Culture
Today our series on equality in Europe takes us to Brussels to find out more about the battle over maternity and paternity leave in the EU’s corridors of power. While some MEPs are battling for more parental leave, critics are claiming the costs are just too high.
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No longer do bikers, criminals and sailors dominate the tattoo world. Nowadays even some mothers can be seen sporting ink. And with the changing clientele has come a new generation of tattoo parlours and artists. Berlin’s all female Tatou Obscur is one prime example of the evolving scene.
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This is the year we mark the 200th anniversary of a musical genius. This is the year concerts and events will be held around the globe to mark a great legacy. This is the year we commemorate an artist who is still copied, listened to and celebrated to this day. This is the year of Chopin.
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The Dutch decide to pull their troops out of Afghanistan, leaving the future of its Uruzgan Province in doubt. Also in doubt is internet freedom, as three Google executives in Italy are held responsible for a controversial video upload. Meanwhile in France, halal food is causing a stir.
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A stereotype many countries share of the Italians is that they are extremely stylish. But the flipside is that Italy's northern neighbours, who head south in their droves to sample la dolce vita, have become a laughing stock for their fashion faux pas.
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Most parents would be surprised to hear that some mothers and fathers may soon be encouraging their children to cut up their jeans and paint on them. That shock will subside however, after they view the latest work of František Matoušek – the artist creating masterpieces on his old levis.
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Krakow's avant-garde, experimental theatre company Teatr Nowy is having to close its doors but is turning its demise into an event, inviting fans and friends for a funeral ceremony in March.
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In 2007, the constitution of Montenegro was changed to allow Montenegrin to become the official language of the tiny Balkan state. Proponents call the language “unique,” while critics say it is no more than a Serbian dialect. Either way, it is now a highly political subject.
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About 200 illegal Bulgarian Roma immigrants camping in Bordeaux, France, have accepted government incentives and agreed to return to Bulgaria. But critics say they will just be back again within a fortnight.
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Critics say they are cashing in on centuries-old religious traditions, while others maintain they are merely fighting for survival. Either way, Poland’s business-savvy monks are making a tidy profit with their latest venture – bringing their recipes to the masses.
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Even a global recession cannot knock the Czech Republic off the top of the beer drinking charts. The Czechs have retained their crown as the world’s biggest beer drinkers with an impressive annual tally of 150-155 litres per head.
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Even the most seasoned music connoisseur has a tough time defining dub music. It is a genre that refuses to be pigeonholed and continually spawns new sub-genres. Poland is currently creating its own dub recipe and, according to some, it tastes good.
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Poland’s Catholic Church is facing a recruitment crisis as figures show a sharp drop in the number of young men and women willing to join a monastery. The emergency is forcing the church to advertise online in search of new recruits.
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One groundhog’s reputation lies in the balance today as Ukraine’s usually reliable weather-predicting rodent, Tymek, has retired and his successor faces his first day under the spotlight.
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The Maillie family lives in a caravan nearby an abandoned factory in a suburb north of Paris. There’s snow on the ground, but it’s warm inside, where Vincent, 23, his step-father Bayo, his mother, a couple of sisters, his daughter and another kid in Spiderman pyjamas are taking refuge.
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What do you get when you cross the rock band The Velvet Underground with Czechoslovakia’s 1989 Velvet Revolution? The Plastic People of the Universe, of course.
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Our mini-series on smoking bans throughout Europe has taken us from a pub in Dublin to a Czech café, and from a church in Amsterdam to the one-time smoker’s paradise that is Madrid. And now we finish our trip in the anti-smoker's base of operations – Brussels.
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Part two of our mini-series on smoking takes us to sunny Spain. Once a haven for smokers, Spain seems ready to follow its European neighbours and ban smoking altogether. Network Europe investigates whether this ‘smoker’s paradise’ is ready to make the transition.
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Despite last year’s controversial move to ban the gay pride march, the Serbian government has decided that it will go ahead in Belgrade this year.
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"Part graveyard, part gallery" is how one critic has described Deadline - one of the latest exhibitions at Paris's Museum of Modern Art, which brings together works created in the last years of the lives of 12 contemporary artists who have died in the past 20 years.
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The French entry for the prestigious foreign language film at this year’s Oscars looks like it could be a shoe-in to pick up the golden gong come 7 March.
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A late run by a little-known candidate could scupper chances of Orange revolution heroine Yulia Tymoshenko making it through to the second round of Ukraine’s presidential elections.
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Istanbul has a wealth of cultural treasures but in the past it has been criticised by organisations such as UNESCO for failing to look after this heritage properly. As it prepares to become a European Capital of Culture, some of its projects have again ended up in the firing line.
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Three cities won the race to be declared a European Capital of Culture for 2010. Essen, Pécs and Istanbul have been renovated and refurbished for all they are worth. Now the cities have just one year to strut their stuff on the cultural scene.
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An innovative arts project that reinvigorated community life in one of Bucharest's most deprived neighbourhoods is now under threat - ironically from the building projects and development plans that local politicians see as the key to the area's regeneration.
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Most of us don’t care about the origin, sex or personality of our fruit and vegetables before eating them, but one person is hoping we reconsider this.
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Children the world over may rightly shriek at the sight of an ugly old witch skulking around their recently acquired Christmas bounty but Italian children react somewhat differently to most. The reason is that this hag is a welcome guest in Italian homes during the early hours of 6 January.
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Valentin, the adopted son of former Romanian dictator Nicolae Ceausescu, is pushing for a ban on a play about the trial and execution of his parents in order to protect their good names.
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Euranet concludes our look back at the big stories and newsmakers of the year. The last four months of 2009 focused mostly on climate change and, most importantly, the delays in ratifying the Lisbon Treaty.
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Many countries traditionally “ring in” the New Year with church bells tolling at the stroke of midnight on 31 December. But in parts of Switzerland, the custom takes a different form, where groups of men use cowbells to scare off the ghosts of the year that has just past.
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From January to April of 2009, Europe stumbled from crisis to crisis. First, the banking collapse, then another winter gas crisis and to top it all off - swine flu. Euranet looks back, over three consecutive days, at the big stories and newsmakers of the year.
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Norway has a number of lovely, tasty Christmas traditions - such as mulled wine and spiced biscuits - but there are a couple of festive delicacies that most foreigners find somewhat less palatable.
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Holly, mistletoe, carols…and carp? Turkeys might be dreading Christmas in much of the Western world, but in Poland they are safe - Poles prefer to tuck in to a succulent, freshly-killed carp. But a campaign is afoot to force Poles to be more humane in their treatment of this fish.
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Music is said to know no borders, to cross cultures and religions. But in a continent which praises itself for its European Union, it is still difficult to listen to music other than that from your own country, with the obvious exception of big international artists.
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The lyrics to a long-forgotten 17th century Polish Christmas carol, stolen by Swedish troops when they invaded Poland in 1655, have been rediscovered and brought back to life with newly-composed music.
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An unusual new art gallery has opened in central Bucharest. Laika - named after the first dog in space - is a whole new concept for the Romanian capital's art scene. It does not charge the young artists whose work it exhibits a single eurocent in commission.
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