No, this post is not about a Spice Girls song. Instead, it is about the convergence of the
two organizations that I work for- Peace Corps and AIESEC. For the longest time, I had always thought to
myself that foremost I was a Peace Corps volunteer. Overall, I would be a consultant or
assistant within my organization, helping to monitor its structure and fill in
the pieces where lack of knowledge or skills was evident. However, after attending the AIESEC Euro LDS
conference in Sunny Beach, Bulgaria, my whole mindset on my participation in
AIESEC had changed. After five days of
sessions and by meeting young leaders from all around the world, I understand
now the importance of AIESEC. And now my
Peace Corps path and participation in AIESEC have become one. I can no longer maximize LC Prilep’s impact
on society without fully adapting the values and practices of AIESEC. No longer am I simply a Peace Corps volunteer
who works with AIESEC Prilep. I am an
AIESECer and a Peace Corps volunteer.
Our physical journey to the conference started on Tuesday
morning. One of my counterparts, Angela,
and I left Prilep at 5:30AM on a bus to Skopje.
There we met with two delegates from Skopje, and we boarded a different
bus that headed toward Sofia, the capital of Bulgaria. Luckily for me, I did not need to use
vacation days for this excursion because I was traveling out of country with my
counterpart. However, I needed to pay
for the transportation and fees for the conference with my own money, but as
you will discover later, the costs were worth it.
After an 8-hour bus ride to Sofia, we left our baggage in
the bus station and went to the center.
One of my colleagues from Skopje was determined that we first stopped at
McDonalds to eat. It had been months
since she had McDonalds because the McDonalds that used to exist in Macedonia
were closed about a year ago. Luckily we
were able to find a branch on our way to the center, and I accidentally ordered
9 chicken nuggets and a Big n’ Tasty meal.
Now to be fair, I did not finish ALL of the meal, but I did come
close. However, I did not eat again for
another 15 hours, so it was a feast and famine tactic.
After, we walked around the capital with our eyes open for
other AIESECers. Sofia was the largest
city that I had walked through since I arrived in Macedonia, so I was awed by
the historical buildings, subway system, and the crowds of people
systematically walking to and fro as they did during rush hours in
Chicago. At one point we thought we saw
a group of AIESECers in the central park of Sofia, so I asked them if they were
a certain group without explicitly asking them if they were AIESECers. They were confused, I was embarrassed, so I
walked away apologetically only to discover later in the conference that they
were the Dutch delegation.
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| Taking a photo just over the border into Bulgaria |
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| In Sofia! |
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| McDonalds!!! |
We relaxed over coffee at the only coffee shop we could find
with outdoor seating (a different McDonalds), and after a couple hours, made
our way back to the train station so that we could meet the other delegates and
the organized transport in front of the Alexandar Nevski church. When we arrived at the bus station, we met
other delegates for the first time, two AIESECers from Poland. Together, we
took a cab to the church where we relaxed at a pub, meeting delegates from the
Netherlands and Lithuania. At about
midnight we climbed the organized transport and started our 5-hour journey to
the sea.
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| Aleksandar Nevski Church |
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| Poland and Macedonia |
When we arrived at our hotel at Sunny Beach on Wednesday
morning, I was blown away. Our hotel,
Helena Resort, was gorgeous! It sat
right on the sea and had more than three swimming pools, a spa center, a
delicious buffet, etc. I knew that we
would not have the opportunity to explore the area, include nearby historic
Nessebar, because our days would be packed with sessions for AIESEC. However, I was excited that we could enjoy
our conference in the comfort of a resort.
Unfortunately, as we arrived, we were unable to check into our rooms or
eat, so many of us took an hour journey to hike to the nearest mini market to purchase
some food for lunch and breakfast. By
12:30PM, the conference started, and most delegates were showered, fed, and
ready for the sessions.
The first day, which was titled “Youth to Business” was not
very interesting, so overall the first day was a bit disappointing. However, the first day was also our
opportunity to start meeting the delegates from other countries. The largest delegations (including over 70
from the Netherlands, over 50 from Germany, and over 25 from France) were
difficult to crack since it would be easier for them to stay together with
those they knew and spoke the same language.
For me, I easily connected with the smaller delegations from Portugal,
Croatia, Slovenia, Austria, and the LC from Munich. At the end of the first night, we had a
Global Village where we showcased our national foods and performed our
entities’ “Roll Calls”, which are organized dances that each entity developed
for seminars like these.
The second day started all of the practical and emotional
sessions that would help us shape our Local Committees for the better. The theme for the sessions were, we are
Generation 2015, and the success of AIESEC relied on goals set in an
international conference to realize about 135,000 exchanges in the 2014-2015
period. This meant that we were expected
to bring drastic improvements to all of our LCs in order to accomplish these
lofty goals.
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| Arriving at the Black Sea at 5AM |
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| Our hotel!!! |
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| Representing at Global Village |
It is impossible (and probably very dull) to give a
play-by-play account of all of the sessions and days that we attended throughout
the seminar. But I do want to describe
the overall format of the seminar.
Basically, the way that AIESEC seminars are organized is (and I use this
adverb intentionally) fucking genius.
First, the participants are deprived of sleep because of travel, jet
lag, and sessions that last until about 8PM at night, with each day followed by
a party. So on average, each participant
accomplishes only 3-4 hours of sleep each day.
Informational sessions that create the benchmark for the goals of the
organization are mixed with emotional sessions, so periods of crying are often
entailed by sessions of motivation to accomplish universal tasks. Before most sessions, students are encouraged
to energize themselves by participating in the roll calls, which requires them
to dance in sync with strangers from other countries. Finally, each night is concluded with a
party, where students can drown themselves in alcohol and drunkenly share their
motivational ideas with others.
So yes, in a way the seminar is like a sect meeting. However, nothing of what is mentioned here is
mandatory. People are not forced to cry
or dance. One is not required to drink
or attend a party, and one can enjoy 8 hours of sleep each night if one tries. Overall, people are not touched by some higher
force or Jedi mind tricks, but are instead inspired by the stories and dreams
of other individual members. We took out
of this meeting so much because we believe in the central goal of AIESEC
organization and what each individual member can accomplish- to make the world
a more peaceful place and to develop young leaders.
I finally understand why AIESEC is important to the
world. Even though it has lofty goals
for peace and leadership, it pursues these goals in a practical way (the
organization was created by economists, so of course it is practical). In order for the world to change, people need
to change. So AIESEC focuses on giving
young people the opportunity to gain skills and experiences by going abroad on
exchanges provided by AIESEC. Through
these exchanges they meet new cultures and enjoy life-changing experiences so
that they can change the way they impact their society or lead their life.
Even if the seminar is “sect-like”, at least it
tries to change young people’s mind with good attitudes and ideas about
society. In a way, AIESEC is the entity
that fights the cult of everyday life.
Everyday, people are bombarded with ideas that money is all powerful,
poverty will always exist, wars will continue, certain people are a certain way
so racism is fine, and that somebody should not try to change the world because
the power of one is nothing on a planet of over 7 billion people. We are grinded down by the consensual belief
that we should only care for ourselves, because it would be impossible to
change the world. But AIESEC shows that
when the power of one spreads across members in an LC, LCs in a country, and
countries across the world, real change can be accomplished.
This seminar was truly inspirational for me, and in many ways
changed my outlook on life. I am
motivated to make a change in my organization.
Even though Peace Corps had cautioned us volunteers to water down our
expectations for our organization due to cultural reasons, I feel that I can
finally implement drastic changes to AIESEC Prilep because our organizations
primary culture is that of AIESEC. And
even if I fail to make a change, even on such a microscopic level as Prilep, at
least I made friendships with people from all over the world.
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| Americans at the Conference |
For some of you it may be sickening to hear so me gush about
how inspired I feel after a mere 5 days of conference. For some you may doubt the resiliency of my
passion. But I feel like I learned
enough practical ideas to make some real changes for my organization, and I have
been motivated enough to keep pushing forward when the forces of change no
longer persist. This seminar was the
best experience I could undertake at this point in my service, and I really
hope that I can transfer what I learned from this conference to my organization
and all of the members.
If you want to see a movie that I created for my local
committee, feel free to watch it on Youtube!
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