IISWAI

International Students with Awesome Ideas

Volume 2, Issue 5

August 2009

Basel

 

Would you like to accompany me on a trip through my hometown?

 

Please take a seat and fasten your seat-belt, because we will fly very fast through space and time...

 

Copyright Basel Tourismus

(http://www.basel.com/de.cfm/sightseeing/offer-SightseeingAusfluegeBT-Sightseeing-153966.html)

 

So let us head for Central Europe, to a city in the North of Switzerland, called Basel. It‘s situated on the river Rhine and borders on France and Germany (see map below).

 

Copyright Basel Tourismus

(www.basel.com/de.cfm/baselinfo/offer-BaselInfoBT-Karte.html)

 

Basel has about 187,400 inhabitants and is extremely rich in history and culture. The first settlement is said to have taken place around the year 500 BC, by the Celts.

 

To quote only a few historical facts: In the year 44 BC the Romans built a fort (Augusta Raurica - see picture beneath) near Basel. You can still visit its ruins nowadays and they serve as a coulisse (= backdrop) to many performances.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

(Foto Augusta Raurica, www.augusta-raurica.ch)

 

 

In the middle of the 14th century the plague killed half of the population and only eight years later the most serious earthquake that Central Europe has ever seen, destroyed a big part of the city. In the year 1501 Basel, which until then was part of the Holy Roman Empire, joined Switzerland and in the 1529 the city underwent the Reformation.

 

The City has bred a lot of famous people, like for example Leonhard Euler (1707-1783; famous mathematician) and due to the University (founded in 1460 as the first University of Switzerland), has attracted other people like Andreas Vesalius (1514-1564; author of the first complete atlas of the human anatomy) and Paracelsus (1493-1541; doctor, alchemist, etc. “it is the dose that makes the poison”).

 

Since we have arrived in our time, let’s see what Basel can offer us nowadays.

 

Do you like museums? If so you have the choice of about 40 different museums (from anatomy through cartoons to traffic). Do you like jewellery and watches? If so every year in March you can visit the world’s biggest exhibition of watches and jewellery, the Baselworld. Do you like Carnivals? If so come and visit a colourful Basel (see picture beneath), that is full of music in February or March.

 

Copyright: basler fasnachtskomite (www.fasnacht.ch)

 

Or do you like Dutch painters? If so hurry up and visit the exhibition of Vincent van Gogh “Between Earth and Heaven: The Landscapes”, which lasts only until the 27th September, 2009.

 

Come and enjoy Basel. There’s something for everybody to see!

 

 

For further information:

Basel:                       http://www.basel.ch/en/index.htm

                http://www.basel.com/en/welcome.cfm?

Carnival of Basel:     http://fasnacht.ch/?pm_1=21&mid=21

Baselworld:              www.baselshow.com

 

 

From Christine from Switzerland, who attended “Study Abroad” for 2 weeks, to brush up her English.

Page 12

Here’s another possible vacation destination for you.  Just look at the picture below.  It’s like stepping back in time...