27 dec

Another ivory bone of an elephant! That’s what Francois Mitterand must have thought when he visited another African country and got another of those enormous ivory bones as a present. Mitterand donated all the gifts he received to the town of Chateau Chinon, the town he was a mayor of for more than 20 years before he became president in 1981.
It is an interesting collection. The poorer the country, the more is probably expected from the visit and the larger the present. There was a salad bowl from the United States that Nancy Reagan probably personally bought at a sale of Sears. A horrible thing of thick glass (they called it crystal) with stars and stripes. Another present from Reagan was a collection of silver dollars with all the fifty states on it. It was obviously fake. Nebraska was called The Homestead State’, while everyone knows it is the Cornhusker State.
The Netherlands was even worse. Mitterand had five official visits. The only thing that was memorable enough to show was a silver plated table bell. One of the tiniest and definitely one of the most unremarkable gifts ever received. No wonder Lubbers didn’t get any serious French support when he wanted to become president of the European Union.
It is kind of fun to think how all this giving and receiving of presents went on. What would the French ambassador in the United States have said when he heard that Mitterand would receive an awful salad bowl. And what did he say when the plans about a gold and silver sailboat (Qatar) were heard. And what about that awful table bell from Holland. What does such a thing tell about our country?
Present-wise I would direct my travels always in the direction of Japan. The bowls received, the beautiful calligraphed drawings, even the kind of silly geisha dolls, they are all made so beautifully and with so much dedication that one just can’t get enough of it. The eighties were Japan’s decade, so Mitterand didn’t only visit the prime minister and emperor, but also lots of businesses, who were also generous with gifts. Japan is clearly the exception to the above mentioned rule: the richer the country, the poorer the gift. But then again. Even the french language is based on a lot of rules, with always a few important exemptions to that rule.
Anyway, a fascinating collection. It would have been wonderful to combine this collection with the releases from diplomatic correspondence from the Wikileaks archive. That would make a fun book too, and would be an even more interesting sign of the times.
And have things changed? Of course Michele Obama has more taste than Nancy Reagan and Mark Rutte is probably less stingy, or more diplomatic, than Ruud Lubbers. But somehow one would expect that the rulers of Cameroun and Gabon have realized by now that it is not really appreciated to donate another enormous ivory bone. It is a pity though that the diplomatic mail by now probably has become so dull that recovering those won’t reveal anything interesting anymore.