We cannot express enough gratitude to AEGEE-Budapest for organizing such an amazing event.
Since it is so easy to name many things that are great about the events, we decided to focus on the frustrations a bit as well. After some thorough field research, we came up with the four most annoying things at the Agora. But remember, it just for fun, because we can safely and surely say that the positive things about this Agora overweigh the negative ones. Thanks again, AEGEE-Budapest!
1. Cueing
Cueing for food, for the toilets, for showers…. Let’s face it: nobody likes waiting.
On the other hand, these long lines are great opportunities for making new friends, or catching up with old ones!
2. Talking people
People talking when you want to listen to the speakers, people talking when you want to secretly take a nap during a plenary, people talking when you are trying to sleep off the adventures of the evening before at the gym and people talking when you don’t want to listen anymore (e.g. insanely long question lines when you actually want to leave the plenary hall for some fresh air).
3. Short conversations
The tight schedule often prevents us from having the long conversations you would like to have with your international friends that you have not seen in a long time. The longest conversations we generally have during the day, running from Plenary to Prytanium or workshop is “hi / bye”! Or, if you get lucky and get a few more minutes: “I am so tired / cold / hungry / all of the above.”
4. Hearing damage
One of the most fascinating parts of the Agora is seeing people reunite. Friends you haven’t seen in months, or even friends from a recent event, are always greeted with the dramatic running towards each other, falling in each other’s arms and screaming something like: “I have missed you sooooooo much!” or “o my god, it has been aaaaaages!”. Somehow it always seems necessary to yell this in a tone of voice that is not only extremely loud, but also ten octaves higher than your regular voice.
Tip: from now on put in ear plugs on arrival day to prevent some serious hearing damage.
To conclude, we asked two participants to share their biggest frustration of the Agora. Despite that we love looking on the bright side of life, which is why we also asked them to share their favorite things:
Isabelle Grimm, AEGEE-Dusseldorf:
“There are not enough showers, which is my least favorite part. Meetings friends from previous events is definitely the best part!”
Stanislav Komarovskyi, AEGEE-Kyiv:
“I don’t like the fact that people who were not accepted to the Agora came anyway. The thing I liked were the three girls who just got tattoos on the arrival day in Budapest! The combination of people being so serious during plenaries and then going crazy during their free time is fascinating.”
Written by Maartje Natrop, AEGEE-Utrecht