boston

Catalan President, Carles Puigdemont will travel to Boston, Washington DC, and New York to explain Catalonia’s pro-independence movement. On Monday evening, he will address the Center for European Studies (CES) at the Harvard Kennedy School and give the conference ‘Catalonia, Today and Tomorrow’, his analysis of Catalonia’s current political situation and its place within the EU. Together with Catalan Minister for Foreign Affairs, Raül Romeva and the Delegate of the Catalan Government to the United States, Andrew Davis, Puigdemont will also visit the Cambridge Innovation Centre (CIC) and the Massachusetts Institute of Tecnhnology (MIT) and will take part in a meeting with entrepreneurs. He is also expected to meet with several think tanks throughout the week, including the Wilson Center and the American Enterprise Institute, and will visit the new factory of Catalan company, Europastry.

FC Barcelona will go on a tour of the United States of America and Mexico in the summer four years after their last pre-season tour of the continent. Despite dates not yet being confirmed, the Catalan club has made official the news that the blaugranes will be returning to American soil for the fifth time in the last twelve years (2003, 2006, 2009 and 2011).In 2012 the team took part in various pre-season games across Europe and in 2013 they toured the Asian continent. In 2014 with Luis Enrique installed as coach, the squad enjoyed a pre-season training camp in Birmingham in the United Kingdom before playing in three friendly matches in Nice in France, Geneva in Switzerland and Helsinki in Finland.

Juan Goytisolo (born 1931 in Barcelona) is the latest winner of the Cervantes Prize, which is considered to be the Nobel Prize for literature in Spanish. On Monday at noon, the jury’s verdict was read by Spain’s Minister for Culture, José Ignacio Wert, and it emphasised the author’s "ability to delve into language", his "complex stylistic proposals" and "his desire to bring together" different cultures. Goytisolo, who currently resides in Marrakech (Morocco), will receive the award at a ceremony to be held on April 23 in Alcalá de Henares, in Madrid's region. The Cervantes Prize is awarded by the Spanish Ministry of Culture and is worth €125,000. Goytisolo's works have been translated into English, French, German, Polish, Slovak and Romanian, among others.

Between the 18^th and the 20^th of November, Barcelona is hosting the 4^th edition of the Smart City Expo World Congress. This year it will be the most international edition so far, with 400 cities from 5 continents represented, a 33% increase. Participating cities include Berlin, Munich, Boston, Chicago, New York and San Francisco, who are present at the Fira de Barcelona exhibition centre. The goal of reaching 9,000 visitors may be achieved, as nearly 700 people attended the opening ceremony on Monday. Companies are presenting technological applications for improving the sustainability, mobility and quality of life of everyday citizens. Applications being presented this year include drones for cities, technology to monitor free parking for busy commuters, and applications to assess air quality for the physically active and for choosing the best place to open a business.

The President of the Catalan Government, Artur Mas, travelled to Massachusetts and New York to promote Catalan businesses and present Catalonia as one of the main biotechnological clusters and tourist destinations in Europe. In addition, Ernst & Young presented their report on life sciences companies and research centres in Catalonia, which indicates that almost 30% of this sector’s turnover in Spain comes from Catalan businesses.