peacecamptexts

Youngsters of four nations (Jewish and Arab Israelis, Hungarian and Austrian) plus a group of asylum seeking adolescents residing in Austria will meet for a 10 days' encounter in the solitude of Austrian mountains.
They will bring their thoughts about the concept of peace and about how they could contribute to make their own world more peaceful.
They will bring their observations about issues of coexistence, of discrimination and conflict within their own living space and share their ideas about complex social issues. A set of workshop will help them experiment with non-violent, creative and innovative ways to cope with challenge, they will face mission impossible tasks, discuss complex issues in "talks4peace" and "large group sessions", prepare a "show4peace" with which they will go on stage in the Viennese theatre "Dschungel" before going back home as Ambassadors of Peace

Living together with Trauma

peacecamp 2016, the fourteenth of its kind, included 37 teenagers – Jewish and Arab Israelis, Hungarian and Austrian, a small group of youngsters seeking asylum in Austria – and 16 adults experts in art-therapy, psychotherapy, group- and trauma therapy. Amongst these there was not one person who did not know what trauma was from his or her own personal experience, or from the experience of a person really close to them.

peacecamp brings together teenagers and adults from different parts of the world for a ten days’ encounter in a remote place in the Austrian mountains; here, they learn about each person’s personal identity, about their culture and religion and about actually prevailing social, political or other issues relevant to this group within each one’s life context. Here, they develop modes of coexistence based on solidarity, cooperation and empathy and on the understanding of each group’s narrative and perception of reality. Here they try to break away from a self-perception as victims, from blaming and accusing the respective other for whatever suffering and pain each one of them is enduring and to assume ownership and responsibility over their life. Here they learn to tell their stories and to respectfully listen to the stories of others, trying neither to judge nor to blame, because none of them, even though having had to endure in recent the past or enduring now a great deal of suffering, is not the author of the script history wrote for them.

They shared and learned about fates and blows of others, coming to the conclusion that there is suffering beyond their own; they learned that life had written for them scripts difficult to live through, but that they could now, in the present and the future, make their own choices and take ownership over new chapters and new developments of their lives.
A 16 years old “princess” from Aleppo will never forget the moment her mother locked their house before they went on a journey which brought them to a reception camp in Vienna; a 16 year old Afghani is not bothered any more by his mother waking him up to school – he came alone the whole long way and has no mother to wake him up and no school to attend right now. A young unaccompanied Somali refugee has no mother to ask what she is cooking; he left home alone, when 13 years old and is now 16, waiting for asylum. They learned about the fears of Israeli teenagers afraid of being stabbed on their way to school, about Arab teenagers feeling offended by such fears and by Israeli’s precautions against them.

They were asked in different workshops and settings what the word “peace” meant to each of them, what obstacles were standing in its way, but mainly, what they themselves could contribute to a more peaceful, to a less violent world which would be more welcoming, more safe and more rewarding to themselves and the people around them.

Ten days of debates, of games, of music, dancing and trying out new ways to cope with, and resolving tasks and problems proved that it is indeed possible to find ways of cooperation and of shared creativity, even if existing conflicts and problems still remained unresolved. That one could leave these problems unresolved as they were for the time being, and nevertheless find modes of shared action, leading to impressive results which can be shown to, and appreciated by others. And so, in only ten days of shared creativity it became possible to arrange a show4peace and to go on stage in a real theatre in front of a large audience puzzled and surprised to witness the results of joint, reflective, creative, artistic action.

All went home as “ambassadors of peace” with the mission to bring to wherever they had come from some of what they had learnt and taken with them from the experience peacecamp.


Peacecamp 2016:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6nzvs_AM2Lc
show4peace 2016:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4GcdqUvyXPU


Evelyn Böhmer-Laufer
July 2016

Zusammen Leben mit Trauma

Im diesjährigen peacecamp 2016 gab es unter den 37 Jugendlichen – arabische und jüdische Israelis, Ungarn, Österreicher und in Österreich Schutzsuchende – kaum jemanden, der nicht wusste, was Trauma ist. Deshalb war es besonders hilfreich, dass es unter den 16 Erwachsenen – Künstlerin und Künstler, Historikerin und Historiker, Pädagogin und Pädagoge, Psychotherapeutin, Psychiater – gleich drei Trauma-Expertinnen und -Experten, drei Psychotherapeutinnen und -therapeuten und Menschen mit besonderem Einfühlvermögen gab.

Eine 16-jährige „Prinzessin“ aus Aleppo, die niemals den Augenblick vergessen wird, als ihre Mama die Wohnungstür für immer abschloss, ein junger Afghane, den die Mutter morgens nicht mehr weckt, um ihn zur Schule zu schicken, ein 16-jähriger aus Somalia, dessen Odyssee in Traiskirchen nur ein vorläufiges Ende fand, junge Israelis, die Angst haben, am Weg zur Schule oder zur Freundin ein Messer in den Rücken zu bekommen, junge israelische Araber, die diese Angst als schikanös und diskriminierend empfinden, tauschten sich miteinander über ihre Lebensgeschichten, über die Geschichten ihrer Nationen, ihre Kultur und Religion, über ihre aus Angst und Zuversicht gesponnenen Zukunftsvisionen aus. Ein Experte führte diese Jugendlichen mit einer Mischung aus Takt, Feingefühl und politischer Korrektheit durch die tägliche „Großgruppe“, eine für die Auseinandersetzung mit sozialem oder politischem Konflikt für Erwachsene entwickelte Technik , die den jungen Leuten ein großes Maß an Belastbarkeit, Geduld, Empathie, Ausdauer und Standfestigkeit abverlangte. „Was bedeutet für dich das Wort Frieden, welche Hindernisse stellen sich ihm in den Weg, welchen Beitrag könntest du jetzt, welchen später einmal zu einem friedvolleren Zusammenleben in deinem Lebensraum beitragen?“ Dies waren die Fragen, mit denen sich alle, Jugendliche und Erwachsene, zehn Tage lang befassten; hierzu wurden quasi unlösbare Aufgaben spielerisch aufgelöst, Gespräche und Debatten auf höchstem Niveau und tränen- und spannungsgeladene Gruppendiskussionen geführt, um zu dem Schluss zu gelangen, dass es möglich ist, noch bestehenden Konflikten, unbewältigten Spannungsfeldern, ungelösten Problemen zu trotzen und gemeinsam und solidarisch kreative Wege zu beschreiten, die zu ungeahnter, herzeigbarer Leistung führen können. Und so standen sie nur neun Tage nach ihrer ersten Begegnung gemeinsam als Truppe auf der Bühne und es hieß „Vorhang auf“ für die „show4peace“, einmal in Lackenhof, dem winzig kleinen Ort am Ötscher, dessen Gebirgsluft unter mal strahlend blauem, mal Gewitter grollendem Himmel dieser beschwerlichen, aber heilsamen Reise ins eigene und des anderen Innere Rahmen und Kulisse bot. Im Dschungel Theater Wien standen sie dann alle gemeinsam auf einer echten Bühne in einem zum Bersten gefüllten Saal und brachten ihr Publikum mit einer Mischung aus Tanz, Percussion, Erzählkunst und Musik zum Schmunzeln, zum Lachen, zum Weinen und zum Nachdenken.

So war peacecamp 2016: ein Zusammenleben mit dem Trauma

hier der Link zum diesjährigen peacecamp- Film https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6nzvs_AM2Lc

show4peace 2016:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4GcdqUvyXPU


Evelyn Böhmer-Laufer
Juli 2016