German version: see below<\/p>\n
Fortaleza, May 28th 2014, Dragao do Mar, 16:00 It is nearly 17:00, Professor Arne K\u00f6rtzinger from GEOMAR, together with Christian M\u00fcller, speaker of the DWIH Sao Paulo and head of the DAAD branch in Rio de Janeiro, go to the entrance where they welcome Thomas Rachel, the parliamentary state secretary of the Ministry of Education and Research. He is our special guest and key note speaker.<\/p>\n It is slowly becoming dark and when, half an hour later, the greeting words of Christian M\u00fcller, Arne K\u00f6rtzinger, the president of Dragao do Mar and the key note speech by Rachel have ended, all the screens as well as the coccos, Jago and the blue modules light up. The atmosphere is fantastic and we enjoy the premier together with the guests, mingle and receive our first feedback. The state secretary gets a personal tour from Arne K\u00f6rtzinger, who explains the Kiel marine science that is behind every module in his usual lively way.\u00a0After a good hour the ceremony is over and we are happy and relieved about the first positive response. At last we can also relax and enjoy being guests at the reception on the Meteor.<\/p>\n Our thanks go to the entire team with Christian de Lamboy, who was our connection in Sao Paulo and who now has insider knowledge about the exhibition technology, to Jan Krimphove, our project partner from Salco Logistics<\/a>, who ensured that our container arrived safely and on time in Fortaleza and Dragao do Mar, to those responsible from DIWH-SP and the DAAD for their fantastic support and cooperation, especially to Anja Grecko Lorenz (DIWH-SP), who helped us with all our questions, and we also thank Oswaldo and his team at Dragao do Mar for their help solving technical problems. We are proud that we could contribute to the German-Brazilian Year and look forward to further stations in Brazil.<\/p>\n Friederike, Gerd, Emanuel<\/p>\n\n\n\t
\n<\/strong>The first guests are arriving slowly, numerous scientists from Germany (Kiel University, GEOMAR, ZMT Bremen) and from different institutes and universities in Brazil, representatives from DIWH in Sao Paulo, from the DAAD offices in Rio and Fortaleza, from the German Embassy and the honorary consulate in Fortaleza as well as from the organizers of the German-Brazilian Year 2013-2014. During the past two days, they have been discussing possible scientific collaborations between the two countries and talked about planned research projects. Thus the opening ceremony is not only the highlight at the end of the German Brazilian Year 2013-2014 but also concludes the successful workshop \u201cBrazil-Germany Cooperation in Ocean Science and Technology: Research and Capacity Building\u201d.<\/p>\n