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A peer visit between the Community Moderators from the Centers for Community Development from Bulgaria, Romania and Greece was held in Thessaloniki, Greece on July 4-5, 2012.

The meeting was attended by representatives of the all Centers for Community Development from the towns of Byala Slatina, Kameno, Novi Pazar, Pavlikeni, Etropole and Peshtera – Bulgaria, representatives of the Center for Community Development in Targu Mures, Romania and of the Center for Community Development in Thessaloniki, Greece. Besides the Community Moderators the meeting was also attended by representatives of the project-partner organizations: Amalipe, Bulgaria, Liga pro Europa, Romania and ARSIS, Greece which have established the Centers under the “Promoting the fieldwork at grass-root level among traditional and marginalized Roma communities” project.

With introducing the activities of the Center for Community Development ‘Baraberi’ in Dendropotamos, Thessaloniki as well as with the general activities of ARSIS, Greece, started the meeting Mrs. Marianthi Mota – project coordinator from ARSIS. She explained to the audience the various projects implemented by ARSIS on the territory of different towns in Greece and Albania focusing on Thessaloniki. ‘We called the center ‘Baraberi’ because in the Romani language this word means ‘together’, started her speech Mrs. Motha who also underlined the importance of the fact that ‘Baraberi’ shares the same office with the local Roma women organization.  Early marriages and drop-outs, especially among Roma girls are the main problems of the Roma community in Dendropotamos, Thessaloniki, became clear from the presentation of the Greek organization. “We work mainly on the prevention of girls dropping out early from school and try to keep everyone in class. For these children we see on the streets we use special mobile schools on wheels and in this way we use their free time. Furthermore, we organize various community initiatives”, shared Mariana Mota and Mariana Dimu from ARSIS. The Bulgarian and Romanian partners presented their activities to their hosts also through short presentations. Later on during the day the Community Moderators saw in practice how to work with mobile schools which attracted many children from the local Roma neighborhood. The mobile schools come from Belgium, have been used by many organizations worldwide so far and have proven its effectiveness. More information about mobile schools can be found here: http://www.mobileschool.org.

There was a meeting between the District Mayor of Melpomene-Ambelokipi and the community moderators of the three Balkan states. During the meeting with the local Mayor it became clear that the district is building two new schools – one elementary school and a high school. The hope of the local government is that everyone will attend school. On the other hand the Greek community moderators asked the local authority to repair a basketball court in the neighborhood. The mayor took note of all the activities on the project and expressed readiness to support. Especially for him the Roma anthem “Djelem Djelem” was played and at the end of the meeting the community moderators received three CD’s with songs composed and sung by the mayor as a present. 

At the end of the two-day meeting the partners of the project gave a brief overview on the present implementation of the project’s activities which end in January 2013. The main targets are the institutionalization of certain centers and the active participation in the development of local strategies for Roma integration as well as action plans for their implementation.