peacecamp 2018

Hello everybody! My name is László Hajba (Laci), and I’m new to PeaceCamp. I took the role of coordinator for my school from Szilvia this year, but she is still helping me from the background.
In my professional life I’m a freelance language teacher and educational consultant, and also an openly gay teacher in a secondary school in Budapest. I care deeply about equality, tolerance and freedom of speech and thought, and I bring these issues to my lessons as well. I am also a committee member of the Global Issues Special Interest Group of IATEFL (International Association of Teachers of English as a Foreign Language) where we promote awareness and understanding of global issues to exchange ideas on integrating peace education, human rights education, development education, and environmental education into English language teaching. It is for teachers who see themselves as educators in addition to teaching the language and who are keen to bring real-world issues into the classroom, instil a sense of social responsibility and develop critical thinking skills.
In my personal life I’m an avid gamer (board games and video games alike), runner, sci-fi fan (especially Doctor Who) and computer geek. I’m looking forward to getting to know all of you in July.

My name is Ghadeer Zoabi. This is my second participation in peacecamp as the Palestinian Coordinator. I really enjoyed the team, the workshops and the fascinating landscape in Lackenholf that I wanted to be part of this amazing family for the second time (I hope it wouldn’t be my last participation). Last year, I was overwhelmed by the way participants interact and honestly express themselves by confronting their fears and prejudices. I believe in openness, respect and communicative discussions to get to know the other, who could be geographically or religiously different but shares a lot with our character and interests. In addition, we have to discover our true self and redefine our identities in order to relate to other people in a wider range.
I am a proud mother of four teenagers (two girls and two twin boys) and always try to encourage them to challenge themselves in every possible way.
I work as a high school teacher of English and communication studies. I enjoy my job for I like being around teenagers, who constantly amaze me with their fresh spirit. However, troublemakers make me wonder what I am doing at school and consider other possible careers, not yet hopefully .
I wish you all a wonderful time and a marvelous experience in peacecamp18.

Hi, everybody!
My name is Edward, I’m 70 years old and I’m the co-ordinator of the Austrian delegation.
I was a teacher and headmaster of a private school until 2016. Although I’m retired now I have so much to do that I wouldn’t have time to work again. Currently I spend most of my time for studying, a bit of my time I spend for doing sports, making music and doing voluteer work with children and adults at the red cross organisation. In my spare free time I enjoy life very much with my friends and my family.
I’m married to Susan and I have two grown-up children and soon I’ll be grandfather of three lovely children.
In summer I live in a small village in Burgenland next to the Hungarian border, in winter I’m most of the time in Vienna, the city I love very much.
I’m not a very skilled musician but I like to play the piano, the guitar, and I like to sing peace-songs with a friend of mine. Although I don’t have much time I like doing sports, above all I like cross-country skiing and alpine skiing in winter, cycling, swimming, and nordic walking in summer … and I‘d like to travel around Europe.
From time to time I work as a mediator and I like to help people solve their conflicts and problems. I want to know more about other cultures and meeting you is a very good possibility to know how people live, to get information about your country, your culture, and to practise and improve my language skills of English. I’m sure participating in the project will widen my understanding of other people’s problems my own perspectives of the world we live in.
2017 was the first time I participated the peacecamp-project. This year is my second time to be in peacecamp as a co-ordinator of the Austrian delegation. I’m very happy I can be part of the project again. For me it was a wonderful experience and I am sure it will be very nice again. I honour Evelyn and Ronny very much and I admire the wonderful job they do with the project.
I’m looking forward with huge curiosity to meeting you. I‘m sure we all will get a lot out of this marvellous project and we’ll see the world and all the problems from a new perspective.