IC is over...

Yesterday the whole delegation returned to our youth hostel where we had alreadz stayed before IC. Kind of feels like coming home... We had dinner together and spent the evening in the hostel's bar with some cocktails, trying to hve our own social closing of the conference.
It is really difficult to realize everything that has happened, to process all impressions and information, to sort things out and draw conclusions... that will certainly take quite a while.

I enjoyed the last days of the conference most, because I finally felt how I could connect to people, have wonderful conversations all night long, enjoy the parties (due to a bad cold during the first days of the conference I had to go to bed earlier than I wanted).

So in the end most of us really didn't feel like going home. I would have liked to stay another week. Not only knowing that at home my diploma thesis is waiting for me, but even more because I there are another 400 people at IC that I did not have the chance to talk to and that I would love to get to know... Oh well, fortunately in AIESEC there are always plenty of opportunities to meet again, and I hope to have the chance to facilitate at other interntional conferences soon!

Birte

The End is near

Only 1 and a half days are left of IC 2008. It’s unbelivable how fast the time has passed. 8 Days full of partner launches, discussions and parties are behind us and when there was a break in the agenda it was filled with a country meeting.
Just now we have finished the morning plenary and looking forward to a day full of functional training and of course the official gala dinner in the evening. J

Cheers,
Mathias

Partner Launches

Most of the days at IC start with a partner launch and sometimes there is a second partner launch around lunch. So you could suspect, that this would result in endless and boring company presentations. But it’s completely different here at IC. Most of the company representatitives are high profile speakers and that becomes aparents in course of their presentations. So it happens quite often that those launches are the highlight of the day.
Some companies, that are present here at IC: Microsoft, ING, Alcatel-Lucent, PwC, Artemisia & Ashoka etc. ect.!

Yours,Mathias

Sessions on IC

What are we actually doing on IC? We talked about country meeting, about parties, about the opening… but what are actually the sessions all about? I want to give you a brief impression on how sessions look like.

The first days of IC have been focussing a lot on the external trends. We had many workshops on sustainability, workshops by external partners, many key note speakers and panelists from diverse and interesting backgrounds, we discussed our personal ideas and goals and exchanged ideas how we can contribute to a better world. In this context we also discussed the position, role, and relevance of AIESEC.

We also took part in the Alumni Congress celebrating AIESEC’s 60^th anniversary, which was organized as a huge Open Space, giving us opportunity to get to know our alumni, being inspired by their stories and how they continued their way after their time in AIESEC. The Open Space was hosted by one of the founding fathers of “Art of Hosting”, which was great to see, how an professional Open Space looks like.

Since yesterday, the IC started to focus a lot more on current AIESEC issues. The word of this conference is certainly “growth”. So yesterday we got introduce to a number of growth strategies and heard several examples of countries who have successfully made use of them.

Today we will have workshops to explore these growth strategies further. I’m looking forward to these workshops although I’m not sure, whether I agree with everything that is proposed there. Throughout the last days we have become increasingly sceptical concerning the aggressive way some people/countries promote growth. Nevertheless it is very interesting to see which ways some countries find to position themselves, to set up partnerships, to explore key markets, and to improve their performance. We collect many ideas what might work in Germany as well.

Compared to our conferences, the sessions during IC are a lot more up-front. We are presented fancy movies, long speeches and one power-point after another. I guess, this is the global way of transmitting content, I personally would wish for more opportunities to discuss issues in groups. Instead, we usually have just “sharing rounds”. Good Case Practises take an important role, which are often very interesting. The discussions take place in breaks and during the parties.

Greetings from Brazil!

Birte

WENA PARTY

Hey AIESEC Germany1

Who rocks the house? - Germany rocks the house on IC!
Especially if you consider the WENA Party. You might know that AIESEC in the world is devided in 6 regions jusst like AIESEC Germany is. WENA is one of those world regions and stands for Western Europe North America. The other regions are Central Eastern Europe (CEE), Middle East North Africa (MENA), Asia Pacific (AP), Ibero America (IGN) and Africa.
Well, in addition to the offical Global Village that was already held, there are global villages on the parties, one of each the regions. You can imagine those global villages just like the ones we are used to at German conferences. At the Offical Global Village, it is more about content and no alcohol is allowed.
Monday evening, finally, it was WENA party. Parties do not really start before midnight here on IC as everyone is so busy with country meetings. Germany was the first contry to set up the stand in the party room. Our delegtaion had bought some material for showing our coulors: banners, Luftschlangen and of course a flag. As gifts we had wrist bands in the German coulors. We had imported plenty of litres of liqueur: Korn, Jägermeister, Asbach and Eierlikör! Delicious, isn’t it? When the people wanted to have some Korn with soda (Kinderbrause), they had to come in groups of three to our stand. Tell us their reasons for drinking tonight, put some soda on their hand, drink the shot, shake their head and done. We would encourage them with the shout: Three reasons for drinking, two incredients, one try, GO GO GO. I can tell you we rocked the house, everyone wanted to come to the German stand. Besides, the DJ did not have AIESEC songs on his notebook, so we privided him with some and also taught the party people to dance the “I like to move it”. It was definitely so far the best party on IC. Our delegation was striving for excellence and enjoye participation!
So, my dear members and colleagues, work hard, party harder!
Yours Rebekka

Country Meeting with Iran

This IC offered a great opportunity to catch up with our extension in Iran, get to know the people better, learn about the Iranin realiy and how we from Germany can support our extension best.
The MCP from Iran, Alireza, and the MCVP Exchange, Communication & IS (what a job description…), Neda, are here at IC. Yesterday evening we had a country meeting with Neda, and she gave us a very detailed update on how things are going in Iran. We talked about the current state of the LC and MC, about their exchange plans, CEEDers, conferences and trainings, planned projects, knowledge management, and many other topcis.
As none of us has been directly responsible for the Iran extension, we were all really impressed what is already happening in Iran. Many information have been new for us and we identified many small things how we can improve our suport for Iran. Neda is a wonderful young woman, and she knows exactly what she wants.
Iran will be looking for a CEEDer this fall and next spring, an there will also be new exchange opportunities with Unilever. We are very much looking forward to receive more detailed information to pass on to you. So keep your eyes open on SAM, this might be the challenge you have been looking for!!

At night we had MENA (Middle East - Northern Africa) party, with chicha, arabic music and dancing. MENA parties are traditionally non-alcohol parties. It was quite sad to see, that this seemed to be a reason for many people to prefer to have country meeting and working groups instead of joining the party. Nevertheless there was a good atmosphere J.

Yesterday I had also a meeting with the MCVP ER from Bahrain. It was very interesting to hear which events they organize together with companies, how they position themselves, and what their proposition to companies is. She told me, that it was very hard for them to offer “Talent Access” to companies, as it is so easy for global companies in Bahrain to have access to students from all over the world, so they are not wiling to pay for any acitivities offering engagement with students from Bahrain. Again I realized, how little I know about Middle East countries and realities. This IC opens my eyes and challenges my perspective on these countries. I’m really looking forward to having more discussions!
Birte

Country Meetings

One of the most interesting parts of the IC is the opportunity to meet with different country delegations, having discussions about Good Case Practices, cooperations between the countries and relevant developments in the network. As there are only few spaces in Agenda for those meetings, they are mostly done at lunch, dinner, after the Agenda or even at the bus on the way to a special event.
Before the IC we identified certain target countries, especially in terms of exchange, we could set up meetings with, to discuss the further collaboration between our countries. Naturally that are mostly the larger countries in the network. Beside that we are also meeting with smaller countries to exchange Good Case Practices or just to give them the chance to introduce AIESEC in their countries to us.

Yours,
Mathias

Hello dear AIESECers,

yesterday we had the official opening ceremony for the IC. The main theme of this year's congress is "Responsible Youth. Sustainable Future." There were many guest speakers including the President of AIESEC International in 1978/79 and the former minister of the environment. We had a Capoeira presentation and even more introduction into the Brazilian culture.

After the Opening there was the Official Global Village. 106 countries/territories presented their local food and culture, it was a very special moment. The girls in the German delegation dressed up in Bavarian traditional clothes and the guys went for the northern fishermen shirts.




Yours,
Michael

What an amazing city... imagine a place were 19 million people live - more than in the complete North Rhine Westfalia.

We went to the highest building in Sao Paulo and took that video of the downtown of Sao Paulo:

Hello beloved readers of our Blog,

finally we made to give you a short impression of our first experiences in awsome Brazil.
Birte, Mathias and me arrived on the 14th in the morning and got to know the city on our own (ah okay...alone with Birtes lonely planet).
The funniest thing was when we had our trip from the airport (which is 30 km away from the centre) to our hostel. We decided to take the cheap bus and metro instead of having the airport shuttle. When we finally were standing in the metro (which seemed impossible in the beginning because of the huge amoun of people) we saw an advertisement for the Official Global Village of the IC in Sao Paulo...we were so surprised but it felt good.

Sao Paulo is full with so many different people and all of them are very hospitable.
The whole entire city has so many different faces that it is impossible to discover all of them within a few days.

After the first two days we went to Rio de Janeiro with another 80 AIESECers.
For us it was also great to take the Study Tour as a start into the conference. We got to know people, we started talking to them and we got a feeling for the international network.
Everything will be a lot more comfortable for us tomorrow when we are (finally) going to the IC Site, because we already know so many people.
Rio was amazing. It is defintetely one of the most beautiful cities in the world. We had a tough program (with brazilian time:)) but we saw a lot during two days. We started in a Samba Club and ended at the Christ Statue.
Yesterday we had a laundry party at the washing machines in our hostel with some guys from Greece and Italy discussion the member selection in AIESEC.
So we have a lot of fun but we also getting to know the network.

Tomorrow we will go to the IC and after the beginning of the IC you will find our first impressions in this blog.

Enjoy reading and add a lot of comments, guys.
See you back in Germany
In charge of the German Knaller-Delegation
Gesa

Birte, Gesa an Mathias have already left for Brazil last week and currently are on the Study Tour to Rio de Janeiro. Nuno hast left for the pre-meeting on Saturday and Verena, Rebekka and me will take the flights this Tuesday night.

Have a look at the IC 2008 video:



Your IC-Delegation 2008!

Dear AIESEC Germany,

with this blog we would like to keep you updated about what we will be experiencing at IC in Brazil. IC is the biggest conference that AIESEC offers and is being held once a year around August. Around 650 delegates from 108 countries are attending, creating an unique atmosphere throughout the whole 10 days. With that around 350 Alumni will engage by celebrating AIESEC's 60th anniversary.

IC is just like your national or regional conference. You have facilitators, a chair, many delegates, role calls, partner sessions, functional tracks and of course parties.

Become a part of the IC Delegation and have a look at what happens on IC 2008 by reading this blog.

Your IC-Delegation 2008,
Birte (TB), Gesa (MU), Mathias (JE), Michael, Nuno, Rebekka, Verena