ERASMUS+ Key action 2: Capacity Building in the field of youth The Young Side of the Moon

The project

The project “The Young Side of the Moon” is co-financed by the ERASMUS+ programme of the European Union, Key Action 2 Capacity building in the field of youth. 

Venues 

Italy(Caltanissetta), Senegal (Ziguinchor), India (Vijayawâda), Vietnam (Hanoi), Kenya (Kisumu). 

Countries involved 

Italy, Senegal, Kenya, India, Vietnam, Latvia, Greece, Cyprus 

General objective 

To engage youth workers from EU and Partner countries to step up into leadership roles in their local and global communities as agent and multipliers for sustainable codevelopment and growth. 

Specific objective

To enhance the socio-professional development of youth workers and organizations to respond to identified community needs and global challenges affecting young people Worldwide. 

Results achieved

- N. 48 youth workers from EU and Partner Countries equipped with key competences and tools on Project Cycle Management and community development. 

- Strengthened the capacity of youth workers and organizations involved to delivery community based project addressing young people. 

- Strengthened international cooperation and the exchange of experiences on youth work and community development between different World countries. 

Mobility of youth workers

The project include different mobility activities of youth workers: 

- A Training Course in Italy, Caltanissetta, 20-28 February 2015, involving 28 youth workers from Italy, Senegal, Kenya, Vietnam, Latvia, Greece, Cyprus. 

- A Job shadowing in Senegal, Ziguinchor, 20-28 April 2015, involving 5 youth workers from Italy, Greece, Senegal. 

- A Job shadowing in India, Vijayawada, 20-28 June 2015, involving 5 youth workers from Italy, Cyprus, India. 

- A Job shadowing in Vietnam, Hanoi And Ha Giang Province, 30 August - 8 September 2015, involving 5 youth workers from Italy, Latvia, Vietnam. 

- A Job shadowing in Kenya 28 October to 6 November 2015, involving 5 youth workers from Italy, Cyprus, Latvia, Kenya. 

The final booklet "The young side of the moon: youth workers and community development around the World.
The booklet is intended as a learning resource to support community development in the frame of youth work, specifically targeting youth workers that are engaged in community work with disadvantaged young people. Overall it aims to provide inspiration and guidelines to provide youth workers with knowledge, key competences and practical tools needed for the development and delivery of community-based projects that responds to identified young people community’s needs. PCM is combined with a creative approach experimented by Prism, which is based on use the concept album of Pink Floyd entitled "The Dark Side of the Moon".

The booklet gives also an inside look to youth work and community development as experienced in different regions of the World: Senegal, India, Vietnam, Kenya.

To download the booklet:
http://www.associazioneprism.eu/images/pdf/Bookelt_The%20Young%20Side%20of%20the%20Moon.pdf

The project video
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hnW3TkedVJQ&feature=youtu.be

This project has been funded with support from the European Commission. This publication reflects the views only of the author, and the Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein.

UNITED: Understand Neighbors Integration Through European Dances

                             

From the 16th to the 24th of February 2016 the association ASAP Europe from Fasano, organized the Erasmus+ KA1 Youth Exchange UNITED: Understand Neighbors Integration Through European Dances, supported by the European Commission under the Erasmus+ programm.
 
The topic of the exchange was the intercultural knowledge through dance as an instrument of dialogue and mutual respect and was held at Park Hotel Sant’ Elia. ( http://www.parkhotelsantelia.it/it/home/)

The exchange was attended by 40 young people from 8 countries: Italy (Asap Europe), Lithuania (VsI "Jaunimo epicentras), Poland (Stowarzyszenie Mlodziezowych Inicjatyw Tworczych - Creator), Greece (Interalia e Youth Horizons), Macedonia (Asocijacija za napredok, edukacija i lobiranje -PEL), Croatia (Civilna, edukativna i transparentna platforma - CET), Spain (AC Amics de la Biblioteca de la Fonteta) and Romania (Asociatia SUPER TINERI -ASIRYS). The average age was between 18 and 25 years old and most of them participated for the first time to a project under the Erasmus+ program. The passion and the entrepreneurial spirit of the group made very positive this experience for everyone: for Asap team, for the participants and for also the staff of the hotel, with whom there was a very good harmony and collaboration.
 
The aim of the project was to support the mutual knowledge and understanding of the young participants about different cultures and the rich heritage of traditional dances existing in Europe. The trainers involved in the facilitation of the learning process were Francesco Palazzo and  Mariagrazia Pinto from the “Association Asap Europe” and Panagiotis Papailias  from the Greek “Association Youth Horizons”.
 
During the week, the participants were involved in group activities, energizers, role play and workshops according to the non-formal education principles, recommended by the European Commission. The focus of the exchange was dance meant as an instrument to break down prejudices and stereotypes and creating relationships among young people.

Every day of the week there were 4 activity sessions; the participants used free time to know each other, relax, discover the territory and organize the various workshops.

Tuesday, 16: from the morning until the evening all participants arrived in Fasano. After dinner we spent the evening doing activities useful to know each other (Name Game, Towel Game, True & False).

Wednesday,17: the morning session was focused on the presentation of the programme and the coordinating team; to the formulation of group's rules, the exploration of fears, expectations and contributions of each participant on the imminent experience. In the afternoon, the first session was a very funny activity: Mission Impossible, aimed to create a group spirit and a greater mutual understanding; the second one was about the exploration of the concept of culture and cultural diversity (Mouse Game). During the evening, after dinner, we had our first intercultural night: the participants from Lithuania, Spain and Macedonia introduced us to their typical food and drinks, explaining ingredients and origins, giving the opportunity to everyone to learn about their culinary traditions.

Thursday, 18: after a first activity about stereotypes and prejudices (Abigale Story), participants committed themselves, in groups, in choosing and represent through role-playing and dancing the main traditions of the different countries, in which music has a central role. In the afternoon, there was the first workshop held by participants from Greece who explained us the origins of two traditional dances and tried to teach the basic steps to the whole group. In the evening there was the second intercultural night, in which the participants have discovered flavors and traditions of Romania, Croatia and Poland.

Friday,19: the first session was focused on the issue of participation and inclusion of young people with fewer opportunities, while in the second session there was the Macedonian workshop with songs and dances. In the afternoon the group had the possibility to admire the beauty of our territory thanks to a short trip organized in Polignano a Mare.

Saturday,20: the day was dedicated to various workshops. Spain, Poland and Italy, involved participants in different dances, explaining the origins and characteristics. The evening was spent  in Fasano: the group visited our town, walking through the streets of the old town and the  Portico delle Teresiane.

Sunday,21: free time morning. Some of the group visited the Zoo Safari and others went to Savelletri. In the afternoon it was the turn of the Lithuanian workshop.

Monday,22: After an activity focused on intercultural learning, there were the last two workshops  of Romania and Croatia. The last session was dedicated to the preparation of the final performance. In the evening we had our last intercultural night in which the protagonists were Italy and Greece.

Tuesday,23: during the morning we talked about Erasmus + and guys had the chance to work on future project ideas, during the afternoon the participants were involved in different activities, in which they could evaluate the week and the learning process and themselves about the gained experience and the acquired skills. Then they received the Youthpass certificate. It was an intense moment full of emotions, in which guys shared opinions, feelings and impressions. Finally, it was organized an evening opened to the local community of Fasano where participants performed the traditional dances of their mother countries. The evening was also livened up by the performance of a Fasano group of musicians and dancers of the association "Impronte di Puglia" that involved everyone in pizzica and quadriglia  (italian traditional dances).

This was the third experience at local level to Asap Europe and was a great success as evidenced by the feedback from participants, among which were established strong relationships. In addition, ASAP team has been strengthened even more and, after this intense experience, the already active volunteers Anita Pinto and Angelica Velletri were joined by other two girls from Fasano, Maria Vita Pinto and Valeria Carparelli. “This experience- Maria Vita says - was for me very satisfying, useful and constructive because it allowed me to meet people from different countries, make new friends, overcoming the initial shyness and improve my English, as well as create a good relationship with each participant”.

Photos link:  
https://www.facebook.com/medi /set/?set=a.966793036707822.1073741851.546148255438971&type=3

You can find some video of the week at the Youtube channel of Tamara, one of our Croatian participant:

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCQENzQSmip2j_cXlmP51NsA

What's Happening in Turkey?

by Burak Kahraman

Starting from May 28, 2013, over 200 demonstrations took place in 67 cities of Turkey.  Five people died, tens lost their eye-sight, and thousands were injured after the disproportionate response of the police.  While this abuse of police force was not something new in Turkey, the number of supporters and participants in the recent demonstrations reached a record-level. So why did millions pour into the streets? The answer is that the last drop of patience regarding Prime Minister R. T. Erdogan and the AKP rule, dried out. Next, I will briefly explain the reasons for the uprising by referring to some of the policies that generated it.

First of all, in the past eleven years, PM Erdogan  has deconstructed all the institutions that could stand against him, such as justice, military, education, business world and mainstream media by introducing new laws, reassigning his supporters into high state positions, by arresting journalists, generals and activists. He has built an AKP empire where businessmen standing close to him have become richer and penalties of criminals standing close to him have been eased. On the other hand, life became increasingly difficult for the opponents. Journalists have been arrested, businessmen have been threatened, media have been silenced.

Secondly, Erdogan is a religious leader and his Islamist renovations started to bother non-religious populations who view the newly introduced laws as intrusive for their life styles. Restriction of alcohol sale, banning of many websites (including the pornographic ones), as well as public statements regarding expected fertility (that the PM would like each family to have at least three children) and youth values (that he aspires to a more conservative young generation) were seen as constraining individual freedoms.

Another policy of the Prime Minister that annoyed a large segment of the population was his denigration of Kemal Ataturk and his revolutions. Ataturk established the secular Turkish Republic by replacing Ottoman sultanate, which was ruled by Islamic laws. Erdogan  stated: “why shouldn’t parts of Quran influence the constitution while constitution that some drunken guys wrote years ago is considered as appropriate?“, referring to Ataturk and his ministers, thus reasonably enraging the secularist part of the Turkish society. 

After being elected in democratic ways, the Prime Minister has ruled as the ultimate leader of the country and has neglected his opponents’ criticism and demands.. PM Erdogan has indicated that he took permission of whatever he does from the nation in the elections. This mentality, neglecting the half of the population, gradually frustrated and radicalized non-AKP supporters 

The final pretext that made people start the recent uprising was the decision to destroy the only central park of Istanbul, Gezipark. The government’s plan was to rebuild ‘Topcu Barrack” which was torn down by Ataturk’s government. It was a symbol of Ottoman’s Islamist regime. He also wanted to build a mall and a mosque there. He stated “I don’t need to ask permission from the opponent parties and some looters for this”. In that way, he referred to protestors (mostly coming from the Turkish middle class) as looters and vandals.

In the morning of the 29^th of May, about a hundred protestors in the effort to protect Gezipark were faced with a brutal police attack. In the next days, police kept attacking, Erdogan kept his neglecting manner and mainstream media kept hiding the events. Because of these reasons the number of protestors increased from a hundred to millions in just a couple of days throughout Turkey.

Erdogan’s policy against the Gezipark Resistance may have been the most formidable one. Instead of trying to appease people, he tried to polarize the country, stating: “I can hardly hold my own 50% at their homes”. This sounded to opponents almost like a call for a civil war. The basic reason for this stance was to protect his electoral power. Turkey’s societal structure is not suitable for Erdogan to collect more/new votes given the unyieldingly secular background of the opponent part of the electorate. So, the Prime Minister tried to protect what he already has, by pointing out the protesters as traitors.

The PM largely succeeded in that. This resulted in an unpleasant atmosphere in Turkey where, for the first time in the republic’s history, polarization of the society is quite obvious; a polarization between the AKP supporters and the non-AKP ones. However, at the same time, the Gezipark events unintentionally created a new social unity.  This unity formed by non-AKP supporters consists of very different groups that one could never imagine together. For the first time in the history of the republic, “left-wingers”, “right-wingers”, Turkish nationalists, Kurdish nationalists, anti-capitalist Muslims stood together against this threat towards freedom.

Burak Kahraman is a musician & film maker and holds an MA in Composing for Film and TV Programme from Kingston University

Is it Possible that a Protest Could Take Down Powerful Erdogan and Provoke a Significant Change in the Iinternal and Foreign Policy of Turkey?

by Nikos Karavasilis

When the Turkish government decided to build a commercial center in the area of Gezi Park, surely it did not expect the consequences and developments that followed. A small and peaceful protest, in a matter of days, turned into an assertive movement of continuous occupation of the Taksim square. The undisguised violence used by the Turkish police after the demand of “zero tolerance” from Prime Minister Erdogan, intensified public reactions, resulting in many injuries and deaths.

Since 2002, Erdogan has led the country and within these years Turkey has made important steps of progress and democratization. One can hardly deny that Erdogan is the most important Turkish politician after Kemal Ataturk as well as the great economic power that his policies endowed to the country. But in the last years a certain fatigue has been observed regarding structural reforms while. Moreover, the government has taken decisions that increasingly limit the liberties of the civilians and intervene in their daily life, as for example the prohibition of kissing in public and the limitations in the consumption of alcohol. The return to the Islamic past is now obvious.

The Turkish opposition parties, which were constrained to very low rates because of Erdogan’s “glory and splendor”, and due to the authoritarian behavior of his government, see now their role being upgraded. Furthermore, the Turkish prime minister announced his intention to hold a referendum on the park Gezi issue. In the case that the result is negative for his policy and in combination with the upgraded dynamics of the opposition, the political scene in Turkey might change radically. It is also possible that the opposition demands early elections, a fact that could cause unrest in the current conjuncture.

On the other hand, if the Turkish government does not effectively handle the current crisis, this will probably result in an even greater turmoil, which might give the opportunity to the army to intervene, and also to ethnic and religious groups (such as the Kurds and the  Alewites), to persistently claim their demands. Any turmoil in the interior could significantly affect the foreign policy and the economy of the country thus causing a serious blow to the public image of Erdogan that largely rely on the growth of the economy,

The foreign policy of a country is directly affected by the internal developments. Following that rule, , in Turkey the facts that beset its society have an impact on its foreign policy. First of all, the European Union strongly expressed its dissatisfaction for Erdogan’s practices, who cynically answered that the EU should take care of Greece and not of Turkey and also stated that he does not recognize the authority of the European Parliament. Such statements, spoken by a candidate state for EU accession , are obviously unusual. Lately, the anti-European statements from Turkey are increasingly multiplied, especially because of the non-attribution of a specific accession date and due to the turn of Turkey to the Islamic world.

Moreover, even the relations with the United States of America have been damaged. It is clear that Turkeys efforts to become a regional leader, does not seem a good idea for the US or to their close ally Israel, which demands also the same role in the area. Their relations are being more damaged due to the current events that are criticized by the American government and raise deep concerns about the restrictions of the freedom of expression in Turkey. Erdogan sees that slowly, his former allies are opposing to his policies. It is not a coincidence that regarding the Syrian crisis, Turkey turned out to be the only country demanding a military intervention, because there was no support from other countries and as a result Turkey was obliged to change its stance demanding now, a political solution.

So, we can see how a minor issue –the cutting down of some trees in a public square- might become a threat for a government; how its reaction to a series of bloody protests  can affect the international relations and the foreign policy of the country. Erdogan is now called upon to find the solution that will satisfy the public opinion, without showing that he is falling back – while maintaining the leading and decisive profile he demonstrates- and at the same time addressing concerns of the international community, which seems to be very worried of his domestic policies and the steps of “Islamization” that he takes. 

Nikos Karavasilis has recently graduated from the Department of International & European Studies at the University of Piraeus