This leisure programme for young people in Bilbao aims to provide them with positive experiences in Basque. So the hub of this practice consists of helping to promote the creativity of youngsters and their participation in activities. What is more, we put the familiar references (famous people or educators who work with them as part of their daily work) in contact with the youngsters.

The key to the offer is diversity (music, dance, radio, TV, videos, fashion, drama) because we work in many fields of culture and leisure. This project is run after school hours. The activities and formats have developed since the programme was set up eleven years ago; even if we decided to give priority at first to large format events held in one day, as time has passed, we have added other things without losing the impact of the show format, by adding smaller events that take place more frequently. There has also been an evolution in the type of events, from passive events to more participatory ones. The youngsters should be the protagonists throughout the programme and that has been reflected in that evolution.

At the same time, one of the keys in the programme is that the influence process should go beyond the actions and not be limited to the actions themselves, because it is greater than they are. Harrapazank has to be understood as a process and not as a series of actions.

As it is a programme for the teenagers of Bilbao, we were in no doubt from the start that we had to take the typologies of Bilbao’s teenagers into consideration; in other words, Bilbao’s teenagers acquire Basque naturally (at home or at school), so their attachment to Basque is not a matter of life or death for them; they are teenagers living in an urban environment; they are literate in the new technologies; and their priority is to have fun.

In other words, if the “market” offered what we needed, we took it and brought it to Harrapazank (music concerts, etc.); if it was necessary to adapt the market offer, we did that (Mihiluze, “Are gazteago” radio series, Skunk Funk fashion parade, Flash mob, Lip-Dub, etc.); and finally, if the market did not give us what we needed, we started from scratch (Jozank meetings, Bertsotramarraskya, Komeriaren Kluba, Distirazank, Dantzazank, Eszena, Sortuzank, etc.).