What is the official language of the European Union?

Jordi   Wednesday, June 23, 2004, 09:49 GMT
If you want a small town try Beziers. What I say is that calling Marseille, the second city in France, a small town would mean that all towns, except Paris of course, are small in France. Remember I told you I was born somewhere in France. Guess where? I visit the place quite often and what a beautiful port and cathedral!
Axel   Wednesday, June 23, 2004, 09:51 GMT
Are you born in Beziers Jordi?
Damian   Wednesday, June 23, 2004, 10:04 GMT
Bordeaux?
Damian   Wednesday, June 23, 2004, 10:05 GMT
Nantes?
Damian   Wednesday, June 23, 2004, 10:08 GMT
Rouen?
Damian   Wednesday, June 23, 2004, 10:09 GMT
Come on, Jordi...spill the beans! :-)
Jordi   Wednesday, June 23, 2004, 10:22 GMT
Marseille, of course but I know Toulouse very well and Paris and Lyon. Even Bourg-en-Bresse, Fontenay-le-Comte and other small hidden places throughout the French geography. Guess what? France has some of the most beautiful cities in the planet, starting with Paris. I can't understand the French. Or can I? They only can criticise France but don't you dare do it if you're not French! Well, pretty much the same could be said of anyone else. That's why I get so pissed off when people won't acknowledge how nationalist they really are. You're only considered nationalist if you remind the rest of the planet of some forgotten culture or nation that has all the elements but no passports.
Axel   Wednesday, June 23, 2004, 11:02 GMT
Oups! Hope you didn't take what I wrote about Marseille too badly!!
Are you living now in Barcelona? It is a very incredible city, don't you think? It is just like if we were in fantasy world with that amazing architecture from Gaudi!
Damian   Wednesday, June 23, 2004, 11:20 GMT
Is Marseille a very cosmopolitan city? Being a large port on the Med coast it must be very international. That is the impression I have got from reading guide books on France....and other countries. Reading those books is like actually travelling there. So the French don't take well to criticism? I suppose that is true everywhere...national pride and that. The English don't seem too bothered by it I have found...maybe they are used to it! (Tongue in cheek!) If you slag off the Scots though you may have a haggis slung at you. :-)
nic   Wednesday, June 23, 2004, 11:42 GMT
I admit you are right, that's true french like to criticize their own country but do not like when foreigners do it. There a "part de vérité". For my part i don't think France has the most beautifull cities. Italy is far away from all the country i have visited in my life.
Axel   Wednesday, June 23, 2004, 11:50 GMT
Yeah, there is probably a part of national pride. But what bother me is the generalisation of some critics. It is impossible to generlize without reducing the reality.
Well Marseille is a very cosmopolitan city, probably the most one in France as the main part of the population has foreign roots from the first or the second generation (mainly from Italy, Portugal and the Maghreb)... and that's what makes Marseille so particular! Unfortunately, it is a city which has a lot of economic difficulties compare to other French cities such as Lyon, Paris or Toulouse. Anyway, thanks to the tgv the things are getting better nowadays.
Jordi   Wednesday, June 23, 2004, 11:51 GMT
Marseille is indeed a beautiful cosmopolitan city, which has many lights and shadows to it like all cities that are really interesting. I love cities that have post-card images that aren't all blue and green. It is true that many Muslims have made it their home but what really bothers me is poverty because that always opens the doors to fundamentalism. By the way, snobbery doesn't help either.
Barcelona is one of the most beautiful cities in Europe. It indeed has a special caché to it that makes it different and amazing and I know that city very very well. In cities like Barcelona one can be anything he likes. One has to master a city to love it. Personally, I love cities with a port, with a big wide port because they have been opened to the world for such a long time. London and Paris are also port cities (river ports). But there's a lot to be said about ports on the Mediterranean. And I love cities where people are in the streets at 2 and in the wee hours of the morning; normal usual everyday people, even with children, because the weather is one of the commodities one can enjoy without paying a fee. Don't forget to sleep a two hour siesta! You can also walk for miles up and down the Seine, if you don't live in Paris of course, and where else would you find such an exciting open air museum? And if you go to Paris in spring, God! What an experience! I now most big European cities and I could carry on. Then again, one of the most beautiful cities in the world is Sydney, where I grew up and got the bloody beautiful accent I've got. The harbour is simply breathtaking and human beings haven't spoilt it. They've just added to it. We have such a beautiful planet because I'm sure Edimburgh must have quite a lot to it. I don't like the cold, Damian, but I don't mind it if people and their stones warm up my heart and my hearth.
Jordi   Wednesday, June 23, 2004, 11:52 GMT
know and not now.
Damian   Wednesday, June 23, 2004, 12:01 GMT
Thank you for all that, Jordi. The world has so many beautiful cities. It is a tragedy that so many were lost in awful wars. Yes, Edinburgh does have it's individual beauty and charm. And yes......Edinburgh is no place to be outside when the winter wind is in the east. I read though that one of the coldest cities to be in the winter is Minneapolis, in America. Or was it Montreal?
nic   Wednesday, June 23, 2004, 13:07 GMT
Montreal is very cold the winter, i experienced it but what about Moscow?
Barcelona has the reputation to be one of the most interesting and beautifull place in Europe.
I don't like cities only beautifull and...clean, like Geneves which is a beautifull town but its soul is like deleted because of it
Edinburgh is beautifull and ....magic
Imagine how were Warsaw and Berlin before war.