Tourism Terror Threats

Hi everyone,

As most of you already know, the U.S. has heightened the threat level for tourists traveling to Europe; specifically to the U.K., France, and Germany. I wanted to make sure I let you all in on some of the facts.

Photo Courtesy of The New York Times

First, I should say, "don't freak out." The travel advisory isn't a formal travel warning. This means the State Department isn't telling Americans NOT to travel, but that they should be aware of recent threats to security.

"The precise details of the alleged plan remain unclear, and the information that is available in the public domain cannot be verified, rendering an assessment of its credibility difficult."

The attacks are supposed to resemble Mumbai attacks, which targeted high-profile tourism areas.

"Media reports quoting unnamed intelligence sources on 29 September referred to an alleged Islamist extremist plan to launch coordinated attacks in the UK, France and Germany. The purported plot, which has been linked to al-Qaida leaders based in tribal areas of Pakistan, reportedly calls for teams of gunmen to simultaneously strike targets in major cities and take hostages, in the manner of the November 2008 attacks in Mumbai (India). A German counterterrorism official indicated that much of the information was derived from the interrogation of Ahmed Sidiqi, a member of the militant Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU) who was detained in Kabul (Afghanistan) in July."

We've been warned by Northwestern Study Abroad to avoid crowded tourist infrastructure, American 'icons' (like Hard Rock Café and Starbucks), and to be alert when using public transportation. An article from the Associated Press Sunday stated:

"The alert wasn't intended to urge travelers to stay away from public places. It fell short of a formal travel warning, which could have had broader implications including a stronger likelihood of canceled airline and hotel bookings and the suspension of many U.S. college and university study-abroad programs."

Apparently, the top concern is what implications this may have for Americans considering travel to Europe. Travel experts say that those who already have plans in place are not likely to change their plans, but more realistically it will be those who are still in the planning phases who may hold off on finalizing anything until the situation is made more clear.

Germany, France, and the U.K. have not changed their internal threat levels. According to an article in today's New York Times (online) France is taking intelligence information from the U.S. seriously- French officials arrested 12 people in the south of France today. The government may be taking the threats seriously, but the Associated Press article seemed to imply- from their interviews with Americans currently in Europe- that Americans aren't going to let themselves be scared into hiding.

"At Paris' spring-summer 2011 ready-to-wear fashion shows, W magazine fashion market director Karla Martinez said she gets 'worried for five minutes, but then I forget about it and get back to the job that I'm here to do.' [..] 'It's a little scary when you're staying in a big hotel with lots of tourists, because we hear that could be a target, but I try not to get too worked up about it,' she said. 'At the end of the day all you can do is keep your eyes and ears open and try not to be naive.'"

Three NBA teams are still going ahead with travels to the U.K. and Spain.

"Lakers center Pau Gasol said he had no intention of spending his time in London sitting in a hotel room. 'It's a great city to be out and walk around in, and experience things. It would be a crime to stay at the hotel,' Gasol said."

Most of us have been following the news and we are being careful not to put ourselves at extra risk. I've tried to design this post to accurately reflect the mood in Paris. I hope I helped to ease your mind or at least give you a few helpful hard facts.

Expect a post from me soon about my Lazy Sunday spent at the Bastille market and a new Parisian discovery!

P.S. I saw a picture online today of Keira Knightley at Paris Fashion Week- how can I be in the same city as all of these celebrities and not have seen any of them!? Sigh.

Love,

Hillary

Information in this post was gathered from the following sources:

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5isVrwHYielnHBYr4EvvWIzuJ8I0gD9IKEKAG0?docId=D9IKEKAG0

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/06/world/europe/06france.html?ref=global-home

http://www.internationalsos.com/en/

Huelga, part deux!

Hey guys!

Alright, think back to a time, long long ago, when I was in Bolivia. Do you remember me telling you that the way things get done there was to have a strike? While I was in Bolivia there were several strikes. I have recently learned that this is how people express their opinions in Paris as well! Tomorrow there will be a strike..I forgot why.. someone told us last week..but regardless the outcome is that public transit is going to take like 10 times as long. I don't have to worry about this because I'm a 15-20 min walk to class and I don't take the metro to get there. My french teacher warned us today that she might be late tomorrow because of it. After class today I was walking home and saw the roads blocked off and tons of people walking around with stickers that I couldn't read. Maybe it's already starting? It's only a one day strike though so who knows.

Ok let's get down to business. I have a lot of reading to do today and tomorrow so instead of telling you all about Normandy on Friday and Saturday, I'm going to talk about my Thursday and show you some pictures from that day!

Thursday:

Last Thursday we had french placement testing in the morning. After testing we walked over to Ladurée, a famous macaroon place, and picked out a few macaroons to eat! My favorite one was vanilla because it tasted like ice cream in a cookie sandwich. I'd never had macaroons before but they're delicious and they are in all these bright colors! They even have mimosa flavored.

Later, one of the French students in our program, Camille, told us she wanted to show us where the Jardin du Luxembourg was. It's a garden we all kept hearing about but no one had seen yet. What I thought was going to be a 15 min walk to the gardens ended up being a 2.5 hour tour around part of the city.

First we walked back towards school and Ladurée, and up to the Seine.

This is the beginning of Pont Neuf, the island in the middle of the Seine on which Notre Dame sits.

Our first stop was to be Notre Dame. (Again). This marks my fourth time inside Notre Dame. But this time was a bit different, outside one of my friends pointed out something really cool! There was this really old man feeding the birds (enter the Feed the Birds song from Mary Poppins) and the birds were actually on his hand! Then the birds were landing on the shoulders of this old lady chatting to another old lady, and she didn't mind at all!

After Notre Dame we walked past part of the Sorbonne (famous public university), and entered the Pantheon. the Pantheon is where lots of famous dead people are buried, and it is located in this odd but beautiful area next to a law school and what amounts to like a regional government building. Here are a few pictures from outside the Pantheon and inside it.

This is the bad guy from Ocean's 12! I've found the Night Fox! He's in an ad for cologne that's on bus stops all over the city.

Inside the Pantheon:
In the basement of the Pantheon where most of the graves are:
Voltaire's body is in the casket behind his statue:

Outside of the Pantheon were two groups of college-aged kids. One group was in all red, and the other in all blue. Most of them had odd random squiggly lines in face paint on their faces and they seemed to be standing around. Camille said it was their form of hazing for "associations" or college clubs. Their hazing is tame and all in good fun, it's not harmful according to Camille. After a stop for gelato we walked into the Jardin du Luxembourg.

THIS PLACE IS AMAZING. First of all, we had a beautiful day to be walking around outside. It was in the 70's and sunny. I don't know how I've been to France twice and missed this. I've always come in March when it probably isn't as magical, but in September at least it was heaven. I can't really describe it in words, but I'll start by saying this place is huge. I didn't see all of it because our feet were hurting and I didn't know exactly how far it went. We walked to the center by the fountain and rested for about half an hour. There were people all over the place going for walks, reading, chatting, or eating. Here are some of the pictures I took:

This is the senate building:

Alright folks! That's it for now!

I'll update again soon!

Love, Hillary

My Teacher is Famous!!

Hey everyone!

Lately I'm finding out more and more about my school, Sciences Po. I learned in class yesterday that they have an acceptance rate of 5%. To give you a comparison, Northwestern is currently trying to lower it's acceptance rate from 23% to 20% in order to rise in the rankings. It is the most highly regarded of political science schools in all of France! I guess this means that the teachers are top notch as well, because I just found out that the teacher I had today (who is also the director of the public health side of our France program from the French administrative side) wrote an article in Le Monde, a famous french newspaper.

It is in french but in case you want to take a look, here is the link!

http://www.lemonde.fr/idees/article/2010/09/06/ne-sacrifiez-pas-la-jeunesse_1407360_3232.html

Au revoir!

Hillary

Huelga!

Hey folks!

I'm writing to you from La Paz! I thought I'd write and let you know about some of the political stuff going on in southern Bolivia right now.

Remember how there was a taxi trufi strike a couple of weeks ago and I explained that strikes are the most common practice for citizens in Bolivia who want something changed? Well, there is another strike happening. This one is in Potosi; the mining region of the country. Bolivia produces silver, zinc, tin, and lead. For the last 12 days mines have been minimizing

their output and it is looking like several mines have now shut down completely! Miners and other citizens in Potosi have shut down all road traffic in and out of the city and have disrupted air travel as well. Some news outlets are saying that rioters cut the railroad line to Chile early this morning. The mines are owned by Swiss, American, and Japanese companies. Several Bolivians have been on hunger strike since Saturday (the Governor just joined it too)! They are asking for Evo Morales, the current president now famous for giving more rights to certain indigenous groups, to come down and negotiate with them.

There are some tourists who have been able to get out but many are still stuck there. One of the demands is to deal with a border dispute with nearby Oruro. It's been over a month since I was in Oruro- but phew! I'm so glad I'm not down there for all of this. I doubt it's going to get too violent, the government wants to negotiate peacefully and I think I heard a woman on the radio say that negotiations were going to happen in Sucre (judicial capitol) sometime very soon. They are telling tourists to avoid the area as the region is in complete control of the rioters and tourists will receive little or no support from the government.

News:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-10949160

http://ph.news.yahoo.com/afp/20100808/twl-bolivia-protest-france-6b0205e.html

Con amor,

Hillary