NUTRITION FACTS:THIS ISSUE CONTAINS 100% NATURAL FIBRE AND IS LOW IN CALORIES, SUGAR AND FAT. FOR YOUR DAILY DOSE OF FIBRE, SIMPLY EAT THIS

PAPER.

SERVING SUGGESTION:TASTES GREAT WITH SOY

SAUCE.

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JOURNOBOOK“EYP IS MY LIFE” (INTERVIEW WITH RITA GRANT)REINVENT EDUCATION ON A GLOBAL SCALETHE CLASH: DOWNLOADINGCHAIRS ARE HUMANS TOOWHAT HAVE I GOTTEN MYSELF INTOSOCIAL NETWORKS: AN ALLY OR AN ENEMYENCIRCLINGSWIMMING WITHOUT LEGSSESSION SURVIVAL GUIDE

BERNETI blog, therefore I am. I am online again. How do I love Poland! Never expected they had internet connection everywhere, even on the bus. After today’s elections, our new Dutch government should take Poland as an example. They should implement the chocolate bars in our national fl ight company too.

KATARZYNADuring the last three months I have been at home for only three days and after that I spent ten hours on a train trying to get here to enjoy the EYP spirit. After this session, apart from feeling PEDed, I will seriously have to start preparing myself for my studies. My future friends seem to be ready to choose the books instead of social life, not very promis-ing at all.

KATERINAGetting on the bus line Prague-Poland-Ukraine, I had no idea what was going to come later on. I should have guessed that, when the stewardess returned my ticket in a cover written in Cyrillic. The 12-hour bus journey turned into an intensive Russian course, only sometimes disturbed by a child crying loudly on the seat in front of me. Thanks to a ceaseless movie screening I had an excursion into the fi lm industry during the Soviet era. I learned that seeing Leon-ardo DiCaprio dubbed in Russian was a truly dreadful expe-rience. The way home is certainly going to be interesting...

JOURNOBOOK

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KHALIDRandom Facebook-status? What about a random journey, to somewhere near the Himalayas, like Nepal, to teach, at a local school, in a remote village? You might be wonder-ing why, I would say why not?! Every once in a while we get fed up with having to go to school, making homework, fall-ing into this routine etc.. Taking random decisions like this can broaden your horizon in so many unexplainable ways, not to mention the tremendous impact you will have on the locals. I will leave you there, think about it ;)

MAJASometimes you feel like one decision is capable of changing your whole life. That is exactly what happened to me. From sticking to languages for nearly half of my life, I chose IT as my university course. I wished for an adventure and that is defi nitely, what I will get. But well… instead of enjoying myself, when I still can, I will be stuck with some nerds talk-ing about the newest games. How fascinating!

NASTASSIAYour dad is having his midlife crisis. Wet socks. Having to pay €60 more for your favourite Ben Howard concert that you really want to go to. The fact that I will actually pay that. People with too many prejudices. Me being exactly that type of person. Magazines writing about the beauty of ‘curves’ and then use pictures of size zeromodels. Dropping your Iphone in the toilet, twice. People using their Ipads as portable cameras. ‘Going Dutch’. Your favourite show being cancelled due to an ‘incredibly important soccer match’. Fortunately, I am in Rzeszow now and I will, hopefully, not have to deal with any of these issues.

TOBIASI do not want to sound kafkesk by saying this, but a meta-morphosis for me is a natural as well as required process. It most certainly does not happen overnight, but it should be gradual. Maybe I am too biased to give an, in any way, objective view on the subject, but I hope you can under-stand that development has to take place. I do not oppose Liberals or Conservatives as both are seeking a change. And change is what keeps us going, what keeps us adapting and alive.

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Many people say that they have started EYP just because it looks nice on your CV. Was it also like that for you?

No, defi nitely not. I do not even mention EYP on my CV, especially because it is truly hard to explain to outsiders what it actually is. I just wanted to challenge myself.

What was your fi rst EYP ses-sion?

Frankly speaking, I attended loads of Irish sessions at the begin-ning, but the fi rst one that actu-ally counted was the 60th Inter-national Session in Stockholm in 2009. As it was the 60th IS, they had a massive budget and every-thing was kept at the highest stan-dards. They even had a bar, all made of ice. It was a fl amboyant and posh session. My Chair was lovely, people were incredible… It was simply the perfect session for me.

Can you think of your best and

worst EYP memory?

My best memory? That is a hard one… Probably the National Selec-tion Conference of EYP Germany in 2010 in Wuerzburg. It was amaz-ing. In the middle of nowhere, just us on a mountain.

Don’t you have any bad memo-ries with EYP then?

Not really, but there was one embarrassing moment. As I was at the session in Stockholm, I was interviewed for the German TV and I didn’t know what to say at all, so I just blurted out ‘EYP is my life!’. Unfortunately for me, I am afraid you can still fi nd the video somewhere online.

What is your favourite EYP game?

I love all of them, games and ener-gisers are an inseparable part of the EYP atmosphere. However, if I really had to pick one I would probably go for street fi ghter.

“EYP IS MY LIFE!”

A dedicated EYP-er since 2007. A French speaking his-tory student from Ireland. A lovely ginger with curly hair and freckles. Meet Rita Grant, the President of the 9th National Selection Conference of EYP Poland in Rzeszów.

M A J A Z A L E W S K A K A T A R Z Y N A S O K O L O W S K A

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What obstacles did you have to overcome to get where you are now?

When I fi rst started, my biggest fear was defi nitely speaking in public. It was so scaring to express my opinion in front of so many people. The idea of a hundred eyes looking directly at you, over-whelming... However, it is easily banished by EYP, so now it is not a problem anymore to stand up and say what I think.

How did you feel about being selected for the session just two weeks prior to the start?

Really nerve-wracking. It was challenging to fi t months of prepa-rations into two weeks. Especially, since it is my fi rst time as a Pres-ident. However, I had all the offi -cials to help me and Ola was a big support for me as well. I was get-ting emails every fi ve minutes. It was a hard decision to make, but I am extremely happy to be here.

What are your expectations for this session?

I would simply like to live up to everyone’s expectations and I wish for everybody to have a blast.

Have you ever experienced an EYP romance?

Not yet… but I still have the upcoming four days of the ses-

sion. ;)

You might have already seen the Media Team website and our short introductions. We would like to ask you the same ques-tion: What would you do if you woke up as a potato?

I would be so happy. There is noth-ing better than to be Irish and a potato. I will just sit there and be happy.

During CJO’s teambuilding you mentioned that, even though you are yourself a ginger, you enjoy ginger jokes. Could you tell us one of your favourites?

(giggling)

What is the most unrealistic t h i n g about Harry Potter sto-ries?

It is that the ginger has two friends.

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M s. Peterson, I don‘t understand how to take the integral of f(x), could

you explain it to me?” Ms. Peter-son walks over to Suzy, rather annoyed as she had just explained it to the class. “*Sigh*.. Yeah sure, what you do is…(blabla). Do you understand now?” “Uhm…yeah I think so, thanks!” Suzy answers, putting on a fake smile.

Obviously, Suzy did not get any-thing from that forced explana-tion by her teacher but she could not possibly ask her to explain it again, just imagine how that would make her look. We have all been there, almost every student is all too familiar with such a situ-ation. For some it might not be too big of deal, it just means that they have to practice more, but oth-ers might be completely lost. Now what does this have to do with online education? Well, there are many ways one might study using the internet, but the focus of this article will mainly be on videos as an educational resource.

The idea of online education is

not new and has been a subject of interest ever since the birth of the internet. It simply has not mani-fested itself enough to gain world-wide attention. However, over the past few years, as technologi-cal developments have presented the world with new possibilities, online educational videos have become more accessible e.g. You-tube. Throughout the world, con-cerns have been raised over fail-ing educational systems, think about standardised testing or the ‘corporate attack’ on education. This has led many students to seek for help using the main informa-tion resource available to them, namely the internet. As students, successfully, began to use educa-tional videos to help with their studies, for example Khan Acad-emy or MIT ‘OpenCourseWare’, it started to draw interest of some rich and infl uential people and institutions.

These people and institutions include Bill Gates, Google, and many US Colleges among which are Harvard, MIT and UC Berke-ley. Once convinced, Bill Gates has

K H A L I D E L G H O U L

REINVENTEDUCATION

ON A GLOBAL SCALE

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been a fanatic supporter of Khan Academy, founded by Salman Khan, and donated several mil-lions for its development to an online school free to use by any-one in the world. As Harvard and MIT saw one of their Alumni, Sal graduated both universities, set up such a profound organisa-tion, they could not possibly stay behind. This lead them to come up with edX, a platform which allows everyone around the world to fol-low online courses at both univer-sities earning them a certifi cate.

As we have been babbling on about online education for quite some time now, you might start to wonder what the actual advantages are over the physi-cal resources? Well, here goes: self-paced learning, interactive exercises, quick reviews, track of progression, insight in study, pear-to-pear teaching, no insecurity and resource accessibility. All fac-tors which are in advantage over the physical means when look-ing at virtual ones and there are some more. However, the oppo-site is true as well and in some

cases the physical means receive preference. One huge difference is the real-time interaction with the teacher and fellow students, which contributes highly to one’s social development. Another is the resource aspect, real-time books etc. are acknowledged by educa-tors before they are used to teach students, on the internet, however, one can upload whatever he or she wants, which might turn out to be completely wrong.

By now, you should have a bet-ter understanding of the position of online-education tools, the pos-sibilities, the risks and its poten-tial implementation through-out the world. It is rather evident that there are still many things that need to be overcome before education can be put online and made accessible on the web for everyone. However, as you have all gathered here to talk about the challenges we face concerning the web, we have already taken a step into the right direction. Continue walking and make sure to reach for the full potential online educa-tion harbours.

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F or hundreds and hundreds of years Europe has been developing its own unique

culture. With twenty-seven coun-tries, all writing their own his-

tory and living their own spe-cial traditions, Europe is ‘United in Diversity’. Over the past decades, Europe’s rich culture has almost been growing out of pro-portion and culture is, and has always been, vital to our daily lives. The cre-ative sector is a unique

source for growth, both economically and socially. However,

funding these artists is getting increasingly dif-

fi cult and artists are being forced to stop the work they are passionate about. All due to one simple, but seri-ous problem: downloading.

Finding an individual in this ‘wired society’ who has never downloaded is

like looking for a penguin in the Sahara. Down-

loading has become a daily activ-ity, whereas people do not under-stand what sorts of horrifying consequences these simple mouse clicks have. To put it simple, every time you download a piece of art you are actually stealing some-one’s salary. You might just steal their little son’s bike while you are at it. Culture is essential to our image for the rest of the world. And if we want to stay this way we must be able to support those who create art. As the Vice-President of the European Commission said: ‘Art feeds the soul. But who feeds the artist?’ Well, not the ones who download.

Culture has a special place in our hearts and we should do every-thing we can to retain that special spot. Small, starting artists may never have a chance to actually fulfi l their dreams, simply because nobody buys there albums. If you actually care about the artists you are listening to, then think about them and their son’s bike twice, when you decide to download their new album.

THE CLASHIn order to save the l ives of artists something must be done about downloading at once.

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O h, there’s a new album out?” Click. Download. We have all been there,

haven’t we? Downloading music or movies from the internet has become an almost automatic action for our generation. For most of us it is so self-evident that we do not even recognise a crime in what we are doing. People got used to downloading because it is the easiest and quickest way to get the material they want. They claim it is their right of free dissemina-tion of information and that they are doing nothing wrong. The big companies who own the copy-rights of these materials are lobby-ing in the governments to stop this practice. Are we indeed the crimi-nals? Is it only us to blame?

The way I see it, widespread ‘ille-gal’ downloading did not just come out of the blue. It was a result of a certain evolution of society, where media companies have simply failed to keep up with the trend. They kept on selling records or DVDs while you could easily get a movie online straight away in the

cosiness of your home. Once this was fi nally realised, it was already too late to stop the hype. There-fore even selling it online did not prevent the majority of people from download-ing their media ille-gally. All because it has become a habit which proves hard to get rid of.

Nowadays, compa-nies are increasingly pressuring govern-ments to accept treaties such as ACTA, which are not really the solution we are looking for. So let’s face it, almost everyone is download-ing and is going to be doing it. This will continue until a reasonable and balanced solution is found to redress the mistakes made in the past.

Downloading has become an inevitable part of our soci-ety. To legalise the i l legal or not to legalise, that is the question…

THE FIRST DIGITAL GENERATION IS ALREADY GROWING UP IN THE ERA OF INTERNET PIRACY. WHAT COURSE OF ACTION SHOULD WE TAKE TO EDU-CATE THE NEWBORNS INTO ETHICAL PIRATES OR SHOULD WE DO NOTHING AND LEAVE THINGS JUST AS THEY ARE? NASTASSIA AND KATE ARE HERE TO DISCUSS THE ISSUE.

K A T E R I N A Z E J D L O V A

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WOJTEKDuring one of his fi rst sessions, Wojtek was confronted with the toughest problem for an EYP-er: explain what you are doing in EYP. While he and his committee was playing some kinky games, like Pass The Orange and The Coin Game. His friends were shocked: did these people call themselves the European Youth Parliament? ‘My friends thought it looked like we were in a mental institution.’

DORAIt took Dora her whole fi rst ses-sion to actually understand EYP. The theme of her fi rst session was ‘Destination Unknown’. The fi rst speech from the President elab-orated on the theme. She talked about the future, the delegates’ personal futures and how we infl uence it. During the opening ceremony it was confusing, dur-ing closing ceremony it all made sense.

CHAIRS ARE HUMANS

TOOB E R N E T M E I J E R

N A S T A S S I A W I N G EK A T E R I N A Z E J D L O V A

Sometimes it is hard to imagine, but your own Chair, once, has also been a clumsy, nervous and confused f irst-t ime delegate.

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OYKU‘I did not know any-thing about EYP when I went to my fi rst ses-sion’. Oyku’s fi rst ses-sion was in Greece. The enormously helpful and patient Chairs were the best part of the ses-sion. ‘We started with the human knot game. Everybody knew it, but I had no idea.’ Because of her extremely compe-tent Chairs she got com-fortable with the games right away and she admits that it was her most memorable ses-sion.

MARIJKE‘It left a big impression on me to have a great Chair and to afterwards meet up with her and just chat like normal people.’ In the end it is not the awarded certifi cates and alumni-statuses that make us stay in EYP. It is the personal connections. ‘I would have never continued if I did not have such an amazing chair’.

LYUBOVThe terrifying experi-ence of the start of team-building, being three years older than her Chair and having two interruptions of police-men during parties and committee work made her fi rst session unfor-gettable. After the even-tually terrifi c session, there was the issue of getting home. ‘My boss left without me, my visa was expiring and I had to make my way back to Ukraine through twisted ways’. However, it never kept her from coming back.

FLORISBelgians tend to have the reputation of being pleasantly crazy and Chair Floris defi nitely lived up to this standard at his very fi rst Interna-tional Session. His Chair would shout ‘rodeo’ every other hour and every delegate would try to jump on his Chair’s back, like an actual Spanish torro. How-ever, crazy Floris did not always feel this comfort-able. After his very fi rst speech he collapsed and, fortunately, got to the bathroom just in time…

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ULLIHere, we fi nd our Chair Ullrich, better known as Ulli. A quiet delegate with a stammer problem who did not feel comfortable to talk in front of an audience. Eventually, he made his very fi rst point, which made his teacher shed a tear out of pride. The glory did not last long. The next ses-sion Ulli woke up one morning, to discover him-self nicely decorated with beautiful fuchsia nail polish and red lipstick at places where the sun never shines.

LUKASZLukasz is the perfect example of a small little caterpillar blossoming into a beautiful butter-fl y. After fi ve minutes of teambuilding Lukasz decided just not to say one more word during teambuilding, doing his utter best to completely disappear into its surroundings. Eventually, he found his EYP romance and with that and a lit-tle experience our Lukasz transformed into the beautiful butterfl y Chair he is today.

MARKO“At fi rst I was really sceptical about teambuild-ing and I did not really see the purpose of it,” says Marko, “I didn’t want to take part in it, but in the end I realised that, surprisingly, I actually liked it a lot.” And what is the essential benefi t of EYP, among other things, according to Marko? “You get to know many special people, many of whom become your really good and, perhaps, even life-long friends.”

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O bviously, all of you have experienced a very inter-esting fi rst day here at the

session. However, like most of the, by now, experienced offi cials, you are still wondering what you have gotten yourself into.

The European Youth Parliament (EYP) is a non-profi t organisation (NGO), currently active in 36 coun-tries across the European Conti-nent. In over 100 events each year, motivated young adults discuss current topics, explore the world of politics and experience differ-ent cultures fi rsthand. In addi-tion to the rather dry and formal attires, following actual proce-dures of offi cial European institu-tions, EYP also facilitates socialis-ing and group dynamics in order to increase the quality of its events.

National Selection Conferences, International Sessions or Regional Forums are just some of the events organised by the EYP. Especially, in recent years a wide range of new activities and events has developed. Each year, the Euro-

pean Youth Parliament involves up to 20 000 young people, from Portugal and Great Britain to the newly formed National Committee of Azerbaijan.

Due to its size, EYP has to be man-aged internationally. The Board of National Committees (BNC) meets twice a year to discuss pol-icy changes, much like the Euro-pean Parliament does. The Gov-erning Body (GB) consists of EYP-ers who have long gone past their active career and instead meet in order to discuss and pro-pose policy changes. Lastly, there is an offi cial Offi ce of EYP in Ber-lin, led by the Executive Director Ville Vasaramäki, responsible for a professional representation of EYP.

However, the European Youth Par-liament is not merely a parlia-mentary simulation. Long-lasting friendships, personal growth and leadership qualities are just some of the things that delegates learn and experience at a session.

WHAT HAVE I GOTTEN MYSELF INTO?

T O B I A S S A T L O W

Facts, facts, facts

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W e all know it. The awk-wardly familiar sound announcing that some-

one just messaged us. The red num-ber in the corner saying somebody wants to become ‘friends’ with us. The ‘thumbs-up’ button called ‘Like’ which helps us maintain social relations with people quite remote from our lives, reminding them of the fact that we still exist and care about whatever they just posted on their ‘wall’. And all the other activities that have become just a mindless routine in our everyday lives. Yet imagining this scene would have seemed strange just about a few years ago. We have integrated social networks in our lives as a natural activity and logging into Facebook or a similar website from time to time to check what is happening has become as automatic as brushing our teeth before going to bed. Was this a wise step though, displaying our lives online?

Naturally, this might all be seen

as a mere result of evolution. Are not all major breakthroughs faced with suspicion and labeled bad at fi rst too? Is it somehow different

this time? There are simple rea-sons why this particular inven-tion has become so popular. The expansion of the internet, instant messaging and, consequently, social networks sparked a revolu-tion in means of communication to such an extent that has never been seen before. The connec-tions, a few decades ago unimag-inable, suddenly seem quite easy to maintain and breaking news is spreading with the speed of light, shaking up the world. It has

SOCIAL NETWORKS

AN ALLY OR AN ENEMY

KATE ZEJDLOVA

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ally not aware of who we actually provide with our personal data as well as where, how and for what period of time this information is stored. Another potentially con-troversial issue is the new scan-ning software Facebook recently launched in order to monitor chat conversations and look for some-thing that would look suspicious, therefore, potentially criminal. While serving the web for a good purpose now, I cannot help myself asking how a tool like this could

brought the world much closer together and nowadays, this paral-lel universe connecting you to the rest of the world is just a few clicks away. How easy is that.

Yet nothing is ever that simple and every coin always has two sides. Social networks are also very easy to be abused. As we start to feel more and more comfortable with the internet we do not realise how much information we voluntarily give away. Let alone do we under-stand that not every trace we leave behind in the virtual world can be erased later on. Due to the unclear privacy policy we are usu-

develop in the near future. Should we really be careful about every word we type into a chat window? It seems harmless, but you will be surprised when at some point in the future this information, which we thought was not stored, pops up when it is absolutely inconve-nient and could cause a lot of trou-ble…

One of the things an average user might also dislike is the fact that Facebook is slowly, but contin-uously pushing us to ‘get more social’. This means that it encour-ages us to provide more and more information about our lives through innovations such as ‘time-line’. The result is that every per-son now has a personal page that tracks their personal life from the day they were born until the resent day. One might wonder whether Facebook will eventually invent a way to fi nd out whether we died and post an announce-ment about that on our wall…

All in all, the truth is that we are trapped in a world that is very hard to escape from because it has silently become a part of our soci-ety. Social networks are a good servant, but a wicked master. The internet gives us incredible oppor-tunities and almost an absolute freedom. However, there is a price to pay for every bit of freedom. Yet how much privacy loss is unlim-ited liberty worth?

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T he European Youth Parlia-ment (EYP) is all about cir-cles. To the world of EYP,

which you are now a part of, they are worth more than all other geo-metrical shapes. Circles are not necessarily natural, but for sure more than handy. As with many other things one motto is valid: The bigger (the circle), the better.

The great people around you, your committee, will play the leading role throughout the session. At the beginning of teambuilding, the others standing around you will probably be glancing at their shoes. Rest assured that this awk-wardness will soon be replaced with happy chitchatting. In case you have not had enough of these people after the fi rst impressions, you will be able to spend whole nights talking to them. At these times caffeine in any form will prove to be your best friend.

Next, during committee work, it is the time and place to sit in a circle and challenge you both academi-cally and socially. Being a delegate

will require many things from you: fl exibility when confronted with opposing opinions, willing-ness to work together as a group, to reach consensus and fi nally enjoying a party after committee work.

Furthermore, the session will allow you to fi nd more than just a new circle of committee friends; there will be over 70 delegates present for reasons similar to yours. All of them accompany you through the stages of a session. All those people who were a little bit edgy in the beginning have been smoothed through this wonderful, most perfect shape imaginable, a circle.

The end of a session, as you will notice, always comes too quickly. However, thanks to your new cir-cle of friends, you will have many places to visit and fl oors to sleep on. Any session you go to will make you ravenous for more. Be eager to widen your circle and encircle your surroundings.

ENCIRCLINGT O B I A S S A T L O W

Closing in all around

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1. We do not prosecute people whose English is not perfect. Therefore, speak.2. If you do not know something, ask an offi -cial. They do not bite.3. Remember that nerves are perfectly human.4. Do not bother about Facebook, E-mail or any other social contacts from the outside world.5. Force a smile on your face.6. Do not bother about sleeping.7. Carry a watch.8. Socialise as much as you can. Meeting new people will provide you with loads of adrena-line. 9. Drain yourself with coffee. Put some cof-fee powder in a sock at breakfast and carry it with you, always. If nec-essary even cold water will do.10. Treat others the way you, yourself, want to be treated.

T his summer billions of people voluntarily locked themselves up in their homes, which they preferred to enjoying the

weather. They were only focused at their tele-vision screens, which displayed the Olympic Games in London. However, from the 29th of August to the 9th of September, the greatest part of the audience continued watching their daily soaps again. We often forget that the Olympics have even more to offer: the Paralympics.

One of the legends of the Paralympics in the wheelchair marathon is the 33-year old David Weir from Britain. This year he won the gold medal, his fourth gold already. Weir said it had been the toughest race he had ever taken part in. He crossed the line in 1 hour 30 minutes and 20 seconds. Sitting volleyball for athletes with just one leg was a neck-to-neck race. Finally it was the men’s team of Bosnia and Herzegovina who claimed gold.

One of the most spectacular events during the Paralympics is swimming. Again it was Britain to run off with the golden medal. Jessica-Jane Applegate set a Paralympic record in the 200 meters freestyle with 12.63 seconds. Her team-mate Ellie Simmonds is one of the other most remarkable athletes in swimming. Next to ath-letes without legs or no left arm, the 17-year old girl with dwarfi sm made an unforgettable impression while gliding through the water.

Watching the Paralympics can be at least as exciting as Usain Bolt’s 100m sprints. Hopefully, in a few years, the world will also be stuck to their screen while seeing a man with a golden wheelchair crossing the fi nish line.

B E R N E T M E I J E R

SESSIONSURVIVAL

GUIDE

TOP 10 TIPS TO LEAVE RZESZOW HAPPY AND

ALIVE.

SWIMMINGWITHOUT LEGS

B E R N E T M E I J E R

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