“Without an Erasmus exchange I wouldn’t be here as a winner”

Joan Alemany i Royo, 23 from Girona, is one of two winners of the international Tour The World competition organised by the multinational tour operator Tour Radar. He will now travel to perform on five continents for 50 days.

What is The World Tour, the international competition you have just won?

A few months ago, Tour Radar, a large multinational tour company based in Austria, held a competition searching for two travellers who wanted to travel the world, with the only condition that it should be with an unknown person. The prize is five trips on five continents in 50 days.

How did you find out about it?

Through one of the different Google alerts I have that tell me about issues that might interest me.

What were the entry requirements?

Participants had to make a two-minute video explaining who they were and giving reasons to choose them to take around the world. After looking at the videos that other people had already uploaded, I decided to go a bit in the opposite direction. Not so much to make a winning video, but to make a different video. So at least they would notice me, I thought.

What video did you make?

Radar Tour asked you to answer different questions like why you want to travel the world, what your life is like, and what your family will think if you go travelling for 50 days. They also gave extra points for anyone who did things with a large group of people, like a flashmob, as they wanted to see if you had the voice to be able to make yourself heard. Based on that, my idea was to try to get those extra points. With a friend we went to Barcelona with the idea of looking for groups of people who participated in group hugging. And we did. Finally, what were meant to be extra points became the main idea of the video, with me explaining how that particular day went, the feelings of happiness we had and how we’d enjoyed doing it.

Why do you think they chose you?

I suppose the thing that brought me to this point is my open mind, which allows me to speak and engage with everyone, to connect with new people, new lives and my enthusiasm for little things. And also how I convey it to people, also to the promoters of the contest. I have also realised that if I hadn’t gone on an Erasmus exchange I wouldn’t be here as a winner, because in the end, this open mindedness of wanting to meet a lot of people, always doing things, moving, is thanks, in large part, to having been a foreign student.

What do you expect to gain from this experience?

The thrill of enjoying each day. The hope and dream that you can enjoy every moment. And it’s not that I don’t expect to get anything out of it, it’s that I can’t not get something out of it. What I do expect is to have a new family, all the people who will travel with us and record the whole experience from day one until the end. The trip will be on the Radar Tour channel on You Tube.

interview