Project 888/Press
note: not for distribution yet ! --Robino 23:57, 10 July 2008 (CEST)
Feel free to use this press-release to your own local/ national context. You can distribute it to radio stations, tv, magazines, newspapers, etc.
English
European Hitchhiking Week is to lead Hundred Hitchhikers to Paris
On the 8th of August and as far as a week before, hundreds of hitchhikers will team up to hitchhike to Paris to promote the idea of hitchhiking. Participants are hitchhiking from as far as Armenia, Russia and Finland. Other places of departure include among others Utrecht, Brussels, Berlin, Barcelona, Geneva, Rome, Athens, Istanbul, Budapest, Prague.
This project shows that the hitchhiking community is still very much alive. Every year thousands of people hitchhike all over the world and in many countries it is still a common way of getting around. This is the first hitchhiking event of this kind. The goal is to suggest to the public that it could be a great human experience to pick up a hitchhiker, share their car and exchange stories.
"I love hitchhiking! It is my favorite means of transportation because it is a great way to meet some nice people and exchange stories. It is great to see how helpful people can be. Sometimes they even bring you as far as your frontdoor or they invite you over for dinner and sleeping overnight", says Fabrice Renucci, one of the event organizers who will be departing from Yerevan, Armenia.
One of the participants set the goal to visit all European capitals before arriving in Paris on the 8th of August. When a couple in their late fifties , Marie France Gardiner and her husband, heard about this idea they decided to also take part in this adventure while touring Europe.
The European Hitchhiking Day came to inspire the shooting of a documentary. Five teams made up of a hitchhiker and a cameraman will be documenting what it is like to be a hitchhiker, filming their adventures from wherever they start from all the way to Paris. Other participants will be contributing to this project with photos, journals, short movies, radio-recordings, and other art-forms, bringing together one joint expression of their love for this way of travel.
Note for journalists: you are free to join the European Hitchhiking Week. We can let you team up with experienced hitchhikers, attend prepatory meetings taking place all over Europe from the 3rd up untill D-day, follow a hitchhiker who will travel from a long distance or we can organise for you to call a team of hitchhikers during the day.
Contact details
French
Available on July 11th
