Ecotopia Newsletter

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Ecotopia Newsletter

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http://ecotopia2010.org/nl/feb/index.html

EcoTopia Newsletter February 2010

Ecotopia 2010 contact address: Info@ecotopia2010.org

Diese Newsletter gibt es auch in Deutsch
Intro

Finally after almost 2 months the snow is melting, the people in this region said it hasn't been such a strong winter since 1978 or so, it started late but it kept on going and it became impossible to go by bike through the forest, the best way was indeed on skies... all in all a very special winter, we had to carry tons of hay, sunflowerseeds and old muesli to feed the deers, wild boars, tits, jays and other birds .... but now we hope the get out of our wintersleep as soon as the first flowers start to grow outside.
(making some video footage of the Ecotopia fields in the winter)

Also the fields in Wiesenburg/Bahnhof were Ecotopia will take place have been under snow all that time, hardly impossible to imagine how colourful they will be in 5 months from now... here is a picture from the main field, from what will be the Ecotopia Village Square in August. We hope to make a nice video film, kind of "the making of...." showing you in August how Ecotopia 2010 was put together.

Talking about film, I (wam) was invited to cook at the 60th Berlinale, the famous filmfestival in Berlin, as part of the "Culinary Cinema" programme, I cooked for the German Premiere of the documentary "The Rainbow Warriors of Waiheke Island" a film made about the crew of the first Greenpeace ship, who lives now in a kind of Ecovillage on an island in the pacific ocean, a film which we will also hope to show on Ecotopia, during the special ecological filmnights we hope to organise (with films like "Menschen-Träume-Taten" and “Meat the Truth” and hopefully some more, if you have some suggestions, please let us know).
All in all it was also a good place to promote Ecotopia and after the premiere many people (also some very "known" ones) came up to me to tell that they will try to come by in Ecotopia (so it may happen that some "famous" starcook or filmstar suddenly will come out of one of our compost toilets this summer :-))

These last months we had lot's of contact with all kind of official institutions, it is always a small adventure to find out how many different official departments there are excisting here in Germany who like to know what we are planning to do and somehow we ourselves are looking forwards to find out what will happen...

News

To organize Ecotopia we created a nice network of co-organizers in our region from about 25 people, which is growing all the time and whose members are living all over the region. Most of us had heard about each other but never worked together in one project before. We also collected people who are active with many different topics like art, youth, environment, anti-facism, music, film, internet, older people, bike roads, schools, hiking, community living, healing, regional money, umemployed, ecology and most likely many others...

Since it is such a big group it was hard to find a moment that we were all at the same place at the same time, but since we believe that Ecotopia is most of all something what happens between people we thought it would be nice to show at least some picture from us... so that you know who is at the other side of this newsletter.
The Ecotopia Crew (These are: Burkhard Pranke, Harald Slibar, Wam Kat (vorne), Harald Schürkes, Sven Herrmann, Iris Seraphin Bergner, Agnes Hannack, Cora Schönherr, Dieter Erich, Synthia Groß, Dieter Wankmüller. Not on the photo, but not less important: Dorothee Bornath, Eddi Stranzenbach, Uma Kerstin Roch, Kristina Drevikovska, Birgit Mandelartz, Martina Novokow, Malcolm St. Julian Bown, Steffanie Wild, Thomas Kulke. Ramona Stucki, Morla Meyer and Meike Eitel (and probably we have forgotten somebody))

Ecotopia Rough Programme

Ecotopia is a kind of DIY (Do It Yourself) or Open Space camp, so the Programme can change any moment of time, until the 21st of August (and even then) it will be for all of us some times a big questionmark whyat will happen next... nevertheless there will be a few things more or less clear... besides that there will be food 3 times a day, a kind morning camp meeting (the "morning circle") and so on... some of this rough planning is described here... (but as said everything is relative (and even that) :-))
31 Juli & 1 August Opening Weekend Sunday 1 August
12.00 hours
Ecotopia Starts
2 - 6 August Building Week

Of course most of Ecotopia will be build before it starts, nevertheless we like to see this week more as the "Finishing Touch" This week lots of practical workshops to build the last parts of the Infrastructure, f.e.:
- solar shower
- compost toilets
- Etc.
7 & 8 August Regional Weekend This weekend the different actions-, culture-, environmental-, antifacist-, youth- groups, eco farms, communities, bands and other iniatives of the Fläming region will present themselves
9 - 13 August The Main Week We expect that most people will come for this week, especially those who like to see people from earlier Ecotopia, but who are we...
14 & 15 August Wiesenburg Parkfestival Every year in the Castle Park (which is next door to the Ecotopia fields) around this time a small culture festival is taking place, we hope to add our inter -national and -cultural Ecological part to it
16 - 20 August Planning and Action week Two main topics this week:
- Actions (f.e. in Berlin or against Military practice Areas)
- How is Ecotopia going on (what and where will happen next year. And what will happen with this years Ecotopia fields in the future)
21 & 22 August Closing Weekend Saturday 21 August
24.00 hours
Closing Ecotopia 2010




Workshops
Slowly the list of workshops is growing, here is a few examples of the workshops which are already announced:

People Solar energy, Chimney Climbing, Uranio 238, Action Theater, Gaia theory, "Goodbye money, welcome LIFE", Ka Lele, Horseback Riding, Bird Watching, Improvised Theater, Talking Drums, Cooking with Mother Ageare, Environmental situation in Byelo Russia, Hand Built Wind Turbines, Blocking Atomic Waste Transports, How you build a composttoilet, vegan cooking, permaculture, Walk About Love, chacra healing, civilian peace keeping, free wireless internet, footreflexology, hitchhiking, come together singing, castor transports, PLAYday is FREEday, free states within states, different practical ecological farming, etc., etc.

Beside that there will be a special Children programme

If you are also planning to give a workshop please fill in the online form http://workshop.ecotopia2010.org

Music Groups
Malcolm & Ritchie of Dju Dju (Ritchie & Malcolm, the core of Dju Dju)

At this moment it is also not yet clear which music and theater groups will come, we recieve emails from a lot of different musicians, bands, theater people, but since we are not yet sure if we can pay any (travel)reimbursements it is not clear if all those people who like to come also can come, but nevertheless we still expect that there will be a lot of music going on the Ecotopia gatherings, as always, sure are already:
Dju Dju , Hagara and Friends, Sherz & Shine, Fidl Kunterbunt, Michael Heinen, Dota (Die Kleingeldprinzessin), Ofer Golany (most likely with a band of Israelian and Palestinian musicians), Drumminggroup Nanigo, plus a few combinations of musicians of the Flämng region who haven't got a name for their band yet...

Ofer
(Ofer with band)

International Preparation Weekend

In the beginning of May we will start to prepare the Ecotopia area in Wiesenburg/Bahnhof, but before we really start there we'd still like to have at least one International preparation meeting, which is planned to take place in the weekend of 16 till 18th of April in Weitzgrund (Near Belzig, about 12 Km from where Ecotopia will take place). The main topics will be o'fcourse the practical planning of the work during the last 3 months before Ecotopia.

But also less practical point, but nevertheless very mportant point will be discussed, like ecotopia promotion, fundraising, programme, travel reimbursement, etc.

Ecotopia Story Telling Evening

During the last months we organised different Ecotopia story telling evenings in Weitzgrund, the next one will for example take place at the 20th of March, mostly we had around 20 people listening to the stories of former Ecotopians, looking at old Ecotopia (EYFA) info material, hearing Ecotopia music of the first years and watching old video's... a very good way to get in the Ecotopia feeling, especially for the people who never have been there. If you do not live in the neighbourhood of the Fläming it will be hard to find an ecological way to come to Weitzgrund this evening, but maybe you can organise your own Ecotopia Story Telling evening in your home area... it is a good way to learn to know each other, since mostly people have no time to tell stories...

Building Up Ecotopia

Beginning at the 1th of May we will start to build 25 composttoilets, 26 solarshowers, 4 small water towers, 6 waste collecting stations, 2 entrance towers with gate, 14 washing stations, shadow places and a lot more as well as ground work, building of hedges, etc.... we have time untill the first week of August to finish it all. Most of the work will be done in working weekends we will organise in that period, but people who have time and interest to help can stay on the Ecotopia fields all that time... we will provide more and more livingwaggons and tents coming closer to Ecotopia, but if you have your own caravan, livingwaggon and/or tent and enthusiasm and time you are welcome to come.
composttoilets (3 Examples of composttoilets one a small campingplace in our region)

The last weeks before Ecotopia we wll organise some international workcamps and group and/or individuals who like to organise their own special creative camp in that time period are welcome to do so...

Building Materials and sponsor questions

As you can see on the picture we want to build mostly with natural material, but are also into using recycled material for building this years Ecotopia, so we are looking for wood, clay and when possible a huge amount of used (or new) material to make a swimming pool with.

Besides that we are of course open for all kind of ecological sponsoring, we are organising this Ecotopia with a an almost not excisting budget and we hope that somehow it will work anyhow... therefor where you can help, please do so... in coming weeks a long lists will be published on our website with all what we need and what sponsoring we are looking , however if you have already ideas now, please do not hesitate and get active...

Tipis, Circus Tents, Yurts

All in all we are expecting at least 600 people, but it can be easily more, most people will come with their own small tent, camper or livingwaggon, but still there will be people who aren't able to carry that much with them on their bike, in backpack or whatever and arrive without their own sleeping "thing", for those people we are looking for big tents. Furtheron for our workshops, meetings, eating and cultural activities we really would like to have some Circus tents and a whole bunch of Tipis and Yurts, if you have one or more or know somebody who has them please get in contact with us... we need a lot...

Apply for Ecotopia
More than about 500 peoplein the last half year informed us that they are planning to come to Ecotopia in August, a lot less however really had fill in our application forms on our website (http://apply.ecotopia2010.org) or the one at facebook (http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=1 ... 03&index=1). Of course you are welcome to come without applying before but you make it a bit easier for us if you announce your coming beforehand, we are sure that we have enough food, but.... so please apply...

Website

The last 3 months we have been busy to learn how to build a website and since a few days this website is life online http://ecotopia2010.org
Internet Making (Making an Website together)

We will try to let this be a very active website and luckly enough we have a small team now who can take care of it, furtheron we are looking forwards to your participation, for example in the forum...

Discussion Lists

This newsletter is a one way information provider, if you have ideas, wishes, dream, travelpossibilities/questions which you like to share with others we have installed two discussionlists for you, an english one, ecotopia_mailer@belzignet.de and one in German ecotopia_deutsch@belzignet.de, each message you are sendig to those addresses is send to all others on that list, you need to subscribe to them in beforehand of course..
Ecotopia 2010 Discussion List
(Englisch)
Subscribe http://eco-sub.ecotopia2010.org
Ecotopia 2010 Diskussion Liste
(Deutsch)
Anmelden http://deu-an.ecotopia2010.org

Facebook
Our Facebook Page (short cut http://fb.ecotopia2010.org has nearly 1500 participants, we are aware that NOT all of them will come, but it is nevertheless a good mailinglist for us, and is getting more and more also a discussion forum with interesting entries on the "wall", if you are on facebook we asked you to invite your friends (http://fbinvite.ecotopia2010.org).

Regional Contactpersons

If you like to contact somebody in your own country/region to find out if a bus, biketour, joint (train)travel, preparation meeting, regional workshop offer or whatever is organised in your area you can already contact these people (if your country/region is not (yet) mentioned and you have time and lust please contact us to put you on this list)

Armenia Vahagn Vardumyan
Finland Mark Petz

Groups who Support Ecotopia 2010
Up to now Ecotopia was always organised by EYFA which is a network itself, but starting with this Ecotopia 2010 we are entering a new form. So far the following groups said they support Ecotopia: Alte Schule e.V., Selea e.V., Alia, Oelala in Reetz e.V., Belziger Forum e.V.
If you organisation wants to support Ecotopia as well, please write us
Ask me and maybe I say
tell me and I might listen
feel for me when I can't feel for myself...