内容摘要：They are trying to get to the River Kennet for winter but have been stuck on the Thames at Wallingford since 22 September because of the red boards.

They are trying to get to the River Kennet for winter but have been stuck on the Thames at Wallingford since 22 September because of the red boards.

Growing up in California, he was seduced by the false glamour of gang life.After his arrest in San Diego for gang activity, Alberto was sent back to Mexico just as President Trump was taking office, and found himself homeless and alone in the country of his birth.

"It was a shock. It still is," he admits. "When I got here to Mexico, I really felt lost. No family, no food, no clothes, no nothing."Alberto says he'd almost forgotten how to speak and read Spanish. "Good thing I didn't lose it completely because it's helped me [to be bilingual]," he reflects.In fact, his language skills saved the 30-year-old from becoming destitute. Through a deportee support organisation, he heard that a local company – EZ Call Center – was looking for English-speakers.

The work, as telephone sales agents, isn't well paid, but employees can earn commissions, and the regular pay cheque gave Alberto the stability he craved."I had to do something to get back on my feet. Thanks to the call centre, now I have," he tells me during a break between calls.

Almost every agent at EZ Call Center is a deportee, including the company's owner, Daniel Ruiz.

He was also born in Mexico and grew up in the US before being deported for low-level drug crime in his early 20s. Daniel says he can relate to his employees' initial sense of disorientation in Mexico.Financially, northern Europe was definitely doing better than it is now, but, in terms of unity, the continent was deeply divided on the back of the migrant crisis in 2015. Populist eurosceptic parties were also on the rise then and, following the Brexit vote in June 2016, there were widespread predictions the EU would soon lose other member countries and fall apart altogether.

Fast forward to 2025 and the EU has weathered Brexit, the Covid pandemic, the migration crisis and Trump's first term in office - and countries very much pulled together afterIt was more of a stumbling, rather than sailing through these successive crises, but the EU is still standing and the wounds of Brexit, for example, have healed with time.

Post-Brexit UK is seen by the EU as a close ally that shares the same values in a world threatened by an ambitious China, an expansionist Russia and an unpredictable, bullish incoming US president.Nato, meanwhile, though worried about Trump's commitment to the alliance, has been boosted militarily and geostrategically by Sweden and Russian neighbour Finland becoming members following the Kremlin's full-scale invasion of Ukraine.