Re: CHAT: The EU expands (was Re: THEORY/CHAT: Talmy, Jackendoff and Matchboxes)

I've heard that the biggest problem is not about
Turk-Cypriots, but about Turkish people who were sent
by Ankara from Anatolia to sette down in the Northern
part of the island. Those are really against the Greek
Cypriots and against the reunification of the island,
probably because they have everything to lose. There
are some thousands of them. Anyway, Turks and Greeks
have been like cats and dogs for hundreds of years
(Turks are also hated by Kurds, Armenians and others;
the eventuality of Turkey joining EU still raises very
strong objections everywhere, among other reasons
because Turkey could become the leading European
country in regard to its population: they soon could
be more than (reunited) Germans ! A very odd
perspective...

There is another "bizarrerie" in the new EU, it is the
Kaliningrad area, which is Russian (before the war, it
was German), but physically spearated from Russia by
Lituania. So Russians who want to go from (main)
Russia to Russia (Kaliningrad) will need a transit
visa through Lituania. They find that very offending.
Kaliningrad is the place for all possible suspect
trades, and mainly controlled by Russian Maffia (by
the way, Russian Maffia is also, up til now, very
present in the Greek part of Cyprus).

As to the alphabets used in the EU, cyrillic will be
the next one when Bulgaria will join it (they are
among the next ones on the list). Bielorussia and
Ukraine still are in the sphere of influence of
Russia, so they're not expected to join it soon. The
border between Poland and Ukraine will give much
problems to the Ukrainians, who are rather
close-related to the Poles, and who were used to cross
the border very often to make some small trade. Kind
of a new "Iron curtain"... financed by the EU. Serbia
uses cyrillic alphabet too, but for the moment, they
look somehow like "banned" because of their attitude
during the war in former Yugoslavia. I can't remember
what alphabet they use in Montenegro. As to Armenia
and Georgia, they are still far away from us... though
they could be good reasons for Armenia, for ex, to
join Europe (it was the 1st Christian kingdom in the
world, and very many Armenians emigrated to Europe -
especially France - after the genocide at the
beginning of the XXth century. My own city in France
is a "twin city" of an Armenian city).

Yes, there is much 'bizarre' in Europe...

--- John Cowan <cowan@...> wrote:
> Joe scripsit:
>
> > >Cyprus means Cyprus, which is bilingual. (There
> are probably some
> > >Cypriots who would disagree, but that's the EU
> position as nearly as
> > >I can tell.)
> >
> > Actually, they are.  All European laws will apply
> only to Greek Cyprus,
>
>
> The current situation borders on the surreal.  All
> countries except
> Turkey agree that the Greek Cypriot government is
> the only legitimate
> government in and of Cyprus.  Therefore, it is
> Cyprus that has joined
> the EU.  But the Turkish Cypriot area is not part of
> it, which means
> that we now have the spectacle of an external border
> of the EU --
> potentially subject to immigration and customs
> controls of the EU --
> which is *inside* the legal territory of an EU
> member.
>
> Bizarre.
>

=====
Philippe Caquant

"High thoughts must have high language." (Aristophanes, Frogs)


	
		
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