A visit turned into a small unofficial international meeting. With a dash of motivation, happiness and work, Kolping youth Europe overcomes boundaries and offers activities, adventures and friendship.
Everything started with the aim to visit Bratislava with a friend from Kolping youth (KY) Hungary. When the responsible person of KY Slovakia heard of this, he said that Kosice is more beautiful as Bratislava and we could meet him there. That was the first step towards the first unofficial KY Europe meeting.
After a short moment, a Facebook group was created. KY members from Croatia, Ukraine and the Czech Republic joined in happily. Thanks to Doodle and Hostelworld, a time point as well as an accommodation was found quickly.
On Friday the 9th December, I travelled to Kosice by plane and car with a stop in Budapest. There an exciting and cheerful weekend with twelve KY members from six countries was waiting for me.
Saturday started with a collective breakfast in the Kolping house, afterwards we discovered the snow-covered Kosice. We visited the famous church tower and listened to stories about curiosities of the city. To warm up, we tried local specialties and hot wine at the Christmas market. After that, we successfully fled an EscapeRoom, a game where you need to solve riddles to get out of a room. A nice dinner completed Saturday and small gifts from the different countries were exchanged. We had biscuits from Ukraine, smoked cheese from Slovakia and of course chocolate from Switzerland. After long discussions and consumption of delicacies of all countries, Sunday had arrived faster than we thought. After a savory brunch at the Kolping house, everyone started sadly the journey home. The next possible destinations had already been discussed and who knows, maybe it will be in Switzerland.
If this story appealed to your spirit of adventure, or you know young people who would love to participate in international Kolping activities, visit www.facebook.com/kolpingjugendeuropa/ and make publicity! During the year, several meetings and workshops in whole Europe are being organized and especially the youth week in summer is a highlight. This year, the European youth week will be in Bamberg (DE) from the 13th to the 20th of August. I hope, I will meet you there!
Heinz Straessle
