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October saw the visit of King Charles to Bordeaux as part of his and Queen consort Camilla’s royal visit to France. And they were accompanied by The Mayor of Bristol, Marvin Rees.

You will already have seen a lot of news coverage of the visit. We thought you may like to read some different perspectives, especially French ones. You can read an interesting blog on the visit from the Invisible Bordeaux website here And to see the visit from a the point of view of a Bordelais have a look at Mayor Pierre Hurmic’s own Facebook post all about the visit here

In response to the approach from Barrs Court Primary School, we visited in the penultimate week of term and gave a half hour presentation to three different classes at the School. The presentation was on all things Bordeaux and twinning.

We focused on Bordeaux, its history, its location in France, its trade – wine of course was mentioned – and we discussed some of the differences between the French and British school days. And we also took a little time to talk about the other cities twinned with Bristol.

We asked the pupils what they already knew about Bordeaux, why they thought the Mayor of Bordeaux and the Mayor of Bristol would meet and what they would discuss and even how many bottles of wine they thought that the Bordeaux region produced in a year! 

And of course the topic of the recent placements of students from Bristol University in various Bordeaux primary schools for two weeks was raised – which interested the pupils.

When asked how the sessions went and whether the children enjoyed the presentation, a couple of replies were “It was fun to learn about the student exchange programme – that was really interesting.” and “It was really fun to listen to. He kept us all engaged.”

Let’s hope that we now have nearly a hundred young Bristolians fired up with a desire to visit France and, you never know, an ambition to live or work in Bordeaux in the future.

If you know of a Bristol primary school who may also want to take advantage of the offer of repeating this presentation in the 2023/4 year, please reply to this email – or ask them to contact us directly. We’d love to be able to help and to spread the message re twinning in general and Bordeaux in particular.

A bientôt!

Mark Atherton, for
Bristol Bordeaux Partnership

www.bristolbordeaux.org

As a part of our annual program, 6 Master’s students teachers from Bordeaux University arrived earlier this week for 15 days.

Alexia Boblet, Margaux Bonnet, Anais Darnaud, Emma Ges, Léa Bourgoin and Adeline Vogel will teach French in 6 schools across Bristol :

• Compass Point Primary, BS3 3AU
• Ashton Gate Primary, BS3 1SZ
• Dolphine Primary School, BS6 5RD
• May Park Primary, BS5 6LE
• Southville Primary, BS3 1JG
• Hareclive E-Act Academy, BS13 0HP

Here are some pictures from the French activities morning at Ashton Park Primary with about 140 children involved.

What a wonderful way to start our year of celebrations!!

Thank you to Bedminster Winter Lanterns for their amazing event.

Also wanted to thank you kids, teachers and parents from the Victoria Park Primary School for their creativity

Massive MERCI to Quartet Community Foundation for the financial support to make this project a reality.

More events are coming.

So stay tuned.

Produced by the Bristol Bordeaux Partnership in collaboration with Lighting up Learning and Bristol City Council, funded by Quartet and designed by Jack Anderson, this interactive tool will help learners and schools alike spread the word about Bristol’s oldest twinning relationship.

Comprised of a suite of fun and entertaining activities which also link to things you could do in school, it is the perfect tool for discovering the South West Capital of France.

Feel free to download it from our website with this link.

https://www.bristolbordeaux.org/uploads/bbp-bordeaux-learning-pack_2022-01-07_1529.zip

SAVE THE DATE! Our Annual General Meeting is coming on the 20th January at City Hall (6 pm – 7:30 pm), in our room.

Wine and nibbles provided. It will be the start of our 75th Twinning Anniversary Celebration’s year.

To talk about this important and thrilling milestone, we will host DR Ann Kennard, Chair of Bristol Hannover Committee; the other city involved.

Follow the link to book your FREE ticket.

www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/bristol-bordeaux-partnership-agm-tickets-242678055597

Dear Members and Friends,

The Annual General Meeting of the Bristol Bordeaux Partnership will be held via a virtual  Zoom video conference on Tuesday 23rd February between 18.00 & 19.00. All current and prospective individual, family or business members are invited to attend.

The meeting will include a short talk by our guest speaker Dr Jenny Gaschke: Curator of European Art pre-1900 at Bristol Museum & Art Gallery.Dr Gaschke specialises in British and European Landscape art and has been working with Sandra Buratti Hasan (Musée des Beaux-Arts Bordeaux de Bordeaux) and Guillaume Faroult (Louvre) on the exhibition ‘Absolutely Bizarre! Les drôles d’histoires de l’école de Bristol’ since 2016.

This major exhibition of over 60 works by the Bristol School of Artists will open in Bordeaux in June 2021.

Please register:

You are invited to a Zoom meeting.

When: Feb 23, 2021 06:00 PM London

Register in advance for this meeting:

https://us02web.zoom.us/meeting/register/tZMud-mrqz4sHNVNJ8wPU4jCDb3H7qtfm4V1

After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the meeting.

Bristol Bordeaux Partnership: https://www.bristolbordeaux.org/ has teamed up with Bristol based Zanshin Films: https://zanshinfilms.co.uk/ to develop a personalised video library of Bordeaux experiences for inclusion on the Bristol Bordeaux Partnership website and social media channels.

We would love to hear from anyone interested in participating. We will be asking for participants to video themselves and to send in their content digitally for editing by Zanshin Films.

We would like to have some short 5 – 10 minutes of copy for the following questions:

Who are you and what do you do now?

When did you go to Bordeaux & Why?

What was the best/ most memorable moment of your trip/stay?

How are you still in touch with the Bordeaux or Aquitaine region and the people that you met?

What is your message today for anyone wanting to get to know Bordeaux for work or fun?

If you are interested in participating please contact: mike.healey@bristolbordeaux.com or leave a message on the Bristol Bordeaux Partnership website, Facebook, Twitter or Linkedin channels.

Alternatively please contact Zanshin Films: https://zanshinfilms.co.uk/ via the website.

Looking forward to hearing your tales.

Mike Healey

Bristol Bordeaux Partnership

Web: https://www.bristolbordeaux.org/

Facebook: @BristolBordeauxPartnership

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/11049418

Twitter: @bristolbordeaux

NOTICE OF ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING: The AGM of Bristol Bordeaux Partnership will be on Monday 17th February 2020. The guest speaker will be Assistant Mayor Cllr Craig Cheney. Commencing 6.30 pm in Bristol City Hall. Alongside the business of the AGM we invite all existing and prospective Personal and Corporate members to come and have a glass or two of wine and a few nibbles.