In this busy night, the last evening before the last evening and after a 3 hours meeting with the 6 organisers, the blogentry for Friday (Day 5) can finally be published. It is written by Loredana from Romania. I lived and travelled with her for more than one week in Galaciuc and Bucharest, so it is a pleasure for me to show her my Germany and Hannover one year after we met in Romania. Youth-in-Action makes it possible! So here is her juicy text from last night, a blogging session between Youtube and discussions about life...
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This feels like homework, especially when you have ʻthe teacherʼ aka the editor in the background saying you need to write the text tonight. Ok, so today was different because we had to switch homes and also had the local tv come pay us a visit, which made us all feel like movie stars because we were interviewed about the project and our whole experience in Hannover. The trip to the new hotel was very fun, considering we were playing guitar and waving flags all the way to the bahnhof. We were all already tired when we got to the city hall to meet with the mayor so some of us rested their eyes for a bit, including the Estonian birthday boy, Roger...and then he had his eyes wide open when we got to the Red Light District. But he was the only one excused.
Some serious stuff now: in the morning we had the main activity of the exchange, discussing the different situations regarding immigrants in each partner country and the positive and negative influences on the host population. The evening was a moment of relaxation and learning because we walked around the city centre, visiting old buildings and monuments and before having to write this blog entry we attended the German presentation, enjoying traditional cuisine and beverages and testing our knowledge about the German culture with some well devised quiz. Now I have to finish up because the wake up call is in 5 hours and we have to go to Hamburg in the morning. So far, this project proved interesting enough and I hope our visit in Hamburg and future activities will be useful enough as well for the participants as for the organizers.
I must say I liked the other hostel room better because this one has a certain ʻje ne se quoiʼ aroma about it..but so far itʼs not very persistent. So while other participants are out in the city, I am ʻstuckʼ here with the editor, having to write my impressions on the previous day, getting inspired by alcohol.
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Additions by me, Jannes: Our delegates visited the “Auswanderermuseum Ballinstadt” in Hamburg. This adds to our discussion about emigration on Sunday, our last day. About the aroma in Loredanaʼs room I just can say that we are living in a hotel at Hannover “Steintor”, the party mile as well as close to the redlight district.
Mara in the organisers room
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With many Romanians I had controversial discussions about Sinti and Roma/Gypsies. The same came up on Friday again, when the Bulgarians presented their facts about immigration in their society. He also describes some of the childish things that happened in between (Jannes).Ivan's impression on Day 5:
I woke up this morning with a good sense. I knew that today was another interesting day of the project. We brought some statistics from Bulgaria about the immigration process and we had a meeting with the mayor in Hannoverʼs bombastic town hall. As I said I had a good sense for the day that became even stronger when I found in my envelope for the Secret Angel (note of the editor: Itʼs a game with a secret follower for the whole week) a note in which I was invited to a meeting in 3 a.m. in the morning, but strangely not by my secret angel. And it seemed that nothing could make my mood bad even when I found toothpaste line on the door handie, must be of that Estonian guy. And as every day we needed a good energizer. And it happened…We went outside to the hostelʼs garden through some never seen obstacles like trees and tents etc., conducted by Jannes and the other organizators, but with closed eyes.
After that the presentations started. I learnt much about the other countries’ problems with their immigration and we showed the situation in Bulgaria. Although it is not directly called “immigration”, the situation of “Gypsies” (or more correctly: Sinti and Roma) came up. I hope all the participants understood that we are open – minded for the immigrants, we accept religious and cultural differences and we are trying hard on integrating gypsies and I am sure we will succeed in making it. Itʼs a challenging discussion on how you can integrate “gypsies” without making them feel that they loose their identity and culture – I guess this is the same with all kinds of immigration.
And about the meeting with the mayor – I have to say only nice words. I learnt a lot about the big support for the immigrants in Hannover, resulting in a good integration. I also understood where the places of the treasurer and all the counselors are in the Assembly hall. By literally stepping on Hannoverʼs map in the splendid hall, he also explained the rough structure of the city – the Autobahn, the green places....
(Picture taken from http://www.worldharmonyrun.org/deutschland/news/2010/0619 . Hope it's OK to use it. Thanks in advance!)
Ivan, Bulgaria
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