Cultural exchange and active citizenship

1. Cultural exchange: Dutch-Belgian-Italian cooking

There is one general rule when you live with an Italian: do not attempt to cook Italian food, because you will fail. Luckily our Italian is not that strict, still we generally don't want to take the risk and just stick to other cuisines.

However with Tena scared of the mice and also rather busy last night with filling out dozens of forms, I decided that the courgette risotto should nevertheless be prepared. Pennyless as we are from time to time, I only had money for some simple Belgian sausages to add. Ivonne was appointed as sous-chef, cutting the courgettes and preparing the salad.

Courgette risotto with Belgian sausages

Tomato mozarella salad

And to complete the intercultural experience: ketchup, a raspberry beer, and a lot of salt!

2. Active Citizenship: The PO Box

Where the European Parliament has its time consuming and rather senseless move to Strasbourg every month, AEGEE has its PO Box in Etterbeek. A CD many years ago decided it'd be cool to have a PO Box in the same area as the European Parliament, about 45 minutes to 1 hour traveling by trams and metro away from the Head Office. The poor Secretary General usually wastes half a day to pick up a few letters. Brussels bureaucracy...

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So today it became somehow my turn, and it was a nice and sunny day I thought why not to go by bike. It's a bit risky in Brussels with all the traffic and hills, but what the heck, better than a sweaty full tram. Now that after Percin, also Tena and Ivonne started to get active with their squash, I can of course not stay behind. The joy of peer pressure.

Forty five scary, life risking and exhausting minutes later, I arrive sweaty and tired at the Post Office. And damn it, I realise I forgot the key. Grrrrrrrr. I call Ivonne to complain, she laughs at me, and tells me to come home.

I decide to give it a try, as luckily we are after all in Belgium, and here they do not care that much about rules and procedures. A friendly face, a vague paper having something to do with our statutes, and 2 minutes later I am outside with the mail already. No ID, no key, piece of cake. Phew.

Back to the house, where I crash on our new sofa. Active Citizenship makes you tired.

Meanwhile in the Head Office...

Robin: "girls, tonight we're doing captain cleaning!"
Ivonne: "No!"
Tena: "No!"
Ivonne: "High five Tena, say no to the revolution!"

Robin walks into the kitchen, frustrated. "Then I'll do Captain Cleaning by myself!"

Tena to Robin: "please bring me a glass of water" (Tena avoids the kitchen, is scared of the mice)
Ivonne: "nooooooooo let her suffer!"
The girls go outside for a little smoking/cola break. Ivonne: "If I will do cleaning, it'll be my clothes. These are the last clean clothes I have!"

No hurry Ivonne. You look beautiful the way you are!

Yes, yes, total anarchy now that the President has left the office. His desk has already been taken over, territory marked with a piece of cheese.

Is this a secret plot to attract mice to his desk? Mice prevailing over the cats?! Never!!

I say YES to Captain Cleaning!

Introducing Headoffice Lounge Area

It was Robin's idea already in August, that AEGEE Europe office should get a nice sitting area. But as we learned in our term - change is a tough thing :-) But it was again thanks to our miracle-maker Thijs Hjubers that the CD received 2 beautiful leather sofas (for which we are ashamed of course and beg Environmental Working Group and the Sustaining our Future to forgive us). Check out the AEGEE babes and the new furniture below ;-)

When nothing works

No matter how much I enjoy teamwork, and how much more rewarding a result achieved together with your dear friends and colleagues is, and how much bigger these results usually are when accomplished together,

I chose independence over interdependence.

Today anyway.

The most important elements on my to-do list are all directly related to files stored on our server (Robert) which was hacked and thus down. Files to be sent to the printing house, all files for the telegram, all my other FR and PR files.

All other jobs waiting to be done depend on answers, help, clarifications, input and documents from other people/systems. Even sending an e-mail on boardinf-l is impossible.

Also the post office doesn't want to cooperate today. Percin and I carry 35 kilo of Y Vote materials to the post office. The people with financial power are not around, so we scratch all the money we can find together to pay for the stamps. The lady in the post office wants to make everything complicated and I have to fill in lots of forms. Her French is bitchy and unpolite, and when at the end of the whole process, I am 7 euro short on cash, she almost explodes. I tell her I'll run home to get more money. "Dépêchez-vous!" she shouts, while I run home to find 7 more euros underneath people's desks. Just before closing time I'm back, and the packages are sent to Greece, the Netherlands, and the UK. Pfffff.

Instead of opting for an ulcer, I chose to calmly continue to work on all those smaller matters equally important. Also Tena takes a deep breath and tells the computer that she can do this. She can stay calm. She can keep working all night long. She has a bottle of vodka on her desk for support.

As anyway most other CD members are out, I dedicate myself to assisting Philipp with fixing Dragan's phone and solving the mysterie of the annoyingly beeping fax. I play a little bit with photoshop to create a flashy button for the European Voice website. Luckily YOUrope Needs YOU! won the European Charlemagne Youth Prize, and a quick press release, twit and blog-update assured already some media coverage. And I finally did my laundry.

After preparing a nice salad for Tena and myself, we now continue our quiet night in the Head Office. Still e-mails to answer, Sparks of Future things to prepare, tickets to staple on papers, articles to write, my oh my oh my, maybe we should just ignore it all and go to bed?

11.05 PM. We are not going to bed.

Brussel's Fairytales

After Thursday's Agora kick-off party in Leiden where Ivonne and I had a jolly-green time, on Friday Tena came back home (home? wow we even call this place home now...) after two weeks of touring the UK (check her adventures here). It was reason enough anyway to postpone bedtime for a few hours and catch up in the warm cozy head office kitchen with a glass of wine left behind by some guests or maybe even Les Anciens.

This weekend furthermore marked itself with social, non-work related and private events. What happens in Brussels, stays in Brussels ;-) 

But to just give you a little bit:

Saturday, Gay Parade! 

Dragan & Ana nearly missed it because they were hunting for good restaurant deals for next week's Sparks of the Future event in Brussels. Ilona, Tena and I however did our best to represent AEGEE in this jolly fest of extravaganza. We were a little bit overwhelmed (Tena and I more than Ilona) but had fun. Politicians of course did not let this opportunity pass by to win over some votes. We should have done a Y Vote street action, it was the perfect ocassion, but we didn't bring any materials. Too bad. 

In the evening the Head Office started preparing for more extravaganza of the Eurovision Song Contest. AEGEE-Europe officially supported Norway and was happy to see this endorsement pay off. With a diverse audience cheering (and boo-ing) loudly for different countries, a wall-wide projection of the show and plenty of Slovenian orange juice, the night was considered a success. 

On Sunday the President left to the UK. I did what any vice-president would do: occupied his bedroom. Big mistake, as the Presidential bedroom (formerly known as Presidential bathroom) is very centrally located and therefore has a strong attraction to passerby'ers that came knocking on the door waking me up with important and less important questions/issues as many as FIVE times. 

Today we tried to start another work day. One or two important servers are not working, meaning most of the important files are inaccessible. So a good reason to have a long CD meeting, with lots of breaks and too much sidetracking. 

Ah well. At least the sun is shining. And I am on Euronews this week (OK, my forehead is). Check that here. Minute 4 more or less. Dragan and the letterbox are easier to catch. 

Unexpected visitors

using robins account:

I wanna show u pictures, but you wouldn't believe :)
u have to come here and experience the cd life for a day or two, and replenish your karma with cleaning at least one room ;)

visiting was announced 10 hours before arrival, but mickeys was not ;)

thanks to him by bringing a delegation of happy italian girls to spice up the kitchen conversations a little :)

its always a warm feeling for me to see the thankfull faces of cd when they can turn on the light in their room again, or see where the toilet seat is located.

next on the list: take out the 3 garbage bags ivonne put in front of the house last week

i always feel happy in this house :)
now i will eat pasta, provided by mickeys delegation :)

good luck with the work people!
thijs

Almost weekend again

Yesterday was a day of hard work. While Dragan was assembling a guestlist with everybody interesting and important in the field of creativity, innovation, sustainability and youth for Sparks of the Future, I searched for a venue and also finally had the printing house contract signed and finalised. It includes a nice discount and quite some free posters and flyers for this year. 

At the end of the afternoon, Ivonne and I went to Mediamarkt for a new AEGEE Camera, which was closed, so we went shopping for second hand dresses instead. The CD is committed to sustainable consumption, in the framework of our current flagship project Sustaining our Future. 

At night, Dragan, Ivonne and I retreated in the social room for another movie session. 

Nice movie, but a bit depressing.

So Ivonne put on movie number 2:



Dragan wasn't fascinated and went to bed.

Today again a lot of work. Had a CD meeting as quite some decisions were to be taken. Tonight AEGEE-Brussels + event guests, AEGEE-Leuven and AEGEE-Maastricht coming, so high time to start cleaning.

Tomorrow: AEGEE Y Vote stand at the European Parliament during the 9th of May Open Days!

The Garden

The Financial Director is a quite messy person and eventhough the bills and all financial papers are perfectly in order (THE DESK IS EMPTY) keeping anything not financial in order or clean doesn't interest her much.

She doesn't like cooking, cleaning and in general is not a good housewife-to-be, BUT somehow there is a fascination for gardening. Don't ask why it's just as strange a fascination as collecting poststamps (which she does).

After working for 4 hours in the front yard, 3 big garbage bags later she returnes victorious to the house. She expects compliments or at least somebody noticing. NOTHING, NOTHING at all.

The work of the Financial Director is generally not so much appreciated or better said... People have no clue what you're doing and if you try to explain it, which you suck at, it doesn't help at all. And apparently the CD also doesn't appreciate gardeners.

So dear network and especially the people that visited the house before please be amazed at the nice work done. Compliments can be put under reactions or send to treasurer@aegee.org

Mexican times

Yesterday I was quite convinced to be the first case in Belgium with the Swine Flu (aka H1N1). With all other CD members out on meetings or traveling, Ivonne and I took a recovery day which consisted basically of shopping for fruits etc. She did some gardening, I sent out the website poll. Dragan came back from Paris and tried to relax and watch some TV, until I came to bother him about a workshop to be given at the EU Russia conference. Bedtime: 1.00 am. 

Today we were supposed to have CD meeting at 10.00 am, but somehow most of the CD was now infected with Swine Flu and in coma. Percin was up on time and went to the conference to help them out. Dragan and I also joined for a few hours to give a workshop on advocacy methods for youth. Me mostly as background decoration, but OK. 

Coming back to the house, I cooked dinner, something Mexican, to celebrate the fact that I probably don't have Swine Flu but a normal one, and am feeling much better now. 

Ivonne said several times that she particularly liked the tortilla chips, which I didn't make, but came straight out of a bag. She still has something to learn about appreciation. 

Now it's almost 10 pm. Everybody is still in the office. CD-elect Denis came by to say hi and deal with some visa issues. We are listening to eurovision songs. Norway is particularly popular, though Percin keeps cheering for the Turkish entry which is in fact a Belgian girl. 

One more calm day tomorrow (though with a LOT of work, uffff) and then again a crazy weekend with way too many visitors.

Finally

02.33: I took a shower.

And the new bathroom is beautiful.

House of hell, where did the shower cabin go?

Day 1:

Thijs Huijbers arrives.
Last time to shower.
Last and only one to shower: Robin
Shower cabin removed.
End of day: 1 o'clock.

Day 2:

Removing floor and shower cabin.
Sanding starts.
Cleaning shower cabin on the balcony.
Ivonne goes to French class, dusty because of the sanding.
Dragan, Evren and Tena leave us to go to places where there are such things as showers.
End of day: 2 o'clock.

Day 3:

Still no shower.
Sanding the walls.
Started painting.
Wrong paint used.
The people in the house are almost not able to stand each others smell.
Percin leaves the house to help Ana moving. Leaving Robin to paint alone after giving the people in the house uncooked pizza. Bastard!
Ivonne is sick, sanding, taking minutes at the CD meeting, painting and working on the travel overview.
Anita is sanding, painting and working on final report of SUPS Beograd. All night long.
End of day: 3 o'clock (except for Anita).

Day 4:

Still no shower.
Anita missed her French class and is high on cafeïne, not able to sleep.
Ivonne is still sick and working on travel overview.
The people in the house are disliking Thijs more and more. When is this hell going to be over?
Robin went to pick up publications and was stared at in the tram with white paint in her hair.
Cry for help!
External associations offered their showers, but the CD members already have a far developed case of agoraphobia (fear of open space) and are unable to leave the house.
End of day: still ongoing.

The not so glamorous parts

CD-life isn't all conferences, networking, representation, finances, application writing and press releases; sometimes the gutter simply clogs, a leak is created and it rains into the office. With cleaning it as only solution.