Kedves Mindenki!
Elhatároztam, hogy leírom az egyes táborokkal kapcsolatos élményeimet, mert különben hamarosan elveszhetnek a múlt homályában..:) persze, ha egyszer elkezdek írni, akkor nem tudok leállni, mindent el akarok mondani. Így történt, hogy ez a hosszú beszámoló még mindig csak az első része egy 2 hetes tábor + 1 hetes nyaralásnak Tramonti-ban!
Pictures are a bit messed up, but enjoy reading the first part of my diary about the last workcamp I participated! :) For those, who don't want to read all...IT WAS GREAT..THE END!! :)
Elhatároztam, hogy leírom az egyes táborokkal kapcsolatos élményeimet, mert különben hamarosan elveszhetnek a múlt homályában..:) persze, ha egyszer elkezdek írni, akkor nem tudok leállni, mindent el akarok mondani. Így történt, hogy ez a hosszú beszámoló még mindig csak az első része egy 2 hetes tábor + 1 hetes nyaralásnak Tramonti-ban!
Pictures are a bit messed up, but enjoy reading the first part of my diary about the last workcamp I participated! :) For those, who don't want to read all...IT WAS GREAT..THE END!! :)
Tramonti
2014. August 20. – September 2. (7.)
How did it begin with my experience in
Tramonti?? First of all..let’s say, that it was a hard decision, it was not
sure at all, that I will go to that camp. I was prepared to go to Ecovillage
Mogliazze (on the North in Liguria) from the very beginning of my
Erasmus semester.. as on the first week Manuela showed me the description of
all the workcamps of YAP, from which I was supposed to participate in a few. I
chose the Ecovillage on the first place, and during the whole season Liza and
Stefano always tried to pay attention on my preference. I would have chosen
Manservirsi Castle as well, as I thought it would be great to get to know the
operation of a castle, as a tourism attraction as an insider. The ecovillage on
the other hand attracted me, with the opportunity of taking care of some farm
animals, harvesting fruits and vegetables, cooking marmalade, collecting honey
and selling the products on the biomarket. Alessio, a young Italian volunteer of
YAP and at the same time the campleader of last year in Mogliazze told me about
the beautiful panorama-shower as well, which touched me immediately. According
to the news in the village there’s no normal shower, hot water only if the sun
shines and it warms up the water, moreover the shower is not in the building,
but outside, looking over the beautiful panorama of the Appenines. You can
understand why I wanted so badly to go there.
Well, at the end what happened..first of all, I
fell in love with Naples and the South of Italy during my first workcamp of
GIS1, then in while Liza and Stefano visited us in my 3rd camp,
Scandiano, they told me, that there was a new workcamp confirmed a few days ago,
but they haven’t got a campleader yet, however they were trying to announce it
among the Italian volunteers. They told me, that Alessio could go again to
Mogliazze and I could go to Tramonti. They tried to explain this opportunity
with their hope, as this would be the first year of the camp and they would be
happy to trust it with someone who has enough experience (and I was happy to be
a person like this… J ). So finally after a few days I
decided, that I would love to see more of South-Italy, even planned to go on a
trip to Puglia (to visit also an old-Erasmus friend) and accepted the offer.
Two of my best friends from Hungary came to
visit me for a week before my departure. I even had to get ready for moving out
of my room, to send home in different rounds my luggages..so I had some really
busy days. Guiding around my friends in Rome made me fall in love with the city
already for the 3rd or 4th times. But then the day has
arrived when I had to depart for the last camp. I saw some beautiful pictures
about the region, and I knew that I have to change vehicles at least 3-4 times
until I get there..still I couldn’t imagine, how beautiful it would be sitting
on the bus from Salerno and enjoying the curves on the Amalfi-coast, as the bus
climbs up the hills, crossing tiny but cute villages, pushing the horn in each
corner …J and getting lost in the amazing
view of the coast, the blue sea, the white boats, the green lemon terraces.
In Salerno I had to wait for the bus for an
hour, so I took a walk to the seaside and in the pedestrian area. When I
arrived back to the central station I saw an Asian guy with luggages waiting at
the same bus stop, where I should have been. As I checked around, I saw many
tourists in the area, therefore I decided to ask him only if he gets off at the
same stop where I will. He turned out to be Kei from Japan…my first volunteer
of “Make it green!”. In the meantime I contacted Antonio, the local coordinator,
who offered me to pick me up in Maiori. I was always a bit afraid of calling
the local coordinators for the first time, as talking with an Italian on phone
was still a challenge for me. At the same time I knew, that Antonio speaks
really well English, therefore there should be no problem.
Before the camps I was a bit afraid of losing
my Italian knowledge while staying with the international volunteer 24/7, but
it turned out, that even if one or two of the local coordinators had a good
English knowledge, I still had to translate between the other locals and the
volunteers, which I enjoyed a LOT!! I love becoming able to speak fluently in a
language, to slowly start using gestures, to be able to understand dialects,
etc.
Maiori was even more beautiful than Salerno, as
it is already a small paradise, a holiday-resort on the coast, one of the
biggest towns in the region. As with Kei we were walking towards Bar Oriente,
our meeting point with Antonio, we saw in the busstop a young guy, sitting on
his luggage…I became suspicious again…”excuse me, are you not going to the
project Make it green!?”...”oui, yes…I’m Antoine from France”…with a really
strong French accent J. So at the end the three of us were
waiting for Antonio, our really nice and handsome coordinator. Getting in the
car, we had our first sight of Tramonti, driving up and up towards the
mountains, getting further away from the coast. Tramonti is a group of 13
villages (tra monti = between mountains, tramonto = sunset) surrounded by the
lemon terraces, the wine yards, the green mountains, the blue sky and the view
of the distant infinite sea.
Our group of volunteers was staying in the
school of Polvica, where in the menza we had our mattresses, our
dining/sleeping/living-room a huge kitchen some storage rooms and the building
of the swimming pool, where we had some showers and bathrooms. During the
afternoon I have got to know better Antonio, Vincenzo, the head of Acarbio, the
host organization and Nicola, the coordinator of our environmental work with
whom we started to fix some principles, the concrete aims of the project, the
forthcoming program of our free-time and the details of the work itself. From
time to time new volunteers arrived, finally also Franco appeared, our great
chef, who immediately started to prepare the welcome dinner, on which we could
meet some of the locals. As usual I started with some name games and
ice-breakers, then I shared the basic information about the camp, the
accommodation, the next days. The first night we after dinner, we went to the
San Francesco Birreria and Pizzeria to try the new chestnut bear of the owner
and to walk a bit around the village. Of course people, mainly youngsters
looked at us as aliens, but we hoped, that after a while this might change. Our
task, apart from collecting rubbish was also to raise awareness among locals
concerning the environmental problems, and at the same time to raise the
interest of youngsters towards international programs, which are offered so many
times by Acarbio, but for which they can hardly find participants. Therefore we
were prepared to have many contacts with the community, to be presented to the
mayor and to try to involve in our work local volunteers as well.
The first working day started on the main road
crossing Tramonti, leading to the seaside. Our job was to clean the sides of
the road from the trash what is thrown away by people, and at the same time to
be as visible as possible for all the citizens who drive along. It actually
worked very well, most of the people stopped to ask what we were doing, where
we were coming from, or at least greeted us and our work by pushing the horn
and shouting “Complimenti” or “Bravi”. They often arrived with some apples, refreshments
or biscuits or offered us a coffee or an ice-cream in the bar where we stopped
for going to the bathroom. But the best was definitely, the fresh and cold
lemonade brought in the huge 5 liters bottle made of the lemon from one of the
most famous lemon growing region of the world. We did the same job for three
days, walking slowly on both sides of the street, and being very happy when
finally the group coming upwards met the group going towards the coast. I
should not forget about my great interview, given to the local TV channel, who
arrived at one point and asked really nice questions about the world peace J
On the first night, we went by walk to the
third village (Figlino) from Polvica, where on the previous days a fairy
tale-festival was organized, and that night the afterparty for the locals took
place, with pasta and fagioli, pasta with tomato sauce, sausage with spinach,
etc. and of course some house-wine. We walked around the village, adored the
fairy tale paintings on the walls, felt sorry for not being able to come when
it was all alive. We went in to the church of the village, waking up the priest
to have to possibility to see something really special, what I have never seen
before, a church with original painted majolica floor from the xx? century.
Then we also met some nice people from a local social club, who invited us for
some refreshments before the festival started. On the festival we ate a LOT,
…as usual, met the world-famous pasta e fagioli for the first time, and even
danced a bit with some girls, knowing the choreography of all the popular
Italian songs. At the end I had my great moment, going home on bike for the
first time with Vincenzo. I think I can state that riding a motorbike means
freedom for me, especially under the stars, among the green mountains, in Italy
or probably anywhere in the world… J
Another night we went to a medieval festival to
another small town, Capitignano. The organization of the transportation of our
group was so entertaining all the time. When we didn’t have our microbus,
driven by Lello (or Ivan/Igor our huge but nice “Ukrainian”...who looks like a
Ukrainian, according to the opinion of our volunteers but who is an original
Tramontese J), our coordinators usually stood
outside on the main road and stopped the locals asking if they also go to the
next village/ to the festival in the neighborhood/ to the seaside, and usually
we could find 2-3 cars in a few minutes. In Capitignano we spent a really
enjoyable, colorful night, as basically the half of the village turned into a
festival area. We saw an equestrian show, had a great dinner thanks to Franco,
enjoyed the local band and the dancers performing tamburreata.
To be continued…
