Posts Tagged ‘youthnetworks’

Last week, YouthNetworks gave it’s first presentation in it’s home country, and it happened to take place in the city where our headquarters are located: Utrecht! There was a training by the NJI,  (Dutch Youth Institute) and people from all over the country came there to share information, network with each other and offcourse to learn from several workshops, where YouthNetworks was also represented in the workshop about Youth in Action & New Media.
If you would also like to implement the eMatchmaking training in your training or seminar, feel free to ask us any time!

Before I start, please note: don’t try this at home! Taking the very first train to Germany, work all day and returning the same evening with the last train is very dangerous: it nearly exhausted me to death.

Yesterday, I gave my second eMatchmaking training about YouthNetworks. And my third and forth. I had to give three (!) trainings in a row in an international seminar in Bonn, Germany. It went quite well, actually. I got my message across, the participants were very eager to learn and there was a fun atmospeher (and very good cake!). There was, however, total chaos prior to my presentations, as my preperation had some flaws: I hadn’t asked for a computer with the newest version of Powerpoint, access to internet and Adobe Flash installed (for the brilliant animation by Roquefort). It took me over an hour to get everything right, and even then it wasn’t perfect: every 60 seconds a loud BEEEEP broke through my words (before I figured out I could turn the sound off, ofcourse). It was computer hell. Sometimes I wonder why I am giving these trainings about online YiA communities, when I know absolutely nothing about computers..

Anyway, thanks for inviting me, Germany! I am very very very sorry my preperation wasn’t as it was supposed to me, but luckily everything went very well, and I hope you are not angry with me for not asking for specific computer stuff (and if you are, pleased eat one of the stroopwafels I gave you: they’ll make you feel better). Wir sehen uns wieder!

I should have known it when I met the nun. She had just celebrated her 89^th birthday the day before with her niece, and didn’t know how to work her mobile phone. I had had a rough night: who knew Dusseldorf had two airports?  Murphy’s Law had made me very tired, but I managed to find the number she was looking for: ‘convent’. She told me she had kept her name from before she became a nun: Eileen. I said it was a pretty name. Eileen blessed me in the name of God.
But wait, there’s more