Day 7

Sunday the 27th of May

Sunday was the first morning that me and my guest could sleep in. We liked that.

After a quick  shower and a huge breakfast we started making plans for the day. After the planning we sat in the garden for a while.

We called a view of other guests and hosts to meet. It was a weird feeling to not meet up with the entire group in the morning. So we went to a cafe in Kalvertoren for a coffee with a great view on the city. We quickly bought a view gifts for my guest’s girlfriend, parents and friends.

And before we knew it we had to go back to the airport to depart.

Both of my parents came along and we all felt kind of good, until we were confronted with the tickets, passports and  the checking in. It felt so short while ago when we came to collect our guest.

We said goodbye to the latvian group in a dramatic way. A few people cried and everyone was pretty sad.

Then the Hungarian group checked in and we, the latvian hosts, rushed to say goodbye to the Hungarians aswell. Here the saying goodbye was even more emotional and I felt very sad. I hugged everyone goodbye and that was it. The week was over. It took some time to sink in, because it was in the car that I realised the whole week went so fast and was so much fun.

I really enjoyed this week and really made some good friends.

It was very educational as well. I really enjoyed seeing Amsterdam through the eyes of a tourist.

Kees (and a bit of Reinis) 

Day 6

Saturday the 26th of May


Everybody is extremely tired, but there is still one last day left filled with activities. We all meet at the van Gogh museum. We go in, and in groups we were supposed to make some exercises that some of the dutch students had made. Although in the end everybody preferred to just walk around in the museum and look at all the paintings.


Again the weather was beautiful, so after the museum we went to the Vondelpark and enjoyed some lunch with everyone. We all talked for a while and just chilled in the sun. Then it was time for the National games. All the countries prepared a game to play in the park. We started with the Hungarian kissing game which was really funny. After, we did a Latvian ball game and we ended with the famous dutch game: Koekhappen. 


After the park we had some free time. Some people went shopping and others went home to rest, as I said we were all really tired! 


At eight o' clock it was time for the farewell party. Everybody started to realize it was really the end of the week, which of course nobody liked. These were going to be the last hours together. We danced until twelve. The teachers gave a speech about the project, and the Turkish and Hungarian people gave a present to everybody to remember them. After that we cleaned up the mess we made. We already had to say goodbye to some people, which was really sad... Then nearly everybody went to our beloved bar Wildschut again, nearly all the foreigners knew how to pronounce the name by then. 


We had some last drinks, but the vibe was definitely more silent and sadder than mostly. After a while most of us had to leave, and it was a definite goodbye for some of the people. It wasn't fun but of course we tried to stay optimistic, and promise everyone to keep in contact and hope to see each other some time in the future. 


It wasn't the last goodbye for everybody though, because Sunday people are going to bring their guest to the airport. However, not all the countries fly at the same time so we aren't going to see every single one of each other. 


It was a great week! We learned a lot of things. Especially the debate, even though not everybody was really in the mood for it, was very instructive. We got to meet a lot of people and at the end of the week everybody made so many good new friends. It was a lot of fun and the youngsters definitely got to know Amsterdam in the best way! Everybody loved it a lot and saying goodbye was definitely difficult.


We thank everybody who was involved for making this amazing project happen!

Ezinne en Madara

Day 5

Friday the 25th of May

‘Wake-up call!’ it’s 7.30. Almost everybody is very tired from this week. On the program for today was an art workshop, a debate and eating in an Ethiopian restaurant.

When we arrived at school, we heard that the art-workshop would be given by a teacher from this school, Lobke Haaring. She looked very excited about the workshop and she did a short introduction. You had to make art about migration. You could use the computer, you could make a drawing or a painting. You could do it in groups or alone, but almost everybody did it in a group.

For lunch Lolita made some very nice sandwiches, 'kipkerry' and 'broodje pom'. Then was the debate. Everybody was very excited and nervous. We had been preparing the debate for seven hours in total, and it was really amazing.The start of the debate was very good. Kees had an impressive speech, in which he used parts of well-known speeches, like ‘I have a dream’ or ‘Ich bin ein Europeaner’. At the end of the debate, almost everybody had spoken. Even the jury had taken part in the debate, sometimes very annoying for the defending committe because of the good and fair points they made. The jury found that it was a very good debate from everybody, but there can only be one winner, and the winner was: the committee on MINI (ministries of migration).

We had had dinner at ‘eetcafe Ibis', an Ethiopian restaurant near the Amstel river. The food was very spicy, so just a small group of the students could finish their main dish. But the  dessert was very nice, banana-split, coconut ice-cream or a lemon filled with lemon ice. Then everybody went to cafe 'de Stigter' next to the Sarphatipark because it was nearly the last night and everybody wanted to have a good time before they left. It was a lot fun!

Cas Bilstra & Tomi Cserteg

Day 4

Thursday the 24th of May

Hello, we are Luc and Ataberk and we will tell you what we experienced today. 


Today we had to be at school at 9 o' clock, so it was half an hour later then the other days. We started the day with a talk about what we first knew about each others countries and what we know about them now. Everybody told about the prejudices they had of the Netherlands, for example: in the Netherlands everybody wears wooden shoes. 
After this we talked about minorities in the four country’s, what is positive and what is negative about them, or the prejudices people have about them. After this we had a role play. The role play was about a girl who came home with a boyfriend from another culture (a minority in the country) and tells her parents and brother about him. Everybody was divided in two groups and in both groups four people had to act, it was really funny.

After the role play we had lunch, a really dutch lunch. We ate haring and lekkerbekjes (dutch fish) and we ate outside because the weather was really nice. After the lunch we continued with the serious business: preparation for the debate on Friday. Everybody had to think and discuss about their arguments. The preparations were finished at 5 a clock and after this we were done and many of us went to the Vondelpark to eat and chill. It was a really nice day and everybody is excited about the debate of tomorrow (also a bit nervous ofcourse).

Ataberk & Luc

Day 3

Wednesday the 23rd of May


Hello, we're Elif and Josephine. We'll tell you what we experienced today!
First of all, we started at school with an evaluation. Each group had to tell their teachers
what they liked about this project so far and what could have been better. After the short evaluation that took half an hour we started with the interesting presentations of each
country about the findings of their research about migration. It was very interesting to see
that each country had their own stories and opinions about migration. A lot of personal 
stories have been told and that really impressed us, for example: the story from a turkish
student Enes, who told a migration story about his grandparents that were forced to move
from Greece to Turkey. 


After the presentations the whole group went to the famous Albert Cuyp Market. Elif had
some delicious french fries for lunch. The students had time at the Albert Cuyp to buy some ingredients for the evening and to go home and prepare dinner. 
Ofcourse everybody bought some groceries because we needed to prepare food for the
international food night!


In the evening everybody went back to school with a lot of traditional dishes. Every
country had their own tabel with a lot of traditional food. When everything was set 
everybody could eat and it was delicious! Especially the turkish food was very nice. After we all went to cafe 'Wildschut' again.


Now we're very tired so we're going to sleep: good night! 
Greetings from Amsterdam



Elif & Josephine

Enes talking about his grandparents in de Turkish migration presentation

Whilst the presenations

International Food Night:

Hungary

Turkey

The Netherlands

Latvia

Day 2

Tuesday the 22nd of May


Today was a fun day. We had lots of different activities.


We started early at school again at 08:20 this time. We went to different classrooms in the school in small groups, and introduced ourselves to some of the students of 'het St. Ignatiusgymnasium' and told them about our project.


Because we are having a debate on Friday, of course we had to make some preparations. The EYP group (debate group of 'het St. Ignatiusgymnasium') warmed us up with some games so we could get into the preparations for the debate. Again, as always, we were divided into groups ushered by two EYP-members. Every grop had a different topic, and in the classrooms we had to discuss several arguments against and for the topic. This took some time, but we had to do some research and discuss a lot so it was very interesting to hear everyones opinion.


After the debate preparations we went to get some lunch at a pancake restaurant in the city. It was extremely hot outside! Nobody was wearing clothes that were cool enough for the weather. The lunch was really nice and everybody got to experience a real Dutch dish.


Eventually we went to the Amsterdam Museum in the centre of Amsterdam. This museum told us a lot about the history of Amsterdam, how it was constructed, and about the Dutch Golden Age.


When we were done at the museum we all had the day off. From four o' clock everybody was aloud to enjoy the weather.


We decided to go to the 'Vondelpark' (big park in the South of Amsterdam), it was very beautiful and busy. We all sat there for a long time and had some pizza and chatted away for the rest of the day in the warm sunshine. Some people decided to go to a bar after that and others went home.