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| Visite du Parlement Européen avec exposé de Mr. Thomas. Voir diaporama. |
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| Reception chez Mme Haleh Bridi avec exposé de Mr. Petit. Voir diaporama |
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| Visite du Musée de Tervuren et exposé de Melle Leduc. Voir diaporama |
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Dîner de gala chez Mr. le Baron et la Baronne Bernard Snoy. |
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| Visite du port et de la ville d'Anvers. Voir diaporama |
1818 Society French Chapter
Travel to Belgium – October 20-22, 2006
The Fall meeting of the French Chapter traditionally takes place outside of Paris. This year, the Chapter decided to travel to Belgium. Our trip there extended over three days, from Friday October 20 till Sunday evening October 22. It was a great visit which enabled a number of visitors from all parts of France to meet with old friends living in Belgium. A series of events had been planned and not all participants attended all of these. But attendance fluctuated between 45 and 60 people according to the specific event. The general feeling seems to be that the overall visit was very successful. Activities covered a fairly wide variety of themes.
On Friday, we paid a visit to the European Parliament where our host, Jean-Claude Thomas, a senior member of the Parliament staff, gave us a very complete, straightforward view of what the Parliament is today, where it comes from, and what are the main issues and challenges which it faces. We then went to the home of Haleh Bridi, the Bank’s Special Representative to the European Commission who kindly offered her lovely private house for us to meet with Mr Bernard Petit, Deputy Director General of the General Directorate for Development at the European Commission. Mr. Petit gave us a fascinating talk on the evolution of the European Commission strategy for Development Aid, including the recently issued European Consensus agreed upon by the European Council of Ministers. These events were a great combination of information and appreciation, from the political side of the European Parliament to the more technocratic side presented by the European Commission. In both cases a very lively discussion took place with lots of questions and observations from our colleagues who showed keen interest in European affairs. The evening went on with a wonderful cocktail-dinner at Haleh Bridi’s. We can’t thank her enough for the warmth of her hospitality, demonstrating that active members of today’s Bank do care about retired members of yesterday’s Bank.
On Saturday morning, we all assembled to visit the Royal Museum of Central Africa in Tervuren, on the outskirts of Brussels. This is a spectacular museum, the present version of what used to be the Museum of the (Belgian) Congo, created by King Leopold at the end of the 19th century. It now combines displays of Central African art, with much diversified activities of research, study, archives etc. We were privileged to be given the introduction to what is indeed a full blown research institute, by its Director, Mr. Guido Gryseels. Mr. Gryseels is very familiar with the World Bank Group as he is an active member of the Technical Advisory Committee of the Consultative Group for International Agricultural Research (CGIAR). The visit was very interesting as we were assisted by two competent guides, and Mathilde Leduc, the daughter of our colleague François-Xavier Leduc, gave us some fascinating glimpses of her work at the Museum as she is in charge of the archives of Stanley (of “Dr. Livingstone, I presume” fame…). The visit ended on a great African note, since we had lunch in the museum cafeteria where we were served the typical and delicious “moambe” dish from Belgian Congo, all with its pili-pili hot sauce…A bit of nostalgia for so many of us who used to work in Africa and particularly in Congo/Zaire.
Back in downtown Brussels, there was some free time for all members to regroup, and in many cases to go and visit the beautiful and historical Grand Place of Brussels, and do a bit of shopping (chocolates are the heavy favorites). We then took the bus for our “diner de gala” at the Chateau de Bois-Seigneur-Isaac, the home of our friends and former colleague Bernard Snoy and his wife Christine. This was by all accounts the high point of our visit. The Chateau is located 30km away from Brussels, right in the middle of the gentle countryside with green meadows and cows, and it is truly magnificent both inside and outside. It was all illuminated when we arrived at night. Splendidly decorated, with superb furniture and art work, full of memorabilia from centuries of history of the Snoy family, beautiful tables and settings for the dinner, flowers all around, it was something worth seeing. There followed a great dinner with wonderful food and wine, and a fabulous atmosphere among guests. To top it all, we were entertained by our hosts’ son-in-law, Alex (married to daughter Eleonore who was also in attendance with their three adorable children). Alex is a remarkable singer and musician, besides being an accomplished and successful lawyer, and he gave us outstanding versions of famous songs by Belgian composer-singer-poet Jacques Brel, as well as some of his own compositions and some versions of other traditional Belgian “chansons à boire”. It was an extraordinary evening which everyone will remember for long, not least of which for the outstanding hospitality which we received from Christine and Bernard.
On Sunday, we embarked again on our bus for another unusual tour. We headed north towards Antwerp for a visit of its famous port. For this visit, we had the privilege of being accompanied by Honoré Paelinck, a native of the area around Antwerp, who studied there, became a Captain in the Belgian merchant fleet, then became a specialist of transport in general and ports in particular (he was Director General of the National Transport Office of Zaire for many years), worked as a consultant in many parts of the world, including for the Bank, and now lives in Antwerp and still teaches port economics at the university. We could not think of anyone more familiar with the port of Antwerp which he knows in and out. And our visit was enormously enjoyable, no small thanks to Honore’s intimate knowledge with the port and his lively stories full of anecdotes, told with a great sense of humor. Needless to say, the port itself is impressive, second only to Rotterdam in Europe only 60 miles away, with mountains of containers, huge cranes and equipment, miles of storage facilities, enormous chemical plants, and yet reasonably clean… The visit ended with a superb lunch in a small beautiful country inn at the border with the Netherlands. Then back to downtown Antwerp for a visit of the magnificent cathedral, a little walk in the streets of Antwerp, and finally a good Belgian beer at a café on the spectacular Grand Place.
Well, I guess this was a full program, at times some of the fellow travelers were falling asleep in the bus to catch up with their sleep and recover, but it looks like everybody enjoyed the tour (selected photographs of the trip are on the website of the French Chapter: <www.1818france.org>). Great atmosphere, a lot of conviviality, lots of reminiscences about a common and enjoyable past in the Bank, and still great interest and commitment for the current and future state of world affairs in general and development issues in particular.
OL. Nov 7, 2006