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| Shanghai honours Albert Einstein |
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Bronze bust of Nobel prize winner handed over to
the city / Franco-German partnership makes monument
possible on Shanghai’s most important promenade /
Former Chancellor of Germany, Gerhard Schröder,
presents 10,000 euro donation to orphanage in
Shanghai
Shanghai, 5 June 2008 ,Shanghai, the bustling
Chinese seaport home to millions, is honouring
Jewish Nobel prize winner Albert Einstein in its own
very special way. At a ceremony held on the city’s
most popular promenade, the Bund, the city council
today officially handed over a bronze bust of the
outstanding scientist and pacifist to the people of
Shanghai. The mayor of Shanghai also took the
opportunity to recall the time when Albert Einstein
visited Shanghai 86 years ago in November 1922.
Einstein left Marseille on 7 October 1922,
accompanied by his wife, to hold a series of
lectures in Asia. While on the ship, he received
news on 11 November that he would be awarded the
Nobel Prize for Physics retroactively for 1921.
Einstein made a port of call in Shanghai on 13
November to an enthusiastic reception in the Jewish
quarter of the seaport. It was here that the Swedish
consulate reiterated that he had officially been
awarded the prize. The Einsteins spent the night in
the exclusive Hotel Astor before moving on to Japan
the following day.
“In visiting Shanghai in 1922, Albert Einstein
forged a special link between Europe and China which
we have not forgotten and which we shall continue to
foster in the future,” said the Mayor of Shanghai.
He thanked everyone who had been involved in
erecting the bronze bust, in particular Dr. Norbert
Egger, the long-time mayor of the city of Mannheim
who approached the city council with the idea for
the monument, Jean-François Decaux, the CEO of
outdoor advertising company JCDecaux, who, as
sponsor, made the monument at all possible, and
former Chancellor of Germany, Gerhard Schröder,
whose presence underlined the importance of the
ceremony.
In his speech, former Chancellor Gerhard Schröder
paid tribute to Albert Einstein as an outstanding
scientist of the 20th century and a person who was
respected throughout the world for his vigorous
campaign for peace and humanism.
The bronze bust of Albert Einstein will initially be
displayed near Shanghai’s main promenade, the Bund.
Once work on giving the Bund a facelift is
completed, the monument will be returned to this
most prominent of places in the multi-million city
in time for the opening of the World Expo in 2010.
The bust is six metres high and was designed and
sculptured by Tang Shichu, one of China’s leading
sculptors.
During the ceremonial event, outdoor advertising
company JCDecaux presented former German Chancellor
Gerhard Schröder with a cheque for 10,000 euros
which the former Chancellor donated to an orphanage
in Shanghai. Following the inaugural ceremony, the
guests of honour proceeded to the orphanage where
they were given an enthusiastic reception and
Gerhard Schröder personally handed over the donation
to the orphanage.
Dr. Norbert Egger was the long-standing mayor of the
city of Mannheim before going into retirement in
2005. He is a freeman of Qingdao (7.3 million
inhabitants) and Zhenjiang (2.7 million
inhabitants).
Jean-François Decaux runs the Paris-based outdoor
advertising company JCDecaux. The company is the
largest outdoor advertiser in China and in Shanghai
in particular. Here, JCDecaux services, among
others, the underground system as well as both of
Shanghai’s international airports. With sales
exceeding 2 billion euros, JCDecaux is the world’s
largest street furniture company, the worldwide
leader in Transport advertising and Europe’s leading
outdoor advertising specialist and by far the
largest supplier of bicycle hire systems.
In Germany, JCDecaux has been a cutting-edge outdoor
advertising specialist for over 25 years. The
company operates in more than half of all German
cities with 500,000 plus inhabitants, including
Hamburg, Cologne, Munich, Stuttgart and Leipzig, and
also in cities such as Mannheim, Saarbrücken and
Rostock. JCDecaux is also represented in Berlin,
Düsseldorf and Dortmund as a result of its minority
shareholding in Wall AG. The world leader in airport
advertising, JCDecaux runs the entire advertising
portfolio at Frankfurt Airport in partnership with
Fraport.
Shanghai is a special economic zone under the direct
guidance of the central government and twinned with
the Free and Hanseatic City of Hamburg as well as
Marseille among others. As twinned cities, Hamburg
and Marseille will be celebrating their 50th
anniversary between June and October 2008. Hamburg
and Shanghai have been twinned since 1986. The 1920s
saw the emergence, in the sprawling seaport of
Shanghai, of a lively Jewish community which offered
refuge for many European Jews from the Holocaust. In
the 1920s to 1940s, the Jewish community was a key
driving force behind the internationalisation of the
seaport. | |
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