From the 7th to the 16th of April, an IRFF project was held in Romania under the theme "Implementing the Culture of Peace". This project is a follow-up of last year's IRFF Archeological project in Slovakia, organized under the banner of "Culture of Peace", Heritage and Friendship (for more details see the IRFF-Europe web page at Slovakia chapter)

The purpose of this year's program was to create the basis of a public debate involving the people, community leaders and the local schools with themes focusing on Religious Freedom, Human Rights and Social Service.
We had a very rewarding and productive time in this project. Organizations co-sponsoring with IRFF were ICRF (International Coalition for Religious Freedom) and RYS (Religious Youth Service). Organizers for the event were Mr. Massimo Trombin, Europe IRFF co-ordinator, and Mr. Paul Frank, Vice-President of IRFF-Luxembourg and co-ordinator for ICRF in Europe. The onsite directors were Mr. Trombin and Mr. Mario Ferrario, Romanian IRFF President and Catalina Bobocea, IRFF Executive Director.

The usual policy of IRFF is to work in cooperation with local NGO's and in this case it was the Scouts in Brasov, lead by Mr. Marius Rosu. The Scouts helped to organize the details of the project, involving all the locals and assisted in general affairs. By this effort, the local schools, NGO's, political leaders and media became more and more involved and interested in the programs.

The two outside activities we did together were clearing trash from the mountainside, the local reservoir and park, and secondly planting trees in barren areas.
The project started officially with a public conference coordinated by ICRF, attended by more than 200 people and 40 VIP's. Mr. Paul Frank presented a statement paper outlining the need for more education on Human Rights and Religious Freedom and Service. Three other panelists responded: Prof. Costantin Cuciuc, Dr, Cristian Ciochirca and Mr. Massimo Trombin, followed by the questions and answers from the public.

The press was also present throughout the project. Four newspaper articles were published by the local newspapers "Transilvania Express" and the "Gazeta". As well, four reportage from local news channels and one from national TV, covered the project. The program for the 40 IRFF volunteers started with Dr. Sherry Hartman representing RYS International (Religious Youth Service). She gave us a 2-day orientation program, following the RYS model. We discussed what happens when we "process" an activity or experience in our daily life. That is, after we have experienced something, we reflect on what we did. Next, we make conclusions on what we learned from that experience. And lastly, we then apply what we learned.
We worked in teams to "envision" an ideal environment. We then drew this vision on a large piece of paper with our teammates. This gave us a sense of unity and appreciation for the different views of creating a better world.
As well, we studied three major ways in which we interact with others in our environment. Do you know if you are a St. Bernard, a Lion, or a Fox? Put simply, these three animal natures represent three distinct interactive styles: supportive and flexible (St. Bernard); independent and directive (Lion); factual and calculating (Fox). Each style has a way to bring success in any endeavor. We each discovered our basic interactive style by answering a questionnaire. We discovered that our strengths become a weakness when we over emphasize them. We sought to understand how to find the balance in using our strengths in working together with different approaches/styles.

One of the purposes of this project was to involve the "youth and the old" and including all the volunteers, about fifteen different nationalities were represented on site. Also, the age of the volunteers ranged from 64 to 12 years. And like last year's project, the approach was to see this as an "Experimental Laboratory" by all the volunteers, in which all these different nationalities and ages were looking for a way to experience the "Implementation of the Culture of Peace"!

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