Hello everyone,
My name is Juliana, I am from Colombia, and I am sent by France to join you in this space as a part of my European Solidarity Corps (ESC) Volunteering program with the Green School Village (GSV) Association. Last week was my first week and for the on-arrival training, after being accomodated in the Association’s base in Sofia, I am visiting the village of Dolen in the mountains at The Gates (Portite), a lovely guest house that is the place where many people looking for some quiet time come to discover the town and to connect with nature. With my host Veronika, also a member of GSV, we participated in a Permaculture Design Course (PDC) in Italy and we decided to come to this place to explore the local practices that are done here and also see how the knowledge we obtained during the two-week course could be applied and put into practice here by involving the community and making a great use of the space. We had the amazing opportunity to participate in the PDC also with Mihaela, Philip, Lyubo and Bo, also members of the association, from you might have already heard about.
The whole old town is now recognized as an architectural reserve and it is amazing to see the construction techniques that were used some hundreds of years ago and even now some of the houses have been restored using some great examples of construction with natural materials, that, hopefully, I will present later on. Autumn is arriving and some of my activities include harvesting walnuts, collecting some dry leaves and setting up the fire to stay warm, welcoming some guests for the weekends, as well as supporting in solidarity the community projects and events that are already happening here. We will explore together how we can convert this place into a site where the community can gather and create together, which makes it a good candidate with great potential for a LAND center and/or an international center for Activating Community Transformation (iACT) accredited by GSV/PAB.
That is all for now. I will leave you with my introductory video and see you soon !
Hasta pronto,
Juliana.
