They wrote on their Facebook Page:

« After 12 amazing years, having been a large part of the Place Flagey regeneration, it is with regret we announce this Sunday, 27th May at 23h00 we will close our doors for the last time.

There have been World Cups, sizzling summers on the terrasse, Heineken cups won and lost, Six Nations victories and laments, St. Patrick’s hangovers, feasts of pints and burgers, Belgium GAA and FC Irlande end of season dinners and celebrations and just plain good times had by all.

We want to genuinely thank all our staff, and there have been many over the years for the good times, the long hours and being part of the overall success story that is/was de Valera’s.  »

The famous Irish Pub is expected to re-open this summer. However, the date is still unknown.

The news of the re-opening was confirmed by the échevine of commerce Audrey Lhoest (Ecolo).

The post Irish Pub De Valera’s to re-open this summer appeared first on Brussels Express.

The International Yehudi Menuhin Foundation welcomes on stage the dancer Ahmad Joudeh. From Syria to Europe, he meets musicians from different cultures at every stage. A musical route which leaves Syria, crosses Turkey with Burhan Oçal and his Istanbul ensemble whose passionate melodies are inspired by the gypsies of the East, Greece with Dimitri Psonis to finally join the Brussels Chamber Orchestra composed of musicians from multiple cultures accompanied by Gilles Apap, this travelling violinist with an incomparable sound. Together, they will gather on Mozart’s universal music and will conclude this meeting of souls with a common finale, thus illustrating how classical music, associated with world music, generates inspiring exchanges for musician and the public, and revealing with brio what unites us in the depths of our being: our welcoming and generous humanity, as Yehudi Menuhin defended it.

Wednesday 21st November 2018

Brussels Chamber Orchestra

Gilles Apap, violin
Burhan Oçal Together, percussions, oud, violin, qanûn
Dimitri Psonis, santour, morisca
Ahmad Joudeh, dance

Refugees of the Citizen’s Platform for Refugee Support (Bxl Refugees Welcome)

For more info here.

The post Diversity makes music: The Yehudi Menuhin Foundation in Brussels appeared first on Brussels Express.

Curator Sigrid Bousset has designed the series Spreek/tijd – Moments of being – Penser le présent to reflect on some of the fundamental questions that determine how we choose to live our lives.

Over the past months there have been talks by German philosopher Rüdiger Safranski and Dutch thinker Joke Hermsen, who have delved into our notions of time. French historian Alain Corbin and the French sociologist David Le Breton explored our relationship with silence. Karen Armstrong, one of the leading commentators in the world in the field of religion, offered a plea for compassion. All the events have taken place at Flagey.

On Sunday October 7th 2018, Professor A.C. Grayling will share his thoughts on how to make the best use of our time, how to make the choice to stop and wonder at what the world has to offer. It is in the context of this talk and the Moments of Being cycle that he speaks with Brussels Express this week.

How do we measure time well spent? How do we know when time has been well spent?

We have a number of different measures, the main one being our own subjective feelings. Many people say it’s the idea of happy time but we have to be careful with that. Happiness is not an emotion but a state in life. If you have a fulfilling job, if you have a good relationship with your spouse, you will have moments of great joy, and others when it feels like going up the hill, but that doesn’t mean having an unhappy life. These are all states one goes through on a daily basis. They can change and that’s fine.

We can say that time well spent is the time that goes toward creating those happy states in life.

Does an individual perhaps experience cognitive dissonance between the desire to stop and wonder, and Western society’s motto of “time is money”?

This question touches on the central notion of time. There are different points to keep in mind.

There is subjective or existential time (the time we experience). For example, if you and I go to the cinema, and you hate the movie, time will seem to slow down for you. Whereas if I like the film, time to me will seem to fly by.

There is public time, which is common and shared. For instance, I’ll talk to you at 10 am tomorrow morning.

What about objective time? There is no such thing as objective time. It’s a construction we create to be able to make sense in our lives, to create a narrative. We may extend it to the future and speculate on how we will feel, what will happen; and to the past, which are the memories we have.

We have a relativistic time, as you may know from Einstein’s theory.

There’s also quantum time. In quantum theory, an electron can be in two places, or in many places at the same time. There might be two different times, one on top of one another. It gets complicated.

For humans, the most important ones in daily life are subjective and public time. And the dissonance you mentioned happens between these two, subjective and public times. A moment of transcendence, an instant of passion, that’s when time seems to either expand or contract. Public time is in very short supply, it makes us feel as if it were always chasing us.

Life and death. Is it necessary to constantly be conscious of one’s mortality to be able to have a happier, fuller life?

We have to be aware that the amount of time we have is limited, by any measure of time. But we don’t need to be thinking about our own deaths constantly. Spinoza said, “The most important meditation there can be is on life not on death.” To learn to philosophize is to learn to die.

You need to have the courage to peer into the fact that you will die, then accept it and live. Every moment you have on this planet you go and live.

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