Fusion Germany
The Opening Festival
What a wonderful day it was!
We had a great concert area with a parachute over the top of the stage, a low and high ropes course, a 5 a side football comp on our oval, pony rides, a Fusion café, tours of the property, a much loved train taking people around the property, a fishing competition on our lake, our new Children’s Playground, a catering van (loaned to us for free) where we served chips and the best Bratwurst (German sausage), and other food areas where we served Crepes and cake and coffee and drinks. It was capped by a perfectly flat Festival area with enough room for hundreds to participate in one of our favourite dances called My Big Fat Pony!
One little boy when he was offered some sweets took a very ordinary packet. When asked why he didn’t take the nice ones said he didn’t want to take the good ones, he wanted to leave it for other children to enjoy.
We reached our 200 target of volunteers. You should have seen the cakes many had made! We had our inaugural Wheelbarrow race, the Ryobi Cup, won by a team of locals called the Pirates. The Nigerians came third, took a wrong turn at the last moment! Their prize…a brand new wheelbarrow! It got a good laugh! In fact there were many good laughs on the day.
We officially opened the slide at the Children’s Playground. A good moment as we were able to say that now children were to be at the heart of the new Academy. We finished with Heel and Toe polka and a giant Big Fat Pony. People just stayed, talked and helped clean up.
The former Manager was there and was very moved by what she saw. She couldn’t believe the transformation of the main building and was delighted to see the way the property was being used.
A local said: ”I have lived in Iserlohn for 20 years and I have never experienced Community like I experienced today.”
And the ongoing response from people has made us so thankful for the day. We had 2 days of coverage in the paper with a half page spread with colour photos.
Monday the 31st March – we worked hard to prepare the place to welcome people. Over 80 of our supporters turned up to be part of a night of history! We had 13 people including a local florist doing a beautiful array of flowers. We shared the story of the dreams for the property and the number of people who volunteered to be part of it with us has moved us. People from a nearby city came to see how they could contribute. Here is one example of how the networks are opening for us. One guy, Shrouder, a worker with the Blue Cross – who talks in schools was so taken by what we are doing here that this week he will be coming with us to our property in the East, Derfflinger Hof, to see how we may be able to work together in developing the property as he is focused on schools in Berlin and has been looking for a property near Berlin to bring young people to.
A local leader who was there to witness the hand over said: “Well I wasn’t in Berlin when the wall fell down in 1989 but I can tell people I was there the night that Fusion took over the Academy in Iserlohn!” They really see it as being this significant for Germany. To have this level of support from local people was one of the reasons we felt it was so right to explore purchasing the property. At Midnight we burst into cheering and then celebrated with cake and coffee.
Fusion Open Crowd festivals run at the time of the World Cup, 2006 were received by enthusiasm by the German community. In March 2007, Martin Woods, Fusion’s European Coordinator and his wife, Jenny, moved to live at Iserlohn. They join Christiane, the Secretary for Germany and an enthusiastic team across West and East Germany. In April a property was secured by the local team in Gusow, to become the heart of work with young people and those who are finding life difficult in the East, and a training centre for the country. In June 2007, a Pilgrimage to Germany will draw team from around the world to run Festivals across Germany and connect with young people in schools.
Fusion Germany
Fusion Academy
Berliner Platz 18
58638 Iserlohn, Germany
Phone +49 2371 35 10 90
Email info@fusion-deutschland.de