Prologue: Accepting yourself and feeling part of the community
This first session has helped us to get to know each other and consider: why am I here? and based on this really simple premise we have begun to create a community.
Different people, different personalities, different nationalities, different artistic concerns and different “lifelogs” have come together to share our expectations, goals, capacities and illusions.
Here is a list of all our contributions that have provided us with a starting point:
Why have I signed up?
- To be around creative people who have got something to say.
- To open up my mind and attitudes more.
- Because I want to learn more about the subject of intercultural communities. To discover experiences. To share learning.
- To launch our artistic career.
- To mobilise new renewed energies. To get to know interesting people.
- To learn how to create.
- To get to know each other and to learn.
- Because I was really excited to see a call for artists from other cultures for the first time.
Expectations
- To set myself a creative participative challenge.
- To learn about other cultures
- Personal growth.
- To learn more about culture. To take part in the activities. To develop a product in a team as a migrant.
- To open up the circles of the performing arts to new artistic entrepreneurship projects.
- To create and manage to develop an idea or an artistic proposal.
- To get to know different people and experiences.
Needs
- Teamwork. Learning. To be a more inclusive culture.
- To be openminded.
- A group committed to activism.
- To make my work known.
- To get to know different people, their realities and viewpoints. To learn.
- Real support to achieve my expectations.
What can I contribute?
- Sharing aspects of my culture which are largely unknown.
- Knowledge of the performing arts, in particular, of various styles of theatre.
- A cultural journey through my experiences as an actress, dancer and singer.
- What I am, where I come from and what I do.
- To provide communication tools.
- Time, experience, participation and creativity.
- Commitment and creativity.
Preface: Being part of something recognisable and creative.
At this session, we were able to welcome some new members to our community. Something we hope to be able to continue saying at future sessions.
We also shared the expectations created at the first meeting, and thanks to Cruz Noguera, each one of us was able to express how we experience culture from the perspective of where we are from and what it is that we can contribute to our community as far as culture is concerned
With regard to the following sessions, we will start by listening to the life stories of all the people taking part. Each person will be able to share their life and artistic experiences from different approaches to intercultural integration: equality, diversity and interaction.
Introduction: First lines.
Once our long-awaited logbook is physically in our hands we all start to write the first few lines together: literally and figuratively.
During several sessions we have gradually got to know a little more about each of the members of the community.
Through their reflections, their writings, their music, their songs, their instruments, their clothes, their handicrafts, in short, through their personal stories we have been able to travel from the Basque Country to Venezuela, from Colombia to Nicaragua, from Tunisia to Argentina, or from Morocco to Uruguay.
Nuestro Cuaderno de Bitácora Intercultural
As the final act of the community, on Sunday 20 November in the Sala BBK, we performed a play that served as a vindication of the cultural diversity of the Basque community within a natural process of individual and community expression.
The protagonists of the play were the people themselves who bear witness to their experiences and who have participated in the Cuaderno de Bitácora Learning Community to promote debate and critical thinking, #un viajejenecesario towards inclusive societies that are committed to equality, recognition of cultural diversity, interaction and sustainable development.
They sing, act, recite, dance and show us the reality in which they live. They are the ones who show us cultural diversity and its potential, their creativity, human richness and social commitment.
It was an emotional, honest and joyful work based on the experiences lived, shared, listened to and collected in OUR INTERCULTURAL BITÁCORA NOTEBOOK.