We attended to the learning activity of Errasmus plus project "Young Urban Creative Inclusive Tours" between 7 / 11 September 2022 in Ancona. The project is carried out by the German Federation of the Blind with partnership of Italy, Belgium and our association. Our members Elif Kain, Mina Turgut and İbrahim Elibal participated in the program.
You can read the report prepared by the group below.
The group left for Bologna, Italy on Wednesday, 7 September. From there we travelled by train to Ancona where the event will be held. Our group settled in the hotel in Bologna and Ancona without any problems.
The event started with a visit to the Cathedral of San Ciriaco on 8 September 2022. The Cathedral of San Ciriaco, also known as the Duomo, named after St Cyriacus, is one of Ancona's most popular landmarks. Located on Guasco Hill, on the site of the old acropolis of the city of Ancona, founded by Greek colonisers from Syracuse, the Duomo sits on the foundations of an ancient temple dedicated to the goddess Aphrodite. the Roman amphitheatre and the Church of Santa Maria della Piazza are also next to the Cathedral.
We were welcomed at the Cathedral of San Ciriaco by an official who gave us information about the Cathedral. After the information received under the rain, we visited San Ciriaco Cathedral. During the presentation made here, Ancona city map, San Ciriaco Cathedral and tactile printouts, prepared for the churches around it, were shown.
A guide also gave information about the ruins of the Roman amphitheatre cloce to the Cathedral. However, we didn’t enter in to the ruins.
A presentation was made in front of the historic Marche Teatro building in Ancona, which hosts actors and directors from different generations and is loved by the public. In the presentation, information was given about the history of the theatre and the artists it hosted. The tactile output of the theatre was shown to the participants.
After a walk on Pope's Square, the famous square of Ancona, we went to the restaurant for lunch. Groups had enjoyable and informative conversations with each other on the lunch. Samples of Italian cuisine were served during the meal.
The learning activity in Ancona continued with a visit to the Homer State Tactile Museum. Built in 1993, it houses artefacts copied from all over the world.
Founded in 1985 by Aldo Grassini and Daniela Bottegon, the Museum opened on 2 December 1993 in a wing of the Donatello secondary school. In the summer of 2012, the Museum moved to its current location, the Mole Vanvitelliana.
As a 3D encyclopaedia of art history, the Museum contains casts from original ancient Greek masterpieces, sculptures by Michelangelo and Canova, and works of art by contemporary artists such as De Chirico, Marini, Martina, Messina, Pistoletto and others.
The collections are divided into 4 main rooms:
- Greco-Roman art
- Romanesque-Gothic art
- Renaissance art
- Contemporary art.
The museum also offers various courses open to families and professionals, training for teachers, counselling services and a documentation centre.
The learning activity continued on 9 September 2022 with a visit to Ancona Nature Park and the surrounding lakes. This park, which harbours many plant species, offers a beautiful view for walkers as it is also close to the sea.
During the walk in the park, the guide provided detailed information about the plant species found here. Participants could touch the plants and their leaves. Deep Lake and Great Lake located near the park were visited. Visually impaired participants had good experiences.
On the same day, groups were separated and different activities were carried out. During the free time, participants had chances to walk on the beach, swim, tour the city centre. participants from Our association carried out activities with different groups.
The learning activity continued with a visit to the town of Castelfidardo on 10 September 2022. Firstly, the administration building used during the establishment period of the town was visited and a presentation was made to the group by the guide.
This town, which is the centre of the production of the accordion and its ability to be played by everyone, contains buildings that reflect the evolutionary stages of the accordion and the different aspects of the craft profession. The accordion factory founded by Paolo Saproni has produced many accordions of different types and sizes for a long time. The accordions produced are exhibited in the Accordion Museum. In this museum you can witness the historical development of accordions. During this visit, we had the opportunity to touch the accordions and parts produced there. We were also given a short accordion concert.
During our visit to the Castelfidardo campus, the church and parks were visited. Visually impaired participants touched the sculptures of accordionists.
At the end of the tour, packages prepared for lunch were distributed in a church. An accordion player gave a concert during the lunch. After the lunch, a photo session was organised with the artist and the group.
After the event, feedback on mobility was received in the same church. Among those who provided feedback, the participants of our association were the most active in expressing their views and opinions.
As a result of the explanations and our experiences, we are considering the following topics for future events.
1- It was stated that the prepared tours and the presentations of the guides were successful.
2- It was emphasised that the selected hotel is positive in terms of being central, but not suitable in terms of accessibility and usability. It was emphasised that a staircase consisting of 54 steps in total was required to reach the selected hotel, which was not suitable for participants with walking difficulties and wheelchair users. In addition, an introductory tour and room presentation were not made upon arrival at the hotel.
3- It was emphasised that the selected restaurants were successful and not problematic in terms of variety. Evening meals were served at a restaurant about 10 minutes walk from the hotel.
4- Two volunteers were organised by the Italian team. These volunteers did their best to help the participants. In addition, the chaperones who came with the participants from other countries endeavoured to help all participants. Our association did not take extra accompanying persons as it exceeded the foreseen budget.
5- No preparations have been made by the Italy team for low vision. The number and comprehensibility of the tactile outputs prepared for the visually impaired should be increased. The tactile outputs may have been small due to technical possibilities. Larger printouts could have been prepared.
6- The vehicles used for the transfer of the participants were smooth.
7- Our team did not have any problems in accessing the airport and railway station in Italy. Access to the means of transport was provided by prior appointment with the special help desk staff at the railway station and the airport.
The members of our association returned on 11 September 2022 by completing an event where good friendships were established, promoting our country and our association in the best way. During the event, Mina Turgut shared social media posts. Elif Kain and İbrahim Elibal helped to prepare descriptions and short introductory texts. Our team endeavoured to mingle with other groups at every opportunity and to promote our association and our country. We wish our association success in its future endeavours. We would like to thank all our managers and all those who have contributed to representing our country and our association in the best way on national and international platforms.
Elif Kain, Mina Turgut, İbrahim Elibal
We hosted "Diffability" project’s Transnational partners meeting
We hosted the transnational partners meeting of erasmuss plus project "Diffability" between 14 - 15 July 2022 in Ankara. The Diffability project was executed by Vytautas Magnus University of Lithuania as applicant institution, our association from Turkey and various organisations from Germany, Belgium, Slovenia, Portugal and Turkey as partners.
International Relations Secretary Adil Ahmet Kavrama, International Relations Commission Officer Ümit Erdem Yiğitoğlu and Oğuz Akkaya from the Education Commission attended the meeting on behalf of our association between 13-16 July 2022.
during the project;
in order to contribute to the transition of disabled university students to business life, entrepreneurship training curriculum will be prepared and presented through an online platform, trainings and meetings will be held for universities and employers.
In this meeting, which was held at the office of our Association in Ankara, the work carried out so far was evaluated, the responsibilities of the partners and the timetable were clerified. In addition, the issues addressed in the document prepared by our association on creating accessible materials and shared with the partners were presented live with concrete examples. With the interactive presentation participants could ask questions, share experiences and learn more about spesifics of digital accessibility.
So far in the project; sharing information about creating accessible digital materials, determining the needs by reviewing the literature and good practice examples, and determining the topics expected to be included in the entrepreneurship course curriculum have been carried out. Participants had the chanse to discuss the works so far, share their experiences and learn from each other. After the meeting, the curriculum will be prepared and pilot application of the curriculum will be evaluated through focus group studies, a training package for employers, service packs for both employers and universities will prepared created and the project will be completed with the launch of the website where all of the project content will be available.
Bu metni şu anda paylaştığımızda metin güncel durmuyor. Proje bitti. Şu ana göre yazsak geç kalınmış gibi hissettiriyor bana. Bence mantıklı olan metin sonuna not olarak projenin aralık 2023 tarihinde tamamlandığını yazabiliriz.
Note: the project has been completed on December 2023. EGED will continue to take steps for the participation of people with disabilities in education and business life together with its different members during this comprehensive project process, in which EGED is both a participant and a host, and will continue to share its experiences with its members and followers.
"Young Urban Inclusive Tours" Erasmus+ Project Management Meeting in Italy
We attended the management meeting of project, "Young Urban Creative Inclusive Tours", in Bologna, Italy, in which the German Federation of the Blind is the applicant institution and our association is a partner with other organisations from Italy, Belgium and Turkey. EGED International Affairs Secretary Adil Ahmet Kavrama, EGED General Secretary Oğuzhan AL and EGED member Enes BÜLBÜL attended the meeting organised between 03-05 June 2022 on behalf of our association.
As part of the project various learning activities and meetings on accessible tourism will be carried out in different countries. At the management meeting of the project held in Italy the we discussed previous learning mobility meeting held in Berlin, the outputs of the Survey on the Expectations and Needs of Visually Impaired and Low Vision Travellers on Guided City Tours in different countries. Furthermore we discussed plans for of the future meetings to be held in Italy and in our country. After the meeting, all participants from partner countries had the opportunity to examine braille booklets and the instruments of European Music of the last 600 years in the Bologna International Music Museum.
You can read the experience article of Oğuzhan AL, one of the team members, about the meeting below.
We set off to attend the management meeting in Italy of the "Young Urban Creative Inclusive Tours" project, in which the German Federation of the Blind is the project owner and our association is a partner from Italy, Belgium and Turkey. Here I will try to share with you the experiences we have had since the preparation process.
Preparation process:
After it became clear that we would attend the meeting in Bologna with Adil Ahmet KAVRAMA, we decided to extend our trip with our own means. Enes BÜLBÜL would accompany us in this process and we would enrich our trip to Italy by adding one day before the meeting and two days after the meeting. First of all, we bought our flight tickets for 2 June and 7 June. Then we applied for a visa for Italy. First of all, I should say that visa applications can be quite stressful due to both the preparation of various documents from different institutions, potential missing documents, and possibility of the visa application institution requiring additional documents. Therefore, it is useful to start visa applications early and prepare different documents considering every possibility. In order for our visa application to go smoothly, we made our application together. After making our visa application, we started to plan before and after our trip to be in Bologna on 3 and 5 June. After determining the cities we would visit and the places we would stay, we eagerly waited for the day we would go. In the meantime, we bought snacks that would not spoil in the heat and would keep us full so that we could have them with us all day long just in case.
On 2’nd June, Enes and I were at the airport in Ankara at 7.30 a.m. At the same time, Adil took a plane from Adana airport and arrived at Sabiha Gökçen airport. At 9.30 we met Adil and spent time at the airport. When our flight time came, we went through the passport control, boarded the plane and took off to Italy. When we landed in Bologna, we were welcomed by a city whose weather was similar to the inner Anatolian region of our country. We took the train from the airport to the railway station for the city. Here you need to have a ticket or pay with your contactless credit card to get on the city train. We can say that transport in Italy is expensive in general. We paid about 9 Euros for the 2-station city train to go to the railway station at the airport. We bought tickets for Florence at Bologna railway station. In Italy, tickets are purchased from machines with touch screen and no accessibility option. There are fast trains departing every 15 minutes and old type trains departing at the same frequency. While the old type trains cost 10 - 12 euro, fast trains cost 20 - 30 euro. As in aeroplanes, the prices of the tickets increase towards the last minutes. Your ticket has the timetable number of the train and you need to follow which platform the train you will get on will arrive on the screens at the railway station. Of course, this is not accessible. Announcements are made in Italian, furthermore not all train lines are announced. Only some of main train lines and general information are announced in the station. When you get on the train, you have to find your seat yourself. According to the information we received from the information desk, there is no discounted or free ticket application for disabled people in trains in Italy, but the disabled person can get support at the train station provided that he/she makes an appointment in advance or if there is an officer available at that moment. You can also buy a ticket valid for 5 days on trains for 40 Euros. These tickets are only valid on old type trains.
When we arrived in Florence, the first thing we did was to go to the hotel and leave our luggage. Then we started to tour to get to know the city. Instead of using public transport in the city, we went everywhere on foot. The city is small enough to be visited on foot. In the evening, we went to the Ponte Vecchio bridge with its elegant arches and many souvenir shops on the Arno River. We walked on the stone bridge and felt the atmosphere of the city. We walked from the bridge back to the city squares. In the historical streets we examined the historical gates. Each part of the city offers you a different history. After a long walk, we bought pizza from a small shop. This pizza was quite different from the others in terms of its texture and taste. While we were eating pizza in front of the shop, we were listening to a jazz band playing beautiful music on the street. Street music is very common in Florence. Every street music we encountered was of very good quality. After dinner, we continued to wander around the squares and streets to get to know the city. We visited an old theatre and a building that resembles a shopping mall today with eating places inside. Then we reached Florence Cathedral, also known as Duomo or Santa Maria del Fiore, on foot. Since it was closed, we examined its door and its surroundings. This building was quite fascinating, with dozens of statues on each door, each the size of a fist, and each door with different types of statues. We touched the doors one by one and the processing of the sculptures and the details on the doors were what impressed us. After another long tour through the streets of Florence, we found ourselves in the square in front of the Basilica of Santa Maria Novella, sitting on the stairs with dozens of people and listening to the street music of a nice band. We went to our hotel to relieve the tiredness of the day.
On 3’rd June, we woke up at 7 in the morning and went out. We had a breakfast with cappuccino and croissant before we went to our destinations. Breakfast culture in Italy is generally based on desserts. Generally, cappuccino is drunk with cake or croissant. Espresso in the form of shots is drunk as coffee at other times of the day. Come and take culture is very common in Italy. Prices are dependent on whether you stay to eat/drink or leave with your order. In the cities we visited, the places were quite small, usually 5-6 tables. After breakfast, we took a long walk to Michelangelo Hill. You have to climb a lot of stairs to get up here. The square has a structure that you can imagine like a terrace and you can see the city from every point. After taking photos, we visited a nearby church on foot. Of course, we did not neglect to buy coffee on the way. After the church, we went a little further up the hill and reached one of the highest hills of the city. We visited the church of San Miniato al Monte. This church has a very different structure compared to other churches. It has a lot of open space and you climb a lot of stairs when you reach the church. The church is in sections and sections are separated with stairs. The exterior appearance of the 11th century San Miniato al Monte, which is shown as one of the most beautiful Romanesque building examples of the city, is extremely elegant, understated but impressive. The mosaics and frescoes depicting Jesus and Mary give the basilica a spiritual ambience. Another feature of San Miniato that I think you may be interested in is that one of the mausoleums in the basilica belongs to Carlo Lorenzini, the author of the world-famous Pinocchio tale. Both his and other famous people's mausoleums are open to visitors. While some tombs are located in the open area, some tombs are located in small rooms.
After climbing this hill, the process of descending to the city centre begins. When we go down to the city centre, it is getting close to noon. We stop by an ice cream shop in Flroence. Although it was difficult communicate with the ice cream seller, the seller was interested and used an English and Italian dictionary, so we bought what we wanted and cooled off in the hot weather.
Then we reach Pitti Palace with a long walk. Pitti Palace, built as a Renaissance palace, includes five museums in total, including the second most prestigious museum in Florence, and the Boboli Gardens that made the palace famous. we can say that Florence is a city of sculptures. You encounter sculptures everywhere in the city. There are dozens of sculptures everywhere from streets to museums, from churches to gates, from squares to streets. In Pitti Palace, the Boboli Gardens are quite large and wide, and you encounter a sculpture at every point of the garden. The garden consists of floors that are not on top of each other and you pass between the floors by stairs. There are large and small buildings on the floors. The gardens, which offer a very relaxing and visual feast, give you peace while walking or sitting. We did not have the chance to visit every part of the garden, but we had a very long walk. So much so that we could even examine the bathtubs used for bathing at that time and designed in an open area. After the garden walk, which lasted over three hours, we went to the section with museums and visited the Modern Art Gallery. In this gallery, there were paintings by famous painters. All the paintings were kept in glass cases. The gallery gave the impression of a new building compared to the garden and the palace. I did not come across any accessibility arrangements in the palace. There were no audio or Braille descriptions for the paintings in the gallery.
We left the palace at 4:30 and went to All'Antico Vinaio to eat sandwiches. This is a come and take restaurant and sandwiches are prepared according to your request. We took the sandwiches, which I think everyone who goes to Florence should definitely try, and sat on the steps of the church in a square and ate them. There are many squares in the city and there is a church in every square. People sit on the steps of the church in the square. I was very happy that people prefer to sit in the squares rather than sitting in the places. According to our plan, the time we had allocated for Florence was over and we had to leave the places we planned to visit and go to Bologna. We took our belongings to the hotel and went to the railway station. We waited for the 18:20 train. Our train was delayed and we needed to wait until 21:35. We learnt, there was a strike that day and all train services were delayed. Due to the 4 to 7 hour delay, the railway station was crowded. It was quite a tiring process due to the lack of seats. The point that attracted my attention during this process was that nobody made outbursts or raised their voices. People were patiently waiting for their delayed trains. We boarded the train at 21:35, which we were supposed to board at 18:20, and travelled to Bologna. After reaching Bologna, we met with the Italian and Belgian team and had dinner. Afterwards, we stayed in a hotel in Bologna, which was previously used as a school for the blind.
On 4’th of June, the project meeting was held before noon and in the afternoon we visited the International Music Museum in Bologna. In the museum, we examined musical instruments dating back 500-600 years, embossed shapes of musical instruments that we couldn’t touch and 3 Braille books available in the museum. In the evening, we had the chance to experience Bologna squares and buildings in the square.
On 5’th June, before noon, we had a meeting about the progress of the project together with the evaluation of the previous day. In the afternoon we travelled by bus to Venice, one metro stop away. After a two and a half hour bus journey, we took a two minute train ride to Venice.
Venice is a city where there is no car transport, there are canals instead of streets, the streets are quite narrow and the canals are crossed by bridges with stairs. Every street leads you to a square or canal in some way. It is quite difficult to find an address and use navigation in Venice. It took us about an hour and a half to find the hotel where we would stay on the first day. Hundreds of stairs with suitcases were added to this. After settling in the hotel with the tiredness, we went on a city tour to get to know the city. Venice gets silent after 10 pm. It is difficult to find an open place after 10 pm.
On 6’th June we woke up early and had breakfast with coffee. Then we visited the places on our list, which are within walking distance. After these places, which are mostly churches and museums, we went to Burano island by ferry at noon. There are four islands close to Venice and Burano island attracts attention with the houses in the centre of the island painted in different colours. After returning from Burano island, we took photos at the observation deck on the terrace of a shopping centre in Venice in the evening. Venice was the most inaccessible of the three cities due to the constant climbing up and down stairs and narrow streets. We had the chance to experience the city-specific food in the take away restaurants.
On 7’th June we set off at 4 am and after an hour's walk with our suitcases we took the train to Bologna. From Bologna airport we boarded the plane that would take us to Turkey and returned to our country.
EGED will continue to explore countries and cities with its different members and share its experiences with its members and followers during this comprehensive project process in which it will be both a participant and a host.
Kategori: