Lithuania
Our Communication Prior to the 1st Youth Exchange in Cyprus
Despite the fact Lithuania is a small country, we could not meet as often as we wanted because some of the team members live as far as 300 km apart from each other. Due to the distance and busy schedules we managed to meet all together just once, at the end of the May, in the “middle” of Lithuania, in the city of Kaunas. It was a nice hot spring day (which is quite a rare instance for Lithuania), so we could have drinks outside, meet each other, discuss the youth exchange and our first assignments (logo and posters). In the picture you can see left to right Augustė, Julija, Simona, Tomas, and Evelina.
Unfortunately, by the time we met, one of the participants of our team, Viltė, quit the project because she had to move to Paris at the same time as Youth Exchange to start her studies at university. So, in a short period of time, the representative of our organization, Gabriele, found another participant, Karina. So, we were six members of the team again.
The most convenient way to discuss tasks and issues proved to be a separate Facebook chat for our Lithuanian team and a chat. Therefore, all the major milestone tasks were announced on the Facebook page, while smaller day-to-day discussions and issues were held in our chat.
The First Creative Projects
As the participating team of SOESOS Youth Exchange, we had to submit our proposals for logo competition. In order to be fair and efficient choosing the two best proposals from our country, we created an online Facebook vote in our closed group. Unfortunately, we did not win the competition (good job, Romania!), but we believe our contribution was valuable and competitive. Here are the logos that our team members created:
The next major task was the creation of posters which would show and describe the environmental problems of Lithuania and the ways, as we imagine and propose, for solutions of these problems. Since, as mentioned before, we could not get together as much as we wanted to “juggle” ideas or visit some environment-related places, we had to do our “homework” independently most of which consisted of taking pictures of the polluted environment around us, reading articles on the Internet, and asking opinions of people environmental issues related experts as well as just our friends and acquaintances. So, this is how our posters were “born” (they are presented in the SOESOS Facebook group). We will be happy to present and discuss them in more details when we have our presentation in Cyprus.
Our Expectations and Our Contribution
The last (but not the least) issue that we want to introduce in this short report is what we expect from the project to give us and how we can contribute to its success. These are the direct quotes of our participants which we leave for you as our goodwill and promise. J
“I wish to prepare as much as I can and expect others to have done the same. This will allow us to be the most efficient in doing our tasks.”
“I hope to meet a lot of inquisitive, excited and friendly people that will not only contribute a lot to the work being done but will also be a joy to be around.”
“Together with the project team, I will perform various creative tasks, I will work with the project partners. I will do my homework well and timely.”
“I believe I can contribute to the projects successful completion by giving motivation to others and myself, by supplying valuable information to the participants and by using non-formal methods to get information across.”
“I never have any expectations for any project, but in this one I hope to learn more about how can youth make their own projects for making the world a better place, how to start and how to not lose motivation if something doesn't go the way you planned it.”
“I am full of ideas and believe that all of the participants are as well, thus there will be no limits to our contribution to the cause.”
See you all soon!
Yours truly,
the team of Lithuania:
Evelina, Simona, Tomas, Augustė, Karina and Julija
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