The Day of the Mediterranean is the annual commemoration of the foundation of the Barcelona Process on 28 November 1995, the aim of which is to strengthen relations between Europe and the Southern Mediterranean countries. The Barcelona Process led to the creation of the Union for the Mediterranean (UfM) in 2008, which celebrates its 15th anniversary this year, as does the Euro-Mediterranean University (EMUNI).
In November 2020, 28 November was declared the official Day of the Mediterranean, and calls upon the entire Mediterranean community and everyone who identifies with the Mediterranean to celebrate. The first Day of the Mediterranean was celebrated on 28 of November 2021, with over 75 activities in 18 Euro-Mediterranean countries.
This year´s Day of the Mediterranean 2023 – Find the Mediterranean in your City – is about capturing a slice of the Mediterranean in the most unexpected places, whether it be people, architecture or cuisine.
For 2023, EMUNI decided to ask all its students past and present, Euro-Mediterranean Innovation Camp (EMIC) candidates, and General Assembly members in its network to submit photos on this year´s theme to its Communications Department, which then presented the whole EMUNI team with a series of anonymised photos. 15 were then selected to be mounted on a special anniversary collage: ´15 Years, 15 Photos.´
At EMUNI, we hope the photos have captured the spirit of the Mediterranean and its diversity, which is so important to retain and commemorate, especially now during the hardest moment for the region with conflict and natural disasters that have occurred this year.
The collage features photographs from EMIC Season 1 workshop finalist Khaier Eddine Bourguiba from the Virtual University of Tunis in Tunisia; Khaled Sartawi, PhD, Vice President for Academic Affairs from Philadelphia University in Jordan, second-year Arts & Design students from Alamein International University (AIU) in Egypt Farah Kholief, Raneem Tarek, Rowan Essam and Sondos Eldeeb; as well as a submission from EMUNI´s Alenka Breznik of the Education Department.
Collage highlights:
Taken of Alenka Breznik by Khaier Eddine Bourguiba
Left to right: Rowan Essam and Sondos Eldeeb
A big thank you to everyone who submitted their photographs!