Weltwärts

The German Government set up the Weltwärts programme to allow young Germans to volunteer in a different country for 6-18 months in areas like education, health, environment, culture and human rights, in order to broaden their minds and strengthen international understanding.

The following are excerpts from volunteers' final reports after 12 months in Auroville A transformative year that still resonates Much time has passed since my Weltwärts year in 2008-09.

Friederike Mühlhans has a long experience of working for Auroville International (AVI). Since 1997 she has been a board member of AVI Germany and since 2003 she has been Secretary of the AVI Board, with a four-year break when she served as Chairperson.

Abishek, a youth from Annai Nagar village, recently spent 18 months volunteering in Germany, as part of the Weltwärtsprogramme.

Long-term AVI Germany board member Thomas Dreyer passed away on 6 January after a long and serious illness. Thomas was the main project manager of the German Weltwärts volunteers programme, supported by his wife Birgit.

On a sultry May summer’s evening, after one of its communal and tasty pizza nights, the Youth Centre (YC) premiered a documentary simply titled ‘The Youth Centre’.

As Auroville battles encroachment, nearby deforestation, water depletion and chemical farming, the green skills developed by the pioneers who brought the barren plateau back to life become ever more important.

Under this programme, over the past eight years 122 young German volunteers have come to work in Auroville, generally for a period of one year.