Meet the team: Jero

We must confess we only know Jero for a week, but as we are sure many of you know already, AEGEE event serves to meet someone, maybe much more, as those who know a ton of years ago.

Known as a philosopher, casanova, free thinker, poet, skater, singer, dancer, bohemian, drinker, lover, love dealer, the man who taught Barney Stinson everything he knows, in summary a guy who enjoys life.

It doesn´t matter if you are a lesbian, bisexual, heterosexual, emo girl, blondie, barbie, vicious, morbid, funny, dirty minded, loves dominant, submissive, slave, student, housewife, executive, likes Lady Gaga, heavy, deaf, professional, liberal, open-minded, single, married, couple, partouza, young, mature, or insane. Jero will look after you the whole Agora.

What more do you need to know about him? At this moment, he had one of the hardest jobs in the world: each month he needs to go to one AEGEE event around Europe to check that everything goes in the right direction. It looks easy, but it is necessary to have lot of experience to do it like he does.

It is also important to know that one of his favourites hobbies is music. He like very much listen to music. His favourite singers are Enrique Iglesias, Justin Bieber, King Africa and the faboulous group, Back Street Boys. He is also the President of the fanclub from Rebecca Black.

Definitely, Jero is one of the funniest people I know within AEGEE, but that's just the surface, if you really get to know him well, as we hope to do for many years, you will find a great guy, good listener and surely, at most important moments, he will be there.

Unfortunately Wikileaks has just revealed that Jero had a small accident and needed crutches. Please, if there is a nurse in the Agora, no matter the country of origin, please contact with Jero, he really needs your help.

Finally, we only could say that he promise to us to sing his favourite song “Baby” from Justin Bieber, in the stage for all the people if each girl who goes to the Agora give him a kiss in any part of his body during the first days. But to prove it, you must to take a picture!!! After that, he will choose the best one to give her the best prize ever: a romantic dinner with him. So, what are you waiting for?

Written by

Jorge Ruiz & Chema Rueda

(Note from Editor: It seems Alicia was so lazy to create this blog entry that she asked two friends to do it :D

Streaming and IT people

This Agora will have, if computer goblins don't mess up with it, a streaming service for the whole network to see what is happening in the plenary room. I know this decission will make happy many people in Europe, and specially our president Manos and the Secretary of the Agora, Bea, who will also have a copy of the video to better make the minutes.

The exact link to the website will be announced in www.agoraalicante.org and it will allow direct participation via one of the popular social networks (to be decided which one). And there will be also some experienced AEGEE-people from our team with the main task of transmitting the special atmosphere to those of you who could not join us in Alicante, sending real time updates from the plenary room.

How is this possible? We have the support of University of Alicante and also a great team of people in charge of the IT department. Apart from Javi, Juanola, Antonio and Bene, they are:


Guille

He has been in charge of coordinating the team from the quiet city of Pavía, in Italy, where he is spending an unforgettable Erasmus year. He has even become Erasmus Responsible in AEGEE-Pavia! He will also be the Gym DJ, and he has already starting to collect music and sort it out according to different purposes: tender wake ups, hard core wake ups, dressing up for parties... He may give us also a surprise during the European Night.
He will hate me for finally writing a post about him, but he deserves it!



Gabriel

One of the fresh faces in our team, and directly coming from Murcia, he has been in charge of agreeing with the University of Alicante everything related to the video streaming and the wifi network that will be available during the Agora. One thing we have learned in this Agora: you never have too many IT guys in your team :) Moreover, he's always smiling and brings tons of positive energy into the team. He will always be around to solve any problem




Alberto

Another of the Murcia guys, he is always ready to be an organizer in AEGEE-Alicante's Summer University. Apart from supporting everyone else on the team, his speciality is the Spanish language course; our participants never have enough of  it, and sometimes he has had to prepare an extra session in record time to make them happy. If you attend the Spanish course on the Opening Day (Wednesday 27th) you may learn the basic secrets of our language in less than one hour.

               Posted by Miguel

Ah, FYI it is raining already in Alicante for 3 days... See the forecast here.

Meet the team: Pilar y Rakel, aka Murcian Sisters

You cannot find two sisters more different and, at the same time, so similar.

Pilar and Rakel, Rakel and Pilar. They are a stream of energy and creativity. They are responsible (working as a clockwork couple) for the visual identity of our Agora: the logo, the design of the web, the tshirts, the promo video for the tshirts, stickers, the badges that Zare proposed... And also the info signs during the event (they are just fresh out of the printing and they are great!).

Pilar, sister of Rakel

But what I like more from them is how enthusiastic they are now with the Agora project, spending sleepless nights in front of the computer, and cheering everyone with their emails. This is a clear sign on how such a project can inspire people and help them to become part of a team, share responsibilities, contribute in discussions and propose ideas. This Agora would not have been the same without any of them.

Rakel, sister of Pilar

The two sisters (and also Carol and more people from Murcia like Alberto and Gabriel) are willing that the whole team travels finally to Murcia, their home town, so they can show us around hat nice city. We did not manage to do it for the pre-Agora meetings, but I am looking forward to go there for the evaluation weekend. I am sure they have already many ideas.

In AEGEE-Alicante there is a tradition: we love brothers and sisters, specifically when they are twins (or they seem to be). Starting from Saioa and Neila, several couples of brothers or sisters have contributed to the growth of this antenna (Miguel adds: even my brother was active in AEGEE for a while; I was more than once surprise-kissed in an Agora by a random girl who had been SUing with my brother).

Not only the Agora, now Rakel has joined the brand new PRC and designed the new logo! And I am sure these sisters will be rocking AEGEE in the next years.

Posted by Miguel

Paint the Agora in Green

Dear Agora Friends:

Agora Alicante has the aim to be as GREEN as possible. Not only because of Lía and the Jungle Party (see the updated party program here); Inside the organising team we wanted to make an effort and prove that it is possible and easy to take the environment into account when organising an AEGEE event. And no better event to make the message arrive to all members, than having a Sustainable Agora. Does it mean that it will be a perfect event with zero impact on the environment? Of course not, setting such an objective would have been unrealistic. But you will see during Agora Alicante there will be many details that will contribute to the general reduction of the impact, and maybe we inspire you for your Summer University or any other event you are organising.

Recycling Mobile Phones.

We all have old mobile phones in some drawer at home, like if they are in a cemetery. Why do we humans have such behaviour? Scientist have not found an answer yet... but I have one! You were all keeping them to contribute to Agora Alicante. We will install at the check-in desks a container for collecting your old mobile phones, and in exchange you will get a reward... A Spanish shot and a kiss from your favourite organizer. With your collaboration, the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) will get support from each phone collected, and the oldmobile phones will be repaired and reused, or dismantled to recycle its components. So bring yours! No problem if they do not work anymore, we can give them a use!

Plastic glasses and bottles

Disposable plastic glasses and dishes have been banned from our shopping lists. They are a waste of petrol and much less sustainable than cardboard glasses or reusable glasses... Same for the plastic bottles of less than 5 liters. We are getting strong muscles after carrying more than 1500 liters of water yesterday to our headquarter!

Separated waste disposal

University of Alicante has a strict policy on separating waste for recycling. We will follow this policy and we will have whenever possible different bins for your waste. But remember, the most sustainable waste is the one that is not produced. So we will make an effort to reduce the bags and boxes, buying king-size packages for food.

Other details

Walking buses for the parties (10 min walking from the University to the party. I promise. The way back may take much longer, depending on how much fun you had) :D 2 workshops will be related to Environment. Welcome pack with surprises. SFM paper (Sustainable Fortestry Management). And more...

Map of antennae organising EDE 2011

And why do I send this post today? Because April 22nd is Earth Day. April 22nd is the starting point of the 2011 edition of the European Day of Environment organized by Environmental WG. Agora Alicante is the contribution of AEGEE-Alicante to EDE. Why not putting your antenna on the map with a small action rom today till June 5th, World Environment Day. And April 22nd is the last day I have almost free before The Big Trap, the pre-Agora intensive meeting.

Posted by Miguel

Decalogue to recognize Spaniards in AEGEE

How to recognize a spaniard in an AEGEE event

Ok, in this Agora it's gonna be easier than ever to recognize the spaniards. Wherever you look there will be one spaniard at least (organizers, chair team, WGs, Project Managers, candidates, etc...) But sometimes it's not that easy... that's why we offer you some tips to follow:

1) Loud speaking

I still remember one time in a hostel in Amsterdam, when a guy came from nowhere and ask my friends and me: why everytime there are 2 or more spaniards in a room, you speak so loud??? Well... the answer I gave to him was pretty clear: Because we all have many interesting things to say but we can't wait the other to finish, so we just raise our tone to make it clear :)

2) Two kisses

This never fails, in the moment you introduce yourself to someone and he/she tries to give you two kisses.... well, that's a spaniard! In Spain we always introduce ourselves with kisses... well, not always! There is a simple rule:

woman - man   : kisses
woman - woman : kisses
man - man: hand shaking

But anyway, if (s)he introduced him/herself probably (s)he has already told you his/her country, so you already know his country :P

3) Spanglish

I've already talked about this in a post before, but I'll give you some rules now:

· Every word starting with S and not vowel right after, should have an E before: ESpain, EStupid, ESchool... But if the S is followed by a vowel, then we can pronuntiate it good: SUn, SOrry, SEa...
· We have the same sound for B and V: /b/, so don't worry if you hear Bideo, Batican, Biagra, Bocabulary....
· For us the vowel U has the sound /ʊ/, so again we have problems with pUblic, bUs, pUnish...
· One of the funniest thing for everyone is hearing a spaniard saying Gym, Jam, Gin-tonic, etc. /dʒ/ is pretty hard for us
· But the bestest among the best is when we make direct translation of typical spanish proverbs because we don't think there will be the English equivalent: check the post about it!

4) Sangria

In ESpain we have maaaaany different drinks, maaany delicious dishes, millions of sweets... but when it's time for the European Night, what do we bring??? SANGRIA! Yes, that's all. And notice I put "bring" in italics. Why? Because Sangría it's soooo easy to prepare that actually we don't bring anything anywhere, we just put one euro each of us and then we buy the ingredients and mix it... and yet all the people love it! Why? Because it's not an alcohol with 39568036853 degrees that burn your mouth when you drink it... Take note about it!

5) Party animals

Indeed, if there is something characteristical for every spaniard in the world, is that we love FIESTA! But of course following the Spanish timetable (trying not to go out before 00:00, when cinderella is coming back) that's why we always fill the last bus for the parties and you can hear us singing loud in the bus! And after that, if we can't find the party we'll do it by ourselves! It's not strange to find us signing and dancing in the streets all together. Ok, we don't know very good the lyrics, but "la la la" it's enough for any song!

6) ESleeping

Where do you think that we find so many energies for being so active? Of course we need to rest and we love to sleep... That's why we need a good waking-up team: good music, a lot of noise and "encouraging" us to leave the bed is the best way to wake us up. If that doesn't work you can try, at least with the guys, to say: "you don't have balls to get up" Surely we'll get up inmediatly :)

7) We love intercultural exchange

Allright, most of the time we are together speaking in spanish (we are lazy to speak english and we admit it), but when it comes to relationships... we love the intercultural exchange! Few times you will see a spaniard trying to flirt with another spaniard when, in front of them, there is a sea of possibilities of "meeting a new culture".

8) Food

As I said before, in Spain we have many different dishes and drinks, and as chauvinist as we are, it's the best of the world for us. So don't get mad or dissapointed if you offer us some tasty stuff and we say: in Spain we have better things... It's not our brain talking, but our patriotic pride.

9) Camarero and chumba chumba

Any time someone starts the game of camarero or chumba chumba, few spaniards will resist the temptation of joining!

10) But over all friendly

Yes my friends, you can call us whatever you want, but there is an inalienable truth: whoever spends his time with a group of Spaniards will have the time of his life. We are open people and very friendly, our main barrier is the language, but if we manage to avoit it, for sure we are good work mates, travel partners and party wing men! Moreover we like to be the best hosts ever (maybe inherited from the Arabs that lived here in Spain for 700 years), and that's why this Agora it's gonna be unforgetable!

(Of course, there are always exceptions, as this is just a bunch of Estereotypes!)

               Posted by Juanola

Meet the team: Pilar Lop

Pilar Lop, Pililop, Pilarín Chin Chin, Pili, Pi,... She has so many names as faces!! But you’ll have to discover one by one!! If you are lucky... :)

Pilar is always proud of her little hamlet “Castelserás”!! She got from it her loud voice (which she uses to remind us that it is only 100 days to buy the Agora Alicante T-Shirt!!). She also inherited the fighter spirit to deal with Iceland volcanoes, Georgian Visas, or her not-so-easy friends, which twist every word that she says only to see her reaction (even by email, because you can easily imagine how much she was shaking her arms while she was answering them!!).
You’ll identify her because of her claps, her supporting whoops of joy to reinforce her ideas and express her (everlasting) excitement. You’ll also identify her on account of her HAPPINESS. Pilar always does her best and you can count on her forever, whatever you need.

By the way, we kindly invite you to join her fans club in Facebook http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=143564125665173. Not every single person has one... Have they???

Pi, don’t hate us so much, we love you and you know it.
                          Posted by Sergio & Pablo & Isa
PS: We have  AEGEE-Zaragoza and she has been the Merchandisong coordinator during these months previous to the Agora. During the Agora she was going to be the cleaning lady :D:D:D:D but now she will be the Dungeon Master.

Spanish proverbs

One of the main mistakes of the spaniards while speaking english is trying to make a direct translation of the proverbs, while in every language they are different and there are very few cases when this works.

This is a guide for the funniest ones:

• From lost to the river à In for a penny, in for a pound (Now that we are in this situation, I don't mind to go further) 
• The ocassion is painted bald à You have to strike while the iron is hot (You have to make the most of the chances that come your way)
• If I have seen you I don't remember à Long absent, soon forgotten (You forget about people when they aren't involved in your life for a long time)
• A lot of noise and few nuts à All mouth and no trousers (Refers to those who speak a lot but take no action)
• Bad grass never dies à The devil looks after himself (Bad things don't disappear)
• There is everything in the vineyard of the Lord à There's nothing so queer as folk (There is nothing as strange as people)
• Is the same dog with different collar à It's the same people under a different name (Nothing has really changed)
• In love and war, any hole is a trench à Any port in a storm (When you're in trouble, any way out is a good way out)
• He who went to Seville, lost his chair à Finders keepers, losers beepers (If you leave your place, you lose it)
• World is a tissue à It's a small world 
• Where there is a skipper, a sailor doesn't give orders à If two men ride on a horse, one must ride behind (What the boss says goes )
• Give me bread and call me silly à Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me (I don't care what people say as long as I get what want)
• From a fallen tree, everyone makes lumber à Anyone can kick a man when he's down (Anyone can make a profit from someone's disgrace)
• From that stick, that chip à The apple doesn't fall far from the tree (Kids are just like their parents, good or bad)
• Two tits are mightier than two wagons à A woman's pubic hair pulls more than a tractor (The ability of women to get things in their favour due to their beauty and sexuality)
• God raises them and they meet each other à Birds of a feather flock together (People who act similar at the end are together)
• In the house of a blacksmith, wooden knife à The cobbler's children go barefoot (Not always what he preaches is what he practices)
• He went looking for wool and came back shorn à All that glitters isn't gold (Not everything it's like it looks like)
• As we were speaking of the King of Rome, look who dropped by à Speak of the Devil, and he's sure to appear (When you speak about someone and this guy appears suddenly)
• A bird in the hand is worth more than a hundred flying à A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush (Better what you have than what you are wishing looking at it)
• Waking up earlier won't make the sun rise any quicker à You can't push on a rope (Some things cannot be changed)
• Whoever wants fish, go get their ass wet à There ain't no such thing as a free lunch (If you want to achieve something, you must make an effort in order to get it)
• Shoemaker, to your shoes à Cobbler, stick to your last (Stick to your own business and do not meddle in things you don't understand)

And there are many more... I dare you to guess the meaning!

• You have more tale than little street
• For if the flies
• Your pot has gone
• Everywhere they boil beans
• Switch off and let's go
• It’s not a snot of turkey 
• That if you want rice! Catherine!
• Shit yourself little parrot
• Talking in Silver
• Other one that such dance
• To another thing butterfly
• Between(Among) whistles and flutes
• As water of May
• My pleasure in a well
• There was ended what was given
• In April, thousand waters
• I want Rita to do it!
• There are more days than sausages
• Longer than a bread-less day
• To be in the vineyard
• Fly from flower to flower

Let's check which non-spanish speaker can guess the meaning of 3 or more. It is a challenge!

                 Posted by Juanola