Films from all around Europe

The European Film Week began. During the next days 23 movies from around Europe will be shown at the Eurooppasali at Kampintori.

The movies cover themes such as immigration, education, the situation of women and girls as well as peace and security. These films bring their stories from different parts of the world close to the viewer by means of drama, documentary, music and humour.

All screenings are for free. You can collect your ticket one hour before it starts. The Eurooppasali can fit up to 100 people. So to make sure to still get in try to be there early enough.

The European Film Week still continues until April 29. You can find more information and the program on the website of the European Commission.

Have fun at the movies!

A Day for Europe

Today is election day. Europe is electing a new European Parliament. And if you are entitled to vote, then don't waste your chance.

And remember that you should decide not only on a party but on a candidate as well. What you will do to cast your vote is write your candidate's number on the ballot paper.

If you still don't really know which party is closest to you, check out the EUvox 2014 website to find your perfect match.

Starting from 19:30 tonight YLE 1 will be covering everything around the election including the results.

Eurooppa-päivä at Bio Rex

Tomorrow is Europe day. A reason to celebrate. And that is done prominently in the center of Helsinki right at and around Bio Rex.

An exciting program of discussions, speeches, music and more is awaiting participants. And the event is of course free to join for anyone. Get in contact with candidates for the European Parliament, talk with representatives of countries all around the European Union and welcome the French Foreign Minister in Helsinki.

The full program can be found from the website of the European Commission and lasts from 10 to 15.00.

Join and have a great Europe Day!

Kampintori celebrates Europe Day

Today the European Council invites everyone to celebrate the Europe Day in the center of Helsinki. The day is filled with program, interesting discussions and possibilities to inform yourself about Europe and the European Union.

Interesting guest, among them members of the Finnish government like Jutta Urpilainen (Minister for Finance), Ville Niinistö (Minister of the Environment), Carl Haglund (Minister for Defence) and even Prime minister Jyrki Katainen, will join in for speeches and discussions.

Furthermore each EU nation is represented with an information stand where they will be happy to answer any questions you might have about their country.

The Europe Day program started at 8:30 and will continue till 16:00. Come and take a look!

Europe’s best in Helsinki

Two days ago the European Athletics Championships 2012 started in Helsinki. With a big celebration on Senaatintori with live music, speeches and a live show the games were opened.  

Yesterday the first competitions started. And there are still lots of tickets available for following the games live in the stadium. Of course you can also watch the championships from home. Yle broadcasts lots of it on TV and all the games at YLE areena.

If you don’t want to pay for the tickets but still want to inhale the atmosphere of the championships why don’t you just drop by the Event Park next to the stadium where you can watch the competitions together with other enthusiastic fans, enjoy live music and do lots of other things? For more information about tickets sales, the event park and the competitions check out the official website.

Sing, Europe, sing!

Today is the big final of the Eurovision Song Contest in Baku. Of course the weather today it pretty good and there are also lots of other things to do tonight then watching TV. Watching the ESC in Finland has one quite interesting extra to it though. Finland is the only country where the lyrics of all the songs are subtitled. For those of you who understand some Finnish it should be quite interesting to also follow what artists from countries like Serbia or Bosnia and Herzegovina are singing about.

Sweden's Laureen has good chances to win tonight.

Also quite interesting to know is that you can watch the ESC with two different commentaries. There is a Finnish and a Swedish audio line. It is really amazing through which trouble Finns go through to provide Swedish versions of everything for a minority of around 5 % of the society.

The show starts tonight at 10 p.m. on YLE 2. Have fun!