Ernst and Hildy Beyeler, from catalogue of 2007-08 hommage at the Beyeler Foundatio
Basel, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Ernst Beyeler, one of Europe’s major art collectors for over 50 years and a co-founder of Art Basel, has died at the age of 88 in Basel. He and his wife Hildy, who died in 2008, gave some 200 works of art to a foundation named after them, in 1982.
Beyeler began his career in 1945 when he bought an antiques shop, which grew into the Beyeler Gallerie. His first art show was in 1947.
The Beyeler Foundation was given a new home in Riehen, near the city of Basel, in 1997, becoming one of Switzerland’s best-known art museums, with well over 300,000 visitors a year, half of whom are international visitors.
Federer and UBS’s Ospel were probably not playing the same tune
Basel: peaceful on Sunday, before Fasnacht begins
Basel's Fasnacht: leave your car at home!
Update 25 February 09:30 (video clip) Basel, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – The people of Basel will have sore feet by the early hours of Thursday 25 February, as Fasnacht moves into its final drumbeats after three days of incessant marching and parade-watching.
If you’ve read Swiss newspapers you could be forgiven for thinking that the guests of honour were Libyan leader Muammar Qadaffi and former Swiss President Hans-Rudolf Merz. They were indeed present, but only in effigy, dozens and dozens of versions of each of them. Uncle Sam, who looked like an IRS (US tax authority) employee saying “I want YOU!” also showed up several times during the parades and in city bars.
More intriguing, however, were the rumours flying thick that one of the pipers behind a mask was Marcel Ospel, former boss of banking giant UBS and a citizen of Basel. “He never gave back his bonus!” the word went round. But should the piper pay the piper? Ospel apparently thought not.
Getting Qadaffi and Merz in place for the parade, Basel Fasnacht
Basel's streets fill with piccolo players practising on Sunday, before Fasncht begins
If he was behind a mask he was one of thousands, and there was no danger of it being pulled off in this festival with no written rules, but an unspoken list of do’s and don’ts. Masks stay on.
Another giant question mark hanging over the crowd was the possible presence Roger Federer. The tennis star had said that he would not be participating in the Dubai tournament because of a lung infection, that he would be taking a little time off. Where better to do that than in hometown Basel during its famous Fasnacht, the city whispered loudly.
For loud it is in Basel during Fasnacht, surely one of Europe’s most spectacular shows and all the more endearing to visitors because it is not put on for tourists.
The parade route is 7km long, but the city’s population joins in so enthusiastically that there are 14km of people. “It poses a few organizational problems,” says Fasnacht Comite President Felix Rudolf von Rohr, a former politician, ruefully.
The way money really works in Basel
Photo: a band practises in a side street before the Monday afternoon parade
Basel, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - Fasnacht, Switzerland’s largest carnival celebration, started at 04:00 Monday 21 February. The usual loud “Ooooo” of the crowd as the city’s lights went out was promptly followed by the daunting sound of pipers and drummers from 500 groups, and the eery light of the traditional “lanterns” carried on marchers’ heads. GenevaLunch brings you a feature story later Tuesday on this satirical event that involves 10,000 people every year for three days, marching in the streets and partying but most of all using it as a means to make fun of themselves and the world.
Carneval march in Miege, canton Valais, February 2009
Lucern, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Carnaval, a festive time before the sombre period of Lent, called Fasnacht in most Swiss German-speaking areas, kicked off early Thursday morning in Lucern and Soleure, with marches and music in the streets. Swiss cantons and villages celebrate their carnivals at different times around the start of Lent, the period leading up to Easter. The Catholic cantons generally start earlier and end before Lent, on Ash Wednesday, 17 February this year.
Canton Valais’s Carnaval begins tomorrow, Friday 12 February. Festivities continue until 17 February, although some of the German-speaking areas celebrated early.
The most famous of the Protestant cantons’ carnivals are in Basel, 21-23 February and Bern, 18-20. Bern’s fete is relatively young, started only in 1982, but it’s a colourful event.
Links to: Valais dates, Basel Fasnacht (Ger) and city tourism office in English, Bern Fasnacht (Ger)
View from Neuchatel-Chaux de Fonds train Tuesday late afternoon: icy roads, plenty of snow
Neuchatel, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – A 67-year-old man and the conductor plus 97 passengers of a TGV traveling between Bern and Paris were happily unhurt when the man’s car, stranded on a TGV line near Bayards, canton Neuchatel, was hit by the train. The accident occurred Tuesday evening 9 February at 20:35, say police. Train service on the line was re-established only at 17:30 Wednesday evening. Travelers scheduled to take the TGV via Neuchatel were shunted to Basel and Lausanne for other trains.
The man had lost control of his car, which skidded onto the rails and was stuck there.
Roche head office, Basel
Basel, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Pharmaceutical multinational Roche says its turnover fell by 22 percent in 2009 compared to 2008 due to charges linked to its purchase of US company Genentech. Operating profits rose by 14 percent before the exceptional charges, however, and the company had record sales, up 10 percent to CHF49.1 billion.
Image 2010: Bakbasel
Basel, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Lech in Austria and Lucerne in Switzerland were the two most popular seasonal tourist destinations in the Alpine region in 2009: Lech in winter and Lucerne in summer. Switzerland has three destinations among the overall top 10 for the year: Lucerne, Zurich and Engelberg. But a report published 21 January on tourism in the region shows Austrian resorts well ahead of Swiss ones as popular winter resorts, taking the first seven places, with Zermatt in eighth. Zermatt gains ground as a year-round destination because it is also popular in summer.
Endocrinologist finds key to predicting impact of stress on stroke, pneumonia patients
Dr Mirjam Christ-Crain, 2009 Latsis Prize winner
Bern, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – One of Switzerland’s most prestigious scientific awards, the Latsis Prize, was awarded to Dr Mirjam Christ-Crain in Bern 14 January. The award, worth CH100,000 is given annually to Switzerland’s most outstanding young researcher, selected by a panel of the Swiss National Science Foundation. The winner must be under the age of 40.
Christ-Crain is head of endocrinology at the Basel University Hospital. She was given the prize for her work in discovering that measuring stress hormones levels, such as cortisol, in a pneumonia or stroke patient’s blood can provide doctors with information that allows them to make treatment decisions. Both illnesses can either remain benign or turn deadly, but there are few clinical clues for doctors to make a prognosis and treat the patient accordingly.
New rules from Basel for banks worldwide
Basel, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - Central bank governors, meeting in Basel Sunday 10 January, “welcome the substantial progress” made by the Basel Committees on Banking Supervision (BCBS), they said in a press release issued Monday. The group has charged the BCBS to come up with details rules, a set of tougher standards for banks, by the end of 2010, in response to the global banking crisis of 2008-2009. The standards would affect banks worldwide.
The new regulations were outlined in a report by the Committee in mid-December 2009.
The Swiss postal service, La Poste, begins issuing the new Basel Carnival commemorative stamp 5 January. You can order them online, in English. Great for collectors, or even as easy gifts for non-philatelists: these are particularly charming stamps. Background story on GenevaLunch
Basel Carnival collector's postage stamps
Bern, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – The Swiss postal service will start selling its newest commemorative stamps, for the famed Basel Carnival (Fasnacht), 5 January to collectors and 12 January in post offices. The one-franc (regular letter price) stamps may be used starting 12 January.
The three stamps commemorate the centennary of the organizing committee that is at the heart of the three-day pre-Lenten festival, but La Poste points out that Basel’s Carnival itself dates back to the 14th century. The stamps show typical costumes and the heart of the party, the city’s Spalentor, town hall and the cathedral. Basel artist Andreas Daniel Vetsch created them.
The festival in 2010 takes place from 22-24 February.
Links to other sites: Basel Carnival (Ger), Basel tourism office, Swiss post office philately page (Ed. note: the new stamps are not yet listed on the English pages)
Basel, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – The CEO of Geothermal Explorers, the company that was drilling as part of a Basel geothermal energy project called Deep Heat, has been cleared of wrongdoing by a court in the city. Charges were brought against Markus Haering after the company’s drilling appeared to provoke earthquakes in Basel in 2006 and early 2007.
Basel, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – More stringent rules for banks, designed to strengthen individual institutions as well as the financial system as a whole, are recommended by the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision in its latest consultative proposals published 17 December. Banks will need to increase their capital base, introduce more stringent risk controls and limit much unsecured business if proposed new rules are adopted in three years. The proposals suggest:
The AltaRock Energy project in California, north of San Francisco, to drill deep into the Earth’s bedrock and use the heat released as a renewable energy source, was abandoned Friday 11 December. The project has been seen as a key part of the Obama administration’s efforts to find alternative energy supplies. The move comes just a day after Switzerland’s geothermal project in Basel was shut down permanently, following earthquakes at the site in 2006 and early 2007.
Links to other sites: Alta Rock, New York Times
Basel's Deep Heat project, December 2006
Update 11:35 Basel, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - Basel’s innovative geothermal energy project made world headlines when it was begun in 2001, but the city suffered a series of tremors in December 2006 that prompted fears the deep drilling may have triggered the earthquakes. The Deep Heat Mining project, designed to pull energy from the deep bedrock, was closed temporarily in early 2007, but Thursday 11 December canton Basel City officials announced that the project has officially closed.
The head of the Geothermal Explorers next week faces charges in Basel, and 20 Minutes reports that there is widespread surprise in the region that he is the only person who will have to answer criminal charges and that no cantonal or city officials have been charged in the affair.
Insurance claims against the project came to CHF9 million, reports swissinfo, but the project has ended, the official report published Thursday notes, because risk analyses have suggested further drilling could set off more earthquakes.
Basel, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - Carl Hirschmann, Zurich club owner and scion of the owners of Basel-based Jet Aviation, has been sentenced to a fine and court costs in Basel, and ordered to undergo therapy. Hirschmann was found guilty 2 December of slapping a young woman at a Basel nightclub and of hitting her boyfriend in the face and breaking his nose.
Hirschmann made headlines in October when he was arrested in broad daylight in Zurich and detained for three days, and accused of indecent assault.
Philipp Hildebrand, SNB
Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – The incoming head of the Swiss National Bank, Philipp Hildebrand, says Switzerland needs tighter banking regulations than most countries, due to its size relative to the country’s economy. Total banking assets exceed seven times Switzerland’s GDP, he notes, and they are very concentrated, with the two big banks, Credit Suisse and UBS, having two-thirds of the total.
Recovery may be underway but the costs to the global economy, longer term, loom large. “The potential costs of the support measures taken – capital injection, asset purchases, and guarantees of bank debt – in the G7 countries together with Australia, the Netherlands, Spain and Switzerland amount to about 20 percent of GDP in these economies,” he says, although actual outlays have been about 8 percent.
Hildebrand, who takes over as SNB chairman in January 2010 when Jean-Pierre Roth retires, made his remarks in a speech Wednesday evening 18 November at the University of Geneva.
The SNB is focusing on two areas of bank regulation changes, in line with recommendations drawn up by the Financial Stability Board (FSB) The FSB was created in April 2009 and is housed at the Bank for International Settlements in Basel, Switzerland.
Etas project in Zimbabwe: the Roger Federer Foundation is spending some CHF80,000 a year on the project to improve the infrastructure of 8 schools, as well as investing in teacher training and the quality of education for about 2,000 children in the Matopo region.
Basel and Zurich, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Roger Federer has signed a 10-year contract with Swiss bank Credit Suisse, for an undisclosed sum, the bank announced Monday 16 November. Federer, on his web site, notes that “As part of the partnership agreement, Credit Suisse will make a significant annual contribution to the Roger Federer Foundation, which is dedicated to helping disadvantaged children and to promoting education, sports and play, particularly in Africa.” The foundation was inspired by Federer’s South African mother and currently states on its web site that its capital is CHF4 million.
The bank’s CEO, Brady Dougan, did not stint in his enthusiastic praise of the Swiss tennis star:
Basel, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - Roger Federer missed out on the chance to win his fourth successive title at his Swiss hometown tournament. He played without his customary power and precision to let Novak Djokovic take the title.
Basel, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - World number one Roger Federer eased past his fellow Basel player Marco Chiudinelli (ATP rank, 73) after a difficult first set in the semi-finals of the Basel tournament. He won 7-6 (9-7) 6-3 against his much improved friend.
Only by prescription in South Korea © 2009 F. Hoffmann-La Roche Ltd
Basel, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Swiss drug giant Roche confirmed Friday, 6 November, it was under investigation by the South Korean Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for illegally helping British bank HSBC and other companies in South Korea to acquire the drug tamiflu. The FDA raided the local offices of Roche 4 November and seized documents and computer files. It is illegal to purchase tamiflu in South Korea without a medical prescription.
Basel, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - Roger Federer and long-time friend from Basel Marco Chiudinelli teamed up against Pakistani A.H. Qureshi and American James Cerritani 3 November in the first round of the ATP doubles match in Basel, and lost 4-6, 3-6. Both can now concentrate on their singles game.
Link to other site: Rogerfederer.com
Basel, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Roger Federer’s return to tennis Monday 2 November after time off for family gave him a smooth win over Olivier Rochus 6-3, 6-3, in a match that lasted 66 minutes. Federer had 12 aces in the match that showed him in top form.
Photo: Seco
Basel / Bern, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - The Swiss economy remains relatively steady, but with Credit Suisse’s Swiss manufacturing index dropping slightly and the forecast for tourism showing lower but stable figures in coming months. The manufacturing figures “still [show] however that the Alpine economy is leaving the deep recession behind,” reports news agency Reuters. The tourism forecast is gloomier and follows publication of figures by BakBasel, an economic research institute, showing that tourism from November 2008 to October 2009 was the second lowest since the end of the second world war: only 1995 was lower.
Then they grow up and become rowdies
St. Gallen and Zurich, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Hooligans disrupted trains between Zurich and Basel Wednesday night 28 October after the FC Zurich-FC Basel match in Zurich. Police had to use rubber pellets and pepper spray to try to subdue the rowdies who occupied the Altstetten train station railway tracks, causing transport chaos until just after midnight. A police officer was injured by kicks to the head. The match ended drawn 2-2.
