#europe

We habitually engage in meddling with nature. Until this century most of this meddling was good. Witness the preservation of the European countryside. But since then we've smoked it up and littered it and dumped too much in too many waters. I don't think it's our privilege to behave this way. ↗

— Lewis Thomas

#century #countryside #dumped #engage #european

No country in Europe has a larger proportion of men and women of immigrant descent, mainly from the African continent and mainly Muslim: an estimated six to seven million of them, or more than 10% of the population. ↗

— Timothy Garton Ash

#continent #country #descent #estimated #europe

The aristocracy of Western Europe has absolutely tabooed silver in those countries and driven it away from there. Here it finds its only resting place. ↗

— Richard Parks Bland

#aristocracy #away #countries #driven #europe

In some European theaters, it's still not uncommon to have a late start and three LONG intermissions, because people actually eat and drink and converse during the intermissions. ↗

— Joe Bob Briggs

#because #converse #drink #during #eat

In Paris the cashiers sit rather than stand. They run your goods over a scanner, tally up the price, and then ask you for exact change. The story they give is that there aren't enough euros to go around. "The entire EU is short on coins." And I say, "Really?" because there are plenty of them in Germany. I'm never asked for exact change in Spain or Holland or Italy, so I think the real problem lies with the Parisian cashiers, who are, in a word, lazy. Here in Tokyo they're not just hard working but almost violently cheerful. Down at the Peacock, the change flows like tap water. The women behind the registers bow to you, and I don't mean that they lower their heads a little, the way you might if passing someone on the street. These cashiers press their hands together and bend from the waist. Then they say what sounds to me like "We, the people of this store, worship you as we might a god. ↗

— David Sedaris

#cashiers #europe #euros #hospitality #japan

Among the many misdeeds of British rule in India, history will look upon the Act which deprived a whole nation of arms as the blackest. ↗

— Mahatma Gandhi

#asia #conquest #england #europe #great-britain

Fallujah was a Guernica with no Picasso. A city of 300,000 was deprived of water, electricity, and food, emptied of most of its inhabitants who ended up parked in camps. Then came the methodical bombing and recapture of the city block by block. When soldiers occupied the hospital, The New York Times managed to justify this act on grounds that the hospital served as an enemy propaganda center by exaggerating the number of casualties. And by the way, just how many casualties were there? Nobody knows, there is no body count for Iraqis. When estimates are published, even by reputable scientific reviews, they are denounced as exaggerated. Finally, the inhabitants were allowed to return to their devastated city, by way of military checkpoints, and start to sift through the rubble, under the watchful eye of soldiers and biometric controls. ↗

— Jean Bricmont

#foreign-policy #france #human-rights #iraq #kosovo-war

Kosovo today is closer to Europe than other countries in the region of South Eastern Europe. ↗

— Ibrahim Rugova

#countries #eastern #eastern europe #europe #kosovo

I really want to do something in Europe. With a small movie, it can be an interesting challenge. But I have to get the right project. I don't think it's so important to go to Hollywood. All that trash that comes out of there! I don't want to do that. ↗

— Ziyi Zhang

#comes #europe #get #go #hollywood

Europe has a long and tragic history of mostly domestic terrorism. ↗

— Gijs de Vries

#europe #history #long #mostly #terrorism