4th stop of the bus tour: Bratislava
After being in Graz, the MovEurope bus tour arrived at the Slovak capital on the 6th of May, where it was received by JEF Bratislava.
MovEuropeForward activities
The activities took place at Namastie SNP, a spacious square in the city centre. Despite the very warm weather in the morning people were not discouraged to pass by the stand and participate in the different activities of the MovEurope bus. Once again, the artistic installation caught the eye of the people who were engaged to take part in some of the activities such as the Europe history quiz, “I’m going to vote” or the rope pulling contest. The action gave cause for interesting conversations about Europe with local people.
The citizens of Slovakia are satisfied with the membership in the European Union. However, they don’t participate as enthusiastically as other Europeans in the elections to the European Parliament. Even though they rely on Europe, Strasbourg and Brussels are far away from them.
Debate
In the evening, after the bus activities, took place the debate “Education – challenge for Slovakia, commitment for Europe” held by JEF Slovakia and youth Politics Education. The speakers were Katarina Nevedalova, member of the European Parliament, and Miroslav Hajnoš, founder of the European Dialogue of Positive Attitude. Both of them discussed about education and youth policies that have been adopted over last 10 years and also about measures that need to be taken in further legislative period.
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5th stop of the bus tour: Budapest
On the 8th of May the MovEurope bus tour led to the beautiful capital of Hungary.
MovEuropeForward activities
In cooperation with JEF Budapest the bus team built up its stand on the university campus of Budapest as a part of the university festival to promote students organisations. The location was central and due to that highly frequented by young people. The most successful activity was the “voting postcards” in which people write their wish for Europe and “commit” to vote in the EP elections and then put the card in a box.
Most of the young people in Hungary are not aware of the European Union, nor about the next European Parliament elections, so it was a challenge for the bus team to engage people who pass by the MovEurope stand and talk about the elections.
Debate
After the bus activities a debate about Civil Rights took place in the University building in the department for social sciences. The speakers were candidates from the Europeans People Party (Adam Kosa), Socialist Party (Roland Gur) and Tamas Meszerics, Professor in modern international history. The debate was moderate by Lattmann Tamás.