Goals

Problem statement:

For the youth of Rustavi, the last two decades have been one of increasing difficulty: the lack of opportunities, limited public spaces for interaction and very few meaningful cultural events. Many regularly commute to Tbilisi for jobs and opportunities, but this reduces the chance to develop a supportive local community.

We want to make life more exciting for youth here through a series of regular cultural events and creative parties in the open air, such as in the national park of Rustavi, events that reflect and embrace the city’s diversity. This events will also allow the youth to demonstrate their talents and create spaces for meaningful and inclusive interaction.

Last year, we organised three major events at this venue which were reported on local TV. The photos are on our Facebook page: www.facebook.com/mindandwill

The first event was the celebration of the Day of Friendship on May 2nd. We found creative youth to perform stage, supported by the Youth Center of the Rustavi Mayor. This began our organization activities, and we gained many supporters who wanted future events. We want to Friendship Day every year.

The second event, “Look into your Friend’s Eyes,” was broader and involved a variety of dancing groups and singers. The third event involved ethnic Azerbaijani youth from different schools of Rustavi. They performed Georgian folk dances and sang different Georgian and Azerbaijani songs.

There's projects are just the beginning, but they reflect the possibilities of creating a community here in Rustavi if they begin to happen regularly.

Proposed Solution:

The beneficiaries of our project will be the youth from different ethnic groups. After this September in Aliev square, the creative pupils have asked us to do it every year. This coming September, we are will do so, calling this event "Cultural Friendship." Besides the spectator audience, painters, singers, children's musical bands, and folk studio members will participate. The age of participants ranges from 7 to 16 years old.

On the 16th of October, we will organize the event "Funny Friendship" in the national park of Rustavi, which will involve the largest number of schools yet. At of now, we have chosen participants from the Georgian Gymnasium of Rustavi and the 18th State School. We plan to inform more schools not only in Rustavi, but also in Gardabani. The participants will be selected by their music teachers.
We will find the creative youth in the schools and institutes and help them to make their events, or shows in the open air of the National Square of Rustavi, where there is a big stage. Such cultural events will help the youth communicate and realize their abilities in addition to adding joy to life and integrate diverse sections of society.

We hope that all of these festivals will combine to uncover the intellectual and creative part of Rustavi.

Sustainability:

We want to interest youth in developing their own creative abilities, so that one day they can organize their own festivals.

In the meantime, we are planning more events. We plan to make exhibitions of their pictures, photos, design models. The organization has its own resources: Molberts for the paintings' exhibition. It will be in the open air in the national park of Rustavi or in the Square of Aliev, and we have the mayor’s permission. Music groups who can sing and dance will participate, and our will help them to showcase their abilities to a wider audience.

To perform these events, we need speakers and microphones. This equipment will be a good resource to our organization to make joyful events in the city traditionally three or four times each year, one for every season. The equipment will let us to solve the problems related to equipment rental costs.

Equal gender opportunity:

All the events that we organize are open to the public, and the musical groups we work with comprise of both male and female students.