Eew!

Or, if you’re more cultivated, go ahead and say, “E U”, either way we know you’re talking about the European Union. I’ve always imagined the EU to be some abbreviated code for a select group of European bankers who meet periodically behind barrels of distilled spirits in some dank rathskeller to determine the exchange rate of the currency that might be used in Berlin, Paris, or Rome. 

Apparently that’s not the case. As Ella explains in her latest post, the EU functions as a parliament that tries to make sure the countries it represents making up Europe don’t trample on each other’s interests. Like Germany invading France, or Italy refusing to sell olive oil to Rumanians. In other words, good intentions among nations on the European continent that have a rocky history of getting along.

As is laid out with photo essay pedantry in the subterranean rooms of the Parliamentarium, it all came together in the shell-shocked aftermath of World War II spearheaded by an agreement between France and West Germany.  The rest of Europe was so amazed at the rapprochement they decided to join in with the understanding that becoming friends might have economic benefits. With a headset guiding us along a wall of headlines and tabloid pics from the last eighty years, we were reminded that although Olof Palme and Aldo Moro were assassinated and it seemed like it took forever for the Berlin Wall to fall, Europe didn’t disintegrate into tribal warfare. Better still, it experienced an economic boom. So although Britain won’t be joining them, three cheers for the EU! 

Then how come I didn’t feel the hope? Blown up photos of earnest young people ready to legislate not necessarily a great future, but a future that isn’t some sci-fi fantasy doesn’t convince me.

As if to make a claim against my uncertainty, the Parliamentarium had bell-shaped cones hanging throughout the basement layout, like some dimly lit tribute to Stanley Kubrick’s 2001 floating space station, and on the exterior of each these hollowed out half-egg shell shaped units were the faces of certain creative European minds from the last century. Einstein, for instance. I could stick my head inside his bell and read about him in seven European languages. See, the Parliamentarium seemed to be saying, he was one of us! Sure, I wanted to object, then why did he flee to America? 

Next to Albert there was a bell with James Joyce’s face on it. Okay, well he fled Ireland, but when I read The Dubliners, or Ulysses, I don’t think, wow, how European! 

And on my way out as I surfaced to the gift shop there was the bell with Franz Kafka’s photo on it.  His dark lemur eyes seemed to be looking into the soul of Europe, and it wasn’t pretty.

If you want to slake your thirst in the EU Parliamentarium, there’s always an American drink on hand.