Saturday, 6 December 2014
YAE invasion
Thessaloniki will never be the same again...
Robin
A very warm welcome...
People say you can get the measure of a city by how warm a welcome you receive, let me say I am feeling very welcomed in Thessaloniki so far!
With all of this happening on our planning day how can this not be an amazing week?
After a great planning meeting with our partner Babis, we met Haris Lefakis an old friend of Andrew Hadley and a professor responsible for some of the biggest classical music events in this region. Harry is chairman of Thessalonikis Conservatory of Music. What an inspiring and interesting gentleman.
We then went on to see some of the amazing history of Thessaloniki, first the Arch of Galerius (Roman Emperor who built much of the ancient city.)
Then we saw a number of the city's famous churches dating from the time when this was the second city of the Byzantine Empire - all about 2 metres below modern street level.
I was amazed at seeing so many visible remains of this city's history.
We then walked past the Rotunda (also dating from the Roman Empire) my goodness how I wanted to see inside. But the strangest site was seeing a scooter waiting for a haircut, now you don't get that in the UK!!!
The night was made complete by making a return visit to a restaurant run by Kostas who remembered Andrew after 8 years and talked fondly about Andrew's leaving party where 40 people were dancing in the tables to traditional Greek music!!! The food and music was very special.
Walking home we saw the excavation for the new metro and the problem with building in a city with so much history it isn't long before archeological ruins are found. Here you can see 20 metres under the road the original Roman paths and sewers - breathtaking and humbling to think of all the life that took place here 2000 years ago!
Friday, 5 December 2014
En route to Greece
I'm just waiting for Andrew before we head over to Greece. This is Andrew's second home so it promises to be interesting. Looking forward to pushing the participants on this project. With the famous Greek hospitality our tag line of 'work hard, play hard, work harder' will be tested this week.
Part of me thinks we should have managed the timing better to coincide with the summer, but hey beggars can't be choosers, I can guarantee my Greek office this week will be more interesting than my UK office! More soon
Thursday, 4 December 2014
Youth Against Extremism - Photo Competition
Get creative and support the cause - looking forward to seeing your ideas
Tuesday, 2 December 2014
The project moves on to GREECE
It is now early December and the project is moving to Greece. We are off to Thessaloniki to work on the films and present them back to a conference at the end of the week.
As well as Momentum World, our partners from catalyst in communities and the volunteer police cadets will be represented from the UK. We will also meet our Greek and Hungarian partners to catch up on their projects
This blog will be live throughout the week and we will try report as much as possible what is happening so please keep in touch with us and joining the debate and discussion
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