The Netcom TimesEBM special issue 27th of February 2010 Kraków

the network: still growing?

Dear Network,

behold this newspaper! It was designed only for you by your Network Commission, 11 peo-ple you elected to take good care of you when you are at home without mummy and daddy...We are bringing you the lat-est gossips from all over the Network, because we want to bring you closer to each other. “European integration” is what AEGEE strives for, and European integration is what we practice in AEGEE on a daily basis. For example I met this girl from Romania last year, and during the Agora, after a long and interesting conversa-tion we got blind drunk with Polish wódka and made out on the toilet decided to start an exchange project together. In AEGEE, everything is possible, you just have to imagine it – and you have to know about the rest of the Network. To start new and exciting projects, to travel to marvellous places you have never been before, information is everything. That’s why we proudly present you the new edi-tion of the NetCom Times!

We are the Network Commission, elected at every Agora to serve and protect the AEGEE Network: to help every Antenna with their questions, doubts and problems. We also help the Comité Directeur, keep-ing them informed about what is going on in our Network, giving important feedback for their decisions – and cleaning their kitchen in Brussels because they live like pigs are working so hard for AEGEE that they have absolutely no time for their own household. Okay, actually it is not so bad, at least the last CD was even worse.

We hope you enjoy reading. And as always, if you have any questions – asking is for free!

Yours,

Thomas Leszke / AEGEE-KölnSpeaker of the Network Commission

Words from the Speaker

Strengthening vs. enlarging

New CA:AEGEE-Sarajevo

by AEGEE-SarajevoAEGEE Sarajevo is located at the very heart of the city of Sarajevo (nearby is lo-cated National Theatre), in the country Bosnia and Hercegovina, on the Balcan peninsula. The thing that is special for city of Sarajevo is the fact that it had been uder the various governments: first the Osman Empire, then the Austrian-Hungarian Monarchy, afterwards Yugoslavia and all those gov-ernments left specific marks in the city. So if you are going from the center of the town to the old heart of the town called Bascarsija you will first see mix of soviet and Austro-Hungarian architecture and

slowly as you get closer to the Bascarsija you will see the Osman architecture. Last year, more precisely in May, 10 students from Sarajevo University came together to organize one event called Youth activism days and there we met people from AEGEE Beograd and the whole idea of AEGEE Sarajevo started. During summer we worked hard and in September we had our first Local Agora on which we elected the Board and officially start-ed with work. In this year AEGEE Sarajevo plans to organize Network Meeting, TSU together with AEGEE Kragujevac and other events for local students.

by Eszter Virág RabSpreading AEGEE-Spirit around in as many locals as possible is usually one of our goals when we talk about en-largement in the network. It definitely has its advantages: approaching new territories that haven’t been conquered yet by the SU knights, getting to know mysterious cultures or learning to say cheers again in a new language.

Meanwhile strengthen-ing would stand for the aim of winning an even bigger repute and respect for the whole organization by mak-ing all the locals as equally de-veloped as possible. The pro-cess may result in having even more professional antennae

with a very strong education system that could provide the fluent integration of the new AEGEE-freaks.

All in all, we could say that first of all creating a very strong basis and background in the already existing locals could stabilise the network, while opening new antennae could bring the fame of our beloved AEGEE into newer and newer places. To sum it up, the enlarging process wouldn’t have to stop, but we’ll always have to keep an eye on quality assurance to make sure that it’s going to live for many more 25 years. HAPPY BIRTHDAY by the way!!!

by Marika HeymannAEGEE Wrocław organized the best New Year’s Eve 2009/2010 party! We’ve gathered 140 guests not only from Poland but also from Spain, France and more. The party took place in an elementary school in Wrocław and it was joined with school supplies col-lection for the kids. The theme of the whole party was “Hollywood” and the costumes were manda-tory. We’ve hosted celebri-ties such as: Lady Gaga, Amy Winehouse and Tom

Cruise. All our guests feast-ed before generously laid tables, and after midnight they’ve welcomed the star of the evening: Barszcz Czerwony (Polish Beetroot Soup) with croquettes. The party continued until the very last person of the dance floor and until the last drop of vodka was drunk. As the visitors were leaving the cleaning ladies bid them farewell. So then... We’d like to thank everyone for com-ing and we’ll see you next year!

netcom meeting katowice

by AEGEE-DurhamThe last weekend of January 2010 saw Durham play host to its first AEGEE event, a weekend of Scottish-themed fun all in homage to the Scottish poet, Robbie Burns, who is celebrated in Scotland each year on the 25th January. The 20 par-ticipants arrived on Friday 22nd and took part in a morning of ice-breakers, fol-lowed by a photo challenge tour of the historic city, in which teams had to chan-nel their inner Harry Potter and King Arthur in order to capture the best photos and take home the prize. That night participants treated the Durham AEGEE mem-bers to delicacies from their home countries at the in-ternational meal, followed by a bar crawl which let the participants sample some of what Durham’s nightlife has to offer.

Saturday morning brought an early start as the group made the train jour-ney to Scotland’s capital, Edinburgh. Some took part in a walking tour of the city and learnt about the rich history of this fascinating city. Others took the oppor-tunity to visit the National

Museum of Scotland and the National Galleries, while a few chose to kick back in some of the city’s cafes and soak in the Celtic atmo-sphere. After a busy day of sightseeing it was back on the train to Durham to get ready for the vital ingredi-ent in any Burns’ Night cel-ebration: the Burns’ Night Supper.

The participants gath-ered in one of Durham’s tra-ditional pubs and were en-tertained by a Scottish piper and a Celtic folk band. The traditional address to the Haggis, a poem written by Burns himself, was brilliant-ly delivered by a Durham University student. After everyone had finished their (surprisingly tasty) Haggis, the night really got going as the drink, and the conversa-tion, flowed.

On Sunday the guests had the opportunity to explore Durham for them-selves and eventually it was time to say goodbye. Everyone was in agreement that Durham AEGEE’s in-augural event had been a resounding success, the only problem being when to start planning the next one…

Burn Baby, Burns

new year’s eve in wrocław

by AEGEE-Moskva, AEGEE-Kyiv

Growing up in AEGEE? How is it possible? Only in one case, if you are a local!

And if you are a local you deserve a huge birthday party, lasting for 1 week, like AEGEE-Moskva, who be-came 18 in December. One of the most successful locals in the ex-USSR area is fa-mous for the phantastic mix of Russian hospitality and modern city life during their events. And it can’t be dif-

ferent in this local from the capital of Russia, old and full of traditions ex-residence of Russian tsars and a modern business and governmental centre. AEGEE-Moskva is known in the network for high-quality events, both serious and fun ones. Once you came to them you fall in love with their local and city and dream about coming back one day. People from Moscow know how to work and how to rock!

AEGEE-Kyiv is getting

older too, but remains one of the brightest stars on our eastern horizon. At the mo-ment you read this article, they are already 15 and may-be tired a bit after a 4-days party in Kyiv. Kyiv showed us, that they are not afraid of challenges, even such a huge one as Agora.

They are getting older, but their soul – the members - is still young and ready for new events. Happy Birthday and good luck!

getting older,But still young

by Thomas LeszkeIf you happened to be in the Southern Polish city of Katowice in November 2009, more precisely 5th - 8th November, you would have witnessed scary events: the whole region was con-quered by aliens! There was no escaping, they were all over the city and its sur-roundings. But in case you had the courage to have a closer look at them, you would have noticed strange things about them. During the day they seemed to be peaceful, behaving like nor-mal visitors, or even stay-ing inside, pretending to be working. But at night they turned savage, attacking dis-cotheques in raw numbers, hypnotising not only the local population with their

sex appeal. And apparently these aliens were not famil-iar with the influence of al-cohol, or at least they didn’t seem to care...

The Space Network Meeting Katowice was a great success, for various reasons. With nearly 200 AEGEE members involved, it was like a small Agora, but the local organisers of AEGEE-Katowice had ar-ranged everything perfectly. They had managed to alien-ate not only Polish, but also quite a lot of German and Czech participants (nobody knows where they are now). But most of all they had kidnapped six Netcommies and one AEGEE-Europe Network Director. These poor humans were locked into a small dark room

where they had to work all day without seeing the daylight, only getting out after nightfall to join the aliens for their ruthless cam-paign. Strange enough, even though these Netcommies were held like slaves, they were given a good place to sleep and delicious food ev-ery day, and in the end the aliens even let them go (with the task to spread the word about their greatness).

Thanks to AEGEE-Katowice, especially to Kuba and Michał, and to Netcommie Marika for hosting the internal meeting of the Network Commission during this original and high-quality Network Meeting!

by Kairi PüssGreat things can start from a small e-mail, short message with an irresistable proposal to the members of AEGEE-Tallinn to visit the most Northest Dutch antenna, AEGEE-Groningen and check out the mixed pro-gram prepared by the local students to present the best parts of its culture, have vis-its to the local authorities, to the countryside and nature preservs etc etc. Of course a little push to send the ex-change proposal to AEGEE-Tallinn came from the fact that Groningen and Tallinn are twin cities, so why not to co-operate also in the AEGEE level. So far these two mentioned AEGEE locals have had two very successful exchanges, one in Groningen in October/November 2008 and one in Tallinn in November in 2009 which have helped students with relatively dif-ferent cultural and histori-cal backround understand each other’s heritage and traditions better. From in-tensive debates and run-ning dinners to sitting on the E-Government prime minister’s seat and dipping in the snow after hot sauna and more – variety of activi-ties to make each participant

of the exhanges to feel the spirit! As these student or-ganisations’ cities are also strenthening their collabo-ration as well as the univer-sities, then AEGEE-Tallinn and AEGEE-Groningen have also an aim to sign the official Twin Antenna con-tract soon to continue being an exchange partners, shar-ing knowledge in different fields and helping to pro-mote eachother’s European scale events. This example of good co-operation be-tween antennae is showing that not always you need to have the European funds support to carry out amaz-ing events to meet and share the spirit, but when being at-tentive, flexible and also a bit lucky then it is not much of a difficulty to design a good programme, find some sup-port in the financial form or in kind to have the great fellow AEGEEans over and let the European spirit flow and create even more ideas for future events and to also not only talk about them but to also make them a reality.

Follow the example of those two antennae and find your Twin Antenna to strenthen the European co-operation and through that your own antenna!

tallinn and groningen – from friendship to twin antennae

by Natalia HubertIf you are asking yourself which nationalities are never there on AEGEE events, which countries are never represented on European Nights and which par-ticipants are hardest to get France and the Islands are on top of the list.

But... that is soon to be changed! The boom in the Islands are coming true and soon we will be truly floaded with British people! Same with France: hopefully we will drink more good wine on European Nights.

With two new con-tacts in the UK: Abertawe (Swansea) and Bath and su-peractive locals of the North (Durham, Sheffield...) we will hear more and more proper English with this lovely accent. You could sing in the rain last year in NWM Warwick and enjoy the Valentines Day in Sheffield and the Burn’s Nights in Durham. We’re moving even more cities (London, Glasgow, Liverpool) so be ready for the British Invasion!

In France, definetely

go and visit AEGEE Lyon and Toulouse, these cities are rocking with their lo-cal events! Get ready also for the first Swiss Network Meeting! AEGEE Fribourg is preparing for you a Sweet Swiss Chocolate Shock! Don’t forget to visit Paris, and by the way step by to Belgium! You will be sur-prised to find not only CD in Bruxelles but also AEGEE-Brussel-Bruxelles, meet-ing in En Face every week. Get yourself also to crazy Antwerpen and Leuven, you won’t regret!

aegee Francophone and on the islands

by Anita KalmaneAround 10am in the morn-ing. Half sleepy, half awake I get down to the office. With a cup of tea with milk in my hands I go through my e-mail, turn on Skype, MSN and GTalk and check the latest news updates on Facebook. Network Director’s day has started. People often ask me: “What are you doing all day? Are you working at all? You are all the time online!” And it’s true, I am – but that’s my job. Replying to e-mails, having a conversation on Google Talk with board member of some local, calling on Skype to Network Commissioner and trying to find if some-body from the Academy, PRWG or CWG is online on MSN sound more than nor-mal. If once you hear on the

stage: “… and our Network Director Anita is going to announce you Facebook… I mean, Network Update…”, then know – we tend to joke in this house a lot. There are no similar days in the office here. Of course, the morning ritual always remains the same, but you can never predict how the day will continue and end. Sometimes it’s silent and only around 50 new e-mails arrive in my mail-box, most of them taking just a few minutes to reply. Sometimes the world gets crazy and I get a new mes-sage every minute, plus five people want to speak with me at the same time online and I need to find time for all of them. Sometimes I get annoyed by some stupid e-mails or behavior and start

to shout and do some funny moves. Other CD members are already used to it and do not get scared anymore. Evenings? I hardly notice when the evening comes. No, actually I do it very easily – the bell rings and announces that it’s dinner time. That’s the time when my teammates complain, because most of the time I am not able to join them for dinner and eat it in the front of computer. Reason? Some online meeting going on, which is impossible to be missed. I tend to joke that my job wouldn’t be possible to be fulfilled without internet. I could use normal post and phone, of course, but how much easier it is with internet!

a day in the life of a network director

wanted: aegee-heroThe best job agency in Europe called „AEGEE“ – Agency for Extravagant, Glamourous, and Erotic Eagerness – has something new on offer: from 17th April, 2010 (Agora Leiden), six new people are needed who like to travel, meet new people all over Europe, help them with their proj-ects, and make the Agora happy with lots of suc-cess stories. The name of

this job is „AEGEE Hero“, also known as „Network Commissioner“.

YOU can be a Network Commissioner! If you are interested in joining us in April, or just curious about our work, you are very wel-come to approach us any-time. And you are invited to join our internal meeting on Friday at 18:30 – see you there!

Question Eszti AlfredoAge 23 24Local A-Pécs and A-KØbenhavn A-Salerno

How long have you been AEGEE member?

I joined it 2 years ago Since September 2006

3 words to describe each other Sunglasses, funny, liar (or funny liar), no ok, motivating

Brave (decided to candidate during the Agora), lazy (she prefers hardworkers), enthusiastic (ready to everything she likes)

First event as participant? SU Torino “TO-MOVE” 2008 Spring Agora Ljubljana 2008And as organiser? SU Pécs “Pannonian Pie” TSU Post Event “Napoli-Salerno One-Way”

2006Opinion about CD house? Messy and lovely at the same time Never been there!Next destination abroad? Copenhagen now, but I’m planning to

go to Poland (not with AEGEE)Bruxelles

How many locals are you responsible for?

19 31

How many subcommies do you have? 1 7 (6 + PR subcommie)Favourite Pasta? Gnocchi al Pesto Verde Gnocchi al RagùLast time you got drunk? Still under the effect of last night

(Erasmus life…)Last week, on Friday

Ever been drunk during a statutory event?

well, the European nights are always kind of nice... :) But still, I’ve attended the plenaries...

Of course!

And during the plenaries? Nope Not drunk, but drinking!If you could be a superhero, what would you want your superpowers to be?

The ability to develop new superpow-ers, but if I had to choose only one, that would be moving things with my thoughts

the power to move into time and space with the thoughts

What is the thing that you can’t live without?

A to-do list My laptop

Are you in love? Not for now Yes, with a non-AEGEE memberWhat did you want to be when you were 12 years old?

OMG, a lawyer... preferences have changed dramatically...

President of the Republic of Italy

Your weakness? I want to do 1001 things at the same time...not always manageable!...that’s why I need a to-do list!

Sometimes I’m too much confident in me!

Your passion? if we can include travelling and for-eign languages in AEGEE, then I’d say fencing

Reading and dancing

What is the last book you read? “Anatomy of a trend” Henrik Vejlgaard, about trend research.

“The Fourth Commandment. Honore your father”

Who could play your life? Kate Winslet I would choose between Clooney and De Niro

The craziest trip you’d like to do? I’d need a gap year to visit all the places that are mentioned in the book that I’ve received from my flat-mates: a Year of adventure (Lonely Planet) - dog sled in Greenland if I’d have to choose only one

For me the craziest will be from Moskva, Trans-Siberian till Vladivostok, and then train till Beijing

Your best cocktail? Mojito Negroni or Invisibile strawberrywhich cartoon hero would you be? Mulan: she’s a good fencer, she’s brave,

but still she finds her princeLupin III, the Gentleman Thief

If you had only six months left to live, what would you do with the time?

Travelling as well :D South America, Africa and the missed parts of Europe.

If i had only six month: travelling: Russia, China, Japan, South America.

Eszti, Alfredo, will you get married ? Is there a church open now??? Not sure…we’ll ask around.

double interview: eszti and alfredo

by AEGEE-AntalyaAEGEE Antalya is located in Akdeniz University Campus. We are corporated in univer-sity with Akdeniz University sudents. Akdeniz University has 11 faculties. Our office is in Faculty of Economics and Administrative Sciences.

The city of Antalya is the heart of students, toru-rism and history. Especially students are happy about the diversity of cultural activities in our city. This is one of the most impor-tant reasons, why we have decided to found AEGEE in Antalya. The Akdeniz University, where our office is located, is in the center of the city.

In the begining of 2009 our president made a deci-sion to establish an Antenna of the European Students Forum at our University. Following this decision, we have gathered a lot of mo-tivated students to join our association. After the first formalities were overcome, we have started to do an advertisment campaign at our compus and now we are so happy about hav-ing nearly 40 members in Aegee-Antalya.

Our following plan is a second Local Training Course for our new mem-bers, which will take place probably in May. Also in May we want to organise a Network Meeting.! In July we are going to have a Summer University! Who want to come to this perfect city? Sea, sun, history with the sprit of Aegee!

new ca: aegee-antalya

editorialPublisherNetwork Commission

Editor in Chief & Layout

Michael MakowieckiEditorsThomas Leszke, Natalia Hubert, Alfredo Selitti, Anita Kalmane, Kairi Püss, Eszter Virág Rab, Marika Heymann

E-Mailnetcom@aegee.org