Report from the Comenius meeting in Tutrakan 27 April to 2 May 2010

The Norwegian delegation consisted of the students Inga Pollestad, Helene Bentzen and Melanie Kotte Molvær, school librarian Lone Gregersen, and the teachers Sølve Marie Tegner Stenmark, Vibeke Aas Gulbrandsen and Aage Træffen. We arrived at Bucharest Airport on Tuesday 27 April and were met by the German, the Turkish and the Polish groups. Our hosts at the Jordan Jovkov Secondary School in Tutrakan had organized a bus for us and in the evening we arrived in Tutrakan and were booked into our hotel there.

Wednesday morning we went to an assembly hall where Nicola, the local project leader, wished us welcome to Bulgaria. We saw a video about the country and a wetland area we would later visit. A representative of the region’s educational authorities also wished us welcome and underlined the importance of a project like ours, not least for a place like Tutrakan. Here, groups from the different countries also presented the results of the work they had done at home. They had gone to local shops and markets and found out about the origin and ecological status of various foodstuffs and prices and price differences. The students were also given tasks for a role play they would perform on Friday on the subject of GMOs. After this, we had a meeting with the mayor in the town hall. Here, the school choir sang our project song, an adaptation of This Land Is Your Land, and students from the school also gave us a performance of folk dance before we were invited to lunch.

After lunch, we went to a factory called Buldex, which produces cheese and other milk products, and were shown around the production facilities. On the way back we stopped at a cemetery commemorating the fallen in wars at the beginning of the twentieth century. Especially important was the year 1916, when Bulgarians took back Tutrakan, which had been occupied by Romanian forces. When we came back to town, we had a couple of hours to relax before we had dinner.

Thursday morning we met at school. Here, Bulgarian students gave a presentation of the production of bio-diesel – since we later would visit Bulgaria’s only bio-diesel factory. Before we left, the Norwegian group gave the presentation they should have given the day before. They referred the results from a big survey of Norwegians’ attitudes to ecological products and how much more they were willing to pay for them (answer: not much). After this, we left for the bio-diesel factory at Slivo Pole. We all got a tour of the grounds, but only one student from each country was allowed to join a smaller tour of the production facilities. Then, we went on to Ruse, which at one point was Bulgaria’s largest city and a centre of Central European culture. This golden age still shows, even if it also shows that the city’s high point was some time ago. We came back to Tutrakan, and this time we had dinner at our hotel, the Lodkata, on the banks of the Danube with a marvelous view of the sunset on the river.

Friday morning we met at school. We were welcomed by the headmaster ,and the different countries decorated a table with objects that were typical of their countries. Together these tables gave a good impression of the diversity within the project. One student from each country explained what the objects were and why they were chosen to illustrate the country. Then, there was a reception in the school yard, with the whole school present. We sang our song, and in return the students gave us a folk dance performance and invited us to join in. Later, we had the performance of the role play. The subject was the same as the title of the project: “GMOs – will they feed the world?” The different groups (each group consisted of one country’s students) were supposed to be either optimists, pessimists and so on, and present their views. Here, we got an impression of the various arguments that are used in discussions on the topic. After the role play, we had lunch in the school canteen.

After lunch, we went by bus to the Kalimok-Brashlen preserved area, where we were shown around by the local expert (whom we knew from the film we had seen two days ago) and he could tell us about this wetlands area and the birds, amphibians and fishes that are here. We came back to Tutrakan and departed on what Nicola, the Bulgarian project leader, had organized for us in addition to the preliminary program: A boat trip on the Danube, which gave us the opportunity to see Tutrakan from the water (which Nicola had never seen even after living here for 16 years) and experiencing this river which connects so large parts of Europe. In the evening, we had dinner at the other hotel , the Palermo.

Saturday we went to Varna, Bulgaria’s Black Sea capital, a bus trip of some three hours. We visited the Assumption Cathedral there, and took a short city tour together before we spent some time in smaller groups. We met to have a look at the Black Sea and the beach and walk to the bus, which took us to a shopping mall where we had some more time to spend as we wished. When we came back, there was an official farewell dinner for all the participating students, foreigners and Bulgarians, and for the teachers and representatives of the school. This was the formal rounding off of the meeting, and kind words were said in an effort to express thanks to everyone involved – especially to the Bulgarian hosts, who had put a lot of work into a comprehensive program that everyone was very happy with, and for always remembering things like making sure someone would keep the Norwegian students company so that they would not be forgotten in the hotel.

On Sunday 2 May, we returned the same way we had come – by bus to Bucharest and off from there. And even though we took off from Romania, it was a small part of Bulgaria we took with us in our hearts.

We are very happy with our meeting and our stay in Bulgaria. As a group, all the project participants are getting more familiar with each other and both teachers and students seem to enjoy each other’s company more and more. The Bulgarian hosts had made a great program. We carried forward the work connected with the theme of the project, and we got to know a corner of Europe very few of us were familiar with. There may be many differences between culture as we experienced it there and the one we live in every day. But the similarities are greater, and as Pietro, the Italian headmaster said when the students were saying goodbye: “In our own small way, we are building Europe.”