June 12, 2013, Year 3, Issue 34

the CEU Weekly

An independent newspaper by CEU students and alumni

Usually, the CEU Weekly focuses on publish-ing interesting and thought-provoking written pieces by CEU students, staff and alumni. However, since this is the last printed issue of the academic year 2012-2013, the CEU Weekly is proud to present a glimpse of the life at CEU. In pages 2 through 4, you will find a selection of the best shots taken this academic year at CEU and/or by CEU students. This issue will be

a nice souvenir of your time at CEU .

Student Tip/Did you know? # 78

You should visit at least one of the so many summer festivals of Budapest. See our suggestions on page 8.

Hungarian Expression of the Week Phrase: Vizet hord a Dunába. Translation: (S)he is taking water to the Danube. Meaning: (S)he is doing something pointless. English equivalent: It’s like bringing coal to Newcastle.

Train your brain! Exercising is good, even if it is for your brain. Solve our puzzle and get an exclusive prize from the “DZSEM” cafeteria at CEU : - a voucher for a free lunch !

More details on PAGE 8

FREE LUNCH

Carl Bernstein at thHay Festival of Literature: Obama, Watergate, and Journalism On Tuesday, May 21 the Hay Festival of Literature in Budapest featured a discussion with iconic American investigative journalist, Carl Bernstein. The event was held on the last day of the Festival, a grand finale for a week which was kicked off with a discussion featuring world-renowned novelist Nicole Krauss.

PAGES 4, 5

THE CEU WEEKLY SPECIAL: End of 2012-2013 Academic Year

The Adventures of a

Hungarian Tourist in

Transylvania

PAGE 6

Swedish Multicultural History (Re)Written: First Muslim Friday Prayer called from Swedish Minaret

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The Weekly Cartoon (by Eriksson)

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the CEU Weekly

THE CEU WEEKLY SPECIAL June 12, 2013, Year 3, Issue 34

The Life at CEU in Photos

May 2013 - Balatonfüred Photo taken by Justyna K. Nytko (USA/Poland)I In the photo: Rania Salah Seddik (Egypt), Marta Lis (Poland), Ildiko Szabo (Hungary), Gorana Misic (Croatia), Zina Adam (Moldova), Angelina Atanasova (Bulgaria), Zeljka Tutic (Croatia)

May 2013 - Tihany ('writing' CEU) Photo taken by Angelina Atanasova (Bulgaria)In the photo: C: Zina Adam (Moldova), Gorana Misic (Croatia), E: Ildiko Szabo (Hungary), Rania Salah Seddik (Egypt), U: Zeljka Tutic (Croatia), Marta Lis (Poland), Justyna K. Nytko (USA/

„Forgotten Valentine” Photo taken by Katka Medlova, Slovakia, Legal dept. (HR)

The CEU Faculty Tower Photo of Katka Medlova, Slovakia, Legal dept. (HR)

„When Ellen got a CEU ID card” Photo taken by Katka Medlova, Slovakia, Legal dept. (HR)

THE CEU WEEKLY SPECIAL June 12, 2013, Year 3, Issue 34

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the CEU Weekly

May 2013 – Tihany

Photos taken by Rania Salah Seddik (Egypt)

In the photos: Justyna K. Nytko (USA/Poland), Marta Lis (Poland), Ildiko Szabo (Hungary), Gorana Misic (Croatia), Zina Adam (Moldova), Angelina Atanasova (Bulgaria), Zeljka Tutic (Croatia)

THE CEU WEEKLY SPECIAL June 12, 2013, Year 3, Issue 34

On Tuesday, May 21 the Hay Festival of Literature in Budapest featured a discussion with iconic American investigative journalist, Carl Bernstein. The event was held on the last day of the Festival, a grand finale for a week which was kicked off with a discussion featuring world-renowned novelist Nicole Krauss. The event was held in the Petofi Museum of Literature and the moderator for the discussion was Edit Inotai, a journalist for the Hungarian Népszabadság. Held in collaboration with the U.S. Embassy in Hungary, the American Corner of Corvinus University, and Alexandra Kiado, the event was held in English with simultaneous translations into Hungarian.

The discussion began with Bernstein musing on his exposure of Watergate at the age of 28 and his prominence in uncovering the story even as a college drop-out himself. “The fact that we were young is the reason we were able to work on this story for two years”, Bernstein admitted. When Inotai asked Bernstein if Watergate could happen today, given the recent discoveries of political profiling by the IRS and the surveillance of Associated Press journalists by the administration, Bernstein stressed that

“Watergate was about a criminal presidency”. For Bernstein, what the current administration is doing, including surveilling reporters as part of an investigation into leaks, is legal under current laws and the administration has the “statutory authority to undertake such measures”. However, Bernstein spoke unequivocally and honestly in saying that it is “outrageous” that Obama has made it his policy to inhibit journalism in such a matter, as it was clearly his and his administration's intention to inhibit people from speaking to journalists. Yet, Bernstein also made sure not to mince words and addressed the bipartisanship currently at play in the U.S. political arena and the current scandals; the Republicans who are now touting freedom of speech as the greatest of rights are the same ones who have previously said “let's put those leakers in prison”. However, Bernstein made sure not to dismiss the criticisms mounted by the Republicans as a mere witch hunt, but as concerns which have shown to have validity to them. As per President Obama's governance, Bernstein concluded resolutely that he has had “real trouble governing effectively”. He has not been successful at addressing neither institutions nor bureaucracies, as witnessed by the Veterans' claims scandal and the lack of success in closing Guantanamo once and for all, as promised during the campaign and his second term in Office. There is also no question that the White House was not transparent in addressing

Benghazi.

->>>

Carl Bernstein at the Hay Festival of Literature: Obama, Watergate, and Journalism

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the CEU Weekly

„Aka Japanese...aka Garden”

Photo of

Katka Medlova, Slovakia, Legal dept. (HR)

Clothes Drive Photo of Katka Medlova, Slovakia, Legal dept. (HR)

Thank you for our readers for sharing their CEU photos with us!

The CEU Weekly

THE EVENT REVIEW June 12, 2013, Year 3, Issue 34

the CEU Weekly

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Why have recent revelations during Obama's presidency proven so disappointing? What has added the extra sting to the way Obama has carried out his time in office is his initial campaign promise to be a different kind of President. He promised a presidency without spin, but what we have seen instead are the same efforts to spin and to withhold information from its people as we have seen before from the White

House. Whether the White House under Obama or the State Department under Former Secretary Hilary Clinton, the hope felt in 2008 has by many instances waned. Thus, though Obama's time in office has been neither Nixonian nor criminal, it has been disappointing and that is a truth Bernstein has not been afraid to admit.

Looking into the eyes of his audience members and letting his hands speak for him, Bernstein spoke with authority on the state of the union. The executive branch has proven itself to be a disappointment and Congress, the third branch of government, has shown itself to be broken-

spurned not the interests of its citizenry but by financial and parochial interests. What is commonly referred to as the fourth branch of government, journalism, was also irresolute in the lead up to the wars in Iraq in Afghanistan. Bernstein stated that Saddam Hussein had “nothing to do with 9/11” and what the United States should have done was waiting for the facts, instead all we were interested in was going to war. For Bernstein, the tendency to divide into right and left has been a scourge in politics, in the United States, in Western Europe, and in Hungary. It has been an impediment to both governance and to journalism. Journalism still holds the same definition for Bernstein as when he learned it at 16; it is “the best attainable version of the truth”. “We need to go back to what reporting is”, he stressed. What we need are traditional news institutions that are loyal to this definition of journalism-whether they are reporting on community events, sports events, or national news. These institutions must make the reporting of facts their priority, nor reporting on “how the facts might fit into an idealogical box”. After all, journalism is not about political outcomes. When Bernstein was reporting on Watergate he did not agitate for a political outcome; he was uncovering truths. He realized Nixon would be impeached, but he did his journalistic duty and did not call for it. What we need now is to get to a point where we were when Bernstein first uncovered Watergate, when people were able to say “we are Republicans and we are Democrats and we can agree that Nixon has to go”. We need to go back to seeing ourselves as an American people and not as either 'the right' or 'the left'. When asked about Murdoch and the British press, Bernstein celebrated the 1st Amendment of the U.S. Constitution as one of the world's greatest inventions” and held it as an example for the U.K. He stressed that there will be “untruths” published and there will be violations of privacy and when an editor or a publisher violates the law, whether it be through phone tapping or hacking, they should go to prison. Instead the British response has been regulation of the press by the state and self-regulation by the press. Doing away with the British Official Secrets Act, which prevents certain news from being printed, is “all the difference in the world” for Bernstein. For Bernstein, the threshold for libel is high in the

United States and quite low in England and for the press to prosper, the threshold should be as high as possible. Bernstein in no way absolves the press of their responsibility, however, stressing the need to conduct respectful reporting. During the Q&A portion of the event with the audience, the first question which was asked was regarding Wikileaks, to which Bernstein admitted

that what struck him the most was how unsensational they were. Bernstein stated that Bradley Manning “violated the law” and people who risk doing so for a principle do it knowing the risks, but he also critiqued Assange for being very careless and stressed that it is essential in such circumstances that the upmost care is paid and that people not be put into danger. The second question was asked by Hungarian researcher and Professor Peter Molnar regarding whether or not a public interest test should be used for leakers. Bernstein replied that he hopes in sentencing judges are lenient and take mitigating circumstances such as the public interest into account. However, he stressed over-classification of information as the main roadblock to the public's right information today. The most poignant question was what advice Bernstein would give to a class of students studying to be journalists. Bernstein stressed three key aspects: “be a good listener. Let people tell you what they want to tell you”, “use common sense” for stringing facts together is not journalism, making sense of them is, and the most defiant piece of advice- “all great reporting is done in defiance of management”. Asked if there is a future for investigative journalism, especially with newspapers closing all around and the internet age taking hold, Bernstein was quite optimistic in answering “yes, and a pretty bright one!” A big believer in the internet as a magnificent tool for journalism, with an unlimited interview, photo, and video content capacity, the problem for Bernstein is that there is yet to be an economic model for good internet reporting. In addition, broadcast networks which could use profits to fund their news divisions don't think of doing any such thing. “Hopefully we will invent some kind of model that works” Bernstein stated, leaving the challenge to the audience. Commending Christiane Amanpour, celebrating the

Washington Post and the Wall Street Journal, and naming the modern New York Times as the best newspaper we had had in the world, Bernstein said today could be considered the golden age of journalism. As for himself, having led a career whose focus has been the “use and abuse of power”, be it Watergate, Pope John Paul II, Rupert Murdoch, or Hillary Clinton, he feels this dominant thread is what made his career so satisfying. Having grown up with strong beliefs in civil liberties and a firsthand knowledge that surveillance is not justified under any circumstances, when his family experienced surveillance by the FBI during the McCarthy era, Bernstein has thus made investigative journalism his cause célèbre. “One's life is your story and I like my story” he confidently stated, smiling at his audience full of professionals, researchers, students, and to-be journalists.

Mariya Yefremova

the the CEU Weekly ON THE ROAD

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A Friday of 2013, the 26th of April was the first time that the Friday

prayer (Azan), as well as any prayer at all was called out from a Mosque in Sweden. As the Azan was called, a thousand of local residents and dozens of journalists had gathered. “A historical day. My tears of happiness are running” said Erol Gavgaviougly after the 40-year long wait since he moved to Sweden. The presence of Islamic congregations dates in fact back longer than that. Mohammad Fazlhashemi, professor in Theology and Philosophy at Uppsala University, confirms that the first Islamic congregation was founded in Sweden in 1948 by Tartars fleeing the Soviet Union. Of Sweden, a country allegedly treasuring human rights, freedom of speech and diversity as components essential to inclusive forms of democracy, one would certainly expect the permission to have arrived earlier. One would also expect more citizens to raise their voices for the right to exercise religion publicly and collectively, as enshrined in Article 18 of the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The funds to cover the loudspeakers and other equipment needed to make this historical moment come true have been collected by members of the congregation in the suburb Fittja, south of Stockholm, over the course of a year. Moreover, a long democratic procedure precedes the decision to let the prayer be sung every Friday for 3-5 minutes during a one-year probation period. The final permission needed was granted by the police, who saw no compelling state or public order interest justifying denial of Azaan to be sung from the loudspeakers of the minaret. Local politicians received around 100 letters and emails of complaint

from individuals and civil society initiatives. A host of arguments were employed as to why the Azaan and Islam should not have a place in the

Swedish public sphere. The points of concern ranged from social

conservative ones, holding Islam as a foreign, unwanted element in Swedish society, to rights based arguments framing the public call of Azaan as a violation of religious freedom. The latter argument was framed according to the following logic: the call to come and pray constitutes religious propaganda and exposes citizens to infringements of their right not be exposed to such messages. This arguably misses the point that church bells also are used as a call to religious assembly and as conveyers of Christianity The spokespeople of the Fittja congregation were careful to stress that they are both Swedish and Muslims. This concern notably manifests itself in the interior design of the mosque: birch tree in one of the arches to symbolize a part of Sweden. With or without the birch-tree ornamentation, one would like this particular mosque, as well as all other mosques on Swedish soil, and its attenders to be viewed as part of Swedish society, culture and religious heritage. Unfortunately, Sweden and the rest of Scandinavia, is not spared from the worrying winds of increased religious and multiethnic intolerance, primarily directed towards Islam and Muslims. It is high time to speed up inter-religious as well as secular collaboration for tolerance, understanding, respect, solidarity and equality before the law.

Miranda Myrberg, Nationalism Studies,

Sweden

June 12, 2013, Year 3, Issue 34

The Adventures of a Hungarian Tourist in Transylvania

Visiting Transylvania is considered a somewhat must-to-do travel for Hungarians.

I will not get into speculations on the Trianon-trauma, on nationalism and on politics, the point is that after a while I started to feel slightly weird not having seen anything there despite having travelled to quite a few countries of the world already. This month I changed the situation and went with my boyfriend for the first time in our life to discover a part of it, on the occasion of the Transilvania International Film Festival (TIFF). Since the festival takes place in Cluj, we have spent there most of the time, visiting besides the must-to-see spots– for instance the building in which Mathias Corvinus was born – several cinemas, cultural venues, churches, bars and museums where tourists have apparently a surprising effects on the people who work there. The film festival’s atmosphere is really open and international, apparently I looked like a local (until opening my mouth), since several times people started to ask me about practicalities of the festival in Romanian and when I replied in English they switched with no problem. Also the location of the festival is impressing. The city’s most central square (Piaţa Unirii) is an amazing venue for film screenings in the evening. If I would see the St. Michael Church and the statue of King

Mathias lit up as the background for the film-watching multitude on a postcard – I would consider it pure kitsch. However, being there in this picture was a really beautiful and memorable experience. Regarding bars and restaurants I was a bit concerned what if people would think I was a local Hungarian and find it outrageous that my Romanian vocabulary was constituted of 10-15 expressions. However, as I learned, it is clear that I come from Hungary, since I am far too loud when speaking to be a Hungarian of Cluj. J Anyhow, we had nice conversations with Hungarians and Romanians, people whom we met occasionally were always friendly and helpful, someone spent 40 minutes to tell us everything about Cluj that tourists would never find out. To be honest, there is one sphere of tourism in which we did not experience too much openness and trust: the world of museums. In the ethnographic museum of the town the employees just did not get why somebody goes there to watch the permanent exhibition when they have a lego-expo. In the Museum of Fine Arts and in the Open-air ethnographic museum the employees seemed to literally suspect visitors and followed us for all the time. During our trip we travelled for one day to Târgu Mureş, where luckily we arrived to the Teleki-Bolyai Library (one of the first Hungarian public libraries, founded in 1802) right in the moment when a Hungarian guided tour started. The most striking sights of the city are the City Hall and the Palace of Culture for me, a lover of Art Nouveau architecture.

Agnes Kelemen, Nationalism Studies, Hungary

Swedish Multicultural History (Re)Written: First Muslim Friday Prayer called from Swedish Minaret

the the CEU Weekly

THE WEEKLY CARTOON June 12, 2013, Year 3, Issue 34

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The Weekly Cartoon (by Eriksson)

he Weethe CEU Weekly

CEU COMMUNITY June 12, 2013, Year 3, Issue 34

About the CEU Weekly This is a student-alumni initiative that seeks to provide CEU with a regularly issued newspaper. The CEU Weekly is a vehicle of ex-pression for the diversity of perspectives and viewpoints that integrate CEU’s open society: free and respectful public debate is our aim. We offer a place in which current events and student reflections can be voiced. Plurality, respect and freedom of speech are our guiding principles.

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Buda Castle Beer Festival June 13-16 Buda Castle, former Royal Palace

Wagner in Budapest Opera Festival June 8-23 Palace of Arts

’Royal Fair’ of Király utca - a new street festival June 16- 17 Central Passage, Király str. 8-10.

Mark Knopfler Concert June 22, 8 pm Papp László Budapest Sportaréna

Budapest Summer Festival June 14 - August 31 Margaret Island Open-Air Stage and Városmajor Open-Air Stage

Sziget Festival August 5-12 Óbudai sziget

Welcome – welcome to “Train Your Brain”!!! Here you have a new challenge. The task is to follow the arrows and read the phrase, which is a Swedish proverb. The first letter is marked in bold. Arrows will direct you down, up, left or right. Squares with hyphen are empty. Signs “/” mark spaces between the words. The person who will first send the correct answer on ceuweekly@ceu.hu will get a FREE LUNCH voucher at the Dzsem Cafe!!!

↓→→↑ / →→↓←↓←↓ / ←↑←↓ / ↓→→ / ↗→↑→ / ↑ / →↓→↓ / ↓←←↓→→→ / ↑→↑↑←↓

A - E W I A Y - E M

L I F H T - E A R M

V O U O K E - R S U

E L T L I T I W - -

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FREE LUNCH

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Summer Events in Budapest