3rd Meeting – Seville, 21st-25th October

The third Comenius meeting took place from 21st to 25th October in Seville, Spain, where Xavier and Salvador and their team made a great job of keepng everyone happy. This time the emphasis was very much on drama, with all of the participating schools presenting dances, sketches and recitals. The Austrian team consisted of three teachers this time, Mrs Schneidhofer, Mrs Rasinger and Mr King, and we were accompanied by four fourth-year pupils, Tim Benesch, Christoph Vappetic, Emma Clement and Daria King.
One of the “homework” tasks was to prepare masks that would represent the feelings happiness, love, anger, sadness, lust, hate, envy, pride and fear. Ours were made by the pupils of 3e, under the watchful eye of Mrs Fasching. Our first task at the school in Seville was to show off our masks and exchange them with masks from other countries. Some of the masks will be used by professional actors in plays in Seville.
After “breakfast” (at 11:00 am) the pupils were taken into Seville to the Parque de Maria Luisa to do some orienteering in mixed-nationality teams. Mr King’s team won, of course (but we didn’t get a prize…). We did all manage to get back on the coach before the real rain started, though.
The “afternoon” (evening for us) was free, but very wet. As the weather was not ideal for sightseeing we took a bus into the city centre and the pupils had a meal at Burger King before returning to the hotel with Mrs Schneidhofer. Mrs Rasinger and Mr King went to a very impressive flamenco show with one of the two German teams and then enjoyed some terrifically tasty tapas for dinner.

Wednesday was performance day and our pupils showed off the dance they had prepared with the help of Mrs Rasinger. They did a fine job, despite having to go first. The other countries also performed some very good pieces and it was interesting to see how differently each country had interpreted the task.

After breakfast there was another creative task to complete, again in mixed-nationality groups. Using all sorts of objects, pictures, etc., the pupils either had to represent things they liked about Spain and the Comenius trip or things they did not like about them. These things were then attached to a “shopping bag” or a “waste paper basket”. Each group then presented their piece of work and explained their choices. This exercise was a great opportunity for the pupils to get to know each other better and worked very well.
After lunch we all went to the river to do some kayaking and visit a museum, Pabellon de la Navegacion (Pavillion of Navigation).

Thursday morning was again devoted to drama, with our pupils performing a very entertaining version of The Alder King (Der Erlkönig), which saw Christoph pulling out all the stops to get the audience laughing. After a visit to part of the university accommodation, where we heard about the very difficult living conditions of people in that area, we returned to school to see a play performed by ex-pupils. Unfortunately, as it was all in Spanish, we didn’t understand an awful lot of it…

Thursday afternoon and evening were the last chance for everyone to mix, with an orienteering competition through the old town centre (guess which group won!) followed by group meals for the pupils and the teachers.