- 7 hours ago
Great Continental Railway Journeys Season 9 Episode 6
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Short filmTranscript
00:01I'm embarking on a new series of railway journeys,
00:06exploring Europe's most beautiful and historic regions.
00:10Ooh, we're about to set off.
00:14From Belgium...
00:16Oh, I'm loving this.
00:21...to Hungary...
00:23This is amazing.
00:25...and the islands of Sardinia...
00:30Fantastic.
00:31...and Corsica.
00:33Ha-ha!
00:34I'll enjoy nature, history, culture and fun
00:38in some of Europe's most enchanting places.
00:44I am looking forward to a tremendous railway adventure.
01:11My journey begins at London's splendid St Pancras Station, from where I'm bound for Belgium.
01:20In just two and a half hours, we will thunder under the River Thames, ride high above the Medway,
01:28roar through the Channel Tunnel, bypass Lille in France and arrive in Brussels, the city of waffles, chips and chocolate.
01:40The Channel Tunnel opened in 1994.
01:44The passenger train operator Eurostar aims to carry 30 million passengers annually between Britain and the continent.
01:52Is that coffee? Yes.
02:04I always think it's a joy to eat on a train.
02:08A humble meal, but as you speed past the landscape, it somehow tastes better.
02:13And to wash it all down, an excellent Belgian lager.
02:24My first destination will be the capital, Brussels.
02:29I'll explore the low-lying landscape of the Flanders region and its North Sea coastline,
02:34before heading south through the rolling farmland and wooded hills of Wallonia.
02:40Using the dense rail network, I'll take in renowned cities and historic landmarks
02:45to explore a country rich in culture and contrasts.
02:57Unity makes strength is the motto of Belgium.
03:02But since that country tries to tie together the Flemish and French cultures and languages,
03:07on this journey, I'll be interested to see whether that's as much a wish as a maxim.
03:14Revolution brought about the independent constitutional monarchy of Belgium less than 200 years ago.
03:20I wonder how it was so quick to industrialise and to adopt railways,
03:26and why it colonised the heart of Africa.
03:29The Netherlands, France and Germany have all occupied Belgium,
03:34and the country has been smashed to pieces because of the rivalries between the great powers.
03:39Today, its capital hosts important international institutions,
03:44maybe in the hope that they could help to guarantee peace.
03:48After all, this flat country has had a very bumpy past.
04:06Bilingual Brussels is the political and commercial heart of Belgium,
04:10and one of the country's three federal regions.
04:15hosting the headquarters of the European Union,
04:18it's one of the most international cities in the world,
04:21with foreign nationals making up over 40% of the population.
04:28To explore the capital's colourful past, I start in its medieval centre.
04:36The magnificent Grand Place is a phoenix,
04:40and its history reflects the two cultures of Belgium,
04:43and also the country's vulnerability to attack.
04:47It was burnt down by King Louis XIV of France in 1695,
04:53and then rebuilt.
04:55And it was sacked during the French Revolution, and then restored.
05:00And when I first saw this, I was struck by the harmony of the architecture.
05:05In fact, it's highly varied.
05:07The town hall here is a wonderful example of Gothic architecture from the Middle Ages.
05:15But then the exuberant gold buildings.
05:19These are baroque guild halls of the companies of craftsmen.
05:25Together they are a kind of celebration of fine architecture that's absolutely uplifting.
05:33And that's why this is considered one of the most beautiful squares in the world.
05:40From the 16th century, Belgium, then known as the Southern Netherlands,
05:45was ruled in turn by Spain, Austria, and then France.
05:49In 1815, its population, many of whom were Catholic,
05:54became part of the United Kingdom of the Netherlands under the Protestant King William I.
06:00With rising unemployment and growing resentment towards the Dutch King,
06:05the scene was set for rebellion.
06:08Opera can stir political passions with its rousing music and lyrics.
06:14And government censors have often demanded changes to an opera plot,
06:19where it involved the assassination of a king, or a chorus of enslaved people,
06:23or a call to arms in the name of liberty.
06:26One of the most consequential performances took place here in Brussels,
06:31at the Royal Theatre of La Monet in 1830.
06:35And the political passion passed from the singers on the stage to the spectators,
06:40to the streets, and eventually engulfed the state.
06:48To discover how the dramatic events unfolded,
06:52I'm meeting historian Professor Marnix Bayan.
06:57Marnix, hello. I'm Michael.
06:59I'm Marnix. Pleased to meet you.
07:01Marnix, what was the mood in Belgium on the eve of this famous opera performance?
07:05There was already a combination, let's say, of, on the one hand,
07:10social unrest in the streets of Brussels among the proletarians,
07:14combined with this kind of political unrest that existed above all among the elites.
07:19What is it about the United Kingdom of the Netherlands that the elites object to?
07:24There had been a strong resistance against these kind of despotic rulers
07:31from Joseph II at the end of the Austrian period and then afterwards Napoleon.
07:36So people didn't want this kind of ruler again.
07:40William I wanted a Dutch nation, really, so there was his language policy,
07:45there was his religious policy.
07:47He underestimated how strong certain feelings of liberty were.
07:52What did Belgium people mean by liberty?
07:55Liberty of the Catholic Church, which has been suppressed.
07:57Liberty of the press, the liberty of speech,
07:59which they also found that William I suppressed.
08:05The French opera, La Mouette de Portici,
08:09had taken Paris by storm following its premiere in 1828.
08:14And its political message struck a chord in Brussels.
08:18It was an immensely popular opera,
08:21about a 17th century revolt in Naples against the Spanish king.
08:27There was a build-up towards it, there was an amazing amount of people,
08:31not only in the Opera Hall itself, but quite a lot of people that gathered outside.
08:35There was dissent about poverty and so on.
08:38The revolutionary nature of the opera itself was somehow spread first among the audience,
08:44and then spread also on the streets.
08:47Tell me about the particular aria that sparked the revolt.
08:51So the aria was called L'amour Sacré de la Patrie,
08:54The Sacred Love of the Fatherland.
08:56It sparked, of course, these patriotic feelings.
08:58Even the singer himself urged the audience to rebel.
09:05In this spectacular 19th century venue,
09:08opera singers Camille La Chérie and Denzil Dallard,
09:12accompanied by pianist Uri Bronchti,
09:15take us back to that historic performance.
09:18Think about the atmosphere that night.
09:20The space was crammed with people, rich people downstairs,
09:24proletarian people also sitting in the upper benches.
09:27People were expecting something.
09:29There was heat in the air.
09:59The sacred love of the country,
10:02pra laudasit la pierté.
10:05In my country, I have the way,
10:09a man and his heart wereいます.
10:11Pra laudasit la pierté,
10:15pra laudasit la pierté.
10:19Pra laudasit la pierté,
10:22pra laudasit la pierté,
10:25pra laudasit la pierté.
10:45So the revolt moves from the opera house into the streets.
10:48Describe the scene as the audience bursts out of the auditorium.
10:53They were singing and chanting and they were, of course, repeating the area,
10:57l'amour sacré de la patrie.
10:59Crowds were awaiting them also.
11:00Outside they knew what was happening inside.
11:03It became violent from the start.
11:05How long does the revolution last?
11:07How long does it take to change the regime?
11:10It takes a month between 25th of August and the 4th of October.
11:14Were many people killed in that period?
11:16So at the Dutch side, more than 700 soldiers killed.
11:20I think, I believe some 500 from the Belgian side, the people of the revolt.
11:25So it was really a violent clash that took place.
11:37A short walk away in Martyrs Square, over 400 people who lost their lives
11:43are buried in a crypt beneath the memorial to the victims of the revolution.
11:49It's a very impressive, a very substantial monument.
11:53Marnix, I'm slightly surprised that the Belgian people,
11:56having got rid of a king, William of the Netherlands,
12:00then decided to put in another king, Leopold I, who's a German.
12:04Yeah, might be a surprise indeed.
12:06And there were certainly more radical forces among the revolutionaries
12:09who would have wanted a republic.
12:12Leopold I was a well-connected and skilled diplomat.
12:16Uncle to both Queen Victoria and her husband, Prince Albert.
12:20He swore to uphold the new constitution.
12:23And he would reign successfully until his death more than 30 years later.
12:29It was an entirely different monarchy.
12:31It was a king who had to pledge his loyalty to the people.
12:36But I wonder whether 1830 has consequences for the Belgium of today.
12:41The Belgian revolution has had an enormous impact.
12:45One could say otherwise we wouldn't have had an independent Belgium.
12:48But it's also the kind of state that has been created.
12:51The one thing the founding fathers wanted to avoid
12:54was to have once again this kind of very strong ruler.
12:58They wanted to have a state in which as many liberties as possible
13:01were guaranteed.
13:04Today, Belgium's head of state is its seventh king, Philippe.
13:08There is a federal government, three community governments,
13:12one for each of those who speak French, Flemish or German,
13:15and three regional governments in Flanders, Brussels and Wallonia.
13:20There are forces that would say we want, let's say,
13:24Flanders to be connected to the Netherlands
13:26and Wallonia connected to France.
13:30But I think there are many things that are still behind us.
13:34There is in the first place the monarchy,
13:35the tradition of liberty, and then there is Brussels,
13:38this bilingual city of Brussels which no one will want to abandon.
13:54From the city centre, I'm heading two and a half miles south
13:57to the district of Saint-Gilles.
14:01The first horse-drawn tram line opened here in 1869,
14:05and trams remain part of the urban landscape.
14:19The fortunes of trams go up and down.
14:23After the Second World War, they were regarded in much of Europe
14:26as old-fashioned.
14:27Here in Brussels, they closed some lines,
14:30investing instead in buses and metros.
14:33But now light rail is very popular with politicians,
14:37and a big expansion of the Brussels system is promised for the future.
14:57This vibrant residential neighbourhood boasts some of the city's most notable buildings,
15:03and was once home to a creative pioneer.
15:08From the 1880s to the Great War, Art Nouveau was a new style that swept Europe.
15:16It affected art, the decorative arts, and architecture, and it blended all three.
15:23Those green-painted canopies that cover the entrances to metro stations in Paris
15:28perhaps most easily bring the style to mind.
15:31The iron is in sinuous curves inspired by nature,
15:35and it supports a roof of glass.
15:37And those structures are iconic of the city.
15:40But their architect was inspired by what he'd seen in Brussels.
15:48This is one of Europe's earliest Art Nouveau houses.
15:52It's now a museum.
15:54And my guide is curator Benjamin Surstrassen.
15:58Benjamin, hello.
15:59Hello.
16:00I'm Michael.
16:02What a magnificent house.
16:04Tell me about the architect.
16:05The architect is Victor Orta, a Belgian architect.
16:08And this is his house, built between 1898 and 1901.
16:12Wonderful.
16:13May we go inside?
16:15Yes, let's go to the dining room.
16:19Orta, the son of a luxury shoemaker, trained in Brussels,
16:22and became assistant to King Leopold II's architect, Alphonse Ballard.
16:28After setting up his own practice,
16:30he built four outstanding Art Nouveau houses in the city,
16:34including this one, his family home, with adjoining workshop.
16:39Oh, the dining room is an immense surprise, isn't it?
16:44With what appear to be tiles on the wall and metalwork.
16:47It's almost like an underground station, it's extraordinary.
16:51To use industrial material in a private house,
16:54and this idea of brick and steel on the wall,
16:58at that time it was much more original, new and unexpected.
17:02So he wasn't afraid, as it were, to show how things were made.
17:06Yes, the key word is sincerity.
17:09The idea that if you use a specific material,
17:11you have to keep it visible to show it,
17:14and not hide it to make it look different.
17:18Here you are a very interesting feature,
17:21which showed that at that time,
17:23they were very interested by what we call now new technology.
17:27You have here a phone,
17:28and you can call it a different room of the house.
17:32And the stable is also linked with electricity.
17:35It's a hot plate.
17:36Yeah, exactly.
17:37My goodness.
17:38Yeah.
17:39So it's important to remember that,
17:41although this seems historic to us,
17:42this was at the cutting edge of modernity.
17:45It was on the forefront of innovation,
17:48in terms of technology, in terms of architecture.
17:51We have a wonderful amount of glass here,
17:53letting the light in.
17:55Presumably this was important to alter.
17:57Yes, there's a big link with nature,
17:59to be away from the stress of the work of the city,
18:02and to let your mind go.
18:07With its gently curving ironwork and decorative motifs,
18:12the grand staircase is one of the highlights of the house.
18:17This is superb.
18:20Yes, the idea of this staircase is to attract as much light as possible.
18:25And the details, the decor is beautiful everywhere.
18:28There is a big vocabulary of ornamentation.
18:31A butterfly, a dragonfly.
18:33It was such a sweeping movement, Art Nouveau, wasn't it?
18:36Yeah, it begins here in Brussels, and it goes everywhere.
18:40You have Art Nouveau in Buenos Aires, you have Art Nouveau in Tokyo.
18:43So it's one of the first international movements, fashion movements.
18:49Art Nouveau's house has been a museum since the late 1960s.
18:54But in 2006, it reopened following a major renovation
18:58of its original features and details.
19:02Victor Orta thought of every important creature comfort.
19:07Here I am in a gentleman's bedroom,
19:10and every need is catered for.
19:17Voila.
19:19Tasked with the huge restoration project was architect Barbara van der Wey,
19:24a specialist in heritage conservation.
19:27Barbara, hello. What a pleasure.
19:29Michael. Nice to meet you.
19:31And this is a lovely model.
19:32Mm-hm.
19:33So I understand that Orta bought two houses.
19:36Yes.
19:39One that he lived in and one that he worked in.
19:41And we are here, actually.
19:43At the ground level of his office.
19:46And you have been responsible for the restoration.
19:48Mm-hm.
19:48What were the challenges?
19:50The house was in a very bad state.
19:52It was split up and sold to different owners.
19:55And we thought, it's a house museum.
19:57We want to show how he lived and how he worked.
20:01Tell me a little bit, as an architect, what is it you admire about him?
20:04Art Nouveau architects were working on the two dimensions.
20:08Orta worked on three dimensions.
20:10Normally, the middle spaces of this kind of houses were dark.
20:15He brought the staircase into his living space.
20:18And he brought daylight from above.
20:20Many people might think that Art Nouveau was French.
20:24Are you very keen to assert its Belgian origins?
20:29Well, you look at history and the dates.
20:31I think Horta in 93 was really built already the first interesting house.
20:36The Hotel Tassel and space and light and the decoration.
20:41He had his own language.
20:42So, we think he really was in Belgium the first and also in Europe.
20:46We're proud of him, of course.
20:54From the south of the city, I'm travelling six miles to the district of Haran,
20:59in its far northeast, on one of the 19 tram lines out to the suburbs.
21:14For the capital of a small country,
21:17Brussels occupies an impressive place on the world stage.
21:21It hosts 38 European Union organisations
21:24and other major international institutions,
21:28including the military and political alliance, NATO.
21:32Between 1995 and 1997,
21:35I was the Defence Secretary of the United Kingdom.
21:38And one of my pleasurable duties was to come to meetings of ministers
21:42of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation
21:45at this building in Brussels.
21:48NATO was set up after the Second World War,
21:51an alliance between the United States, Canada
21:53and most of the European nations that weren't under Soviet control.
22:00The Soviet Union collapsed in 1991
22:02and the Eastern European countries were set free.
22:06And seeking security, they clabbered to become members of NATO.
22:12Based first in London and then Paris,
22:15its headquarters has been in Brussels since 1967.
22:19A new home and a new era for NATO's headquarters,
22:22dedicated formally with full military honours.
22:26Membership has grown from 12 to 32 countries.
22:30And in 2018, a new, larger headquarters was opened across the road
22:35to accommodate a staff of over 4,000.
22:43It has marked its 75th year.
22:46And I'm meeting the Assistant Secretary General for Defence Policy and Planning,
22:51Angus Lapsley.
22:52Angus, hello.
22:53Hello, Michael.
22:54Welcome to NATO.
22:55It's great to see you in a new building since my day.
22:59So, an organisation that is more than 70 years old.
23:03European governments are being told they must spend more on their defence.
23:07A question mark has been placed over the United States' participation in NATO.
23:12And, of course, the threat from Russia in Ukraine and possibly more broadly.
23:16These have been interesting years, haven't they?
23:18They have.
23:19They've also been quite exciting years for NATO as an alliance
23:22because Europeans are now starting to step up.
23:25We are now spending an average of 2% of our GDP on defence.
23:28The Americans are more engaged, actually, in deterrence and defence here in the continent
23:34than they have been at any point in the last 30 years.
23:36In my day, I don't think we use the word cyber very much.
23:41But, you know, is NATO now addressed to the modern sorts of threat?
23:47Has NATO managed to stay up to date?
23:49We're trying.
23:50And it's a constant struggle.
23:52But, yes, for example, you know, we now acknowledge that an attack on us in cyberspace,
23:57or indeed in space, could be one of the things that could trigger what we call Article 5,
24:02when we're going to have to defend ourselves.
24:04It's not just about tanks or ships or planes anymore.
24:07What's your daily work, Angus?
24:08Talking to governments all over Europe.
24:11I get really deep and high-quality military advice from our Supreme Allied Commander, General Cavoli.
24:17My job is then to help politicians, civil servants, parliamentarians, translate that into action.
24:22And is Brussels a good place to have NATO?
24:25I think it's a great place to have NATO, actually.
24:27I mean, it's incredibly well-connected.
24:29It's really close to London, Paris, Germany, the Netherlands.
24:33It's a very cosmopolitan place.
24:35It's become one of the world's centres of government.
24:38Over the decades, the organisation has built up an extensive archive of its key moments in post-war political and
24:45military history.
24:47Public Disclosure Officer Nick Nguyen is in charge of the collection,
24:52which includes a recreation of the Director General's office as it was in 1960.
25:00I'd like to invite you to sit in this very special chair.
25:03Well, thank you.
25:05I feel very, very honoured indeed.
25:09Tell me about the foundation of the Alliance.
25:12Go all the way back to the beginning.
25:13So, on April 4th, 1949, the North Atlantic Treaty is signed in Washington, D.C.,
25:18under the leadership of President Harry S. Truman.
25:21Ten European countries and two North American countries decided to come together to basically form a defensive alliance.
25:29Article 5, the key article, is about collective defence.
25:32An attack against one is an attack against all.
25:35It was mainly meant, especially at the end of the Cold War,
25:38to guarantee that should the Soviet Union do something crazy,
25:41that our North American allies would come over and help.
25:45And you have prepared me here some lovely documents.
25:50This one, for example, an original. Tell me about that.
25:54This is one of our most important documents.
25:56Immediately following the signing of the treaty,
25:59it was decided that there should be a supreme military allied commander
26:03to basically take charge of the European armies on European soil.
26:09And so there was only one general that all of these countries could agree on,
26:14known for D-Day, the Normandy landings, the Second World War.
26:18It was General Dwight D. Eisenhower.
26:20And amongst the signatories, Ernest Bevan.
26:22That's right.
26:23Who was our Foreign Secretary.
26:25That's right.
26:26Here we have a handsome gavel, presented to the North Atlantic Council by Lord Ismay,
26:35Secretary General 1952 to 1957.
26:38The British had the first Secretary General, did they?
26:40They did. One of Churchill's confidants.
26:44Remarkable man.
26:45And this was his farewell gift to NATO.
26:47And there you can kind of see the NATO star.
26:49Of course.
26:51The period that's of great interest to me, because I was there for part of it,
26:55is when the East Europeans, liberated from the Soviet Union, begin to express an interest in membership.
27:01Absolutely.
27:02And here is a memo written by our Secretary General at the time, Manfred Werner,
27:06to President Lech Wałęsa, addressing Wałęsa's interest in membership for Poland into the alliance.
27:14It's dated 1993.
27:16Six years later, in 1999, Poland becomes one of the first members to join NATO from the Eastern Bloc.
27:30A never-to-be-forgotten night at the opera led to a country called Belgium.
27:36And ever since then, Belgians who speak French and those who speak Dutch have been debating whether the country should
27:43exist at all.
27:44And you might think that that would undermine the capital Brussels, but not at all.
27:49It has the magnificent Grand Plus.
27:52It has stunning buildings by Victor Orta as the city that hosts the European Union and NATO.
27:59It is a headquarters for international organisations.
28:04If Belgium is insecure, Brussels is self-confident.
28:14Next time, a bit more power.
28:17Oh, I'm loving this.
28:20Coasting along.
28:21Doing great.
28:22Born Talon.
28:26It's a round cut diamond.
28:28That's very exquisite.
28:30This one has 57 facets.
28:32I can see very clearly the many cuts.
28:37Peter, a moment of great theatricality as the curtains open to reveal the great masterpiece.
28:43That is why we are the one who wants to put all Americans.
28:59You can see more in the middle of the sea.
28:59To go behind.
29:06You can see more in the dark and global peace.
29:07You can see less on the wall.
29:07You can see more in the dark and blue.
29:07You can see more in the dark and blue.
29:13You
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