Inclusion is Fusion!

Svátek čaje is a multicultural festival, which is held yearly since 2009 on the castle grounds in Cieszyn near the Polish-Czech border. This area offers unique atmosphere created by the historically significant buildings surrounding the castle hill. The organizers of the festival (come from both sides of the border and) are the civic associations Laja Foundation and Petrklic help z. s. The event promotes cultural diversity and creates a platform for meetings and exchanges between people from the tea production and trade. The first edition of Svátek čaje in Cieszyn and Český Těšín was held from 12th to 13th June 2009. The event, which was originally intended as a technical meeting of owners of teahouses. Gradually it grew into a public event focused not only on the culture of drinking tea, but also on traveling and learning about music and customs of foreign nations. The event took place in the courtyard of Castle Hill on the Czech-Polish border, in Laja tearoom on Polish sid...

If we talk about sustainability there is no way around to actually live sustainably and follow a critical path of consumption. One essential way of living sustainably is to live "zero waste". Zero Waste has become a life philosophy, movement and life style for many people in the world who choose to use natural products without plastics and packaging. Looking at waste, cosmetics play a big role in producing micro plastics (in creams) and plastic packaging: Everyday we are using tooth paste, body lotion or soap that are probably wrapped with plastic. There is an alternative to that! Milan Maushart from International Young Nature Friends put together some ideas of how to produce your own after sun lotion, shaving cream and soap for travelling: First of all, it is very important to prepare everything properly and be very careful when doing so. Every jar and every pot you use should be fumigated. You can do that by using new ones but I would recommend to use normal po...

Living Library is meant to provide a safe environment for sharing and discussion. You can think of it as an actual library where people go, borrow books for a limited time and read them. Only here the books are people and the action of reading the book means having a conversation with "it". In our case, the books were some of us, the participants of the second meeting for the INFUSION project in Cieszyn, and the readers were the visitors of the Tea festival that was happening at the same time. The topics of the books can vary and their subfocus is to challenge stereotypes, discrimination and prejudice.   The Living Library attempts to challenge prejudice by facilitating a conversation between two people: Books and Readers. Books are volunteers who have either been subjected to discrimination themselves or represent groups or individuals within society that are at risk of suffering from stereotype, stigma, prejudice or discrimination. Living Books often have pe...