First Week in Brussels

Looking down the street outside my residence

On January 28th I arrived in Brussels, Belgium to complete an internship with the US State Department's Mission to the European Union (USEU). While in Brussels I am renting a room from a couple living in the Woluwe-Saint-Lambert municipality of Brussels. They have a dog, Happy, and a daughter and several months-old grandson who live just outside Brussels in the village of Tervuren, who I visited with the grandparents the Saturday after I arrived. Outside of briefly leaving Brussels, I spent much of my first weekend here exploring the city. Which, of course, mainly meant me wandering around getting a feel for the city. I did, however, accomplish some useful tasks, such as scoping out where my internship is located and purchasing a new SIM card and a metro card (which amusingly has the word 'Illinois" over my head in the photo section since the employee scanned my driver's license for a photo). I also stopped by the European Quarter, where several of the main institutions of the European Union are located. The metro stop was right beside the European Commission, and across the street from the European Council.

The European Commission

January 31st was my first day on the job. To my surprise, the department of the US Mission to the EU that I am working in is the US-European Media Hub. The Media Hub's mission statement is to “promote transatlantic relations by connecting U.S. policy makers and experts with European radio and television broadcasters. The Hub also provides information on U.S. policy and positions in video format to media outlets and the European public.” Thus the Media Hub contains a video studio, and the other interns working there are tasked with interviewing visitors and promoting the work of the US Mission. While formally a part of the US Mission to the EU, the Media Hub also works with the two other American embassies located in Brussels – the bilateral American Embassy to Belgium, and the US Mission to NATO.

The European Council

As a political science student concentrating in international relations, my role at the Media Hub is a bit different. My primary responsibility as the Media Analysis Intern is to assist Foreign Service Officers in drafting the 'EUR Early Alert', a daily analysis of the European press read by senior policy-makers in Washington and at posts in Europe. Each day, the Media Hub receives a large quantity of information from US embassies in Russia, Turkey, and 8 EU member-states about the media environment in those countries, on the commentary coming out of the European press on the major happenings of the day, and on public views and perceptions in those countries of American policies. Our task at the Media Hub is to sift through all this information and create a one or occasionally two page report that succinctly analyzes and summarizes what the Europeans are saying about the issues of the day for senior officials in Washington and elsewhere – and to have everything finished early enough that the report is received by officials in Washington by the start of their day. Normally the Early Alerts focus on three or four topics that are being talked about across the European press, but with everything going on in the Middle East and North Africa we have had a narrower focus. For instance, during my first week on the job we looked at reactions in Europe to what is going on in Egypt and elsewhere in the region, with special attention to perceptions and evaluations of US policy.

I contributed a little to the Early Alert on Tuesday, and on Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday I was listed as a co-drafter on the reports. Monday I did not make a contribution, as upon arrival I did not even have access to the internal State Department network. Nor did I have a security badge. So my first day interning at the State Department primarily consisted of being led around by the administrative assistant to complete all the necessary registrations and paperwork to be able to work autonomously. The bit of productive work I accomplished on my first day was to help the director of the Media Hub research and plan what she should cover at the Munich Security Conference, which she would be attending on Thursday. I also had the chance to sit in on Media Hub interviews of three Afghans – among them a head of an Afghan human rights organization and a member of the Afghan Parliament.

The European Parliament

Tuesday began with orientation and security briefings, which eventually led to me receiving a security badge. I also took advantage of one perk of working for the government – being able to exchange in the embassy my American Express Traveler's Checks at the actual Dollar-Euro exchange rate, rather than the highly inflated rates I had seen elsewhere in Brussels. With the security badge in hand I was able to enter the bilateral embassy to pick up lunch at the cafeteria on my own – I was pleasantly surprised that the paninis served there are quite good (and include some unexpected combinations like cheese, ham, and pineapple). I arrived back at the Media Hub (which is down the street from most of the other embassy buildings) in time to contribute to Tuesday's Early Alert. After work I met up with some of the other USEU interns for a movie night – the film we watched was rather appropriately the political Frost/Nixon from 2008.

Wednesday was the first day I was available to help work on the EUR Early Alert from start to finish. The first step in the process is sending out a tasker email to the 10 embassies with a list of topics we want information on from the national media. To create the tasker we at the Media Hub skim the International Herald Tribune (the global version of the New York Times) and several European newspapers to get a sense of what reporters and commentators are focusing on that day. After sending out that guidance I spent the time waiting for feedback from the embassies by reading up on how the situation in Egypt and the broader region has evolved and what commentators in the English-language publications I can read are saying about, among other things, the US response to the protests in Egypt, whether Western leaders should negotiate with or fear the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, and what the likelihood is of the protests in Egypt causing a domino effect across the region that topples similar authoritarian regimes. Probably the most strongly debated topic is whether we are seeing the beginning of the Arab version of the revolutions of 1989 (when the Eastern European communist regimes fell, to be replaced by stable democracies that are mostly members of the EU and NATO today) or whether we are going to see a repeat of the 1979 Iranian revolution (when a brutal secular dictatorship that was aligned with the United States was toppled by a broad range of protestors, only to be replaced by an equally or even more brutal and strongly anti-American theocracy).

Outside the European Parliament

After we completed Wednesday's Early Alert, I attended a conference I had been invited to the previous day. It was a briefing by Matthew Cassetta, the Program and Exchange Officer for the USEU Public Affairs department, and Apar Sidhu, the head of the USEU Political-Military section, for a class of Swedish students from a school that has sent students to the embassy previously. The former explained the relationship between the three US embassies in Brussels, and pointed out the US Mission to the EU’s unique distinction of being the only American embassy to an organization that the US is not a member of, and the latter talked about the American view on issues concerning the European Union's Common Foreign and Security policy and how the USEU works with and towards the EU. The person who had invited initially talked about me possibly giving a speech on what an internship is like at the USEU, but since it was only my third day we decided against that.

Thursday and Friday were less eventful, and mainly consisted of me working on the EUR Early Alerts. On Thursday, we primarily focused on Egypt, dividing our coverage into four sections:

• Reaction in the European press to what Spain's El Pais termed Mubarak's “brutal counterattack” against demonstrators.
• The implications of the situation in Egypt for the United States (Belgium’s Le Soir headlining “Developments in Egypt are a nightmare for U.S. Administration”).
• Speculation as to what will happen in Egypt after Mubarak leaves (the Italian Il Tempo warned “After Mubarak the risk is either chaos or sharia,” while the German Tagesthemen argued “The argument that Mubarak must stay because there is nobody there for the transition is nonsense expressed by political cowards”).
• And the general consensus across all of that European media we monitor that, as Spain's Cadena SER headlined, “Everything hinges on the Egyptian Army.” 

I also wrote a smaller section on Yemen, focusing on the fact that the president “sacrificed the idea of staying in office for life in exchange for not being kicked out immediately” (France's Les Echos), amidst more general speculation of a “domino effect” of protests and potentially revolutions in the Middle East/North Africa.

Friday also focused on Egypt and Yemen, but this time around was a special two-page edition of the Early Alert. I'm told the Media Hub rarely sends more than a page, but given everything happening in Egypt we wanted to leave officials in Washington with extra information to absorb over the weekend. Commentators in Europe for the first time on Friday described the situation in Egypt as “civil war,” with Spain's El Mundo headlining “[Vice President] Suleiman threatens protesters with an 'Iron Fist' to ‘avoid paralysis’.” Some in the European press were positive on American efforts in the crisis while other opinions were more mixed. Like Thursday, there was also a focus on the position of hte Egyptian military, and the question remains: whose side will the military take? We also briefly outlined attention in the European press to protests across the Arab world, such as those in Algeria, Morocco, Yemen, and Syria.

So far I've had a great time in Brussels. While not exactly what I was expecting I've found my internship at the State Department quite interesting and something I genuinely want to go to everyday (which is quite fortunate since it is an unpaid internship), the family I am staying with is welcoming and nice, and Brussels itself reminds me a lot of Vienna...minus the lack of snow.

Iberia with Jean

In the Spring of 2010 I had an unanticipated opportunity to take a second trip to Europe during spring break to visit my sister, Jean, who was studying abroad in Granada, Spain. Initially we looked at traveling all over Europe in an attempt to visit cities in Scandinavia, Poland, etc., but ultimately we decided upon a tour of the Iberian Peninsula. Below was the schedule we booked in advance:

March 20th - Flying out of Midway at 12:20pm
March 21st - Arriving in Madrid at 9:20am, take a bus at to Granada
March 23rd - Granada to Barcelona, leaving 17:40 arriving 19:10
March 25th - Barcelona to Porto, leaving 16:45 arriving 17:35
March 28th - Porto to Madrid, leaving 6:30 arriving 8:40
March 29th - Flying out of Madrid to Chicago at 11:30am; Arriving at O'Hare at 6:05pm

In retrospect, it is somewhat surprising that between all the hostels and flights our trip went as smoothly as it did. Ironically, the only problem I encountered happened to be the very first flight. To save money I had booked a flight from Chicago to Madrid that involved two layovers – in Philadelphia and Amsterdam. I soon came to realize the risks of such an itinerary after bad whether in Chicago delayed my flight out of Midway. While the replacement flight Delta offered me would fly directly to Amsterdam from Chicago, the caveat was that I would have to take a later flight to Madrid, thereby missing the bus I planned to take to Granada. But that was the least bad option, so I left Midway to be taxied over to O'Hare for the substitute flight, and once there I ordered a $100 ticket from Ryanair to fly from Madrid to Granada.

That annoyance aside, I eventually made it to Granada – a few hours later than expected, but otherwise without issue. I met up with Jean and we took a late night bus downtown to check into our hostel. After that, we headed to Jean's host mom's apartment to pick up some extra supplies, and stopped at a kebab store before calling it a night.

The next morning we woke up early to visit La Alhambra – a palace and fortress constructed by the Moorish rulers of the Islamic Emirate of Granada, Al-Andalus, and later used as a palace by Holy Rome Emperor Charles V after the Reconquista. La Alhambra was full of gardens, fountains, and very unique architecture, and offered a great view of the city. Later we went to a sandwich shop, where it became obvious that, just as Jean had said a few months prior, ham really is a staple of Spanish cuisine. From there Jean and I split up, as she still had to go to classes a few days that week. I spent the time wandering around Granada, passing a river, shops, churches, neighborhoods, and so on. After finishing her last class by 8pm I left with Jean to see where she plays waterpolo in Granada. Watching her team practice for 2+ hours wasn't the funnest activity, but in the process I did get to meet several of her  Spanish best friends.

Tuesday morning I slept in while Jean attended her class that started at 8:30am. When we met up I had a chance to meet Jean's host mom face to face while Jean packed for our evening flight to Barcelona. The airport we flew into was not the most convenient – the bus ride to the actual city took about an hour – but I suppose that is the price we had to pay for our 8 Euro Ryanair tickets. Riding the Barcelona metro brought back a lot of memories of the Vienna U-Bahn, and in fact of all the cities I visited on this trip Barcelona by far seemed the most similar to Vienna. The owner of our hostel was a woman about our age from Guatemala who was very helpful in informing us about what to see and how to get around Barcelona. After dropping off our luggage Jean and I went out to find dinner – we had paella and some sort of sweet Spanish wine.

Wednesday was another early day, but this time that wasn't solely for tourist-purposes. Instead, it was to drop off my laundry. The reason for that excursion was because I left Chicago only with what could fit in my backpack, which of course didn't entail many sets of clothes. I figured that it would be easier and cheaper to just find a laundromat at some point during the week than it would to pay the extra baggage fee on all the Ryanair flights. After that, we had breakfast, which for me was ravioli.

Finally we were ready to explore Barcelona. We first visited the piers, and got a cloudy view of the Mediterranean. Later we headed up Rambla street; a major shopping area. What was really weird to me was that several of the stands on La Rambla were full of caged animals – I wonder how many people actually head out there to buy birds or rabbits? We made our way up to the central plaza to find it covered with definitely-uncaged pigeons, and then we headed back down the other side of La Rambla to check out a giant food market that was full of fish, meat, and fruit stands. But we just picked up fruit smoothies to drink while walking back towards the hostel to pick up my clothes.

Park Güell, a large garden complex full of unique architecture, was our next stop. The park itself was quite bizarre in that, once we entered, it looked as though we had left the city entirely and entered a tropical vista. Afterwards we hiked over to the Olympic stadium – Barcelona hosted the 1992 Olympics – and, of course, made sure Jean got to see the Olympic pool. Our next stop was Sagrada Família, the famous unfinished basilica whose construction began in 1882, and which was designed by Antoni Gaudí, who also designed Park Güell. By that point Jean and I were tired from a day of walking, so we stopped for dinner and then headed back to our hostel.

On Thursday Jean and I visited a few more things in Barcelona before collecting our stuff to fly out to Porto, the second largest city of Portugal. Spain and Portugal are on different time zones, so the length listed above for the flight form Barcelona makes the trip seem much shorter than it actually was. Nevertheless, flying across the Iberian peninsula does not take an excess amount of time, and we were able to arrive with enough time to get dinner and explore Porto a little before returning to our hostel. It stood out from the other hostels we stayed at – described as a 'Cinema Hostel' by the owners, each room in the hostel was full of posters from a particular movie. Jean and I had the Bladerunner room, which sadly neither of us have seen.

Anyways on Friday we spend the early morning walking down to the Douro river, which runs through Porto, and took plenty of photos from one of the bridges running across it. Then, on the advice of the hostel owner, we took an unanticipated trip via train to Guimarães, a historical city further inland where the Portuguese nation is said to have been born. Among other things, we visited Guimarães Castle, whose walls we were able to climb and, courtesy of the shopkeeper in the middle of the castle who decided not to charge us on account of the poor weather, we got some great photos from the top of the castle. We also visited the Dukes of Braganza Palace, which was not climbable but was full of plenty exhibits (and a no camera rule that Jean flagrantly disregarded).

Eventually we returned to Porto, and headed out to another city, Vila Nova de Gaia, for dinner. That's less extreme than it sounds, as Vila Nova de Gaia is merely on the other side of the Douro River. At dinner I ordered the octopus, which seemed like a sensible choice given our proximity to the Atlantic, but Jean was more than a little disgusted when I was served a leg complete with suckers. She was even less amused when I offered her a piece to try. Oh well, at least I liked it.

The weather was much better in Northern Portugal on Saturday, but before heading out to the Porto beach we searched for and eventually found for sale a new memory card for Jean's camera. Eventually we took the metro to the Porto beachfront in a nicer area of the city, got some ice cream, and then headed back on the metro to leave Porto yet again. Earlier the hostel owner had mentioned that there are two fishing villages reachable from Porto on the city's metro. We decided to travel to the further-away village, Póvoa de Varzim. We were expecting some far off the beaten track but in fact Póvoa de Varzim looked more like a tourist resort area – there were plenty of condo and hotel-style buildings running alongside a wide open beach. Once at the beachfront we headed near the water – too near in my case, as a large wave soaked about half of my pants. I didn't see the humor in it but Jean found the whole thing very amusing.... In any case, we were both getting hungry and hadn't had a real lunch so we stopped by a pizza restaurant, and later walked out to a lighthouse-style tower before heading back on the metro to our hostel. At that point we were faced with a dilemma – our flight the next morning left at 6:30am, so we could either sleep a few hours at the hostel and head to the airport extremely early, or we could go straight to the airport and try to sleep a few hours there. Since we weren't sure how easily it would be to get to the airport at 3am, we decided on the latter option.

By 8:40am the two of us had arrived very tired at the Madrid airport. Since our hostel rooms weren't ready at that point, we dropped off our stuff and began to explore the city. We first went to the main plaza, were many people had already set up shop selling all sorts of antiques, especially old coins. Next, we went to the Royal Palace of Madrid, or Palacio Real, which is the largest palace in Europe. Once we left after the lengthy tour, we noticed a loud chorus coming from the cathedral opposite the palace. As Jean and I walked closer we saw that a procession was coming for Palm Sunday. I was content to watch, but Jean decided to join in, and thus we entered the cathedral nearly at the front of the procession. I didn't understand much of the mass, but Jean told me later that they went through the whole passion of the Christ story.

After mass we met up with two Spanish girls living in Madrid who Jean had met a month earlier when she was in London. Since they and Jean mostly spoke in Spanish I couldn't contribute much, which was unfortunate since they seemed nice (they both knew some English but weren't confident in speaking it). They showed Jean and I around much of downtown Madrid, including Parque de Retiro. After day, we retired for my last night in Spain. The next morning Jean accompanied me to the airport, and soon I was on my way back to Illinois for the Cline Symposium in Champaign. Overall I really enjoyed being in Europe for a second time; especially this time around for the opportunity to travel with my sister.



You can find all my photos from Spain and Portugal here: (http://www.flickr.com/photos/32227991@N02/collections/72157623711453569/).