Flagship Projects in Nightmare Before Christmas

Writing again from Madrid, same location where we had our workshops during SuFu and the City. So nice good memories... AEGEE-Madrid has organized its LTC, a tradition for december in this South West corner of Europe: Nightmare Before Christmas is the name, and it celebrates now its third edition.

This year the aim is to present a very important set of information to new members of antennae South of the Pyrinees: the importance of Flagship Projects in AEGEE, and especially to show our antennae what can they do in this framework. It has been conceived by a great team of trainers, coming from several antennae under the supervision of the NetCommie Oscar.

We have started early this orning (yeah!) with basic presentations on AEGEE structure and history, to warm up; soon we came into a review of past Flagship Projects, with their objectives and the tools (events) they created to achieve them. Of course we gave special attention to our dear SuFu project, which was presented in detail, event by event, before giving entry to people from Beyond Europe.

Let's hope that, after their case work during the rest of the LTC, an antenna will come up with the motivation, ideas and will to organize another Flagship Project event down here... SuFu and the City was a great success, let's try to repeat it soon!

Alicante awaits us...

Here in Morocco is sooo cold, I want to arrive home in Alicante next week (after a stop in LTC Madrid - Nightmare before Christmas III) and start preparing our traditional NY meeting. This time I will be the host, and it is a pleasure and honour after having been so well treated in Estonia and Greece.

I am really looking forward to meet again all those friends, some of them will be together for 4th year in a row, what a record! For some others will be the first, a nice comeback after a year of absence, and unfortunately some people won't be able to join us this year :( We will have you present in our hearts, that is for sure, because we are the Panda team!

Kadri is working on the program, because we will be there for work; but I will try to prepare the social agenda, with NY party, and hopefully we can squeeze there some outdoor activity as usual (what about climbing the mountain in the picture?). Yes! the sea is there so we will be able to swim again like past year. For those of you who are cold-blooded, there will be also sauna :)

Countdown already started, there are just 12 days till first of you come to Alicante...

SuFuing in the city

4 SuFu Team members...
1 whole antenna working 24h...
A great team of participants...
The support of the Youth in Action program from the European Commission...
A big city to discover from a different point of view...


These are the ingredients for SuFu and the city, a seminar that at this very same moment is having place in Madrid. As we are more or less passing the equator of the week, we can say that it is doing very well. We spent the morning at the waste recycling plant of Valdemingomez; providing service for the whole city (4.5 million people), it is a small city on itself where all the packages and organic waste is prepared for being recycled. On previous days, IUCN speaker Russell Galt showed us the interactions between biodiversity and urban environment, and gave us the opportunity to provide ideas for the future evaluation system of urban biodiversity. We also could learn about citizen initiatives struggling with legislation to have the right to transform an empty space into a public open area for the neighbours, with vegetable garden, sport fields, and even an open air theater! And more and more activities that fill our mornings, afternoons and nights.

Here you can have some impressions from Filip, from AEGEE-Skopje, one of our participants:
"Great seminar, lots of interesting visits and speeches, and all of that in the wonderful city of Madrid. Love it !!". Anyway we will not stop working hard to make the second half even better, we are motivated to close the SuFu cycle with another successful project accomplished!

Now we have to leave you, here it is hard to find some free time :) Participants are now doing a Architecture Photo Rally...

SuFu going to Agora!

It has been long time since our last post... but nevertheless we haven't stopped working. Now it's time to head towards the capital of Ukraine for AEGEE Autumn Agora. And of course we will have some things prepared for you!

We will have some very special things to offer: that will keep you warm, or that you can use to send good wishes to your friends abroad... And rumour goes around, that 2nd episode of SuFu Panda adventures will be premiered in Kyiv...

You can also meet us in workshop on Saturday, to hear about the results of survey made last year among AEGEE members and SuFu follow up activities. Also some people from AEGEE-Leiden will be there to give you some inside info, how our next Agora plans to be little bit more green.

This time, SuFu team members also try to set an example and reach Agora in a more sustainable way. Miguel is soon to take train from Poland to Ukraine, while Kadri and Katrin together with AEGEE-Tallinn team will start their road trip on Wednesday evening. See you in Kyiv!

2nd Danube event to start in Bratislava

So, here we are now: first participants arrived to our hotel in Bratislava and in the evening it will be the welcome party of the 2nd event from "Danube.Let if flow!".

Just few weeks after the 1st event in Danube Delta, in Romania, "Danube - source of inspiration" will now be followed by "Danube - most international river in the world". As you might have read from SuFu newsletter, the 1st event was indeed great success and probably this one won't be any different :-)

The weather is nice and sunny, hotel fancy, local organisers helpful and participants seem enthusiastic. We will have great week ahead: lectures and workshops from both professionals and SuFu team members, outdoor European Night, boat trip to Vienna, waltz dancing lessons and much more.

Stay tuned for our impressions later on :-)

Slow summer time does not stop SuFu team

Hello All!!

I am here in my Moroccan Mountains, tired after a full day driving my 4x4 trying to get some new information about my leopards... and in the evening, trying to revive this blog that has fallen under the lazyness of the summer.

But the lack of news here doesn't mean that we have not been busy! At the moment, the event Danube: Source of Inspiration will be closing in the amazing environment of Danube Delta. I am sure soon our Danube Girls will update you on what happened. And soon, second part of Danube Project will happen in Bratislava - Danube: Most International River in the World (Sept 7-13th).

I am busy with the details of another event, one that is my personal initiative, but only possible with the enthusiastic collaboration of my friends from AEGEE-Madrid: SuFu and the City, from Oct 31st to Nov 8th. More than a week to explore the role of cities in shaping a more sustainable world. 7 days full of workshops and debates, with plenty of visits and conferences, where I hope we can gather 25 young citizens from all over Europe who want to exchange ideas and discover the pros and cons of cities, the incredible power of active citizens in shaping the evolution of their cities, the trends in urban design and architecture, the secrets of urban environments. And during the nights, we will explore "the city that never sleeps"!

We have chosen Madrid because it is a city that has changed a lot in the past years, and more to come with the candidature to host the Olympic Games in 2016. A city with a great park in its heart (Retiro), with one of the best Underground systems, with an active citizneship and gaining multucultural richness year by year, and lots of neighbourhoods with its own personalities. A city to discover in many layers, like a Matrioshka, is waiting for you!

If you want to learn and participate in the discussions, if you have ideas that want to share, then you are lucky!!! You can still apply till Aug 25th! It is an event funded with Youth in Action program, so you may even get flight reimboursement :) You can get more information at the intranet, in facebook, or you can ask directly leaving a comment at this post.

Due to the transition between new and old websites in AEGEE, the best way to apply is to send an email directly to AEGEE Madrid (aegeemadrid (at) gmail.com), including:

If you experience any problem with you application in the website, please send us an email to aegeemadrid@gmail.com including the following information:

Full name:

Aegee antennae:

Studies:

Date fo birth:

Sex:

Address:

Phone:

Email:

Visum required:
Passport no:
Nationality:
Place of birth:

Remarks:

Q1 Why do you want to attend this event?:
Q2 What do you know about sustainable development and urban environments?:

Q3 Tell us something about yourself:

And now I say good bye, but before leaving I inform you that tomorrow is the first day of Ramadan in Morocco... Wish me luck!

The Age of Stupid

During the Geen Week in Brussels we had a great opportunity to see the new documentary called The Age of Stupid. Its a move directed and written by Franny Armstrong, a nice lady who after the movie also gave a small talk.
For me it was the best documentary I have ever seen. Documentaries tend to be just a bit boring movies that aim to pass on the message in a very neutral way. So did this movie, but in a whole new way. The narrotor, Pete Postlethwaite was the last human being on the world (year 2050) and he just wondered, what happened that it all ended up like that.....
Its not the Greenpeace wale saving mission kind of movie, its a movie that makes every single person realise that jeopardising our whole planet because of a "ruined view" is just not worth it. (Theres a very interesting part in the movie about the wind turbines in some northern English village I believe, where the local people fight against sustainable ways of producing energy because the wind turbines are diminishing the values of their view. Really!!).
I really do recommend to see the movie!!
But even better, take your sceptic friend with you and show them the movie! I think its a great movie with which we can illustrate our point.

See the trailer at:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DZjsJdokC0s&feature=fvst