"Illegal Love" in Europe

“Why do people come to Europe if there is no fortune here?” asks Sister Fa, a Senegalese musician who moved to Berlin a few years ago. This seems to be an important question for many of those who immigrate to Europe as their new life is not always what they expect it to be.   

Whatever their reasons might be, many of them find love in their new home.  There is an abundance of stories of African immigrants who fell in love with Europeans, got married and had children with them. Even though they have a family here, there is no guarantee that they can stay forever. The dream of a life in safety often ends up in so called “detention centres”, where immigrants are held against their will and have to wait for the deportation to their home countries. Among the captives in a Dutch prison-like detention facility there is one man who has been living in the Netherlands for ten years, is married to a Dutch woman and has a son with her. None of these facts seem to impress the Dutch authorities or to persuade them to extend his visa. His family is not even allowed to come to visit him. The despair is obvious: “I’d be better off dead than staying in this prison any longer.” No wonder if you consider the circumstances he is living in. The detainees are treated like criminals and sometimes even physically abused. Is this the Europe they were dreaming of?

Now back to Sister Fa and her life in Germany. She met a German guy in Senegal who did research on African music. They fell in love, got married and moved to Berlin where they are living a happy life with their son. Sister Fa is very content with her decision to come to Europe but not everybody is that lucky. Take her friend Bea for example. She came to Europe with her family but after a fight with the wife of her dad, he took away her documents so she had to get married or have a child in order to stay. Now she has a little girl but nobody supports her except for Sister Fa. Another friend of them came to Germany on a student visa but since he failed his exams, his visa expired. Now he has to go back to Africa, even though he was already planning to marry his German girlfriend.

Obviously, many of their situations are difficult but most of them try to think positively and won’t give up their fight for a better life in Europe.

EU Individual Paragraph

Brainstorming:

• similar terms
• Council of Europe
• no EU body
• international organization
• human rights
• Council of the EU
• national ministers meet
• European Council
• EU leader meet

Original - Draft 1:
Regarding Europe there are three terms that sound very similar and can easily get confused with each other – The Council of Europe, The Council of the European Union and The European Council. The main difference is that The Council of Europe is not an EU Institution at all. It is an international huma rights organization in Strasbourg, whose 47 member states have signed up to the European Convention of human rights. It was set up to promote democracy, protect human rights and the rule of law in Europe. Even though it is not an EU body, all 28 EU member states are part of The Council of Europe. The European Council is an EU institution where EU leaders meet together with the President of the European Commission twice every six months to discuss the unions political priorities, whereas at The Council of the EU, national ministers from each EU country meet to adopt laws and coordinate policies. Since our focus is on the European Union the whole semester, it is important to know the difference between these similar terms.


Feedback:

• Topic Sentence: 
• Regarding Europe and the EU...
• to be confused
• put all the councils in quotes
• Register: ok
• more synonyms  

Draft 2:

Regarding Europe and the EU there are three terms that sound very similar and can easily be confused with each other – The Council of Europe, The Council of the European Union and The European Council. The main difference is that The Council of Europe is not an EU Institution at all. It is an international organization in Strasbourg, whose 47 member states have signed up to the European Convention of human rights. It was set up to promote democracy, protect human rights and the rule of law in Europe. Even though it is not an EU body, all 28 EU member states are part of The Council of Europe. The European Council is an EU institution where EU leaders meet together with the President of the European Commission twice every six months to discuss the unions political priorities, whereas at The Council of the EU, national ministers from each EU country meet to adopt laws and coordinate policies. Since our focus is on the European Union the whole semester, it is important to know the difference between these similar terms.

Feedback:

• at all – register
• sentence starting with it
• conclusion   
•  as instead of since 

Draft 3 - Final Version 1

Regarding Europe and the EU there are three terms that sound very similar and can easily be confused with each other – The Council of Europe, The Council of the European Union and The European Council. The main difference is that The Council of Europe is not an EU Institution. It is an international organization in Strasbourg, whose 47 member states have signed up to the European Convention of human rights. The main reason why it was set up was to promote democracy, protect human rights and the rule of law in Europe. Even though it is not an EU body, all 28 EU member states are part of The Council of Europe. The European Council is an institution where EU leaders meet together with the President of the European Commission, four times a year, to discuss the unions political priorities, whereas at The Council of the EU, national ministers from each EU country meet to adopt laws and coordinate policies. As our focus is the whole semester on the European Union, it is important to know the difference between these similar terms.

  

Final version 2:

Regarding Europe and the EU there are three terms that sound very similar and can easily be confused with each other – The Council of Europe, The Council of the European Union and The European Council. The main difference is that The Council of Europe is not an EU institution. It is an international organization in Strasbourg, whose 47 member states have signed the European Convention on Human Rights. The main reason why it was established was to promote democracy, and protect human rights and the rule of law in Europe. Even though it is not an EU body, all 28 EU member states are part of The Council of Europe. The European Council is an institution where EU leaders meet together with the President of the European Commission, four times a year, to discuss the Union’s political priorities, whereas in The Council of the EU, national ministers from each EU country meet to adopt laws and coordinate policies. As our semester’s focus is on the European Union, it is important to know the difference between these similar terms.

 

MY TOP 5 EU-RELATED TOPICS

This week our task was to give an overview of five potential topics regarding the European Union. This should help us decide on a specific topic to write our academic paper about. Here you can read about my ideas: 

Why are the Danish people the happiest people in the EU?

I have recently visited Denmark where I learned that the Danes are the most satisfied nation within the EU, even though they have the highest tax rate.

Interpreters in the European Parliament

Since this topic probably affects some of us in the future, it would be interesting to know what languages are needed. What qualification in general you need to be allowed to work for the parliament?

Joining the EU – The Copenhagen Criteria

What is the Copenhagen Criteria? How can a country become a member of the EU? What criteria are necessary to join? Why do countries want to join?

Why did Sweden decide to keep its currency?

Sweden is one of the few countries which have a different currency than the other EU-members. Why do they still have Swedish Krona? Are they going to change that in the future?

Opt-outs in the EU

What does this term mean? Which states have such opt-outs? Are there different kinds? And what are the opt-outs about?

Those are my five ideas. Researching about my topics made me realize what an interesting organization the EU is and it made me become even more curious to learn more about the European Union.