Filmfest 2025
A day of German films: we will be showing 3 German films, all with English subtitles, on Wednesday 2 July at Guildford High School, London Road, GU1 1SJ. See details and book tickets here.
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3 Freiburg artists came to Guildford June 2025
Klaudia Schrenk, Jan Douma and Gary Krüger exhibited some of their artworks for four days at Guildford House Gallery, together with Guildford's own Ron McGill, The exhibition was open to the public free of charge and the modern images in the historic setting looked great - and the members' private view with a glass of wine was a success too.
See more here.
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New Mayor becomes new GTA President
As provided in our constitution, we invited new Mayor Cllr Howard Smith, to be our president for his year of office, and he gracefully accepted.
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Members' German-themed dinner 2025
Members and their guests thoroughly enjoyed a 3-course German-themed dinner at Lakeside Restaurant on University of Surrey campus in the company of the Mayor and Mayoress, academics from the University, and this year visitors from Freiburg's Anglo-German Club, on Friday 9 May.
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Lecture on War and Peace...and the philosophy of Immanuel Kant 2025
On 24 March 2025, in Guildford Borough Council's Council Chamber, Dr Alex Leveringhaus, Dept of Politics, University of Surrey explained 18th century German philosopher Kant's "vision for peace" and compared it with today's reality, to somewhat depressing effect. It was a fascinating talk, followed by a lively Q&A session and completed with a chat over a drink.
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Winners of our Short Film Competition for Schools 2024
This year there were two first prizes and one runner-up. The Mayor, accompanied by fellow judges Professor Susan Pratt and Town Guide Nick Bale, awarded the prizes at our Christmas market.
The film had to be in German, the topic "Darf ich vorstellen... (May I introduce...)". There was some interesting use of film techniques and everyone had a lot of fun.
You can see all the winning films here.
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Guildford County School team, Lizzie Johnson and Daisy Usherwood, won first prize (Category B - yrs 12-13) |
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Tormead School team, Reeya Kaur and Bela Tharani, won first prize (Category A - yrs 7-11) |
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Tormead School team Ellie Szekeres (team-mate Erin Swinney was absent) were runners-up (Category A - yrs 7-11)
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GTA's Christmas market successful again!
Our traditional one-day market in the Guildhall on Sunday 1 December 2024 saw record numbers of visitors, who drank record numbers of mugs of Glühwein - the mugs were gorgeous again this year - and snapped up our selection of German Christmas bakery, gifts, stockingfillers, books, wreaths, and this year enjoyed a German beer tasting.
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Mayor and Chair attended WW2 Commemoration Ceremony in Freiburg
On 27 November 2024, Freiburg commemorated the 80th anniversary of the 1944 bombing of Freiburg - by the RAF - which destroyed much of the city centre and killed nearly 3,000 people. The Oberbürgermeister invited the Mayors of Guildford and also Besançon, France, another twin town, to attend the ceremony which as he said was "an occasion to emphasise the importance of peace, democracy and reconciliation". The GTA Chair and her husband were invited too to support the Mayor.
It was a very moving occasion. The programme for the visitors included a sobering guided tour themed "Freiburg under the Nazi regime" and an equally sobering exhibition showing the destruction caused by the attack. Then there were two ceremonies, one in the Council chamber, where our Mayor addressed Freiburg's 48 councillors, the other in the Münster, where each of the three mayors gave an address as part of a special service of commemoration. In addition, the visitors were shown round Freiburg's buzzing, humming Weihnachtsmarkt (Christmas market).
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| The Mayors of Guildford, Besançon and Freiburg lighting a Peace Candle in Freiburg Münster | .... | The Mayor of Guildford addresses a meeting of Freiburg City Council.................................................... |
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The bright lights and the atmosphere of the Weihnachtsmarkt attracted lots of visitors, old and young, families and groups of friends. |
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German mini Christmas market - Sunday 1 December 11am-3pm in the Guildhall
The winners of this year's Short Film Competition for Schools will be announced at 12 o'clock and prizes presented by the Mayor. See you there!
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Beer tasting
Members and their guests learnt about German beer styles and tasted 6 different Schwarzwald (Black Forest) beers, 2 of them non-alcoholic, at a tasting run by distributor Black Forest Beers. Both our Patron (Zöe Franklin MP) and our President (Mayor Sallie Franklin) enthusiastically participated.
Mayor and partner in foreground...................................Patron Zöe Franklin MP raises a glass
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Zöe Franklin MP becomes GTA Patron
Our constitution requires us to invite the incumbent MP to become our patron - so we did, and she is! We now look forward to a long and mutually fruitful relationship.
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German music recital - "Mostly Bs"
Erik played 1 piano, while Jo played 2 cellos (1 electric) with 3 bows ... when they gave a public recital hosted at Guildford County School last July. They selected German composers mostly beginning with B, starting with mediaeval saint Hildegarde von Bingen and ending with Kurt Weill.
 Jo & Erik Levi performed their selection at Guildford County School |
Jo Levi (l), Erik Levi, Mayor Cllr Sallie Barker (3rd l), Chair Barbara Ford. |
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Freiburg Cathedral Boys Choir - Freibuger Domsingknaben
They came to Guildford and they sang like angels! 60 boys, aged 10 to adult, sang during the morning service in Holy Trinity Church on Sunday 1 September. Then the Mayor, supported by the GTA, hosted a reception in the Guildhall for the whole choir, and, led by their Director of Music Professor Boris Böhmann, they sang for us again. It was sublime.
For the choir, this was part of a tour of UK cathedrals and churches - the previous evening they had sung in Westminster Cathedral. The tour was supported by the Rotary clubs of Guildford and Freiburg.
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They sang in the Church |
They sang in the Guildhall |
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| The Mayor welcomed them | ||
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Organist Thomas Hawkes accompanied them
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Mayor Sallie Barker with the choir's Director of Music and its teacher, plus Presidents and officers of Freiburg and Guildford Rotary. |
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Newsletter! - See our bumper newsletter here for a report on the last 3 years, with lots of pictures.
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| Members' Trip to Freiburg and Partner Cities Fair | |
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GTA Filmfest 2024 - a great success |
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3 great films! Admission free. -Nosferatu{1922) -Sophie Scholl: die Letzten Tage (2005) -Lola Rennt (1998) Hosted by University of Surrey.
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| Short Film Competition for Schools 2023 | Freiburg winners announced! | |
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Our Short film competition for Schools in Freiburg was won by a pair of talented girls this year.
Watch their mysterious interview with a time traveller here.
Winners Julia Luzot and Julia Obrecht of Freiburg's Deutsch-Französisches-Gymnasium, received their prizes from Stadtrat (City Councillor) Timothy Simms.
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German Christmas market in the Guildhall and Short Film Competition for Schools 2023 We kicked off December with two events, both great fun, supported by the Mayor and a cheerful gingerbread lady. |
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German Christmas market Mayor demonstrates Gingerbread house photo spot |
We sold gifts, wooden toys, bakery, Glühwein... |
....and these specially-designed mugs |
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Short Film Competition for Schools 2023 |
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The brief: make a 2-minute film in German, topic 'Ein Interview mit...' Winners: Lizzie Johnson, Daisy Usherwood, Caspar Noble and Felix Newton with Judges: Professor Susan Pratt of Surrey University and Cllr Masuk Miah, Mayor of Guildford. See the winning films here.
(The Freiburg winners of their competition will be announced later.)
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Blooming Picnic in the Castle grounds
 Hook-a-duck was very popular. |
 The Mayor visited our stall. |
We took a stall at this popular annual outdoor family event, providing activites for the kids and talking twinning to their parents.
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AGM held via Zoom
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Guildford's new Mayor, Cllr Masuk Miah, chaired the meeting. Members took the opportunity to review the GTA's (and its Committee's) progress and to review finances, but did not take the opportunity to offer themselves for election to the Committee.... |
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GTA Filmfest a great success
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We screened three German films, with English subtitles, each one with a specialist academic introduction, and all FREE of charge! On University of Surrey campus. A pioneering silent comedy, a drama mystery thriller and a sci-fi romcom - all fabulous! This was a free event held on Wednesday 10 May 2023. Some serious film buffs came to all three films, others picked out one or two. |
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The Deputy German Ambassador and the Mayor of Guildford came to dinner
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The Mayor, the Chair & the Deputy Ambassador |
On Tuesday evening GTA members held their annual dinner in the Guildhall, with guests including Rüdiger Bohn, the Deputy Ambassador, and Cllr Dennis Booth, our Mayor. The meal was catered by Not Just Hummus (from the V Café at the Guildford Institute), and a serious touch of elegance was added by music performed by a string quartet from Guildford High School. A great evening! |
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Know TV's Babylon Berlin?
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Niall Sellar, translator of the books from the original German, gave our FREE Spring public lecture: "Volker Kutscher: a translator's story" last month. Neil talked about the different aspects of translation eg "domestication" vs "foreignisation" and explained the choices he made and makes in his ongoing collaboration with this successful author. To see our video of the talk, click on the image. |
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Winners announced for our Short Film competition for schools 2022! - You can see all the winning films here.
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Stadtrat (City Councillor) Timothy Simms awards first prizes to the team from Lessing Realschule, Freiburg, in Freiburg's historic Gerichtslaube. |
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Mayor Cllr Dennis Booth awards first prizes to the St Catherine's team (Category B - yrs 12 & 13) in Guildford's historic Guildhall. |
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The Mayor awards first prizes to the Guildford High School team (Category A - yrs 7-11) |
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Joint runner-up, the George Abbot team (a girl and her dog) (Category A - yrs 7-11) |
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Joint runner-up, the Tormead team (Category A - yrs 7-11) |
First prizes went to teams from Lessing Realschule (Category 1), St Catherine's School (category B) and Guildford High School (category A).
Joint runners-up were teams from George Abbot and Tormead Schools in Guildford.
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