October is always a key month for Princess Leonor full of great events and with her birthday as the culmination. October 12 has taken on even greater meaning for the heiress since last year since since then she has celebrated the National Day as a soldier. If last year he returned from the Zaragoza Academy to witness the military parade with his Army dress uniformon this occasion he is expected to return from MarÃn (Pontevedra) with his midshipman uniform. That same day also marks the beginning of the events for the Princess of Asturias Awards, which will last for two weeks in honor of its honorary president.
© Jesus Briones
© GTRESIt has been 10 years since the Prince of Asturias Foundation was renamed Princess of Asturias, coinciding with the arrival to the throne of Felipe VI. Although he has held this position since 2014, Leonor did not chair the awards at the Campoamor Theater in Oviedo until 2018when he was 13 years old. To celebrate this anniversary, the Awards week will last this year from October 12 to 26, when the visit to the Exemplary Town of Asturias, which this year is given to the municipality of Sotres, closes the events. It is very likely that in addition to the Kings, Infanta Sofia will return from Wales to accompany her sister as she did last year. In addition, from October 25 to November 3 the autumn break takes place in the school calendar of the UWC Atlantic College, so it is foreseeable that it will advance its vacation one day to join the Awards agenda.
© GTRESAlthough the presence of the royal family is not expected until October 24, the day on which the Princess of Asturias Awards concert acts as an exceptional preamble to the award ceremony, a total of 15 events in honor of Leonor will precede the days clue. The two previous weeks will feature ten winners from previous editions, among them, the singer Carmen Linares and the choreographer MarÃa Pages Princess of Asturias Award for the Arts 2022; mathematics and physics Ingrid Daubechies Princess of Asturias Award for Scientific and Technical Research in 2020; the writer and playwright Juan Mayorga Princess of Asturias Award for Literature 2022; the american writer Siri Hustvedt Princess of Asturias Award for Literature 2019; the author John Banville also Princess of Asturias Award for Literature in 2014; the Cuban writer, journalist and screenwriter Leonardo Padura Princess of Asturias Award for Literature in 2015; the microbiologist Jeffrey Gordon Princess of Asturias Award for Scientific and Technical Research 2023; the renowned Olympic skier Lindsey VonnPrincess of Asturias Sports Award in 2019 as well as the Paralympic swimmer Teresa Perales Princess of Asturias Sports Award 2021.
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© GTRESBesides, Mary Beard Princess of Asturias Award for Social Sciences 2016 and the Argentine biologist Sandra Myrna Diaz Princess of Asturias Award for Scientific and Technical Research 2019, will star in a special edition of the educational program ‘Take the Word’ starting in November. This initiative has its precedent in 2023 with the visit of Martin CooperPrince of Asturias Prize for Scientific and Technical Research 2009, who returned to Asturias within the framework of the awards ceremony and held meetings with Engineering students and schoolchildren, among other activities.
Leonor adds new distinctions
These Awards, so closely linked to the Crown, are part of the identity of Oviedo, as the venue for the ceremony, and of all of Asturias. For this reason, the mayor of the capital, Alfredo Canteli, has granted the title of honorary mayor to Princess Leonor, who will receive it in the Plenary Hall of the City Council 36 years after her father did so. He will also be presented with the Medal of the Principality on the occasion of his coming of age, which he reached almost a year ago. This is another decoration that King Felipe has also had since 1986.
© GTRESThese distinctions add to the Medal of Aragón, the Medal of the Cortes and the title of Adoptive Daughter of Zaragoza which she received after passing through the Aragonese city while she was trained as a Cadet Lady of the Army, an appointment that came with the imposition of the Grand Cross of Military Merit with white badge from the hands of her father, whose footsteps as heir she follows, for the moment, very faithfully.
All this as a perfect prelude to his 19th birthday, which he will celebrate next October 31. It is not a figure as round and significant as the coming of age that he reached in 2023, but it is the perfect time to take stock of this first year in adult life. At 18 he not only reached a symbolic figure, but his life, his routine and his public presence changed radically. She went from being a student who only attended a few key events, always prioritizing her studies, to a soldier in training who consolidates her role in institutional life as the Queen she is called to be one day.
