are hypocrites, holding them accountable for debts from 1945. Who wants whose diplomatic blood? We hear immediate reactions from the two sides

Polish migrants post-crisis in Ireland: is there no place like home?

Angela Steen — Wed, 24 Feb 2010 16:47:11 -0000

EU enlargement in 2004 meant that the Poles made the most indelible imprint on Irish society - and surprise, they're happy in their new home, despite the fact that both countries have experienced polar fortunes in the recent recession

Brussels: young, gifted and going nowhere fast

Nicola Potter — Wed, 24 Feb 2010 11:00:00 -0000

They’re over-qualified, multilingual and come from every corner of the European Union. They moved to the Belgian capital to find an internship or job. A short report from the heart of this bustling microcosm

'Les Petits Riens': social enterprise in Brussels

Sarah Pybus — Tue, 23 Feb 2010 09:22:01 -0000

In times of crisis, is it time to go second hand? In Brussels, the shop run by 'The Little Nothings' organisation is just the ticket. As well as offering cheap furniture, books and household appliances, it gives the homeless another chance

Belfast in a black taxi: Europe’s last divided city tries to overcome its past

Tim Mac an Airchinnigh — Mon, 22 Feb 2010 16:17:08 -0000

On 6 February, the Northern Irish paramilitary organisation the INLA decommissioned their weapons, and the province took one more tentative step towards social stability. Now that the former war-zone has re-opened its doors to the world, visitors are flocking to western Europe’s last divided city. A taste of the Northern Irish experience

Dutch government fails over Afghanistan

euro topics — Mon, 22 Feb 2010 13:05:50 -0000

The grand coalition government in the Netherlands collapsed on the weekend after it was unable to reach a consensus on prolonging the operations in Afghanistan. The Spanish, Dutch and Belgian press write that although this won't prompt other states to withdraw their troops from the country, it may give the right-wing populists a boost in new Dutch elections

Gaëtan Tarantino: ‘graffiti artists are normal people, not hooligans’

Alison Frank — Mon, 22 Feb 2010 10:00:00 -0000

He escaped prison and fines, sleeps and breathes graffiti and his NGO holds Brussels’ annual graffiti event: how the 32-year-old from Marseille, who once worked in air-conditioning, cheers up gloomy Belgian neighbourhoods with art that emerges from concrete

Communist-themed film reviews: Kawasaki's Rose vs Portrait Of The Fighter As A Young Man

Amanda Mulligan — Thu, 18 Feb 2010 15:00:00 -0000

Having buried the past, it is almost impossible to hear a public discussion on communism in either the Czech Republic or Romania. The Berlin film festival screened a film from both countries in the hope of raising public awareness of their vigilante secret police services

Florian Lukas: no more 'best mate characters' for the 'Good Bye Lenin!' star

Lindsey Evans — Thu, 18 Feb 2010 11:28:25 -0000

He picked up a Deutscher Filmpreis for his role as the fake newsreader with a stick-on moustache who brought the GDR back to life after the wall had fallen in the 2003 cult hit. Seven years on, the 36-year-old is back, this time playing the sensitive lover of a German-born Turk. We grab the actor at the 2010 Berlin film festival

Israeli and Arab film pick at the Berlin film festival

Sarah Turpin — Wed, 17 Feb 2010 15:07:18 -0000

On the 60th anniversary of the Berlin film festival, cinema should be just that: cinema. But this year the international film festival introduces people, landscapes and cultures who and which you'd never encounter in real life

Dismantled: five myths about Kosovo

Martin Wählisch — Wed, 17 Feb 2010 11:46:31 -0000

On 17 February, Europe’s youngest country celebrates its second anniversary. Presumably, most still wouldn't find Kosovo on a map. We regularly read about its soldiers, organised crime and demand for visas. Two roommates in Prishtina – a Kosovar and a German – share their most striking and basic common observations

Berlin film festival: 60 years of masterpieces

Sarah Truesdale — Mon, 15 Feb 2010 12:00:00 -0000

The Berlin international film festival (or Berlinale) has been fraught with political struggles. Created by the allies of west Berlin right under the noses of communist dictators, it was a way of opening a window to the 'free' world. Over the years, it has developed into an unmissable world cinema event

Metropolis: masterpiece recovered at last

Alison Frank — Mon, 15 Feb 2010 11:42:15 -0000

A complete version of the masterpiece of German cinema was screened with great ceremony on 13 February at the Berlin film festival; some missing sequences of Fritz Lang’s film were found two years ago in Argentina, 83 years after the film’s original release

Almost 50 journalists behind bars: 'all young Iranians are potential journalists'

Jude Lister — Mon, 15 Feb 2010 10:00:00 -0000

On 11 February 2010, both opponents and supporters of Ahmadinejad were in the streets to celebrate the 31st anniversary of the Islamic revolution. We speak to the Iranian lawyer and 2003 nobel peace prize laureate Shirin Ebadi

Wanna go out in Athens? Try the Gazi neighbourhood

Aatish Pattni — Fri, 12 Feb 2010 12:00:00 -0000

You could almost call it a phenomenon that has worked its charm on the Athenians over the years. Some of the prostitutes in the area even parade around in the latest fashions, like it’s some kind of catwalk

Concert review: south London band The xx continue European tour

theroxbox — Fri, 12 Feb 2010 10:00:00 -0000

They count Courtney Love as a fan, they're one of the groundbreaking new acts of 2009 and among the most innovative bands of the late decade. As the band of twenties return to their European tour today in Angouleme, one fan remembers how, in spite of wild winds, the Danish hoards flocked to catch a glimpse of the Wandsworth trio

Escaping tourists: moving from Oranienstrasse to Neukölln in Berlin

Andrew Christie — Thu, 11 Feb 2010 15:04:11 -0000

As the former cult quarter of Kreuzberg suddenly blossoms into a tourist trap, hardened Berliners are taking to the hills in the search for authenticity. The story of a relocation from cafebabel's babelblogs

Europe apprehensive about Athens

euro topics — Thu, 11 Feb 2010 11:36:14 -0000

Ahead of the 11 February summit meeting on Greece in Brussels, several EU members are apparently willing to provide aid to the crisis-riden state. The German, Bulgarian, Belgian and Czech press fear a devaluation of the euro and say any measures to help the country should be attached to strict requirements

Chicken!

Nabeelah Shabbir — Wed, 10 Feb 2010 11:50:51 -0000

'Da lachen ja die Hühner,' cackle the Germans. 'Even chickens would laugh!' - it sounds so ridiculous that it's actually unbelievable! But don't undermine the global power of chickens, you cowards; these south-east Asia originating birds have oft harmed global markets and relations

Daniel Cohn-Bendit lets rip on new EU 'commission of hypocrites'

Nabeelah Shabbir — Wed, 10 Feb 2010 11:00:00 -0000

'Just before St Valentines Day we tell Mr Barroso 'Je t’aime moi non plus'' - the French-German co-president of the pan-European greens was more than slightly sceptical about the approved commission on 9 February. See the video (in French)

Ties and tees: three innovative fashion initiatives from Ljubljana, Lille and Berlin

cafebabel.com — Tue, 09 Feb 2010 17:00:00 -0000

Between 20 - 22 January, the historic Berlin-Tempelhof airport compound served as the venue of Bread and Butter, the most prominent trade fair for urban and streetwear, for the second year in a row. We pick tie manufacturers, T-shirt street fashion and an eco-sports label as top of the crop

Fancy a degree from the university of Disney?

Tim Mac an Airchinnigh — Tue, 09 Feb 2010 13:44:19 -0000

How about a stroll down Disney Boulevard, shopping in Disney outlet malls and finishing off with a cappuccino on Disney Square? Hell, you can even get your tonsils out in Disney hospital. The Magic Kingdom is building an empire of kitsch just 30 minutes from Paris, and for thousands of jobless Europeans it smells like opportunity

Uncommon first names: 'Europa'

Sarah Turpin — Tue, 09 Feb 2010 12:00:00 -0000

As the launch of a new online database exploring the origins of strange surnames is announced in the UK, we think of the Scarletts, Nikes and Solidarities in this EU world

Grand Archives: ‘In five years time we’ll probably be bartenders again’

theroxbox — Tue, 09 Feb 2010 11:00:00 -0000

Mat, Jeff, Curtis and Thomas are four friends from Seattle, four musicians from a small city. They’re not easily recognisable - you won’t have seen their faces in magazines or billboards. They don’t seem like typical indie rock stars; ‘nor do we don’t want to,’ says frontman Mat Brooke. We catch the group on their European tour leg in the Spanish capital

EU press react: Viktor Yanukovych, Ukraine's new president

euro topics — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 12:08:31 -0000

Five years after he was deposed by the Orange Revolution, the opposition leader won Ukraine's presidential elections on 7 February, narrowly edging out prime minister Yulia Tymoshenko in a runoff vote. The Swiss, Czech, Polish and Portuguese press bemoan the rise to power of a politician who is widely regarded as pro-Russian, but believes that Ukraine has now finally proven that it is truly democratic

Agenda 2020: 'France and Germany love each other'

euro topics — Fri, 05 Feb 2010 12:00:00 -0000

At a meeting of the Franco-German minister council in Paris, French president Nicolas Sarkozy and German chancellor Angela Merkel passed the 'Agenda 2020', which comprises 80 joint projects aimed at bringing the two nations closer together once more. A desirable goal, French, German and Czech commentators say, while also noting that the agenda could offer more

Marc Guerrero: Catalan MEP on Spain, unemployment and van Rompuy

theroxbox — Fri, 05 Feb 2010 10:00:00 -0000

Youth unemployment has become one of the biggest challenges facing the EU. In Spain the figure has reached 43% amongst those aged 15-26. We discuss this problem and the new era that Europe faces with the youngest ever leader of the European liberal democrats (ELDR)

‘University mafia’ cut corners in Czech Republic, Slovakia, Germany and France

Jude Lister — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 12:00:00 -0000

On 1 February, a new rector was allegedly appointed to the Alexander Dubcek university of Trencin in western Slovakia, after a spate of corruption scandals forced his predecessor to resign. Fake diplomas are nothing new, but these events multiplied across Europe in 2009, with Miss Worlds and prominent politicians standing accused: how can such a reality be explained?

Paris, Krakow: the crop of Europe's pretty urban green

cafebabel.com — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 11:29:13 -0000

The tallest building in the world, the 828 metre (2716 ft) high Burj Khalifa skyscraper, was unveiled in Dubai at the beginning of January. Nowadays the question is more of building outwards rather than upwards, with four buzzwords - happiness, ecology, smartness and economy - via two city models