Individuality within the community
Individuality within the community – European Citizenship versus National Identity
Poronin, 20-27.01.2007
Recently we have participated in the project that has given us a chance to think about our national individuality and if we really feel like european citizens. Our week with friends from Greece, Lithuania, Germany and Hungary started in a traditional polish restaurant on main market square in Krakow. A cold, rainy day couldn\’t be an obstacle to see wonderful places around the city centre. The main part of the exchange took place in Biały Dunajec close to Zakopane. The program of the project was really full of workshops, discussions, games, parties and excursions. We worked both in national and mixed teams. Most interesting for me was a possibility to create something together with people from different cultures and countries. We enjoyed both workshops based on comprehensive discussions and games, trips as the other ways of reaching knowledge and experience. Once, we made a time-line with most important facts from the history if our countries and we could learn much about things that are really important for us. During other workshop we were divided into 3 groups of different cultures (1 – culture of childish happiness, 2 – culture of sadness and work, 3 – culture of love and friendship) and we were to build a house. We realized that cultures differences and lack of cooperation and open attitude could make this task unfinished. Nevertheless for me most amazing thing was t-shirt painting. Having been given white, empty t-shirt (standing for “tabula rasa”) we tried to make something ( using many colours, glasses, little stones…) that could express us well. No more about workshops!:) What\’s more, we could walk to Morskie Oko Lake along trees covered with snow or enjoy in Aqua Park in Zakopane.There were also a lot of sport games on snow, movie evenings and for sure national evenings were something that none of participants could miss as they made us feel, taste and see other cultures. Hungarian dances, lithuanian ways of greeting guests, incredible greek dances with salto (could be real even for those less fit:)), german keen for sport and at last polish love for culture. The atmosphere within the group was great:)!!! Participants overcame differences really really fast. We are sure our new friendships last and lead us to next projects:)
Tomasz Bednarek
