«Like in a Russian folk tale «Masha and the Bear» we got to sit in all the chairs and eat from all the bowls» – that is how a participant of the Estonian camp describes her experience. Estonian camp took place in Haapsalu, a resort town with a rich cultural heritage. Employees and volunteers of the Russian Museum in Tallinn became the participants of the local camp. The local program included visits to a theme center Ilon’s Wonderland, Ants Laikmaa Museum, and Haapsalu Castle.
Even though all these venues are extremely interesting, the focus of the program was still on the people, individuals, not the places.
In every venue, the participants were accompanied by the facilitator – educator Karin Mägi from the Foundation of Haapsalu and Läänemaa Museums. As her method, she used the workshops to create stories for the museums, ones in which facts and fragmented artifacts come together in a single plot. In a way, it was a chance for participants to practice mediation.
Here are some of the revelations the participants made:
🔸Mediation can take different forms, it is a ”transformer”;
🔸A mediator creates the process of understanding the meaning which can be very individual. The mediator does not add anything;
🔸Mediation is like a fountain – circulating, pumping the water in different directions, and circulating again. Or like a river that makes the wheel of a mill move;
🔸There is multidimensionality and multi-layeredness in teamwork and it can be changed in the process;
🔸Mediation is a process of interaction, exchange of energy in a way that it does not get lost, and in the end, it comes out, and the story is born;
🔸Mediation is like a closure of gestalt, a chance to understand yourself better – in the childhood and the present moment, to remember one’s parents, understand them in a different way.
The lesson learned was that the main resource we need for learning something is time. And specifically the time we need to devote to our inner child – that is, to do what we really, really want. Ilon’s Wonderland, the theme center for children and families based on the works of the world-famous illustrator of children’s books – Ilon Wikland, turned out to be the right place to discuss complex and serious topics.