Youth camp celebrates 20th anniversary

Created: 08/08/2022 07:14

Europe as a guest in Possenhofen: young people from France, Italy, Germany and Hungary spent a week at the international youth camp in the youth hostel on Lake Starnberg.

© Andrea Jaksch

Young people from France, Italy, Germany and Hungary met in Possenhofen last week.

The youth camp celebrated an anniversary.

Possenhofen

- "Bon appétit, buon appetito, Jó étvágyat and Bon appetit" was the motto last week in the youth hostel in Possenhofen.

The participants of the international youth camp celebrated the anniversary of the camp with a barbecue evening.

It has been held every two years since 2002.

It is a clash of cultures.

Young people between the ages of 14 and 20 from various international twin towns in the district meet for a week at Lake Starnberg, make friends, improve language skills and go on excursions together.

They eat together, sleep in group rooms and have the opportunity to get to know the other nations better.

This year, 62 young people from France, Italy, Germany and Hungary took part.

"If we manage to ensure that the young people have nice experiences together, they will not shoot at each other," said the former head of the youth welfare office, Bernhard Frühauf.

Together with the then, recently deceased District Administrator Heinrich Frey and the youth worker Eduard Zenger, Frühauf founded the youth camp 20 years ago for the opening of the Possenhofen youth hostel.

"They get to know each other,

and if you know and like each other, you don't attack each other," says Frühauf.

"A few years ago, the young people from Taiwan had the longest journey."

There is no language barrier

The meeting works through contacts.

The Landschulheim Kempfenhausen has a partner school in Taiwan.

This year, French people traveled from Starnberg's twin town of Dinard, Gauting's twin town of Clermont and Feldafing's twin town of Bouc-Bel-Air.

The Italians came from Gilching's twin town of Cecina, the Hungarians from near Budapest.

One or two supervisors travel with each group.

"I had German at school and I give private tuition in Hungary," said the 19-year-old supervisor Hanga Batizi.

"I love the camp here." Thanks to the numerous language skills of the young people and English as the camp language, there were no major communication problems.

Werner Wissmann from Bad Dürkheim, Starnberg's partner district in the Palatinate, made the same observation.

He has accompanied young people to Possenhofen since the first camp.

"Over the years there have only been positive changes," says Wissmann.

"Above all, communication has improved through all nations." This progress was also illustrated by District Administrator Stefan Frey, who gave a speech at the barbecue in three different languages.

He is very happy that the young people spent a nice week at the lake.

During the evening, the camp participants had the opportunity to engage in multilingual dialogue with Frey himself or with mayors.

The young people also got involved and set up a popcorn machine, a juice bar and music.

14-year-old Lina Hitz from the district was also involved.

Every morning she offered a yoga class.

She will remember the camp positively.

"For me personally, it was a nice experience," says Hitz.

"It was great to make contacts and to be out and about with people of the same age during the holidays." And it wasn't difficult to make contacts, whether in the corn maze, in the zoo, during the Munich city rally or when sitting together in the evening.

"This anniversary year was simply special," says coordinator Saskia Geipel.