Through the Eyes of Erika:
“Hello! I’d like to introduce myself in this short article with much love. My name is Erika Peña. I’m currently the communications and volunteer coordinator at Sunseed, and I had the opportunity to say yes to organising a local activity as a follow-up to a project called Storytelling for Change, which took place at Sunseed Desert Technology last February as part of the Community Café Project, a Youth Participation Activity funded by Erasmus+.
The Idea and Planning
We wanted to celebrate Earth Day, taking into account the time Freddy would be at Sunseed and other factors, which led us to choose Saturday, April 19th, for our activity. The idea was simple: a cleanup of the semi-desert ecosystem around Sunseed. The waste collected would be used as raw materials to create accessories or elements to be incorporated back into our space, closing the waste cycle. With Freddy’s ingenuity in construction, my logistics, and Ashley’s holistic planning, the result was an event we called “CaminArte: from Trash to Creativity.”
A month beforehand, we started creating the poster and began distributing it both on social media and in nearby towns to invite people outside of Sunseed to join the activity, aiming to attract as many participants as possible for Saturday. Every week at Sunseed, we held small planning meetings to organize the event, review what needed to be done or checked within our facilities, and share updates with the community so that everyone had the same information and could give suggestions along the way.
The CaminArte Event: From Trash to Creativity
The CaminArte event began with all our energy in the morning, as we set out on a walk along three routes near Sunseed to collect bottles, alumminum cans, glass, and plastics of various shapes and sizes. We returned to the main house, combined all the bags, enjoyed a delicious vegan rice lunch together, took a short break, and continued in the afternoon with different examples of accessories to hang as decorations. At this point, dear reader, we were already halfway through and a bit low on energy, but creativity gradually kicked in, and we came up with different ideas, painting, cutting, and forming these decorations. Finally, we had a delicious snack and expressed our gratitude for this opportunity.
For me, this event showed how a group of people with the intention to improve our space can make it a reality, thanks to initiatives like the Community Café Project.”
