change of life...

[wishmerhill]

I think Jürgen will write something here soon! Stay tuned, as it's damn serious!

[Jyrgen]

Campers and ex-campers, participants and teamers, ladies and gentlemen,

the camp needs 10 minutes of your life!

We are collecting statements, short texts, essays about what influences / impact the camp had on "its people", how it might have changed lives even.
This is not only for curiosity: it might help us to justify why it is was worthy to do the camp and why it will be worth keeping on doing it.
Especially to have something in hand in case we have to discuss with somebody, organisation etc. who gives money (or should give money) for financing the camp.

So:
Take a moment, open a beer, have a coffee or whatever, try to think about the international youth camp and then write it down (in proper English if possible; if it's easier for you: Spanish, Italian, German, French will do, too)
by experience: best ist to take the time right now - afterwards you'll forget it.

We don't need statements like "the camp is so great" or "the camp has really changed my way of thinking" - we need it concrete.
For example:
After the camp I felt encouraged to go abroad for studying/travelling/Erasmus/...
or
The camp made me aware that there are so many different cultures and that mine is just one possibility....
or
With the camp I found out that I have different expectations on life than I had before...
or also smaller things like
In the camp I lost my restraint of speaking a foreign language / after the camp I started to learn a language.
Whatever.

Relations, friendships, love, ..... every statement is welcome.

You can write it as an E-Mail and send it straight to me.
If you would like other people to read it, too, you can post it on the camp forum:
viewtopic.php?f=3&t=476&start=0 (you have to sign in)
or on the facebook group "international youth camp"

Before publishing the statements we will of course anonymize them!

Thank you very much!!!

a hug from Jürgen
and a lot more people working on the camp's future.

[Massimo]

Camp made me to know how's Europe outta Italy... and, last but (absolutely) not least, camp made me to know my future wife! XD
Long life to the camp!

[wishmerhill]

The international youth camp is a whole part of my life. I attended at 5 camps as a participant and 7 as a teamer.

I already wrote a lot about the camps on another post (and in some many mails in the past). Back then we used to write, each of us, small letters about the camp, and I managed to collect some of them. But this time is different, we have to point out how camp was important to us, not just the feelings it gave us.

I was 17 when I approached the camp in 1993. It was in Litomysl (CZ) and it was my first experience abroad alone. I was shy, maybe weird, was not used to speak English nor German (although I was learning both for a pretty long time). There I met friends I am still in contact with nowadays and among them there are some of my best friends ever.
I've been camp addicted since then and just recently I managed to cope with the fact I am grown old and there are (pity) some other priorities.

After Litomysl I started to love languages, I started to travel around Europe end broaden my point of view. I met wonderful people who let me understand how much can we gain from knowing each other, from getting in touch with DIFFERENT cultures and how much such differences make everyone special. And at the same time I learned how, even though there are difference, we are just one kind, does not matter if German, French, Italian, Czech, Polish, Croatian, Hungarian or whatever.

Maybe today, with one Europe and one currency, all of this may sound obvious, but it's not. As long as people sit in their living rooms, watching television and listening to the news they want us to get, people will never really know what's around them. Realities like the IYC can still play a wonderful, important role in making people aware of the world.

That just minimal part of what I think I have learned in my long camp years.

Maybe I'll add some more statements here, but for now... that's all folks!

[phil32]

Hey People,

When I participated for the camp my first time in 2006 I was pretty shy and I had not much selfconfidence. the people there were open to me and it didn't take a long time to make friends. The people there and the atmosphere of the camp helped myself to grow up.
The different friendships helped me to get through many highs and lows of my life.
For me the camp is also important, because there I don't have to think about the problems of my all day life. I am thinking about the workshop and what we could do better or with what we could start with...
To be true, there are many things I could say about the camp. I just don't find the words..

[angelamstel]

Well, what can I say about the camp… it has definitely changed my life, and of course for the best!

The camp has allowed me to get to know incredible people from all over Europe , thus letting me know more about other cultures and countries and expanding my horizons. It has been the best way for me to fight my prejudices, for example, and it has taught me to appreciate the differences and similarities between all countries, more than to appreciate them, to love them. It is wonderful to see so many different people coming from so different countries and backgrounds fight for their ideals, have fun and share experiences, jokes and ideas in so many different languages.

The camp also encouraged me to work as a teacher, for example, because there I have seen what kind of wonderful things teenagers can do (and we together with them), and what a difference they can make, and I wanted to be part of it, taking the idea of the camp further –respect, harmony, understanding, the fact that we can change things with hard work, interest and a smile, just to mention some things… In short, the camp has taught me that we small people can really make a difference in this world, and this is the idea that I wanted to spread.

In other order of things, the camp is also responsible for my leaving my country and going abroad. Hadn’t it been for the camp, I would probably never had gone out of Spain, and would have never had the chance to live a different culture from inside, which of course has given me a completely different viewpoint about life in general, and has given me the opportunity to enlarge my professional field and working competences.

Because of the camp, I have also learnt a lot about Europe, the European Union, European citizenship and European programmes, and because of this also other people from different countries have benefitted from it, by means of seminaries, international meetings and so on, which are now bearing their fruits (youth exchanges and new projects with youth workers from all over Europe, just to mention some).

I could keep on writing for hours, but I think that these lines can already give an impression about how the camp has changed my life; and, last but not least, in the camp I also met my boy, what is to say that the camp is also to be hold responsible of my actual happiness! ;D

[martynka]

hi hi

When I decided to take part in the IYC for the first time I didn`t know in what I was geting myself into.
The camp atmosphere, the people, the whole organisation it was to me definetly unexpected, in the best possible way.

and how camp change my life?
First of all, friendships that I started on the camp will last much much longer then those 18 days.
I met incredible people there, that i miss everyday.
Thanks to the camp I had an opportunity to meet people all arround te Europ, and learn their perception of the world.
Camp proofed to me truely that there are no borders in Europ, literally and metaphorically speaking.

and for sure my first choice for more or less first 3 weeks of August each year is IYC,
if I`m not there I regret, and I`m trying to find a way to get there at least for last few days

hope it will make it, my dyslexia is not making it any easier to write in english

[tijana]

Do you recognize this place?
The place where you can be yourself.
The place where you can be anyone you want to be.
The place where you can find recpect for cultural diversity.
The place with a million honest smiles.
The place with a hundreds of great people.
The place where you can gain totally new experience.
The place where you can attend completely different parties!
Oh, yes, you’re right – It’s the International Youth Camp!!

And the best thing is: once you become a part of it, you’ll stay it forever, because you can’t forget all those lovely people you met, all that experience you gained, all the wonderful things that happened to you on that beautiful place – i one, only & unique place – IYC!!! Be part of it!

[petrushka]

Ok, folks, it is really hard, but there it is.. Jürgen, feel free to use it for whatever you want. If you want, I can even sign it


The IYC has changed my life in many ways and it would probably take quite some time to name them all but I will at least try to sum up the most important ones.

- I have more than 100 people all around Europe which I am glad to call friends – those you can count on when you are down, those who help you when you need, those you can pay a visit to when you are around their home or even stay at their home and much more

- I learned many new skills in various areas, such as intercultural learning, ICT (thanks to workshops), leadership ... And I learned what the word “respect” means in so many different ways

- I improved my English, German and much more, picked so many nice words and phrases in so many different languages, so easily

- and I got my job.

Well, maybe at least the last point deserves a bit longer explanation, so here it is. Before my first camp as a participant I needed to earn money for the travel and participation fee as I was just a normal secondary school student from not that rich family. So I was suggested to fulfil a grant application to the municipality for that. At that time, at the age of 18, it was my first time to see something like that. I had not that big clue about project cycle management, grants and such things. But I wanted to take part in the camp, so I tried, I found out more, wrote the application (with a big help of my friend) and it got approved. I could go to the camp and I went. And there I got to know a bunch of great people, who were interested in similar issues as I was. So we had several talks and finally we decided to carry out and international youth exchange. And we did it, from writing the grant application to realizing the whole project. I was 20 and I felt great, proud because of that project, feeling more self-confident than ever. (And those who know me would confirm that I was never really a self-confident one.) Since then youth work really attracted me a lot. I did some more international projects afterwards and learned more about one of the institutions giving money for such ones. And I said to myself, well, this is a kind of job I would really love to do. Half a year ago there was vacancy at that institution. So I tried. And I got the job. And I was so happy, no one can imagine. I dare say that without the IYC, I would never come this far. Believe it or not.

I say thank you to all the great people who ever helped to carry out so many great camps and I hope that the IYC will get the chance to change the lives of much more youngsters. Thanks.

[Massimo]

Camp made me to know how's Europe outta Italy... and, last but (absolutely) not least, camp made me to know my future wife! XD
Long life to the camp!

Well, I can see I've been too much in a hurry and I didn't write all the things the camp's given me since the time I knew its existence.
Let's try again.

It was the beginnin' of 2005 and I worked in a small office, close to one of Lollo's friends. By him, I met directly Lollo and he talked to me about what the camp was. I'm honest, I had never heard anything like the camp, and I simply thought it could me something like staying together and wasting time like a normal holiday is. So, I'd been convinced to join this mysterious experience.

After a loooooooong travel to Casas, I'd been thrown in a strange and different place, where EVERYBODY called "friend" each other. Everything worked as a family work, and workshops let me know that different languages don't strictly mean "different or alien people" XD

I was a shy boy, I admit that, who had never traveled abroad so much (it's obvious add I'd never made a friendship in 'em) and these only 17 days started to turn me in somebody different. I built more friendships than in the rest of my live before! XD

Just the day after the endin' of Casas' IYC, I immediately started to think to 2006 one and, believe in me, it's been hard and hard to wait for 12 long months! In the meantime, my life changed, and my manners and thoughts too. Myslowice finally arrived (with its looong travel, of course). Poland appeared to me so strange! It really didn't fit to my idea of Europe! But that fascinated me! In the first days I made the rest of acquaintance I hadn't done during the 2005 camp, and so I knew Irena, a nice girl I thought I would have only as a "e-mail" friend... in facts, our relations during that camp had been frequent and friendly, but nothing much.

I didn't know she could be the "no-way point" of my life! After the camp, I sent her a sms just 'cause I found her number in the CD's member list; since that, a day have never passed without hear something from her

Well, I know I lived the 2007 camp by a different view, due to the fact me and Iri joined it as a couple, but maybe it made me to live the rest of experiences I couldn't live alone...

So, how to conclude my "little" report?

IYC didn't give me a job, but it's given me the pleasure to try how is simple and beautiful live not only as a simple "italian boy", but as an "european boy", without thinkin' 'bout curtains, prejudices and so more...

IYC's given me a lot of new friends, which whom I can compare my life and my points of view...

But, much important, IYC's given me a INCOMPARABLE WIFE (iri), a (not so far) FUTURE FAMILY and a neverending SMILE!

THANKS, IYC, AND LONG LIVE TO YOU!

sbf

[irenina]

Well well well!
This is very difficult...to say waht the camp gave me in the "professional" live...
In the general, good feeling of knowing lot of people from whole Europe and many of them as my friends. And even if I am not in touch with them, I remember them and they remember me...Change of my opinions about other europian nations, I knew the best and the worst about them and I love them all!
I could improve and practice my english and my italian (thanks to this, I work now as a teacher of italian language and sometimes as a interpreter), I learn many usefull things on the interculturality seasions and even If I was never shy , I understood that I can speak with people from another countries without problems, even if my english is not so great .
But he most important thing what camp gave me was possibility to meet and know one special person who changed my live in many ways - my beloved Massimo. I will go to live with him in Italy and we will never foget where we meet each other...
Thank you for this and GO ON CAMP!
I love you all
P.S.: WE are the real camp couple

[Jyrgen]

ladies and gentlemen:
this is amaaaazing!
you wouldn't believe all things I received these days...
thank you all!!

I will try to put all stuff together and put it on the net, but probably not here on the forum because I received a lot of mails and texts with the prefix "I couldn't log to the forum".
Don't know if it's a technical or a personal matter -
anyway I'll try to find another way....

thank you again, have a nice life -
Jürgen