Texel report written by Marii Eliise Rüütli

Hi everybody! My name is Marii Eliise Rüütli and I am from Estonia. I was on Texel island in Holland, at the 2nd meeting of CU in 10 years project with other participants from Bulgaria, Italy, Denmark, Holland and of course Estonia. Like the previous reporter (Andrea from Italy) this is for me also the first time for this kind on projects. CU in 10 years has many topics that I am interested in. The thought that we can influence politicians to make our life better and that with our, the youth, ideas is just amazing. It is a great opportunity to get experiences and contacts and good friends from all over the Europe. From this kind on projects we can see that European countries don’t have big differences and most of the problems are the same. It is much easier to solve these problems together and the last meeting proved it. It might seem like we just worked there- not at all- Peter and others made very funny games for us. Every game made us more and more friends and what was the most important for me, they kept us motivated and energized.

At the Schiphol Airport we had almost the same funny thing that Italians had last time. The only difference was that Estonians and Italians recognized each other from the last trip and like last time the Danish came to ask if we were there for the project, but there was some confusion and we thought we are from different projects. Finally, when Peter came we found that it was the same project after all.

At the Schiphol airport we met near the red & white colored meeting point. After talking a bit about the transport and other “important” things we went on a bus and started moving. On the way we picked up the Dutchmen and a Belarusian volunteer Olga who helped out Peter and Remco. Finally we all were on the bus moving towards Texel Island.

First days were for getting to know each other trough different games: energizes and ice-breakers. Also we visited The Most Beautiful City In The World, Den Helder, where Richter is situated. At the same time they opened a very interesting and unusual art exhibition where everyone could take part and discover the instruments that were shown. I would like to add that the instrument that a man was playing was called Tiramine (cool instrument). We also had a little bit time to explore the most beautiful city in the world and I have to say that it really was beautiful.

The working days were quite intense but interesting. Firstly we talked about all the 11 topics that came out at the APV meeting and this time there was 1 addition: health care. Also we practiced an interesting method of discussing the topics in smaller groups. There were 3 roles: timekeeper, monitor & chairman…oops…chairPERSON. Every international group had one of them. I think that everyone did a great job with the roles.
In the evenings and nights most of us were outside in front of the hotel smoking …... or just being passive smokers. The town was also full of life when our group invaded it, especially the cozy place Café De Slock, where we spent some great time together. All of us got along and there were no problems.

The leaving was very sad because we had so much fun and all became very good friends. And the island itself was too sweet to leave behind.

Many of us started to think that it would be a really good idea to make some new project and continue with the CU in 10 Years idea, because the projects each topic need a lot of discussing and we have the people who are interested in these kinds of issues. We also talked about the next meeting in Bulgaria, I’m very curious to find out how the next stage of the project will turn out to be.

For the conclusion I would like to say that the second meeting went well. For so few days we talked about 12 big topics that each would actually need at least 1 day of discussion, but we already got some constructive ideas and common conclusions. So congratulations for all of us and for these guys who made this project happen!

Thanks For Reading,
Marii ;)