“30 participants, 5 organizers and a lot of mosquitos”
AEGEE-Novi Sad offered a Summer Course about modern and traditional life in Serbia. Their event “Colors of Culture – Summer of Youth” took place from 10 to 24 July 2019.
Golden Times: What was your Summer University about?
Ema Milosevic, Secretary of AEGEE-Novi Sad: We had a Traveling Summer University and the main topic was introduction to Serbian culture and history. We made a programme that was a mixture of modern and traditional life in Serbia.
GT: How many participants and how many organisers did you have?
Ema: We had 30 participants, five organizers and a lot of mosquitos.
GT: What were the greatest thematic programme highlights of the SU?
Ema: In Belgrade we visited the museum of Yugoslavia, which was a nice introduction to our history. Later, on the mountain Fruska Gora we had a celebration of Slava, the participants had a workshop on making Serbian national food – sarma – and we also taught them how to dance “kolo”. In Novi Sad we had an interesting visit of the catacombs with a very unusual guide.
GT: What were the funniest or most exciting moments?
Ema: Running for busses in Belgrade, fighting the mosquitos, slidings in Aquapark, beach volleyball tournament, making “sarma”, the funny guy in the catacombs and many more. And everything followed by the catch phrase: “Guuuyz, it is really really important!”
GT: How was the group of participants? How did you manage to integrate them?
Ema: The group of participants was really nice. They connected in the first days of the event which made the organisers’ job a lot easier. Even if they were sometimes late, they were always ready for action, long walks during the day and in the mood for all night parties. Atmosphere was great, they all participated in the workshops and games we prepared for them which made us all more connected.
GT: How was the cooperation in the team? Any special moment you would mention here?
Ema: We had a great team of organizers, we worked really hard, but we also partied really hard! We managed to do a great job, have a lot of fun and make amazing memories together.
GT: How was the romance factor of the SU? Where there many couples and what were the highlights from the gossip box?
Ema: The romance factor was quite random or not that popular this summer, although there was one couple. The gossip box was not really highlighted with romance.
GT: How successful was the SU overall?
Ema: Now, after a month since our SU ended and all the impressions settled in, we can say that we had a successful event, even if we had a few bumps on the road and the weather wasn’t always on our side, we managed to figure everything out. Reason for that was a good organising team and great participants.
GT: Anything you would like to add?
Ema: We would like to thank our organizing team for all the effort before and during the SU and doing such a great job. We also like to thank our amazing participants who chose our SU and made it unforgettable. We hope they enjoyed in every day and had such a great time like we did. New friendships, stories, memories and also maybe some love was born. Thank you, dear participants, you are always welcome here and see you somewhere in Europe! <3
