dinsdag 6 februari 2018

1st visit to the European Parliament in Strasbourg

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It is my first time here in Strasbourg, but i already feel at home.                        edit blog
See the pictures/ video fragments on Google photo's

Sleeping in a hotel, at about 5 km from the location of the European Parliament.
The first day i walked this distance in the morning and late back in the evening.
The 10 km did me good, because i was feeling tired from a long day at an imense location with so many people and so much opportunaties.

The European Union is big, work is always in progress, the Commission and the Parliament are 2 different things and there are a lot of cases going on.
So many representatives from so many countries, and as a beginning journalist it is like swimming in a big ocean without knowing where the coast is.
But it also feels like a day at the beach on an island,.. because everything is clean here and well arranged. There is a big facilitation for the press and the press room is so good that the first day is like a dream. Laptops where you can print your declaration forms, internet, the online streams, access to internet but only the right pages from the EU, EP and EC with live video content.

Then there is the desk, with information, the daily wifi login code on a small paper and so many printouts to read in all the European languages.
Isn't this a waste of paper and can't this be 100% digitalized?


It is a must to provide information to the people and there are always ways to make it better, as a journalist i am willing and able to work on this for the next 4 days.
Hoping that my notes, recordings and publications can help future journalists.

One Dutch Journalist (Edwin de Mol) was also invited by the Information Desk of The Hague, He is a writer and blogs, see his social media page on facebook. 

The first day flies and in the evening i get a chance to interview 3 people in Dutch for the soundcloud channel from EUIA PRESS, the platform i try to innitiate for beginning journalists and for all journalists to get together, find stories and work together on research and covering stories.

How can it be that in a big organisation like this nothing goes wrong?
Probably there are many things going right, and a lot of things can be better, but it seems like a perfect day. Only one thing is making it difficult for me,..
that's my energy, because i already was a bit sick, had an aching throath and was very tired from a flue and some sleepless nights.
My first night in the hotel wasn't a problem, but the second unfortunately sleepless and restless from some bad food.
The vegan bread from the cafe at the Parliament was great, for only 2,70 Euro you get a big bread with salad on it and avocado. The coffee for only 1 Euro is a bit to much for me, so i try to drink a lot of water, but there aren't many facilitations for free water in the Parliament so i had to buy a bottle.
Fortunately Strasbourg has a lot of shops and supermarkets, but the first day is a disaster, because after 21:00 all shops are closed and i walk out the parliament on 21:00 and had to walk for about 45 minutes to get to the centre.

My hotel is near the Musea des Art, a perfect place near the center with a tram stop in front of my hotel, (Appart' City)


Some questions rise after the first day, ...
Why did my hotel ask for Tourist Tax again, after i payed it already, is there some corruption in this industry
Why don't they use scanners in the European Parliament, so i can get my files in one online cloud and drive map and sent this for the declarations to the right person, so i don't have to run around the whole building from office to office.

My traveling expenses where payed by the European Parliament,
a journalist could get a rembourse of 2 days, while visiting 2 days of Plenair Meetings.
2x 180 Euro - 360 Euro and 171 Euro for my flight ticket is 531 Euro.


CHAMBER VIDEO - PRESS CONFERENCE VIDEO PLENARY DOCUMENTS - PLENARY BRIEFING
MEPS                       - PRESS SERVICES                     - PRESS CONTACTS            - COMMITTEE MEETINGS


visit EUIA PRESS NEWS blog for the NOTES on today's  plenary sessions

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