Aventura Marão Clube (AMC) aims to promote healthy lifestyles among the population, especially youth. Its main activities are the organization of international work camps, summer camps, youth exchanges, youth initiatives, sports activities (canoeing, mountain biking), Fair Trade awareness (shops, school activities, fairs, etc.) all this in coordination with Casa da Juventude de Amarante, a Youth Centre, in partnership with the City Hall. Webpage - www.aventuramaraoclube.com
Aims:
to raise awareness among the participants and the population on social inclusion, mainly concerning handicapped young people; to raise awareness also about fair trade, organic farms and environment preservation.
Activities:
group dynamics; presentation to the city and region; discussion on the workcamp theme (objectives, tasks division); visit to the most important places of the city; training on theatre performance and workshop on how to deal with the difference; direct contact and work with local NGO (Cercimarante) responsible for activities with local disabled young people; organize an event (theatre performance) involving both groups (workcamp participants and local disabled young people) to be presented to the local community (street performance – expected more than 500 persons to attend); visits to some of the main cities and spots in the North of Portugal (Guimarães, Porto, Parque Natural do Alvão).
Accommodation/Food:
Participants will be accommodated in shared rooms (4 participants each) of Casa da Juventude de Amarante (even so participants should all bring sleeping bag). Casa da Juventude de Amarante has its own kitchen, WC and showers. In terms of food, our youth centre has a bar\restaurant proposal for the volunteers (breakfast, lunch and dinner) always taking into consideration our aims (healthy food with organic and vegetarian ingredients). Laundry available (self-service). Our youth centre has free wireless.
Location:
Amarante is a small town in the North of Portugal, in Porto district (60km far from Porto) with 12,000 inhabitants. It is a quite famous town for tourism, culture and wine production. Indeed is quite near (18km) the Port wine region. It is crossed by Tâmega River, one of the subsidiary rivers of the Douro River that crosses Porto till the Atlantic Ocean, and it is on the valley of one of the most important Portuguese mountains, Marão (1450m). Amarante is well located (nearby passes highway A4 connecting to Oporto and highway A11 connecting to Guimarães) and has a good public transport system. The city is 40 min way from the nearest airport (Oporto) by car.
With more than two decades of existence, Cine-Club of Avanca produces, distributes and exhibits cinema works and audiovisuals beyond organizing, since 1997, the "International Meeting of Cinema, Television, Video and Multimedia".
Website:
www.avanca.com
Work and leisure:
Volunteers in this work camp are involved in various levels of the organization, providing a determinant support for the success of this International Meeting. Being AVANCA an idea sharing favored space, creative fusion and cultural interchange between, professionals, students and cinema and multimedia lovers, IWC volunteers will naturally participate and dive in this international, culture and creative atmosphere. To moments dedicated to cultural animation and discovering of surroundings, Cine-Clube de Avanca offers a set of activities, which will give an insight of the social realities, cultural and gastronomical, between others, from the village of Avanca and the region that extends between the cities of Aveiro and Porto.
In the working periods, IWC volunteers will do the following tasks...
During preparation and setting phase... - Sinalethic setting for the different spaces in AVANCA 2014 - Poster and pending poster distribution - Exposition setting and Organization - Adaptation of the EB23 Egas Moniz school classrooms for workshops attainment - Workshop related Video-Informatics equipment installation and testing - Cleaning and preparation of the Auditorium of Avanca for competitive sessions of Cinema and Video - Organization of the EB23 Egas Moniz School's polyvalent for the Television competitive sessions - Airport reception and welcoming of the AVANCA 2014 international guests (directors, actors, producers, technicians, etc) - Cleaning and maintenance of spaces and sanitary installations used by the IWC
During the International Meeting... - Check-in support for the AVANCA 2014 participants and guests - Organization of the available camping for the workshop participants - Gestation and maintenance of the Workshop rooms;Cantina support - AVANCA 2014 sale posts support (Which will have several articles related with the festival) - AVANCA 2014 Secretariat support - AVANCA 2014 Press Cabinet Support - Film Projection support during competitive sessions - Cleaning and maintenance of the AVANCA 2014 related installations - Gastronomy Festival support held in AVANCA 2014 weekend
After AVANCA 2014 ending... - Collecting and verifying workshops' equipment - Reposition of the used spaces on their initial configuration and cleaning of the same spaces - Collecting the material of the expositions and wrapping the exposed works - Collecting AVANCA 2014 posters and pending posters in Avanca and in Aveiro region.
Accommodation/Food:
In tents in a specific place of Egas Moniz School, in Avanca. School cook will provide meals. Some of these meals will take place in restaurants of Avanca.
Location:
Avanca, Aveiro district.
Meeting point:
Avanca Train Station during the whole day. Volunteers must provide their time of arrival so that the organization staff can pick them up.
« I can say that the best things about the workcamp and this whole experience were the chance of making a real difference to the lives of very needy children. This is an extremely valuable project where volunteers can have a massive impact. Also the possibility of learning a huge amount about a country so different from our own. I learnt ten times as much by carrying out a workcamp than I would ever do backpacking. »