Debate, design, departure

On Friday we started with a lecture by Attila Kiss, assistent professor at the 'Partium Christian University' in Oradea (Romania). Kiss discussed the historic development of the concepts of statehood and nationhood and how this influenced the situation of minorities in the Carpathian basin in general and in Transylvania especially.

After a short break the plenary was addressed by Vladimir Gjorcev MP (VMRO-DPMNE), chairman of the Committee on Defence and Security, who spoke to the theme of the summer school.

Before lunch a debating course was held. What was learned could of course immediately be applied, not only during the course and over lunch, but also in the afternoon. In the afternoon the group was divided into four. Each group was challenged to design a symbol to represent reconciliation. After some hasty discussions and drawings, each group came up with quite different designs.

The seats in the plenary room had now been arranged like in the House of Commons and two parties had to defend their own design against each other and attack the design of the group facing them. Thus two finalists were decided upon by a jury, consisting of Aleksander Ogorodnikov, Attilla Kiss and Vladimir Plamadeala. The two groups that were selected by the jury stood out on presentation and debating skills respectively. After a fierce final debate the public decided by one vote which design had won.

After some cooling down - in the case of many by having a swim in the beautiful nearby lake - Friday evening concluded the summer school with a closing dinner. During the dinner many speeches were given, each national delegation represented itself by singing a song and/or dancing a dance and at the end all the participants received a certificate for their participation in and contribution to the summer school. After this the party went on for a while of course :-)

Saturday morning, after breakfast, most of the participants checked out of the hotel and gathered in front of the loby to say goodbye to each other. Many left by bus for Skopje and from their on to their respective countries, some others went to Tessaloniki with another bus, to spend some time in that other (Greek) part of the geographical area called Macedonia.