Arts

The interruption to football championships – local, national and European – caused by the coronavirus pandemic is plunging the sport into a crisis. For a sector with billions in annual turnover, tomorrow’s world is looking very different to yesterday’s.

In May 2019, the official Journal of the European Union published a seven-page document entitled “Council Recommendation on a comprehensive approach to the teaching and learning of languages”. According to the EU Council, it is essential for EU citizens to know at least two languages other than their mother tongue.

It was 1972 when the first 87 thousand Interrail tickets were issued by rail companies in various European countries. Today, forty-seven years after its foundation, more than ten million people have chosen Interrail.

Arriving in their millions, foreign visitors contribute to the Catalan capital’s economic boom. But the downside to mass tourism, fuelled by cheap flights and low-cost accommodation sites, has led to growing disgruntlement from locals.

Erasmus, the end of roaming charges, the convenience of the euro: the rhetoric promoting the benefits of European integration only really addresses those citizens who regularly travel to other EU countries. In fact, 37 percent of EU citizens have never been outside their own country.