Art time

My absolute number one favourite museum is the Joán Miro museum in Parc de Montjuïc, Barcelona. Foremost I admire the architecture of the building which has been built on one of the most beautiful areas of the city. I have visited the museum three times now, and it always makes me calm and brings me in an ecstastic mood. The grand white spaces breathe an athmosphere of purity and calmness. Opposite of many other museums where I always want to hurry myself through exhibitions, the Miro museum makes me want to be there for many hours.

Currently there are two special exhibitions which are both fascinating. A broad variety of Sean Scully's work is shown. Scully is an Irish artist who works with oil paintings, pastels, watercolours, prints and photographs, all abstract work with a fascinating combination of colours and lines.

The other fascinating project was the rather more moder work of Qubo Gas. Colourful landscapes which are created through a group process of three French artists. Visit their website!

Holiday heroes therarpy

This morning I woke up in the quietness of an idyllic fisherman village looking out over the Adriatic sea. I finished the biography of Nelson Mandela, after reading Gandhi during my previous holidays yet another humble servant of women and men to a nation that went through so much sacrifice for achieving only equality. It was here where my holiday also came to an end. Would I have known before that the works of these men have a revatilising power then earlier holidays would have looked differently.

Having spent two wonderful weeks with wonderful friends both in Barcelona (Sant Feliu de Llobregat to be more precisely) and Ljubljana I now have returned to Amsterdam to resume my duties with new energy.

A few hectic weeks behind me. I attended the massive Euro pride in Madrid, together with almost 2 million other people. The Cologne pride also was very impressive, not only for its political message, but moreover for the merge of local citizens with the LGBT community whom were partying together. This afternoon I got a glimpse of the EuroGames, parallel to this big LGBT sport event Wel Jong Niet Hetero organised a very good youth conference. Powerful events - and they are organised in solidarity with prides as those held in Istanbul and Budapest (where numerous people severely have been beaten up).

In between much work at the office. Colleagues abroad, sick or on holidays, whilst we're already undermanned. A team-building session - which of course are never meant to be peaceful and silent.

And then stories out the lives of many dear friends, which make the every day office hectics so irrelevant. Just those few things in life we would like to control mostly - we cannot control.

Tonight I am finishing some last work before my break to Barcelona and Slovenia.

A letter of a friend

"The pride week which was organised by Lambda Istanbul came to the end with a magnificant final. Istiklal street was painted colours of rainbow flag. it was the biggest march in Turkey with the most participation we have ever seen. Some people watched as with bewildered eyes, some didn't want to be contended with watching but also applauded and some joined our slogans as well. t was a honour to be in Istiklal street, holding the big rainbow flag and to be able to scream that we shouldn't be silent. t was a day which already took the part in the LGBT history in Turkey. I've been in Gay Pride Marches in european countries several times, it made me feel free to be there but something was missing for me. But Istanbul... Istiklal Street... it had something more sense to be there and also was emotional as much as meaningful. In our country, with our language, we were telling our people that we are here and we won't be silent anymore. At the beginning, while we were preparing for the march there were some people from us watching us from far but then I realized that they joined the march in few minutes. Was it possible not to impress the scene? was it possible be indifferent to this athmosphere? and not to wish to be a part of this magnificent event! Our feelings met in a common point and we became a unique heart in Istiklal Street. I really felt what the Pride's meaning! We were just 1.000 people there, I know it's nothing comparing with the march in European countries, but I felt that we, all gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people in Turkey were there. We all felt so strong ourselves while we were screaming as "don't be silent, scream, we are here"

Ismail

Lost in administration and the big human rights quiz

A hectic day. It started at the office where I together with the administrator worked on finances. I learned two lessons in the past years about bookkeeping. 1: always make the administrator your best friend, becuase you can't do without them. 2: every administrator has a completely own way of working and want to administer everything in a completely different way.
The Netherlands doesn't have a lunch-culture, mostly we eat a sandwich behind our desk. But I went for a quick lunch with Juul (great bagels!) and we talked about her experiences with the OSCE - an organisation that still is rather exclusive to certain discrimination grounds. Interesting input and I will discuss this further tomorrow with another civil society representative.

In the afternoon I visited the farewell reception of the Dutch Human Rights embassador. For his farewell the quiz 1 against 100 was organised, I didn't bring it far as I didn't know whether 4 or 10 country rapporteurs had been appointed in the UN council since June 19th.... (10 is the right answer!). An interesting ocassion to learn more about the UN work on Human Rights and the importance of Special Procedures, and of course about the work of our embassador.

A European Treaty and the Teletubbies

During the negotations last weekend on the EU-treaty some countries managed to drop issues out of their own EU shopping trolley. The Fundamental Right Charter, which for cosmetic reason was already thrown out of the Treaty and only referred to, became subject to undressing by member states. Despite Tony Blair was probably already busy with the preparations of his visit to the Pope right after the gathering, he still managed to position UK laws on Union rights being binding before EU legislation in this field, in the UK.

Poland then realised that exceptions can also be created for areas that are important for them. They proposed something that informally was called the Teletubby-proposal; it wanted binding legislation saying that the Fundamental Rights Charter could not affect the right of member states to legislate in the sphere of public morality and family law, as well as the protection of human dignity and respect for human physical and moral integrity. For some strange reason other member states cynically rejected this idea, hence it became a unilateral declaration, which happily will have little legal power.

Happy Sunday

Boris van der Ham (Member of the Democrat Party of the Dutch Parliament -D66) was honoured 'EuroNetherlander' of the year last Sunday, I was honoured young Dutch European citizen of the year. The elections were a nice initiative to promote Europe in a positive way. Besides that I'm of course happy that this election is a recognition of the need for LGBT youth issues to be on the centre of the European agenda - and for this sake I will also use the title.

I am very grateful to Rogier Elshout - the EU representative of the Dutch Youth council, who not only nominated me, but also lobbied for me, despite he was nominated himself. His work bring Europe to the core of the lives of Young Dutch Citizens should also be honoured!
Photo: www.pitchit.nl

EUrophobia or EUrogloria

EU leaders are currently still strugling in Brussels to find the way forward for the European Union. Some say: we shouldn't have a flag or an anthem; the Fundamental Rights charter shouldn't be legally binding; we shouldn't have a new (democratic) voting system; we shouldn't have one Foreign Minister.

The Netherlands doesn't want that the document will be called 'constitution', there shouldn't be a flag or anthem and there shouldn't be a reference to the primacy of EU law. This makes our demands purely cosmetic. Just because political leaders haven't been able to convey the need of a strong EU a few years ago, they now bring a deceptive message to their own constituency.

I believe that a strong EU is needed not only to safeguard economic growth, moreover to guarantee a healthy, wealthy and prosperous society with a equal place for each citizen and with respect to the world that we live in. It is needed to work on such endeauvours together, not in the last place because single member states' capacity to have a healthy and competitive place in the world economy lack any potential for success. We need to build together, and building together requires a clear common understanding of values. Albeit social, cultural or economic values, albeit human rights values or foreign policy values. A legal framework in which such values can be established is therefore essential. Creating common values is not established at EU-top, it is a journey that shall continue as long as our Union will exist.

Today I was elected Young Dutch European Citizen of the Year, and I'm very proud of that. Working with young people in Europe inspires me because young people have such tremendous energy in trying to understand each other, in building on the common project of the European Union.

Hate crime

I Amsterdam?

Tonight I learned that Amsterdam is the biggest internet hub in the world, holds the 9th place on the list of cities with biggest airports in the world, is the fastest growing city where cruise-ships board new passengers, but has the lowest possible ambition when it comes to developing itself into a metropole. That's at least what the deputy-director of the city council's town planning office thinks. And now he is trying to move politicans in more visionary metropole development policies.

It is true that the current development plans do not meet the needs for fast-growing economy, nor that there's a good enough vision in general in the Netherlands to challenge the fast growing economies in the world that soon will become competitors for our service-based, mainport-based and distribution oriented country. Such vision also lacks at the European level. We want to be the most knowledgeable and competetive economy in the world, at least that's what they say. I also want it, but I miss sufficient tools to realise this.

Our Dutch Cabinet is foremost concerned with the lack of support to EU, and instead of promoting it it tries to negotiate a weaker EU, with less competence to be competetive, and with less competence to promote human rights. When our little country would look into the mirror it would soon see that this country is too little to carry responsibilities that we are nowadays facing all alone. But mirrors can be frightening.

Back to Amsterdam. It is so nice to see politics at a local level every now and then, maybe becuase things get concrete much easier. It concerns the environment which you see every day. I hope that the city council is a bit more visionary and tries to take up some leadership. The plans I heard tonight are good for the city's development as well for the environment in general (though I didn't like the idea of having an enourmous amount of ferries bringing people accross the city - all development needs to be sustainable!).

No time to waste

Sometimes I feel like being a weak compromise between being ultimate lazy, and being super-active. After I came back from Central-Asia I planned my agenda full enough not to be able to recover from a small jetlag (which I thought I wouldn't have). Consequense was that I have been a bit grumpy during the last week whilst being in Brussel and London. This morning I slept until PM - and now I feel ready to face the business this week again.

My business is caused by a feeling of 'no time to waste', the feeling that I need to get everything possible out of life, not tomorrow but now. At the same time I'm actually a very lazy person. Anyhow, consequence is that time flies. Via facebook I met an old friend from Australia, she send this picture which was made seven years ago in London (Kees, Julie and Danielle are on it). I just love facebook!

Thunder!

Yesterday I arrived in Bishkek after a three hour drive from Almaty. It was a beautiful ride through mountains and fields. The air here is a little bit less filthy, hence I can breathe fresh air again and the terrible cold that has pestered me is now slowly dissapearing. The visit to Kazakhstan was very inspiring - met many nice and couregeous people taking good initatives.

Today we had a free day and I went for lunch with a colleague from a Dutch development cooperation whom I very coincidentally bumped into at the reception of my previous hotel...it's a small world after all. After sun-bathing this morning next to the swimming-pool, suddenly clouds surrended us and it started to rain and thunder. We sat down to have a lunch outside under a covered terrace when the lightning struck right beside us in a metal pole... this made a lot of noise and made us jump from our seats...

Kazakhstan

I am on my way to Almaty, on my way to a country of which existence I almost was not aware until a few years ago. A country in which the electorate yesterday decided that its president will be president for life – a country in which the its president faces almost no resistance. A country in which horse-head can be tabled, a country which still practices death-penalty and a country with the biggest amount of nuclear waste in the world. But Kazakhstan also has the fastest growing economy in the region (9-10% per year), ecologic-programs, and is aiming to chair the OSCE from 2009 onwards.
I am happy that I didn't see Borat yet, just not to have a completely subjective view on the country. And I’m looking forward to learn about the country!

The discourse of energy supplies and human rights

Being Dutch and probably exemplary for what poldering is myself I am a great believer of silent advocacy. However – there is one thing that is greatly frustrating about silent advocacy: that it’s silent. West-European’s dependency on energy suppliers such as for instance Russia or resources in the Middle East are in many cases creating an obvious vacuum to social and human rights which we strive for. It is clear that countries want to become less depending from such suppliers, but which steps are they actually taking in this regard?

Next week I will be visiting Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan. The first country is increasingly an independent energy supplier, which for obvious geographical reasons is still depending on Russia for distribution. Kazakhstan is aiming at chairing the OSCE (Organization for Security Cooperation Europe) from 2009 onwards. Several EU member states are supportive to this, merely for economical reasons. Others are not, obviously for more social reasons. Netherlands is supportive, and is currently the second biggest investor in the country, having setup a variety of trade-missions. Through a long-term empowerment program we have in addition been enabled to build-up LGBT organizations to fight against the rising hiv/aids epidemic and strive for better social rights.

Now I do believe that economical opportunities seize chances to combine profitable economic projects with demands for better social rights. Let’s call it social-economic synergy. But it is frustrating how invisible such processes are – as they make it difficult to call for additional measures, or even set certain conditions. Of course, human rights can never only be the change that a country gives for economic profits – as I believe that a true implementation of social rights and human rights needs a sincere believe and understanding of their applicable discourses. But incentives do open doors, raise awareness and demonstrate respect to the principles and values of social and human rights that we ought to consider minimal to each person in this world.

As an ideologist I do believe that maybe next to the daily stock rates we should measure our wellbeing with daily ‘happiness’ indexes. As a pragmatist I do also believe that different sets of indicators will increase the willingness to start working on political change that is socially need based instead of power policy driven. Another interesting barometer would of course be understandable and challenging emission indexes – but that's another story.

Future

This weekend we are visiting Skeiv Ungdom, an IGLYO member organisation in Norway. At the board meeting that we organise here we are discussing how the future of IGLYO can be developed, a process we have recently started. For the first time members will have a major role in the development of a strategic plan, which will be organised through a membership consultation process. For me it feels strange but also good. On one side I know that I will not be involved in this future as I shall be leaving IGLYO the end of this year, on the other hand I have the full confidence that IGLYO shall further develop in the coming years.

Oslo is a beautiful city I can judge from the little we saw of it. After two days of hard working, and a crazy week in Istanbul and Amsterdam, we're now preparing for a dinner in the city and discovering Oslo a little bit at night.