The first day was arrival day. We got to Stratoni in the late evening hours and met with Aris and Claire who told us the background about the building we were staying at and a little about the history of the village. Then we went to get dinner and rest from our long trip.
The second day, we started our training by doing a few activities to get to know each other and played a fun game to help us learn the names of the other participants. We also drew a name from a box and the name we picked would be our secret friend for the whole training and our task was to leave them little notes or gifts each day. The most interesting activity of the day was the Scavenger Hunt – we got to explore the village and even meet a few locals. We summarized the day by reflecting on what was positive, what could be improved and what was negative or what are our complaints about the activities from this day.
The third day, following breakfast, we received a briefing on the daily reports before beginning the training with an energizer. After that, Bojan gave a brief explanation of each of the 8 key competencies, and we had a discussion about how we could use them in our daily lives. There also was an NGO fair where representatives from various organizations were given the opportunity to discuss their primary objectives and upcoming projects. After lunch, we played Top 10 and completed another energizer, both of which were a lot of fun. Once more, we were put into groups and given a text on a different subject to read, comprehend, and write questions and suggestions for improvement before deciding how to do it. The topic had to be conjectured by the others. The individual reflection that followed using the onion method was really instructive and beneficial. That allowed us to see the other person’s opinions and values as well as our own differences and similarities with them. We finished the day by talking about the Iceberg Theory developed by a famous sociologist E.H. We had that as a very good core example of our society and its image. And to top everything, we hosted our 1st of 2 days of Intercultural nights, where we had a great opportunity to have our cultures displayed and talk about our most delicious dishes, snacks, delights and other interesting facts.
The fourth day also started with an energizer and then we continued the day with the Common Group game where we had to do different tasks for a limited time and really showed us that if we work as a group we could accomplish anything. Later in the day, we were introduced to the concept – Theater of the oppressed (Forum theater) where we were divided in group in which we had to choose a real life situacion on a topic from the project ( e.g. discrimination, exclusion..) and convert it to a theater show where after each group acted out their concept we had a discussion. We got to end the night by having the 2 day of intercultural nights.
The fifth day started with us playing The top 10 game. Then we had “The island” activity where we were divided into two groups (tribes) and each tribe was given information about the goals they had but they had to create their own language, rituals, traditions, flag etc..j by themselves. The point of this activity was to see the difficulties in understanding each other that were results of the language barrier and to see that this activity is closely related to reality in terms of the way cultures can interact. We did reflections where we discussed both points of views and got a better understanding of everything. After this activity, we tackled the question about inclusion barriers for young people on personal and structural levels such as education, health, community etc. We wrote concrete problems and after that we had to brainstorm different solutions for these problems as youth workers. The day ended with reflection time.
On the sixth day we further discussed the activities we could do as youth workers and we were divided in groups to discuss it together. Later we were presented “The ladder of participation” after which we had to write a few real life examples we had and then to think about how we could have made the situacion better, what were the obstacles and the enabling factors and could we control them or not. We had a group discussion about this after each group presented their situations.
The seventh day was trip day. First we visited Aristotle Park which was so interesting to see. Afterwards we went to Arnea where we saw some beautiful and unique architecture. Lastly, we traveled to the city of Ouranopoli, where we had lunch and the took a boat to an island called Drenia where we spent the rest of the day relaxing and swimming in the crystal clear water.
On the eight day we had a task to think of ideas about creating our own activities. Our trainers helped us by talking about tips and tricks of creating our own activities. We were divided into groups and had to pick a topic (theme) and think of a few activities that revolved around that theme which we had to present the next day. We had the whole day to prepare the activities.
On the ninth day, each group got to present their ideas and activities on the different topics related to the Balkan Vision project and after each group we had a discussion about what was good, what could be improved and what could be changed for the better.
On our last day, we learned about Erasmus+ and the opportunities that it offers. Then we all shared our best memories from the whole training. In the evening we had a ceremony where we were given the certificates for the training, The top 10 winners were announced and the secret friends were revealed. We also had cards with our names and everyone got to write sweet messages to each other. It was an unforgettable experience.
