Conference entitled “Restart the next 50 years in the EU” and birthday celebration in the Hungarian Parliament

Pat Cox, the President of the European Movement International took part in a conference organised by the Hungarian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, entitled “Restart the next 50 years in the EU” and addressed the audience with a speech on the importance of  European values for further European integration. The event took place in the parliament and was opened by Ms Katalin Szili, the Speaker of the Hungarian Parliament.
Key Hungarian Civil Society leaders, journalists, communication specialists and politicians attended the event and discussed three main issues related to the future of the EU: education, media and NGOs. 

 

 

On this occasion, Mr Cox met the members of the European Movement Hungary and the Hungarian European Society for an informal debate on EU issues.

 

The conference was available for viewing online on www.euvonal.hu.

A poster exhibition entitled ‘Fifty years of Europe’ could be also visited on the venue of the conference.

 

It was a great honour to have been invited by the Hungarian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and to be one of the presenters and members on the educational panel. Our section focused on issues such as: What topics are the young interested in, concerning the EU? EU in the Hungarian National Curriculum. Best practices in teaching EU and active citizenship.

As the Hungarian pedagogigal adviser for Spring Day for Europe I seized the opportunity to talk about the Spring Day project and the way it can help bring the European dimension into schools.

Seven students of mine also had the opportunity to participate in this great whole day event.

In the morning the plenary talks discussed the values of the last and the next 50 years in Europe and besides Pat Cox,  the plenary presenters who shared their views on the topic were the following: Mr Péter Balázs, university professor at Central European University and Ms Eszter Babarczy, writer-publicist, Ms Kinga Gal, member of the European Parliament and Xaver Varnus, organist. The moderator was Mr Tamás Halm, Chair of the Economic and Social Council.

Following the afternoon session we gathered once again in the magnificient chamber and listened to the summaries of the parallel section presentations and discussions as well as the recommendations of the education, the media and the NGOs section.

 

Then the conference came to a closure – Szilveszter Vizi E., president of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences delivered the closing speech.

But the day did not ended because then came the real celebration!!!

We ate from the special birthday cake and drank champagne and by clinking glasses we wished each other a happy and prosperous EU for the next 50 years.

 

 

Five things about me

Dear Bee,

Thank you for your invitation to take part in this meme game that is running all around the blogosphere. I highly appreciate that you involved me into this exciting activity. So basically, the idea is for each blogger who accepts the invitation to reveal five things most people don’t know about them and then to pass the baton to five other bloggers by tagging them.

Well, I had to rack my brains hard to come up with some possible pieces of information that may reveal more about me than just some pure facts stated here and there in my online bios and in my CV. Well, in my utmost effort to keep the ball rolling I’ve come up with the following things:

Two outstanding events (professional ones):

I have been lucky enough to give a short talk at the European Commission’s Press Room as a pedagogical advisor for the Spring Day in Europe project.

During the press conference Christiane Haamann from Denmark and I from Hungary, explained why we were interested in participating in the project.

I felt really proud of representing not only the international Teacher’s team (the advisory board) but my native country as well. You can read the official press release here (http://tinyurl.com/ypgbrw).

The other outstanding professional event for me was when I delivered a plenary talk on Information Literacy: Bridging the Digital Divide at the AEC-NET (Asia-Europe Classroom Network) conference in Beijing on 26 September, 2005.

http://www.aec.asef.org/aecnet/aecnet2005_program.html

 

The most memorable course I have attended:

This occured before the birth of my son on 11 April, 1995. I wanted to be present at my son’s birth so I had to attend a course with my wife where we learnt different respiratory and relaxation techniques. I still make good use of them as a teacher.

Unfortunately, I could not be there next to my wife when my daughter was born since everything came so fast. We live very close to the hospital but still no sooner had we arrived to the hospital than my wife started delivering the baby so I unfortunately was destined to wait outside the corridor with my one-year son in my arms.

How I saved some money once

Sports used to play an important role in my life. I used to be a middle-distance runner and a footballer when I was a high school student. In the early 80’s I ran a so-called mini-marathon (26 km) from Pecs to Harkany. After the run the contesters had a free entrance to the famous spa bath. I really do not know why I did not make it a habit to save the entrance fee this way every year. I think it really pays off in the long run.

Food:

I love all kinds of food. Mainly typical Hungarian dishes like fish soup, goulash, chicken paprikas, porkolt (stew) etc. (see some info on these dishes here, you can even get the recipes http://www.budapest.com/recipes/foods-dishes.htm)

Well, I like indulging in culinary delights but to tell the truth I am all thumbs when it comes to cooking. I usually help my wife in the kitchen but the other day when I came up with the idea of preparing something special by trying to follow a cookbook recipe my family fiercely protested the idea and they did their best to talk me out of doing so for fearing that they would starve that evening. Actually, they based their prediction on past events when I even failed to make decent pancakes. In the end I gave in and thought better of my original plan.

My most interesting video presentation

Guess on what?! Yes, on a drink. And on the famous Tokaji Aszu.

Let me give you a brief backround to this event. We Spring Day teachers who belonged to the international advisory team were asked to greet visitors to the project website in our native language and in English, French or German. We had to introduce an object that symbolises our respective countries.

The first thing that sprang to my mind when focusing on the task was wine. Hey, but please do not jump on a false conclusion. The habit of drinking wine is after all a national costum in my country and we have some really famous wine-producing areas like Tokaj which badly needs widespread publication. So this is how I ended up grabbing a bottle of Tokaji Aszu and the opportunity to publicize the “king of wines” in front of the camcorder. (about the wine http://www.funkcity.demon.co.uk/tokaj2.htm#5) (the presentations are at http://futurum2004.eun.org/ww/en/pub/futurum2004/contact/video_greetings.htm it seems the video files are temporarily not accessible)

 

Here are the bloggers who I’ve invited:

Elderbob Brannan (a webhead and a coursemate at the openwebpublishing course and Coordinator, Open Weekends @ knowplace where I was lucky enough to attend some great open weekends) http://eldertown.wordpress.com/

Illya Arnet-Clark (a webhead and a coursemate at the openwebpublishing course) http://illyasoet.wordpress.com/

 

Berta Leiva (a webhead and a coursemate at the openwebpublishing course) http://bleiva2003.wordpress.com/

Jennifer Verschoor (a webhead and a coursemate at the openwebpublishing course)
http://jenverschoor.wordpress.com

Valentina Dodge (a webhead and a coursemate at the openwebpublishing course) http://vale24.wordpress.com/

 

 

 

 

Hello world!

So I’ve just made it! Finally, I’ve set up my wordpress blog site. I think this calls for a drink. So I go and fetch one. I’ll get back soon.