In this term, the Culture Working Group (CWG) started a new initiative that will make our streets and societies more cultural by very easy actions that can be carried out by individuals or by locals. In other words, the aim is to have Culture Everywhere, which is also the name of the action.
Each month CWG members decide upon a cultural topic, and gather online to brainstorm about possible activities. Later on all these ideas are shared with the AEGEE boards in order to encourage them to improve the cultural situation in the places they live in. Of course, all the suggestions are collected in the CWG website as well.
Last month the kick off topic was literature and AEGEE-Budapest was one of the locals that got very enthusiastic when they got to know about it. On a cold evening in December some of their members met at a really artistic place of Budapest, to be able to feel inspired by the culture and the arts and the good work started.
They wanted to prepare something simple but interesting at the same time. In the end among all the suggestions they decided to combine two of them to get a more effective result: a flash mob to promote public book sharing.
Some days later, six of them met at the Móricz Zsigmond körtér, one of Budapest’s most crowded places, with the intention to show how rich and important the Hungarian literature is. The plan was as follows: some of them would stand in different parts of the square and start reading passages of Füveskönyv, one of the books of Sándor Márai, where this famous Hungarian writer and poet quotes everyday life. After a while the courageous readers would stop reading and leave the books on the benches next to them.
At first nobody was interested in the performance, but later more and more people started to listen to it. Most of the people were retired, but there were a lot of children too.
In any case, the experience was worth it, and even if no one dared to ask them what all this was about, people were enjoying: ”We felt that we did something cultural, and we gave some beauty to the grey and boring weekdays. I think it was a great start of the project and we are excited about the next topics”, says Dóra Andorkó, coordinator of the event of AEGEE-Budapest.
Now the CWG is in the month of photography, so what are you waiting for? Let’s have Culture Everywhere!
Written by Dóra Andorkó, AEGEE-Budapest and Guillermo García Tabarés, AEGEE-Barcelona and member of the Culture Working Group
Photos by Zsanett Dobra, AEGEE-Budapest.