Surviving the European Union

So I suppose I should introduce myself as the late arriving member to this blog. I, like my colleagues, yes I said colleagues even though we are all still in school, am an intellectual, of sorts. This can usually be translated to nerd, science geek, etc., and I’m also quite mad, angry not insane, or so I am told.

Following suit with everyone else I’ll discuss the current events of my life, which consist of the last few weeks in Europe and what I expect from the next half. I’m aware that there is a time difference and if you find that you can’t keep up with my line of thought; please feel free to wait 5 hours for it all to sink in.

So far on my trip I have gone to a wedding in Ireland, spent a week in Amsterdam and Belgium, a few days in Luxembourg and I am now in Ireland. I went to Amsterdam not because I am into all the extracurricular activities that are available there and illegal in the States but because it is pretty much the Graceland for people my age. That coupled with my never having had a vacation before made my decision to go, while I was over here for school anyway, an easy one.

Anyway, each country has been better than the last one, until Luxembourg but I’ll discuss that later. Belgium is by far my favorite despite my having to go to class and visit several key European Union institutions such as the European Parliament, Commission and the Court of Justice. No these aren’t random boring destinations, for in fact I am a law student and that made them obvious but boring destinations while in Europe and politics has never been one of my favorite topics. I suppose that is why I picked a major devoid of it, engineering. I learned the basic structure of the EU and a few other interesting tidbits which may all prove a waste of my time because Ireland failed to ratify a new treaty, which required a unanimous passing in all the EU member states. The New York Times has already proclaimed that the failure of this treaty would cause further turmoil in the EU and I have yet to see a single uprising, anti-Irish march or anything along those lines.

The best part of my week in Belgium is that I got to go to the Stella Artois Brewery for a tour. If you have not heard of Stella Artois or don’t like it I hate you. Going back to the EU, while I was in Parliament, the building itself being a testament to man’s need to overcompensate architecturally, the one thing I wanted to know about was the one thing none of our tour guides could answer, the EU’s approach to intellectual property, IP is a collective term referring to patents, trademarks and copyrights. After some investigation I found that the EU apparently is still developing its IP law and it’s not going to develop any faster now that Ireland rejected the Lisbon treaty.

Now for the other parts of my trip. I recommend everyone go to an Irish wedding, it was awesome, I think it could have been one of the most fun times of my life had I known anyone there. Amsterdam, the boat tours are awesome, mine conveniently dropped me off in front of the Amsterdam Hard Rock Café, which even more conveniently was located next to a Casino. I do so love my blackjack. What’s more is that I could sit at the table and light up a Cuban cigar, which is completely legal in Amsterdam, though smoking will be banned from the casinos in a little over a month. I’m not sure if it is true of all casinos in Europe, certainly different from all the casinos in AC, but I feel that black jack favored the players more than the casino. In place of a shoe there is a machine that is constantly shuffling the cards, which will eliminate most of the basic methods of counting and there are only 6 decks instead of 8. The other major difference is that even though you are not seated at the table, you can still gamble. I feel like the best comparison is going to the track and betting on the horse or dog of your choosing. Before I got a seat at the table I stood and watched the players to see who knew what they were doing and who had the largest stack of chips in front of them and proceeded to put my chips down in the smaller circles behind his/her betting circle. Needless to say, I have made up what I lost in the dollar to euro exchange rate.

Lastly, Luxembourg, what a miserable existence those people must live. Everyone speaks French but the majority of the writing I have seen is in German, I think, at any rate it is definitely not French. Everyone here is very trendy with their clothing and get offended if you can’t speak French, more so if you try and you speak and fail. Basically it’s like Paris only they don’t have any of the tourist attractions so they can all just bite the fattest part of my American ass. Because no one on this trip is fluent in French I have had to learn a bit, which I swore I would never do and for making me violate that dictum I hate the French even more. I’M GLAD YOUR TEAM HAS BEEN ELIMINATED FROM THE TOURNAMENT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! The tournament I speak of is the European Championship and with the exception of Ireland voting last Thursday I think every European has been glued to the tv watching it. Oh and I almost forgot to thank Thierry Henry for deflecting the ball away from the goalie into the net and putting the last nail in his team's coffin. I have to say I am beginning to once again enjoy a game that I used to love to play, VIVA ITALIA.

Thank goodness I’m in Ireland now, where I understand the people… somewhat… more on that next time.