An official ceremony before setting sails

The departure of Fleur de Passion for the Red Sea was the subject of a series of events organised in Seville at the end of April. The Andalusian city was chosen for the various symbols it holds: it was from there that the Swiss sailing ship set off in 2015 on a four-year round-the-world voyage in the wake of Magellan, and it was also there that she completed this long-distance adventure in September 2019.

It is also from Seville that the Three Cultures of the Mediterranean Foundation maintains and promotes the legacy of an era of dialogue and peaceful coexistence. This is what the Transnational Red Sea Center intends to promote in its activities in the coming years.

The symbolic departure of the ship from Seville was reflected in the first official event organised at the invitation of the Swiss Embassy for Spain and Andorra on the « Muelle de las Delicias » (The Quay of Delights). Under a magnificently clear sky and with the boat anchored in the background on the Guadalquivir river, it took place in the presence of the highest authorities of the City of Seville and the Autonomous Region of Andalusia.

In the afternoon, in the spectacular setting of the House of Three Cultures, the former pavilion of the Kingdom of Morocco at the 1992 Universal Exhibition, Prof. Anders Meibom of the EPFL, director of the TRSC, gave a lecture on the coral reef issues of the Red Sea and the missions of the Centre. As a symbol within the symbol, a quatuor of young musicians from the Barenboim-Said Foundation delighted the attendees with moving musical interludes.

From Switzerland, the country of four (official) cultures, to the Red Sea, a region also rich of many cultures, to Seville and its heritage of those three cultures, the spirit that drives the Transnational Red Sea Center to link science, diplomacy and culture could not be more clearly shared.

Read the press release in English, French and Spanish, and download the press kit, pictures and videos free of rights on https://trsc.org/en/#media

Listen to the conference of Prof Anders Meibom at the Foundation of the Three Cultures of the Mediterranean.