Exchanges weekend 2021

Text: Stefan Leung | University of Zurich

From 8th to 10th of October 2021, the Exchanges Weekend 2021 (ExWE21) took place. It was held in Marbachegg (Lucerne) with an outstanding view of the UNESCO world heritage “Schrattenfluh”. No surprise that the venue was only reachable by a cable car. With a total of 27 participants, this was one of the first 3G swimsa events which were held in person and without masks. For once, we were able to forget about the whole pandemic and enjoyed a weekend far away from any zoom meetings and computer screens.

The event already started on Friday morning, when our international guests from Serbia, Romania, Lithuania, Greece and Belgium landed in Zurich. Firstly, we organized a city tour through the old town in Zurich where we ended up on the top of Lindenhof to enjoy the panorama over the Limmat river. Later, we traveled to Lucerne for a quick sightseeing tour including the famous Chapel Bridge, Lion Monument and the Old Town and of course, our guests did not miss the breathtaking mountain scenery at Lake Lucerne.

On Friday evening, we started the Exchanges Weekend with a National Food and Drink Party (NFDP). Delicacies from local places like Basel and Fribourg as well as other European countries brought by our international guests were presented on lovely decorated tables. The Organising Committee provided enough fondue, chocolates and Rivella for everyone. After the first alcoholfree hour, samples of sweet honey meads and strong Rakija were served by our international guests as a digestif.

Our international guests on Friday in Lucerne

On Saturday we woke up to a stunning view of the sunrise over the Schrattenfluh. Unfortunately, after some rays of sunshine, the fog came back and we almost could not see our own tipi from our terrace anymore.

For the ExWE21, we invited three Exchanges Trainers from Belgium, Greece and Romania to deliver quality sessions to our participants. The first session was about Global Health Education which has become increasingly important nowadays. It was followed by some Sharing is Caring sessions, where we brainstormed about potential new national social programs or what kind of challenges we faced during the pandemic. During Small Working Groups (SWGs) we started the revision of our Upon Arrival Booklet for our Incomings, we searched for possibilities to invest the green fees collected from the outgoing students to compensate for their CO2 emissions and what we can improve in the future to motivate our Local Exchange Officers (LEO).

On Saturday afternoon, the participants could either join the hybrid LEOLORE Meeting or bake some briochedough figures, called “Grittibänz” in SwissGerman. The last sessions for the day were about SOGIESC (Sexual Orientation, Gender Identity and Expression and Sex Characteristics) in Exchanges, cultural competence in Exchanges and time and mental health management. The main social program for this evening was all about dancing and singing. From our famous Just Dance sessions to some karaoke, we had a great party for the night. Luckily, we were alone in the mountains, so no neighbors’ ears were hurt in the process.

After a long night, we started our last day on Sunday with a huge brunch. The last three sessions were about motivation and empowerment for Exchange Officers, outcomebased Exchanges and advocacy and marketing. During the closing presentation, all Small Working Groups presented their work and what the next steps would be to continue the work on the topics.

The amazing Exchanges Weekend 2021 came to an end on Sunday afternoon with a three hour hike down to the valley station. After a whole Saturday in the fog, we were lucky to get perfect October weather. On the way down, our international guests made the acquaintance of some cows and calves. All in all, the event ended with having made new friends locally and from abroad as well as newly gained skills to take Exchanges back to its level from before the global pandemic. Check out our reel from the Exchanges Weekend 2021 on our Instagram page swimsa.ch!

The Organising Committee with the Kitchen Team on Sunday morning.