The Workshop
How can we live in balance with ourselves, others, the environment?
Which are our basic needs and how do we meet them?
By forming a temporary community we dived into the topics of Community Building (how we relate to each other), Permaculture (how we design our environment & produce our food), Natural Building (how we create our shelter and upgrade existing structures) and Renewable Energy (how to harvest power locally in a sustainable way, when to use low-tech alternatives).
Location
The venue is located near the village of Vlachia, in a beautiful rural part of the region of North Evia Island, in central Greece. It is on the hillside of Mount Pixarias, facing North to the Agean Sea and overlooking the islands of Sporades. It is a small piece of heaven, close to the mountain-top and close to the sea (45 min walk). It is where we live but it is also our test site, where we are trying to establish a new paradigm in terms of building, farming and living together.
Participants
The Community Toolset was organized by Stagones Social Cooperative and developed by the Hara-Goe project/stagones. Since we wanted to have a European relevance (and impact!), we had the support of nine partner organizations across Europe and the Mediterranean.
The workshop was co-funded by the Erasmus+ programme of the European Union and supported by the Greek National Agency (INEDIVIM), the Youth and Lifelong Learning Foundation.
The Idea
This workshop was designed for youth workers of all ages, motivated human beings that want to get a wide -and in-depth- overview on the topics covered, in order to share their gained knowledge and experience. Throughout the training, the common nominator was the establishment of a temporary community (we had morning- and reflection-circles and used agile tools to organize ourselves and our days). Human beings need to feel safe and heard in order to unfold and interact harmoniously. Our ambition was to offer the space for this to happen!
Goals
Contribute to the development, evolution and spread of constructive human interaction within a community.
Promote an holistic interactive approach to the management of resources and waste, which engages people in a way that overcomes social and financial barriers.
Increase awareness about alternative education systems and proliferate their value in the 21st century.
Create a european network of game changers who will use the knowledge gained in the workshop and the connections made.
Workshop Overview
The workshop was structured into four modules. Each of the topics was carefully selected and developed in a way that served the flow of the training, but also helped participants to recognize that the way we approach and handle a task is more important than the task itself. In the afternoon of the last day of each module we had a small walk to the sea -to clear our minds, regenerate and prepare for the next one. We used the morning sessions of these days to wrap up the thematic, reflect on key points and record the podcasts.
Module 1
Community Building
How do we relate to ourselves and to others? How can we recognize and meet our needs? How do we set goals, plan our strategy, make decisions?
Module 2
Natural Building
How do we design and build our shelter? How do we use natural materials and techniques? What is bio-climatic design?
The Movie
Do you want to see how it was to live together? What we learned and what we achieved? Enjoy this movie!