breaking the ice

I am in Strasbourg – in the center again! I had 2 meetings parallel this week and no policy officer with me. First I thought I easily manage, but now it was really tiring. One meeting was the steering group meeting for the Raxi-Symposium which is going to take place here in Strasbourg by the end of the month October, the other meeting is the BBC+ study session together with some other youth councils. The Symposium steering group was at times quite intense, talking about an event for 120 people, with 348 applications and a lot of facilitators and speakers to decide on, as it is 4 days long and needs a lot of parallel working units. The Study session is much more fun and allows in-depth analysis of the situation of National Youth Councils today. I am happy that those NYCs are willing to take this challenge on board!

I will leave France today and go to Portugal – for the Council of Europe affaires commission. The Commission should be led by the steering group of the commission; but 2 out of the 3 steering group members will not be able to make it to the actual meeting. So I have the full responsibility of chairing this 3 days meeting together with Marian! I hope she will indeed arrive!