Zwönitz/ Germany 25 November - 2 December 2009
In the week round the first Advent Sunday - the beginning of Christmas time in our area - we had the pleasure to host our 2nd meeting of 126 students and teachers from all eight partner countries. What a lively crowd!
Our guests experienced the Erzgebirge region and were impressed with various Christmas traditions. We walked in the St Andreas Parade and visited several christmas markets (not just for the Gluehwein). In our school we had presentations of each country`s traditions and festivals, popular music and religion. Learning our partner countries` national dances was great fun.
Our guests had the chance to make a practical experience of Erzgebirge Folk Art. Bobbin lace is more for experts, we realized. Carving small wooden animals was an interesting but very dangerous activity which everyone practised with great ambition and success. The first aid kit was needed a lot...
We spent one week in Hormersdorf Youth hostel where we had lots of room to meet, talk, dance, sing... Many thanks to the friendly staff for their endless patience!
On day trips to Annaberg and Dresden our guests learned more about Saxony. St Annen Church, Frauenkirche and other historical buildings were explored in guided tours.Going down a mine was very impressive. Now we all know why miners needed a lot of good luck for their hard work - hence Glück Auf!
Our 2nd Comenius meeting was a unique experience and a great success. We hope that the international friendships will last. 
Thessaloniki / Greece 26 March - 2 April 2009
Nearly 150 students and teachers from all eight partner countries of our project spent a week together. Our Greek friends were wonderful hosts. We were overwhelmed by their warm welcome and permanent care during our meetings in school and in host families. Many, many thanks to Nikos, all the teachers, students and parents! Of course there was some work for us during the meeting: We presented several project activities in our Greek partner school 1st Lyceum of Evosmos.
With the help of our word bank we learned a few words of each other`s languages. Surprisingly, "Glick auf" was the most popular German word and we had great fun because some of the words in other languages are real tongue twisters. The Polish boys were amazing: they managed to pick up every word of German after hearing it only once (including the words they should not say in public). We find the Polish language rather difficult but we easily remember "Jak się masz?", thanks to the song which chicken and the others sang so enthusiastically:)))We watched videos about our schools and learned about each country`s school system. It was interesting to compare the lifestyle and daily routines of students from different nations. Online blogs, Power Point presentations and some very beautiful handmade diaries of our friends from Cyprus gave us the chance to compare our ways of life. Here we found more similarities than differences with our friends from other countries: the same hobbies and interests, getting up early and a long way to school, similar subjects etc. One major difference between Mediterranean and more northern countries seem to be the times people eat: Our stomachs found it difficult to adapt to Greek lunch at 16:00...
On two day trips we had the chance to see Mazedonia`s most impressive ancient places: monasteries in Meteora and the tombs of Philippos II (Alexander the Great`s father) in Vergina. The overwhelmingly beautiful landscape and insight in othodox monastery`s life in Meteora as well as the tombs with lots of gold treasures and interesting info on ancient cultures in Vergina were well worth the long bus journeys.
And we had time for a football match: Greece + Cyprus against the other 6 nations. Guess who won?
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Thessaloniki is a big city with some beautiful old churches and sights but, unfortunately, lots of rather ugly concrete buildings, too. Due to a big fire in 1917, there are only few nice old houses.Our main impressions of Thessaloniki: What a beautiful view over the sea to Mount Olympus! The city is full of little cafés with delicious cakes. Yummy! Brilliant shopping facilities - hundreds of nice shops, unfortunately not so cheap. But: Traffic is lethal - nobody cares about pedestrians, motorbikes on pavements, be careful!
Thessaloniki is a big city with some beautiful old churches and sights but, unfortunately, lots of rather ugly concrete buildings, too. Due to a big fire in 1917, there are only few nice old houses.Our main impressions of Thessaloniki: What a beautiful view over the sea to Mount Olympus! The city is full of little cafés with delicious cakes. Yummy! Brilliant shopping facilities - hundreds of nice shops, unfortunately not so cheap. But: Traffic is lethal - nobody cares about pedestrians, motorbikes on pavements, be careful!
All in all we had a great time in Thessaloniki. Our students improved their English so much because they did nothing but talk, talk, talk, without any worries about grammar or mistakes. With a lot of laughing, dancing, singing, eating, playing football and just being together we made friends with people from many countries - what a brilliant time and great success of our project!
