HCA NEWS Interactive Hans Christian Andersen Room in Egypt

Denmark presented the World Library in Alexandria with an interactive Hans Christian Andersen room in connection with the official re-opening of the world's eighth wonder

By Mikkel Stjernberg - H.C. Andersen 2005 - 21 October 2002

As one half of Denmark's gift to the World Library in Alexandria, Danish trumpeter and composer Palle Mikkelborg took the stage at the opening ceremony in Alexandria to perform his work for the occasion, To Read Is To Dream, on 19 October 2002.

As the other half of its donation, Denmark presented an interactive Hans Christian Andersen room to the library.  Egypt's President Hosni Mubarak received the gift with great enthusiasm. The room will be completed in connection with the celebration of Hans Christian Andersen's 200th birthday in the year 2005 and the Hans Christian Andersen 2005 Secretariat was represented at the presentation, along with other representatives from Denmark.

"The original library in Alexandria was a melting pot of ideas, concepts and inspiration from ancient civilizations.  Now, Egypt and pretty much the entire world will try to re-establish the same powerhouse of knowledge and learning for the future. It is a beautiful and necessary idea, but it is especially important to remember to bring children and young people along in the process.  Without them, there is no future and that is exactly why Hans Christian Andersen belongs in a place like the World Library in Alexandria.  No one can speak more relevantly, directly or honestly to children than Hans Christian Andersen," says the secretary general for Hans Christian Andersen 2005, Lars Seeberg.

The interactive Hans Christian Andersen room will be a multimedia cocktail of modern information technology and Denmark's collective resources on Hans Christian Andersen to be used for educational purposes, among other things. In addition, a completely new translation into Arabic of a number of Hans Christian Andersen's works is now underway. It, too, will be finished by the jubilee year of 2005 and will become a permanent fixture of the Hans Christian Andersen room.

"It is the collaboration of Montana, the Bikuben Foundation, ScanCom, Have PR and the Danish Secretariat for International Cultural Relations that has ensured Denmark's representation in Egypt and we are proud to have been able to participate in the opening of the library," says the head of the Danish Secretariat for International Cultural Relations, Niels Halm.


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