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Archives for 30 January, 2005

Belgian Disharmony

30 January, 2005
Posted in: Belgium

Have I mentioned that it is the 175th anniversary of the foundation of the Belgian state? To celebrate this, let me tell you a little anecdote which gives a flavour of life among the linguistically fractious Belgians. During the week I met my friend the orchestra director for lunch. She used to do policing in Albania but she turned to orchestra directing when work there dried up – now there’s a woman with a second string to her bow (no pun intended, she plays the French horn, since you ask).

Anyhow, her orchestra has been doing a bit of work for the conservatoire – helping them out with their conducting exams. The session is run like a real rehearsal and the student conducts, stops, offers advice and suggestions and conducts some more. The conservatoire used to use the Belgian National Orchestra for this important work but they found my friend’s orchestra more satisfactory. Picture the following scene, if you will. Nervous student conducts BNO. Pauses and makes comments on playing. Trumpeter raises his hand and asks coldly “Can you repeat that in Flemish please?” You can see why the poor students might be put off.

Sick again, eh?

30 January, 2005
Posted in: Princess, Reading etc.

Herself has a cough. We were all up all night. She is very sorry for herself and keeps saying “poor me, poor mite, cough, cough”. She has also observed “Mummy sick, Daddy sick”. Yes, we’re all coughing. This morning while I had my shower, Mr. Waffle minded her. I came out to find him curled up in a ball on the floor beside the playpen wherein the Princess sat poking him and saying imperiously “plasticene”. We’re all tired too.Nothing daunted, the Princess and I went off to mass (“church ‘n Jesus ‘n Mary ‘n Joseph”). On our way there, we passed the synagogue. There is always a policeman with a machine gun across the road from the synagogue but today, the place was crawling with police and plain clothes types with things stuck in their ears. I asked a policewoman who was fiddling with the strap on her submachine gun what was going on. Apparently there was a special service for the 60th anniversary of the holocaust. Is it not a bit depressing that 60 years after the holocaust the Jewish community in Belgium needs half the Brussels police force out to protect them when going to the synagogue?

And while we’re on the subject, I note that the Irish President said something spectacularly stupid when speaking of the holocaust (which is not all like her). I quote from that organ of record, the Irish Examiner “Speaking on RTɒs Morning Ireland programme on Thursday, ahead of attending the Auschwitz remembrance ceremony in Poland, Mrs McAleese said “They [the Nazis] gave to their children an irrational hatred of Jews in the same way that people in Northern Ireland transmitted to their children an irrational and outrageous hatred, for example, of Catholics.” ”

Oh good grief. She has at least had the good sense to abjectly apologise.

Comments
poggleon 31 January 2005 at 11:46

I must add that, in my view extremely rarely for a politician, she did sound genuinely contrite.

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