Local initiatives

Have you ever participated in any local initiatives, here in Poznań or other place in the world? Have you ever been involved in your city's life?

I ask you that because this year I attend some very interesting classes called Local community animation. Last time our teachers have proposed us to do a test which concerned the level of our knowledge in the matter of social participation. When I started to analyse the questions I quickly realised I had a problem: I couldn't remember anything in my life that would help me to find the answers. The truth is, I have never actually done anything for my local community (excluding several small voluntary actions). 

To pass the classes I have to create a project which would integrate some people in my local community, so I decided to finally do something that could be useful and different. Happily, the people who I will work with are really great and they have shown me everything they had already done. Their project (initiated in the previous term) has been connected to the Kolektyw group - an organisation working in Łazarz (one of the quarters in Poznań). 

Kolektyw is composed of nine women who wanted to do something new. They came up with a plan to create a garden where everybody could come, coltivate vegetables or fruit and have some fun. The garden is located in Park Kasprowicza, just behind the summer bathing water Arena. The people who have decided to participate in this project had an opportunity to learn how to take care of plants and how to use them to prepare something really delicious. 

In the summer Kolektyw have organised 7 screenings of film, meetings at fireplace, family grills, playig board games together and sleeping in tents. Now, when the winter is coming, it's no more possible. Our task is to find a way to integrate some residents of Łazarz at this cold period of the year and to make them feel better and more connected to their neighbours. We already have some ideas. 

The project is going to finish for me at the end of the academic year, but I already know that I wouldn't like to abandon that. So, my new, private project is to become a real member of my local community for long. :) Keep your fingers crossed!