Hi, I am Mery from Madrid: teacher of childhood education, monitor of free time, artist and globetrotter. Here I am. I have felt at home in several countries and I hope to continue feeling this way for a long time, so, even if it sounds like a cliché, I feel like a citizen of the world.
Why have I chosen this project? Well, I think that this project chose me.
It was not the typical project that since the first moment took my attention and I was sure about doing, since I usually choose experiences related to education to grow professionally. Nevertheless, I arrived in this project and after I had the interview I was sure that I wanted to be volunteer for IDC. Although this project does not have a direct relation with the Education field, it does have it transversally and I felt that within it, I would grow as a person .
The values that you breathe in this eco-community are the kind of values that I want to transmit to my students when I will be a teacher, those who I want to detach and “infect” the people around me with, and those I want to nourish myself with. Values as respect, tolerance, empathy, fellowship, care, no waste of resources because they are very valuable, working with the earth and reaping what you sow, cooking for your mates creating a link similar to a family, taking care of the animals and watching them growing healthy without waiting for something in return from them, without thinking of them as resources instead of living beings. For me, the animals are a symbol that tell me if I am in the correct place and in the camping, they are part of the family. Taking care of them brings me the energy and happiness that I search for.
I have always been aware of how important recycling is, taking care of the Earth because there is no planet B, not contributing to capitalism, using as little plastic as possible, etc. But seeing that care and conscience carried out so naturally makes me believe that we really can change the world, that it’s not impossible. We don’t need to buy things that we don’t really need, with imagination and creativity everything is reusable. I had this behaviour before, but when you are in a place where that is the normal, the golden rule.. Your creativity flies and you don’t see anything as a waste because you find another use for it. Now it is more difficult for me to throw things away, I may end up having Diogenes Syndrom, who knows.
I’ve been connecting with this volunteering life for 3 years now: in a Kindergarten in Poland, in a Montessori school in France and now in this eco-community. And I am happy. I feel so lucky to have the opportunity to travel, to find people around the world and grow with their perceptions and ideas about life, listen to them, talk with them in another language… That really makes me grow as a person, makes me see the world from another perspective and open my mind. The more experiences I have, the more versions of me I can activate, awakening consciences that were asleep. Travel is growing, travelling is knowing yourself, is collecting the seeds of knowledge scattered throughout the world, to sow your own seeds in the people who cross your path.
My expectations for this last month here are that my consciousness continues to open up, that the seeds of environmentalism stay within me, for being able to spread them wherever I go, specially to my family, friends and when I educate children. Absorb like a sponge the bigger knowledge possible to know how to contribute to take care of the planet in the most positive, sustainable and conscious way. Because my father told me when I was a child: “We have to leave things in the same way, or even better than when we found them”.
Here, I have been conscious about the fact that we are the last generation with the power to change the world, take care of it and save it, fighting against that monster everybody knows and nobody faces because we believe it’s a thousand miles away from us: yes, climate change. And if we don’t fight against it, nobody will, because there will be nothing to fight for.
To finish, I want to share a little reflection that I had during an IDC Youth Exchange about resilience and sustainability: The covid has shown us how it is possible to change our behaviour and attitude radically, for example being with a mask during hours of work, not meeting with your friends to celebrate your birthday, or not hugging your grandmother for one whole year… These are things that we have changed overnight to fight against this virus, we accept them and we adapt ourselves for a greater good: the human race.
Why don’t we take responsibility and change our society with significant gestures against climate change, so that we can continue to enjoy time(us and futures generations)on this beautiful planet without harming it as we are doing now? I think it is not so complicated. If we have been able to support all that we have supported these last 2 years, why don’t we change for the most valuable thing that we have? THE EARTH. Only together we can save her, and I don’t see a better cause to fight for, because without her we are not and we won’t be anymore.
