[Strawbale] New proposal for European Strawbale gathering 2009

[Max Vittrup Jensen]

Dear all,

First of all: Sorry for sending such a large mail last time, and thank 
you heaps to (unknown saving angel!) Duncan for fixing it, making it 
small and letting you all know where to get the attachment if you need 
it! (from me or him)
He also told me about the European email list which we could use, 
especially for those of you who have an interest in taking part in 
deciding where the next European strawbale gathering should be. Please 
go to: http://amper.ped.muni.cz/mailman/listinfo/strawbale to register: 
It's simple and easy and there's already about 500 members.
[To those of you on the list and receiving this the first time: please 
read the next post under same topic and request the 467kb pdf attachment 
direct from me.]

I'd be specially interested in hearing about your view of the intervals 
(every second year as now? Less? More?), and especially to hear from 
those of you who were not in Germany: What kept you away? Distance? 
Participant fee? or simply lack of time...?

Below I've posted the feed-back I've received so far. I hope that from 
now on it will all be more public available through hitting 'reply to' 
this email, [perhaps you first need to sign in etc?]
My personal comment is that I especially agree with Sissy, Eva and 
Norak. I worry about having ESBG every year, especially when it overlaps 
with the International gathering. I find the Belgian idea of the site 
interesting, however I fear that keeping it in Belgium will limit 
participation for some, and/or require unsustainable fundraising...

Bales and Love,
Max
PS: Norak: To your concern: I'll post an aerial view soon: there's no 
more than 500 meters between accommodation and our site. We'd have tent 
accommodation and large social/tents tents at the field by our site and 
educational center. The center has 2 rooms for gatherings of up to 15-20 
people, along with office. There should be a small round SB house build 
next to the field as well by 2009 (15 people). Kitchen is on site. If we 
need the large indoor conference center it's 2 km away, however perhaps 
we could use Standa's accommodation instead. Between Standa and us are 
the village commons, where we should arrange for a party, perhaps SB 
game at the soccer field...

PS: Please respect the request of 2 of the email recipients to be 
removed from this group email: All in all: only use the elist from now 
on....

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dear max,

great proposal. austria - at least as i am concerned  :-)   - will 
support you.

yours, thomas
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 > Were you the Scot at the ESBG07?...or an unknown angel? ...and how do 
you like the proposal?
No, I'm a New Zealander living in Denmark. So I was at ISBBC2006.

I haven't looked at the Belgian proposal, but I usually support holding
such things in poorer areas who can benifit most from the visit and
visability of such a meeting. So I like it. I would try and come, I'd
love to see Czech Republic.

Duncan
dlithgow , gmail.com
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please, delete us from this list.
Elisabeth
stengaarden , os.dk
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Dear Max,
I am not against and of course we would help to prepare the event with 
you. (It seems that maybe ArTUR ngo will become more active in straw 
bale and clay, so you will have a bigger partner in Slovakia, then so 
far, I will know more at the end of week)
Yes, I also think that it would help the development in East.
(Morover, maybe we could get some of our straw bale friends to visit us 
too maybe after event, as it is not that far anymore.)

Zuzana
zkierulfova , gmail.com
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Dear Max,

thanks for your offer to host the next ESBG. I like the idea.
For me it depends on the Belgian people, if they really like to host it, 
they have the priority as we agreed about doing it there. If they think 
it's fine to do it in Czech Republic, who should mind to do it there?

I'd love to have a chat with you when you are in Sieben Linden. Please 
let me know when you are here.
Eva

P.S.: Next time, please send smaller mails! Not everybody has a 
DSL-connection, my computer was paralized for a long time with loading 
your document.
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Hello Max

it seems that you feel the straw-ESBG-fever too!

What can we say? In these last two weeks, we were very busy with 
brainstorming and organizing and programming. We almost have the OK 
-word of a nice location here in Limburg: it is not a bio-eco-commune 
like in Sieben Linden or in your place, but it is an open air museum 
with many old houses made of straw and clay: the domein Bokrijk. We 
could make a beautiful link between past and future and the role of 
natural materials.

One of the advantages of Bokrijk: from the structure of Bokrijk (it is 
in hands of our province Limburg) we could get lots of supports for 
fundraising and making promotion for our european straw-vision.

Maybe the international straw-scene is ready for an annual congress, so 
every year. Would you agree with ESBG 2009 in Belgium (give us some time 
to organize it) and then in 2010 in Szech, and then in 2011 in ?

Dear Max, we don't feel like playing a who-will-win-this game.  We are 
still interested to do it, but we will listen to all the reactions.

In the next days, I will explain to everybody of our email-list, where 
we are standing in the organisation of the ESBG 2009. So they will be 
informed about both the proposals.

A bale and love from our side to you

Groetjes
Geert

PS: Nice that you put those videofragments on Youtube. What a promotion 
for the French dip!!!

here is the site of Bokrijk:
http://www.limburg.be/bokrijk/eng/index.html

geert.goffin , telenet.be
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Hiya Geert,

I'm just in and out, czeching the mails...   I basically agree with the 
comment from Eva, and like you I don't believe in 'winning' games; 
cooperative games are best.  I'll get back in a few days with a real 
answer once we get more reactions: I'd recommend that you mail everyone 
and tell about the place, so they have something to compare with?

Peace and Love,
Max

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Hi Max,

thanks for your picturefull presentation. I like the idea of meeting in 
Czech Republik.

I think its important to find a good solution together with the belgium 
host volunteers.

Best wishes

Fredi

www.stroh-unlimited.de
mail , stroh-unlimited.de

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Dear Max, dear all...

thanks Max for your interest and for contactiong the people in your 
country.
Please contact especially Giggi, Hein and Peter from Belgium, who where 
ready to organize a ESBG in their country, where it was not sure yet, if 
it would happen in 2008 or in 2009. There was the idea to meet in 
Belgium in advance with at least one representative of each interested 
country to prepare this in common.

Sissy
from Germany

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wanted to write message to all but my dear yahoo is refusing to send it 
to all adresses at once, could u please max send it from yours so when 
people hit "reply all", everybody in the circle sees the following 
conversation? otherwise it might get really confusing
thanx a lot
norak
ps: sissy is there any email list of conference people yet that would 
make this kind of thing easier?

Hey,
just a quick thought on next gathering...
- my understanding when i was leaving 7linden was that belgian guys are 
considering hosting the gathering. Also during the conference i heard a 
reflection of some sort from the direction of baltic states (if im not 
mistaken Edita spoke it to the circle at some moment) that they might 
consider hosting the next gathering too...
- i think it would be really good to hear from all what their thinking 
on this subject is, especially from folks who were at one time or the 
other considering hosting the gathering. What are your options? What are 
the main issues that would need to be dealt with if the gathering was to 
be hosted at yours place? What would be the facilities? We heard from 
czech, it would be great to hear also from belgians and see if there is 
anybody else int he circle still considering this. And then of course if 
we really want to decide by consensus and not just by "virtue" of silent 
majority it would be great to hear from every single of us - what do we 
think?
- so my position on czech:
i quite like the idea exactly because of the reasons Max mentioned, more 
people from so called east able to come more easily, potential positive 
impact on the situation in czech and slovakia.
- my doubt: arent the facilities too spread out? especially the main 
gathering space - where would it be?
- my position on belgium: i really dont have much of a opinion yet as we 
havent had much specific info, but i know it would be expensive again 
for people like me to come, what always puts one in a difficult 
position. This time i volunteered and i was gratefull for the 
opportunity but in the same time i felt unequal to the people from the 
west who could afford the gathering easily and didnt have to compromise 
their participation (and of course there is many ways how to deal with 
this situation even if next gathering happens again in a "rich" country, 
and i would love to be part of that conversation:)   - my position on 
baltic states: id love it but i have no idea if the guys were at all 
serious? please?
- last but not least: one more big thanx for the folks who organised the 
last gathering. it was a delightful event and i think we need more!
love to all
norak
from turkey and slovakia and czech
seed4peace , yahoo.com

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Please delete us from this list!
Lene Kjaer, livsbanken , paradis.dk

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