Participation: The event involved 68citizens, including 3 participants fromthe city ofAltea (Spain), 3 participants from the city of Warsaw (Poland), 3 participants from the city of Noto(Italy), 3participants from the city of Athienou (Cyprus), 47 participants from the city of Brussels (Belgium), 3 participants from the city of Ljubljana (Slovenia), 3 participants from the city of Sofia (Bulgaria) and 3 participants from the city Agia (Greece).
Location / Dates: The event took place in Brussels (Bulgaria), from 1/02/2020 to 4/02/2020
Short description: I am the EU
On the first day of the meeting, as each partner was arriving at different times, we decided to only organize dinner at an Italian restaurant in the city centre of Brussels. In this dinner, we had the chance to meet almost everyone, since there had been changes, for instance, Rocío Sánchez started organizing this meeting, but she ended her internship and it was Norbert Munyamasoko who took the lead then.
On the second day, Mr Juan Manuel Revuelta on behalf of the Finnova Foundation, gave a welcome speech and also introduced the agenda of the activities that were to be done. Afterwards, Ms Paloma Verdú, from the European Projects Office of the Municipality of Altea, which is the lead partner, presented the ‘’End of the journey’’. As its name states, this was about putting an end to 18 months of hard work. Furthermore, Paloma introduced the Conclusions of the Project and the Sustainability Agreement.
Our first activity was the ‘’Media action’’ that consisted on recording a short video promoting the fight against the fake news, Euroscepticism, and xenophobia, making people aware of these concepts and proposing ways to fight them. Some of the partners did it together as a sign of cooperation and union.
Later we shared a marvellous lunch at a Belgian restaurant. Then, we had scheduled a visit to the House of European History, where we had the chance to see the temporary exhibition ‘’Restless Youth’’ that tells the story of four generations of young people who came of age at key moments in the last century.
Eventually we had dinner, we joined at Chez Leon the 15 people from Altea that MEP Inmaculada Rodríguez Piñero kindly invited to this meeting.
The third day of the meeting started with a guided visit to the European Parliament, where we also discussed about current issues such as Brexit or how do actually things work at the EU. After that we got to enjoy a meal in the very same restaurant of the Parliament.
The icing on the cake this day was the debate at the European Economic and Social Committee that was hosted by Jonathan Hendrickx (responsible for internal organization and contact with Member Organizations within the European Youth Press Executive Board), and the main speakers were: Isabell Wutz (Communication Officer at COFACE Families Europe), Eva Reina (European Youth Information and Counselling Agency) and Cristina Tavío (Institutional Relations at Finnova Foundation); of course our assistants participated with their questions and sharing their points of view and opinions. At this same venue, the second part of this event was the ceremony of the YOUROPE STARTUP EUROPE AWARDS, in which DeAmicitia, Corazón Express and Cruz Roja were awarded, and these awards were given by Diego Zaragozí (Mayor of Altea) and Inmaculada Rodríguez Piñero (MEP). Between the debate and the ceremony, we took some time to read our manifest out loud, and a member of each partner country read a fragment.
Last but not least, we enjoyed a farewell dinner at a local restaurant that is usually only available for sommeliers. This dinner was to put the finishing touch to all of these months working together and forging special and genuine bonds. We are really glad to have hosted the last meeting, it has been a pleasure and we wish you the best for the future.
