Nothing lasts forever and, after meeting on a weekly basis since March, our last meeting took place on the 2nd of June. Oh… many mixed feelings here…

I cannot hide that I feel sad that the classes ended, while it feels like we were just starting. But, on a more positive note it was a great journey that allowed to learn about digital storytelling, apply it to our personal life, acquire new competences and we all ended in a high note with a challenge to share our story.

Last class felt even more special than the previous ones, because it was a moment to dig deep into ourselves, a process that started from the first class with different refection moments among our peers, which allowed us to break the ice until the current point where we feel comfortable to share our more personal stories. This was reflective journey that provides us tools to continue digging our stories in the future.

I believe this type of education is missing a lot in our paths in general and this class came to remind me about the importance of learning with each other on an horizontal structure: we don’t need classes, but we need sessions to share our knowledge; we don’t need a fixed place to learn, leaning can happen anywhere; education is a tool to solve problems and our life experience is as much or more valuable than having a diploma to attest our knowledge.

I could not be happier to have chosen this subject. On one note I want to thank our teacher for this revolutionary class that I rarely get to experience in the traditional university setting and, to all my colleagues that made me this experience so special by sharing their ideas, views and hopes. This is not the end, it is the continuation of our journeys!

One of the most important things for me is when people have the space, the tools and capacities to be transformed from target groups into protagonists.

Following the Ladder of Participation on the right, participation requires real action. We are only participating when we are actively involved in decisions in cooperation with our peers and decision making bodies.

This class constantly gives me this sentiment: that we are not just students, but the protagonists in our narrative and that we all are in full control and, last class was not different, of course! We had again the space to engage in dialogue with our peers, share our project ideas, receive feedback and improve.

“The teacher is of course an artist, but being an artist does not mean that he or she can make the profile, can shape the students. What the educator does in teaching is to make it possible for the students to become themselves.”

Paulo Freire

On one side I was not so happy about my project and these dialogues brought me some more self doubt… On the other side this space for sharing allowed me to enrich my project, due to the diversity of ideas and suggestions received. But, most important of all, showed me we all have different ideas and if we put our hearts into our story all will be fine.

I am writing this blog post while I take a small break from my project and I will go back to it now. My feeling about my project development is totally expressed by this gif:

I never had the chance to reflect much about Panteion University, I mean, in my first visit I immediately though was interesting the general revolutionary attitude even though I had no idea what it was about. Beyond that, this was just a place that I had to visit on a weekly basis to have classes. With no option to not go, I never took the time to think about the real feelings it gives me.

But during last class, I had the chance to actually reflect about my real feelings when I daily arrive in Panteion University and these were confirmed on Friday when I re-thought and re-felt the exact same!

Not good news here… While the entrance instantly gives me a feeling of happiness by seeing people seating in the grass in groups, this new building immediately crushes any feeling of happiness I had left: the dark lift, the lack of natural light, the blue pale colour in every door, dirty walls, everything a bit broken… Here is my exhibition.

As a person who worked in a community space where we were creating new rooms and activities based on opinions shared by local residents during casual discussions on the stairs of Valletta, seeing Panteion University gives me a feeling of emptiness and lack of ownership of the space. Makes me sad to not see the students intervening in the space to make it better with more art and activities.

The topic of our last class came in a great time, because I have to deliver an article on Friday for a magazine. I decided to write about the European Year of Youth and feeling European and our last class brought a new perspective to my article.

Until I was 18 years old I felt Portuguese and being European was just geographical, but everything changed from the moment I started understanding the European project through my participation in various European programmes, meeting people from all corners of Europe and, above all, understanding what unites us in diversity.

In my Google maps I have been marking all the cities I visited and lived in either during Erasmus+ youth exchanges, training courses, studies and internships, volunteering projects with the European Solidarity Corps and during my Erasmus for Young Entrepreneurs.

These were all the places I have called home for some days or even months.

At the moment I feel that my home is in Europe and moving from Portugal to Greece, to Malta or to Denmark is no longer a challenging change, but feels almost as natural as moving within the same city.

For this reason when the question about where we come from was asked, it was challenging for me to have an answer, because my home in the last years was not the same and the homes where I felt the most personal and professional growth were also not the same place where I was born or grew up in.

If you are curious to know more about European financed opportunities to travel, volunteer, carry internships and work I advise you to visit the Youth Cluster platform!

This week I did not attend the class, but I would like to share what adventures I was up to between the 7th and 11th of April. I had the chance to attend a seminar Act.ival for Future in Lübeck, Germany.

I also want to share with you some open calls that SAME has for similar opportunities and, the best part is that the organisation covers all your participation costs, including transport to Germany from wherever you are, food and accommodation, check it out:

• Picturing Europe – Photography & Filming, 20th to 26th of June in Ratzeburg;
• European Solidarity Seminar – Classism, 9th to 13th of June in Lübeck;
• Sailing Trip Lübeck, 6th to 14th of July in the Baltic Sea;

Going from Athens to Lübeck was a long trip, which made me move back to the winter clothes for the weekend.

First a plane from Athens to Frankfurt, after another plane from Frankfurt to Hamburg and finally a train from Hamburg to Lübeck.

Lübeck is a city surrounded by water, therefore I could not avoid taking a picture of the harbour, right outside the place where we were having workshops. I think it is a beautiful and cold view that I have enjoyed daily.

We were in total around 200 young people from all over Europe taking part in multiple workshops and discussing multiple topics: democracy, climate change, migration, diversity, culture. But, the connecting topic was activism.

There was so many ideas, so many interesting people and projects that made me aware about new things that made me want to be a more active citizen than I am now.

I want to be an activist!

Overall it was a fun experience, which allowed me to build connections with young people across Europe and that allowed me to enjoy also many fun moments, including concerts, games, meals, tours, dances and photos.

Photovoice is one of my favourite techniques as I exposed in my first post in my blog! Usually I love to use a disposable camera, because then I cannot instantly view and review the images I took. I love the waiting time and the curiosity I feel until I am able to see the end result.This time, to come closer to this feeling, I used the HUJI app that gives an older and unexpected look to the photos.

When you read my blogpost, I invite you to look at the photos and then compare your initial thoughts with the description of each one of them. Is a picture worth a thousand words?

Since I was a child during Sundays we always had the routine of having two meals: a late brunch and a very early dinner. I like to keep that tradition, especially now that I moved to a house where I have backgarden where I can enjoy the sun while eating brunch and pick up fresh lemons.

Unfortunately I only remembered to take the photo after eating, so I leave you with your imagination.

During the previous Saturday I enjoyed a long walk around Athens and found this Italian restaurant that we really wanted to try, because when we passed the door the smell was great.

Sunday sounded like the perfect day to go for it, so after a late brunch, some time in the sun working and a shower, we started our walk towards the restaurant!

The restaurant was full of people and we waited over 30 minutes to make our order, but the wait was totally worth it! Needless to say after a brunch, I could wait without being hangry (hungry and angry).

We shared two pizzas: a Tartufo and Quattro Formaggi. Both were really tasty and I was feeling very full. But… is a Sunday meal complete without a dessert?!

This unfocused photograph was either the work of my camera trying to keep the secret about the dessert we had or me trying to take the photo as fast as I could so I could start eating the dessert!

I will share with you that we shared a tiramisu and a limoncello. I believe you can see the glass with the yellow liquid and the shape of the tiramisu! It was he perfect end for a Sunday meal in a hot day.

The sun was still up and, in the way home we pass in a green and cosy park, so we went around a few laps looking at plants and other people walking around, we sat in the benches enjoying some of the sun and the fresh air.

I cannot tell you how happy I am that finally we are in the season where summer dresses, shorts and crop tops are out of the wardrobe! I see some locals still wearing a jacket, but I am fully embracing the summer looks!

I see the hero’s journey as a great technique to define a plot structure, character motivation and theme. Overall it allows us to engage the reader or viewer, but “how many stories do we have happening at the same time?” This is my main thought when I watched the video about the hero with a thousand faces.

Every small thing that happens in our life, or in the life of a character, has an impact. Thus, when we tell a story, the character portrayed is not isolated from millions of things that happened in his/her/their life before, which in its turn, influences everything after. The flashbacks that a major role in giving us inside information, but each person and their history is very complex and even the small part of the life of the character that is exposed in a digital storytelling artifact, it is huge.

We are the result of so many people, so much history, so many big dreams that go from person to person, that we will never be alone.

Valter Hugo Mãe

We are in constant development. We are so much more than a single story. We are the results experiences, people, challenges, failures and conquests that pass through our lives.

Last class made me thing about previous experiences and I stayed with a question in my mind…

During my Bachelor’s I used to use my free time to volunteer in movie festivals, because that allowed me to watch, for free, as many movies as I wished during the festivals: movies from professional and amateur filmmakers, short cuts and long movies, documentaries, animation, indie, terror and many other genres. While some of the movies used a narrator to tell the story, making the message very clear; others were based on music and images to tell the story, thus were a piece of art that required the viewer to interpret the information and take conclusions.

All these strategies used are very interesting, but what came to my mind from last class is the fact that, in some short movies, the narrator is the one telling his/her/their own story and, in others, an external filmmakers picks the story and exposes it. This makes me question: “When should a person tell their own story using storytelling tools and when should a movie director “learn” the story from that person and use their resources and experience to put the story together for the viewer? What are the effects of these different approaches?“

It was in 2016 that I took part in the Youth Exchange “Empty your mind and fill it with creativity” and experienced for the first time the use of storytelling as a reflection tool to define new goals.

These methodologies followed me in different projects across Europe. But, only last year I started actively using storytelling in my work: I am passionate about using Dixit cards to start the reflection process and implementing activities using PhotoVoice to support young people becoming changemakers in their communities.

When I was choosing which subjects to take during my Erasmus, I had to try “Digital Storytelling”. On one hand I had low expectations, since the academia is known for focusing on theory, while I was searching for a more practical skill. On the other hand, digital storytelling needs to be a tool that serves the community, so I was curious to know how these components were going to be balanced in the classes.

After the first class I had no doubts that I belonged in the group and in the class. Sitting on a circle, using tools like the padlet and mentimiter and having hands-on democratic activities was exactly what I wished for. Thus, I am ready to enjoy the ride and to later continue using the knowledge acquired. As IBN Battuta said:

Traveling – it leaves you speechless, then turns you into a storyteller.