Brexit Tour - 10 Years later - How did UK change?

Your host is a Brit, Eugene Quinn - and somebody astonished at the stupidity of Britain leaving the European Union.

This walk looks at the productive cultural dialogue between Great Britain and Vienna - in both directions - which may get lost in the future, with Brexit.

We will hear some lovely songs from the island, including Led Zep, Kate Bush and Streets.

Brexit is one of the key developments of the last few years. No other country has ever left the European Union, and so there is so much research on Britain and its disengagement from the trade, travel, political and cultural commitments it has had with Brussels.

As a passionate European, but also a Brit, Whoosh co-founder Eugene Quinn has a special interest in this subject. What happens next will affect him and millions of others - Europeans living in UK and British people who live across the Union. He finds that Brits make the mistake of viewing Europe as an economic project, ignoring the cultural, health, peace, sport, arts, education, travel and dialogue dynamics of contemporary European Union relations.

To mark this bizarre tenth year anniversary, Eugene invites you to visit British art and architecture, look at pubs, football, media and some people from the island who have made a new life in Central Europe.

It's also interesting to explore how Austria has influenced the UK, with good music, art, philosophy and ideas (hallo Popper, Wittgenstein, Toni Spira...). Also food, refugees, and the Freud family legacy.

The most visible British exports are pop music and the English language. FM4 employs 14 British moderators and DJs. Films like The Third Man present an outsiders' view of Vienna, and helped to romanticise this city in the USA. Here is a useful summary of what the film says to the Anglosphere about Vienna: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-iidNmjeKMs

We will discuss how the EU changes without any influence from London. Global players like Banksy, Adele and Neil Gaiman help to present a certain kind of youthful cool. Which country will step up to take the place of these iconic figures?

Humour is a notable British export. Which other EU nation can provide the clowny behaviour we see in so many photos of Boris Johnson? Here is a quick reminder that we Brits can turn anything into a joke, including leaving Europe (for those of you unfamiliar with the diversity of British-English, comedian John Oliver comes from Birmingham, in west England, but broadcasts for the American channel HBO):

The UK has been responsible for much innovation with global consequences, from the industrial revolution and trains, Parliamentary democracy and electricity, to telephones and the internet. And we somehow produced the language which all the world communicates with, and indeed the biggest - and most trusted - media brand in the world., the British Broadcasting Corporation. Will Europe miss that? Or does the EU have a brighter, more unified future without those irritating British, refusing to join in with the Brussels party? Schauma mal.

There was an extra event, on Brexit Night (31 January, 2020), where Eugene was DJ. only playing cool British music in a pub (Tube Station in Landstrasse), to remind people that some Uk culture will survive the disruption, hopefully. That was free, from 5pm-midnight - when Eugene abruptly turned off all sound, to mark the moment. APA, ZiB, Die Presse, FM4 Morningshow, Servus & Oe1 reported. We played Portishead, Rolling Stones & Little Simz/Obongjayar

Walk language: English (of course - most Brits speak only one language and this is part of the problem in terms of a lack of understanding of the Euro perspective). And yes, if you are a teacher, you can also arrange this walk for your students, as an open-air English lesson.

*In UK people laugh at other people's jokes, & in Austria, people laugh at their own jokes.*

The walk will end in a pub, of course.

This walk is part of a series of events celebrating Vienna as a progressive, liberal city:

Human Rights & the City tour

#HowtobeAustrian short films on integration, from migrants.

Music Safari

Austrians attempt to pass the Austrian Citizenship Test

UNHCR Tag der Flucht tour to Macondo refugee camp and the Jewish part of Zentralfriedhof