A small group of AEGEE members gathered in the capital of Finland for a Network Meeting (NWM) with the theme of strengthening the cooperation between the antennae who have Karolina Mazetyte as their Network Commissioner.
AEGEE-Sankt-Petersburg and AEGEE-Helsinki could say ‘present’ with capital P in NWM Helsinki, which evolved into a NWM strengthening the cooperation between those two antennae. Besides the two antennae who had many members in the NWM there was also one Turkish Exchange student from AEGEE-Tallinn, a girl from AEGEE-Bilbao and ACT subcommissioner Patricia Anthony who was in charge of the NWM organisation together with Comité Directeur representative Anna Gots.
Questions like “What is a NWM?” “What is the Comité Directeur?” “What is the Action Agenda?” “What do you do at EBM and Agora?” proved to both girls that there is a need for more exchanges and regional training courses in this Network area. Most of the questions were answered through presentations by Patricia on the current Action Agenda, which was followed by drafting activities for the Action Agenda produced in EBM Valletta. Anna’s presentations about the European level of AEGEE and the many proposals that are going to be discussed in Agora Rhein-Neckar answered most of the remaining questions.
Throughout the NWM the participants were actively participating, especially in the workshops with the topic of European identity and immigration/migration provided by International Politics Working Groups representative Anastasia Petrushkova. In the end it appeared that the participants returned with both more information about our organisation, as well as motivation to create great events and activities. AEGEE-Helsinki might even be able to pass on the torch to AEGEE-Sankt-Peterburg who is considering hosting the next Network Meeting in the near future.
Patricia returned to Copenhagen from the Network Meeting with a lot of food for thought and creative ideas for activities like creating local Action Agenda Working Groups in antennae; organising a European Day of Minorities; sharing stories about members from minority groups online; and more activities that can be used not only in the Northern part but in the whole Network.
As for the social program, the participants got a very big surprise on European Night in the form of a visit from Santa Claus himself. In that way the European Night in Helsinki became a bit cultural. Maybe Santa should consider applying for other events around Europe contributing to the Cultural European Night of more events?…
It was impressive to see how much food, sweets and drinks that AEGEE-Helsinki had gotten sponsored for the NWM. Seppo Hälikkä from AEGEE-Helsinki seemed to be using “dirty tricks” in the run for “best organiser” because he was one of the organisers that was using a lot of effort on cooking high class meals, and ensuring that the participants were never hungry. In general all the organisers did an excellent job and it is certain that participants left the ice cold snowy Helsinki with the desire to return soon!
Written by Patricia Anthony, AEGEE-København