In conjunction with the soft launch, Apple uploaded 10 YouTube videos that explain how consumers can apply for the credit card and use it. Sign up in the iPhone's Wallet app.

MY heart was beating as if it were trying to escape my body. My mind was racing and hands shaking. All from what would usually be the comfort of the sofa. Was I ready? Ready as I’ll ever be, I told myself. I was standing at the greatest watershed moment of my life and was acutely aware of it. I was about to come out publicly as gay to more or less everyone I knew, all at once, through a post on Facebook.

Sandra Brydon, director of Home Group Scotland

GREAT news. I think. Glasgow is a great place in which to be looking for love, with 44 per cent of the city single, according to an online dating company.Why does this matter? Flash back to Valentine’s Day. There I was, lying in a pool of poetical blood, having been shot in the heart with the killer question no single man over a certain age wants to hear: “How many Valentine’s cards did you get?” asked a friend.

THOSE last times.... we all of us have memories our minds keep running back to in these social distancing times. The last time we gathered, last time we swam together, the last drive to a beach. One of mine is the post-swim hot tub at the Scottish Winter Swimming Championships in the chilly waters of Loch Tay – around 30 of us crammed in there, many in fancy dress, some in swim make-up, a great, crowded bath of joy.

Ryanair has said it expects up to 3,000 jobs to be lost as part of a restructuring of the airline.

COMPLAINTS about holidays have overtaken job concerns as the number one issue for hundreds of Scots contacting two independent national advice services every day during the coronavirus crisis.

RIGHT now, Shahbaz Majeed should be heading to Glencoe. Or flying over central Scotland. Or making his way to Harris which he has been trying to get back to since his first visit in 2018. Or maybe visiting some other part of Scotland so he can capture it in a photograph. Instead, he is at home in Dundee (where he is web development manager at the University of Dundee), “climbing the walls,” and looking forward to life after lockdown.

Beth Pearson, author of The Coorie Home

SPONSORED EDITORIAL

IF ever we needed to indulge in a bout of collective escapism, if only for 60 minutes on a Sunday night, then that time is now. Thankfully ITV has just the thing – Belgravia, the latest big budget costume drama from Downton Abbey creator Julian Fellowes and a series that positively ripples with dimples, quiffs, honey-coloured chiffon frocks, eye-popping millinery and glamorous uniforms.

This season's colours and cuts mix up the wardrobe-staple trench, says Prudence Wade.

The Reserve Bank bought R11.4 billion worth of government bonds from the secondary market during April, as part of its measures to introduce liquidity to the market.

Joblessness now stands at the most since the Great Depression era of the 1930s after the coronavirus pandemic brought the US economy to a standstill.

Australia's central bank has predicted that the country is facing its biggest economic contraction on record.

The budget for Census 2021 is ringfenced and won't be compromised as Treasury seeks funds to fight Covid-19, says Statistician-General Risenga Maluleke.

State adviser says government was sympathetic to the economic difficulties caused by the on-going lockdown but growth in infections in areas such as the Western Cape are biggest risk to the faster reopening of the economy.

The head of the International Monetary Fund said Friday that previous estimates for the world economy to contract by three percent this year were too optimistic.

SA faces its gravest test in over 70 years, to rebuild an economy that was already in a protracted slump after the ravages of the Covid-19 pandemic. Yet, one could be forgiven for believing there's a wedge between the state's main actors tasked with the job of resurrecting a country that may see its jobless rate rise as high as 50%.

Canada shed three million jobs in the last two months due to the coronavirus lockdown, causing the unemployment rate to shoot up to 13% in April, the government reported Friday.

Once the coronavirus pandemic is over, the tourism industry will probably find that older, more affluent travellers are more hesitant to do so.

It’s been a nerve-wracking few years for the traditional auto industry. One Silicon Valley VC firm speculates on its future in an interview with Bloomberg.

Anecdotal evidence suggests that institutional investors in South Africa and across the globe are starting to take their ownership rights more seriously.

The Black Business Council stood by Minister of Tourism Mmamoloko Kubayi-Ngubane and South Africa's Broad-Based Black Economic Empowerment policy.

Why and how OM EAST produces Christian comics to reach minority peoples

After two years of hard work, a new church is born in Austria.

A Crimean Tatar man shares how he gained courage and learnt vital truths through reading Into the Den of the Infidels, produced by OM EAST.

Thirteen participants in a weeklong outreach recently interacted with refugees, supporting OM’s refugee work in Linz.

THE Murray window is closing but Tennis Scotland appear to be diving through it just in time. Failing to adequately capitalise on the ongoing successes of Andy and Jamie has been a long-time frustration of the family, with mum Judy vehement in her criticism of the governing bodies for their inertia.

FOUR-TIME grand slam champion, Jamie Murray, will headline the Brodies Invitational tennis tournament, which has relocated to Edinburgh for this summer’s edition.

THE news earlier this week that Tennis Scotland will be on the receiving end of a £12 million package from the Lawn Tennis Association (LTA) is hugely significant.

TIM HENMAN believe the recent investment in Scottish tennis can help improve the game in this country, and the former British number one admits he is hugely impressed with some of the young talent being produced across the UK, in particular Scotland’s Aidan McHugh, the 19-year-old who has recently ventured into the senior ranks.

ANDY MURRAY has had a bumpy ride over the past couple of years, undergoing hip surgery, staging a comeback which saw him win his first title in two years before another injury setback has seen him sidelined since the tail-end of last year.

THE LTA has today announced a multi-million pound package of additional funding and measures to support those involved in tennis in Britain through the impact of the ongoing COVID-19 crisis.

SIR Andy Murray has sent a heartfelt message to NHS staff for their heroic work during the coronavirus crisis.

ANDY MURRAY will swap a tennis racket for a games controller when he takes part in a virtual Madrid Open later this month.

We visit the Grassroots Football Show in Birmingham, England.

We visit Lesser Hampden to see how Scotland celebrated UEFA Grassroots Day.

THE irony that the recent weather would have been ideal for the start of the domestic cricket season is not lost on Kyle Coetzer.

WHILE almost every athlete has been affected by the global shutdown of sport, it is perhaps the old and the young who are feeling it the most.

SUCCESS in athletics can often be a family affair. Scots such as Callum Hawkins and Eilish McColgan have thrived under the tutelage of their parents, while track star Jake Wightman is another who has preferred to turn to his family to coach him to success on the track.

GUS MACKAY was full of good intentions when he agreed to become Cricket Scotland’s new chief executive last October.

When Berlin Brandenburg Airport is put into operation at the end of October 2020, Schönefeld Airport will become Terminal 5 (T5) of BER. In order to avoid duplicate names of terminal sections, gates and car parks at BER, the building and car park infras...

Against the backdrop of the global corona crisis and a collapse in flight operations, the Supervisory Board today set the important course for the development of the airport company after commissioning BER.

Within just a few weeks, the corona crisis has led to a collapse of over 90 percent of flight operations in the capital region. In light of this dramatic situation, the Flughafen Berlin Brandenburg GmbH (FBB) Executive Board concluded a works agreement ...

Following yesterday´s Supervisory Board meeting and the meeting on 19 March 2020, yesterday´s FBB shareholders’ meeting dealt with the results of the meeting and confirmed its main decisions. The shareholders recognised the business plan approved by th...

Berlin’s airports are recording a drastic slump in passenger numbers. In March, a decline in passengers of 64.7 percent was recorded at Tegel and Schönefeld for the whole month. However, the number of passengers has continued to fall significantly over ...

In light of the regulations on hygiene and gatherings in connection with the global corona pandemic, a fire safety and evacuation exercise, which was scheduled to take place on 29 April in Terminal T1 and the BER railway station, has been postponed yest...

27,593 passengers departed from and landed at Berlin's airports Schönefeld and Tegel in April. That is just 1 per cent of air traffic in comparison to April 2019. 22,079 passengers flew from Tegel, and 5,541 from Schönefeld.

IRAQ’S prime ministerial merry-go-round continues to spin apace. Spy chief Mustafa al-Kadhimi, director of the country’s National Intelligence Service, is now the third prime minister designate this year, following the withdrawal of the two previous prospective candidates.