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How did you get from your passion for colors to your passion for European projects?

That’s a good question. I would answer first by describing the fact that I consider myself an extremely diverse person and I like to say that my hobby is to bring hobbies, most of the time. So, the colors, when you think about colors or art in general, you first think about the fact that you have creativity.

And I think that society needs creativity as much as possible, especially in solving social problems.

And the colors have remained close to me and all the artistic part, because most of the things that I do, either in workshops or in the discussions that I sometimes have, simply the fact that I make up, color and so on, are part of me and I want to promote the fact that creativity is more than a four-leaf clover and it is a form of expression that any of us can use in their advantage and in the advantage of society in the long run.

You went to many countries with different activities, including Erasmus. How was your first experience in Erasmus?

It was quite exciting, because I left in the second semester of the first year, which coincides with the beginning of the war.

And there were emotions at that moment, because my first mobility was even in Latvia, which, as we know, is quite close to the conflict zone and has a rich history with the Russian Federation. And there were a lot of emotions, both because of the geopolitical context and because it sounded too good to be true, like, I’m leaving for free, I was talking to my mom and I said, ok, if we lose 200 euros, that’s it, you get there, you buy a house, you get rid of it, you have fun and we’ll see.

But no, it wasn’t a scheme, it was really a wonderful place. And more than that, one thing for which I am extremely grateful is the fact that it was a medium in which I was able to speak English. I was always anxious to speak in English, which is quite amusing, considering what I do now and speaking and being very often active, including my content on Instagram, is in English, mostly.

Back then, no, I was afraid to speak in English. All I knew was that people would laugh at me when I tried to speak in English. So, when I got there and I saw that people understood me, I saw that people laughed at my jokes, that I talk to them, that I can connect with them, it was probably one of the most powerful and validating moments in my life, which practically helped me to be so determined not only to go to Erasmus Mobility, but also to write to them.

What is your most special memory? From the Erasmus projects? From any Erasmus project, from any mobility.

I was in a project in Malta and it was about reconnecting with yourself. And given the fact that the topic was surprising, because it is not a topic that you find so easily in Erasmus Mobility, its form may have started to grow, but in general it is not something so approachable, but it was a training course that really proposed to connect with yourself through different methods, such as building a journal, reconnecting with nature, reflection, yoga, meditation and other things like that. Practically, it helped us to understand each other, to understand the people around us, and I think that project was one of the most beautiful moments, both in itself and in a particular moment. Also, society often, and I think it is so important to have this kind of projects on mental health and reconnecting with yourself, society creates barriers with you, even you with yourself. And often, you reach a point where you have a lot of insecurities, you are ashamed of yourself, especially with your physique or maybe with your talents and so on. And being in Malta, of course, they took us to the beach at some point.

And they took us to the beach, not only to sit there and enjoy the sun, but they also gave us a small task that we had to do, which was to connect with the waves, to talk to the rocks, to feel the sand, to stay with ourselves. And then I connected with my inner child, I entered the water, I was no longer ashamed of the swimsuit, of the swimsuit I was wearing, of my body, of the fact that people were looking at us. And we started to swim there, exactly when we were small and we didn’t care that time was passing or that someone was looking at us. No, it was liberating from all points of view and I think, I recommend the experience of reconnecting with yourself. I recommend it to everyone to do an exercise with themselves, as they feel comfortable. But also the Erasmus projects are places where you can really find topics and talents that you didn’t know you were capable of. Or that just simply didn’t surprise you until then in your life.

With what did you stay and what did you learn from all these experiences?

That we are different, that stereotypes don’t have a place in society. Even if we like to joke, even if it’s probably the first thing we start a conversation with when we go on a project, we don’t want to make jokes about the places where we come from. With how long you stay a week with those people, you realize that even if you come from totally different places, different corners of the European Union, you are much more similar in many ways.

You are curious, you are eager to change something, you are aware that society needs a fresh opinion that comes from us, young people. We are aware that non-formal education brings much more things to the table than, at least in Romania, the traditional school can do. All these things together create the Erasmus community and this feeling of beautiful dependency that you have when you go on such activities.

Did you meet people who meant a lot to you throughout those activities? Can you give some examples?

The first thing I will say is that I didn’t meet people who marked me negatively in the past. Even if there were arguments, or even if there were less uncomfortable things, because it exists. In a group, not even in class, when there are 30 people, not everyone will understand each other.

It’s impossible. But the way in which arguments are resolved, the way in which you are still allowed to work in a team with that person, regardless of the inconveniences, there is still the feeling of community. And when you look back, you say, I didn’t like that person, I don’t want to hear that person ever again.

No, it’s a different feeling of, wow, look at the way in which we can resolve conflicts. Or it can be done in other ways, not just by yelling at each other. And the people who marked me positively are, in general, the facilitators, because they were the ones who somehow opened my appetite to want to do trainings, to want to facilitate, to transmit my message further, and not only through the debates we have during their mobility, but also me, to be in their position, to be creative and to bring information to people in less traditional and less offensive ways. So, I would say, first of all, I thank all the facilitators who created a safe environment for us to express ourselves in a situation where I didn’t feel judged, I didn’t feel rushed, I didn’t feel persecuted in any way, but also all the skills and knowledge they had regarding the different subjects addressed during these experiences.

The Be-Inclusive project is your most recent project, made with the help of the European Solidarity Body. But, why Be-Inclusive?

It’s my childhood, which is growing, and I’m happy about that. Be-Inclusive is the acronym. The name started from the idea that, being through the European Solidarity Body, this implies that we have applied as an informal group of five young people.

And what’s interesting is that, despite being so small, a group of five people is not big enough to propose a national project. We thought, ok, we’re from Bucharest, we do it in Bucharest, and you know how nice the cars are, with the letter B in front of them, and then they go on. So, the idea was for us to think, ok, B inclusive, let’s be inclusive with everyone.

So, this is the funny story behind the name, but also its intention to start from the grass, and then continue as big as possible, and ultimately create an inclusive culture, from small to big.

You talked about the story behind the name. What about the story behind the project?

I, for one, am a person with disabilities. I have a hearing aid, I wear hearing aids, and I’m also under observation for dyslexia and ADHD. And it has a lot to do with my life story, somehow, because I went from kindergarten to master’s degree, studying everything that has to do with school.

And I enjoyed the experience, I’ve had a lot of fun with it, and I admit it, but, despite all this, I realized that it’s not necessarily the most friendly place for a person with disabilities. And this comes from a person who considers herself lucky for the professors that she had, and for the group, to a large extent, that she had. But I am aware that many of us, people with disabilities, don’t have the luxury, or don’t have that much openness, and people don’t know how to encourage or answer our needs so well.

And, practically, Be Inclusive has appeared as an invitation to dialogue, on both sides, not only to persecute somehow, or to put pressure on the students, or on the professors, or on the institutions, because you have to make so many changes in the infrastructure to accommodate us, but, besides informing them about all these changes in the legal infrastructure, and so on, the purpose is, more importantly, to focus on the people.

Namely, to understand that the change comes from each of us. And, first of all, nothing is stronger for a person with a disability than to know that in front of them is a colleague or a professor that they know they can rely on, that they can freely address when they have a problem, without feeling judged, or without being told that it’s just a habit, or that it’s just in their head. And that’s why it’s important for the change to come from each of us, from bottom to top, because, after that, I’m convinced that all these changes, that scare us about the infrastructure and so on, will come with it.

And, as I was saying, it’s a dialogue on both sides. I invite people, even on this road, and people with disabilities, to talk about their disabilities, even if it’s not the most comfortable thing, because it’s impossible to ask a person to understand your disability only from a medical book, or, well, from a specialty, without you explaining how you feel, what makes you unhappy, what frustrates you, what you like, what things you want to do in your community, and so on. Because, in the end, ignorance is on both sides, precisely because of a lot of suppression and because there is no open communication between us as a society.

But, do you see a change in you after you started this project?

I’m much more enthusiastic now and I have much, much, much, much more hope that things can change. Well, to be honest, I’ve always been an incredible optimist and I’ve believed many times in my crazy ideas. But, when you see that people around you believe in the same crazy ideas you have, you get courage and you don’t feel so alone in a whirlpool of confusion.

Of course, when I started this project, I started it through the European Solidarity Corps, because it’s an option that sometimes Europe offers to people, especially young people, to start from somewhere. And that’s how I used it. I wanted to start from somewhere.

This whole idea with the people I had around me and, again, who believed in me, even if at the beginning it was a bit confusing for them and for me. But, just because I started from somewhere, through the project that the European Union has already created for us young people, it gave me courage and it practically determined to me that now I have this mission. How do I get it to the end?

And by the end, it means that I have to talk to other people, to talk to other NGOs. I’ve decided to go to school, so I have to talk to the teachers, to the students, to other bodies that exist in our society and that could interact with my project in one way or another. And, until now, I didn’t necessarily have closed doors.

They were like, ok, we’ll leave them open, we’ll see later when it’s clearer. Which, again, gives me courage and makes me understand that it’s no longer such a taboo subject, or even if it is, it’s not something that we run away from, that we don’t hear about, that we don’t want, it doesn’t exist. And that’s it, again, it gives me courage and it makes me believe that it can be more than an extremely fanciful dream of mine.

What’s your plan for the future?

I like, now, in general, when I think about the future, I like to look either too far or too close. I’m the man of extremes sometimes.

And I’d like to have an answer that is palpable and that effectively answers your question, namely that, of course, I want to bring this project to an end and your project to be just the beginning of what Be Inclusive wants to be. To be practical, if you will, as a kind of cast hole of the entire orchestra that it can become. And by orchestra I mean that there are many, many stakeholders that I didn’t even know I could use in the cast hole advantage that I support.

And that’s why I like to believe that it’s like music, like art, after all. So, in the end, when this project will come to an end, it will just be the beginning of a mission that I hope will last my whole life. More than that, now I started going to school and to see how children react when they interact with the empathy exercises that I do and how they see the world through the shoes of others.

And again, besides the jokes and laughs, I’m convinced that somewhere deep in their minds there will be some questions that they will either answer now or later in time or they will at least have an experience that will encourage them when they find a disabled person not to be afraid to interact with them. And the most important thing is that I’m proposing now, in July, to make a festival for accessibility and inclusion. And this festival is basically proposing to be an oasis of inclusive culture and to be realized through different plays, through disabled musicians, through artists with disabilities, but also through inclusive and accessible workshops.

For example, to make movements together using inclusive techniques, how we can integrate people in different activities with or without disabilities. But without feeling that it’s a discussion between us or you. Because, in general, when we observe the tendency towards inclusive workshops, we focus strictly on a category of disabilities or strictly on people with disabilities and we don’t let others interact with us or vice versa.

And I think it’s important, because society is made up of all of us, to bring everyone to the same place just to discuss, to look left and right, to see, ah, this is how it’s done, ah, this is how it feels, and all these things. Because you can’t explain to a person who doesn’t go through that disability or that life experience, you can’t explain it just through abstract things, just through texts on paper that he reads or doesn’t, but the inter-human experience that he can have in such an environment, I think it’s much more valuable than hundreds of books or articles that any of us would read. So, I would conclude by saying that I want to bring a new movement in Romania, in the way in which we celebrate disabilities, but also in the way in which we interact and become friends with what this universe means.

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