In a candlelit, cafe style setting you will experience a wide range of entertainment, including music and dance from some of the local young people from Scariff and surrounding area.

There will be food and non alcoholic drinks available to buy on the night, €7 on the door (concessions and family tickets available) come one come all, see you there!

You can download the parental consent form or the membership form here if you forgot to bring them home last Friday….

Parental_Consent_Form Weekend Away Burren 2011

MEMBERSHIP FORM 2011

My organisation ‘Fishbowl Youth’ and ‘MCT’ have worked closely together over the last years, so they were able to offer me a project which is something very similar to what I had been doing already for

the last 2 years in Fishbowl. Of course my first country choice had been Italy as I also really wanted to learn the language.

But I had been advised to look for the project rather than country! I had been to Slovenia previously about 5 years ago so I knew I would like it here.

Ok what do I do? Well I’m not fully clear on what I do yet either, so far I’ve just been doing what is asked things like preparing a presentation about Ireland. And going along with MCT people to see how they work. I also help out in Klub Soncek, which basically includes hanging out with the young people, my lack of Slovenian may prove to be a barrier some of the time usually it’s ok. I live 3 minutes away from MCT Centre so it mean I can get up late enough and still be on-time

I have been here in Trbovlje for nearly 2 weeks now. So far I’m loving everything about it! I think it’s beautiful, though many people I’ve come across seem to disagree. The people here are all so open and lovely!

The first weekend that I arrived I found myself being put on a train and tagging along to Slovenska Konicje where I did

not know what to expect but it was great. When I arrived I met loads of others that were on EVS, including people from; Turkey, Germany, Latvia, England, Czech Republic, and many other places! I was very happy when another girl from Ireland Dublin showed up, and knew someone from Clare who I also knew! Yep it’s a small world out here!

Here in Slovenia I seem to have endless opportunities I find

the transport system pretty good. Ok maybe not so on-time but it seems to get you everywhere!  So last weekend I was invited to go to Klagenfurt in Austria, I had never been to Austria so I grabbed the opportunity! One thing I noticed after crossing the border from Slovenia to Austria was that there was snow and mist everywhere!

I was very happy to discover that everything is CHEAP, Food, Beer, Cigarettes, Transport, all a person needs to live off!  Ok maybe minus the cigarettes for me, but still cheap food?! Life can’t get much better than that!

Life is not too bad here, it’s getting cold now though and it’s been raining like crazy, like being at home really. The summer was lovely, it was pretty hot but not as bad as the south. I miss the summer already.

Myself and Patricia (the Spanish volunteer) went down to the south for a week during August, it was roasting, but it was nice to see another side of Greece, lots of pretty beaches.

The work is going good, it is fun although its getting more difficult with the crappy weather and we have to go out in all conditions.

I am surrounded by mountains and thankfully that is where we spend most of our time, I love them, the landscape here is pretty amazing. They still have shepherds which I found to be quite amazing. They move with their flock so there are no fences, there are places in the mountains where you can see nothing for miles, a feeling of endless space. It’s refreshing, coming from a country where every piece of land is owned by someone.

We are assisting on two different projects.

One involves the bears; we go out into the mountains and collect bear hair, which is then sent away for DNA analysis. They have put barbed wire around selected power poles, the bears are attracted to the creosote on the poles, they scratch and bite them, leaving hair behind so this is what we collect. I haven’t actually seen any wild bears (yet) but there are 13 rescued bears here at the centre, they are beautiful animals. I’m hoping to see one in the wild before they go into hibernation, but for such big animals they are surprisingly hard to spot!

The second project we are working on is an otter project. We are sampling two lakes close by, we started out cycling to the lakes but the bikes were totally shit and kept getting punctures so we have to drive to the village and do a lot of walking, which is not so bad considering I think I’ve put on about a stone since I’ve been here!

I’ve been getting on very well with all the other volunteers, especially Patricia. She is great fun so we pretty much do everything outside of work together. There was a pretty rocky start with one other volunteer, who is an Anarchist or something and kept trying to talk to me about the IRA and stuff when we first met! Very strange…

Jessica is the girl that works with me on the projects. She is lovely, she didn’t start out too good though, it’s her first real experience of nature so it was interesting seeing her try to find her feet. She is getting on great now though, she’s really funny and sweet, and we get on very well.

Well that’s pretty much it, everything is great, apart from the weather, but my mam is sending me thermals to combat that issue!
Also, learning the Greek language is virtually impossible, I’m awful at it!

All strings came together on the night and we are very grateful for everyone who turned up and showed their support to the project!!

INVITATION

We would like to invite you to an evening of discussion and presentation based on the “Democracy Project”. This project has been organised by two youth

organisations:  Fishbowl Youth – Tuamgraney and Binaro Uno – Rome, Italy in partnership with three schools: Scariff Community College, Scariff Youthreach and our partner school based in Rome Italy, Nomentano-Liceo Scientifico Statale.

You are invited to attend this event in Scariff Community College on Saturday 16^th October from 7.30pm to 9pm.

There will be a panel of guest speakers including Glen Guilfoyle from Clare Youth services, Michael McNamara local to Scariff who has been active in the Middle East and developing countries, and, subject to confirmation, Timmy Dooley T.D.

We look forward to meeting with you there

Finally Fishbowl is hosting an exchange here in Ireland again.

This year’s theme is personal development and non verbal communication. So if you think you need a boost in your confidence or you have difficulties communicating to your peers? Or people internationally? Then this might be the project for you!

There are 3 other participating countries; Italy, Jordan and Morocco. In total there will be 24 young international participants between the ages of 15 and 21.

During the exchange you will be staying together in the Burren activity centre, where you will do workshops, learn and interact with each other. We hope to have a final show case and have our own international evening, where everyone is invited and you can show them the work we have done. Workshops will be given through Art, Movement, Dance, and your own creativity. Everyone is invited, and your participation will be greatly valued! It is a chance to get to know people in and outside Europe, through a fun creative environment!

There will be no alcohol or drugs allowed at this event.

Participant must be aged between 15 and 21.

If you are from Ireland and interested please contact Christe on: christeslabbers@gmail.com as soon as possible!!! Christe will send you an application form and any additional information

This time we hosted the exchange in Ireland in Mountshannon. The Italians came over from Thursday 18^th – Sunday 21^st March and during these few days we went into more detail on how our schools were governed. We discussed the power and influence of the principal, a teacher, a student and the different boards i.e. the Parents’ Council.

We also had discussions and answered questions about our schools, and we gave the Italians a tour of Scariff Community College, Fishbowl Youth and Youthreach. In Scariff school there was a demonstration of hurling and in Youthreach, we continued our workshops and had tea and coffee.

During that exchange we produced a lot of work in the areas of PR, film, research, finance, logo and fundraising.

The Irish group will go back to Rome in April to compare the research that will be carried out between the two visits.

In the next few weeks we will present a questionnaire to students, teachers and people from the different boards in order to get a better understanding of how our schools work and we will also carry out interviews, which will be filmed as part of the film we will produce during the project.

Currently Fishbowl is working on a Democracy Project, and for that we partnered with two Italian organisations. Other partners in this project are Scariff Community College, Scariff Youthreach and in Rome Liceo Nomentano, a large secondary school with about 1500 student.

We have been running workshops in all the schools and now we have just returned from our first trip to Italy:

Democracy Explored : The First Exchange.

Democracy Explored is a project in which young people analyse democracy. As part of this project, nine students from Scariff Community College, one student from Youthreach and two young support leaders went on an eight day exchange to Orvieto, near Rome in Italy. They were supported by a teacher from Scariff Community College and a leader from fishbowl Youth.

During the exchange we took part in workshops and presented our work, but we had loads of fun too. We played games, took part in teambuilding activities and had an intercultural evening when we presented our culture in the form of song, dance, DVDs and food. The trip was part of Youth in Action, which is a programme funded by the EU.

It was a fantastic experience which we all enjoyed, and we made great friends who we hope to meet again soon!

This was only the first leg of the international project, as it will run until June 2010, with a final presentation in the first weekend of June.

Four students of the Italian school will come to Ireland from the 18th to the 21st of March. During this visit we will explore and make decisions on how we will edit the documentary and compare the research we have done so far.

We will now continue with the workshops in Scariff, and start our research of how our schools are governed, we will interview all the people involved in our school community and create an overview of the way our school works. Our Italian friends will do the same in Rome, and we will compare the results of our research when we meet again in the next few months.