(En)Vision Tempelhof
Berlin | We could of course not let the long way back from Poland go uneventlessly. And so it came that we included another stop in Berlin. This was made possible by the cooperation with Tempelhofer Feld Vision (THF Vision). In line with the activities of the organisation, we came up with the idea of building the Dome on the Tempelhofer Feld. Our intern Helene Paul shares her impressions.
After the stop in Krakow, where the dome already stood for only one day, we were again used to assembling and disassembling it on one day. And for the day in Berlin we had purposefully planned a longer time frame to allow us to talk to as many people as possible. Both the fact that it was a Friday and that the event “48h Neukölln” started on that day helped with the number of people passing our dome. The Tempelhofer Feld is, of course, already a popular place for athletes, travellers and many more.
As we knew of the weather forecast we left our accommodation relatively early to be ready with the construction before the midday heat. The strict regulations governing access to the field and traffic in Berlin, however, put a stop to our calculations. But with a good hour delay we still arrived successfully at our spot on the field and started the construction.
The energetic support of four helping hands made it possible that we ended up with an acceptable delay. A personal highlight was the final action of the construction: to put up our, specially for this event newly acquired, colorful swing cloth as a sun protection over the dome.
“The social space in Europe must be developed.
Concerning the talks, the question “What does a social society look like?” served as the overarching theme for the conversations we wanted to have. Since for most of the time there were only two of us and one person was responsible for the moderation and the other for the recording of the conversation, we ended up having many small discussion rounds instead of one big one.
The point of reference for the scope of what a social society could entail that the conversation was about was always set by the participants themselves. On the one hand, one person mentioned the symbolic effect of the Tempelhofer Feld as a space that reflects a form of social society. On the other hand, the European elections, their transnationality and the resulting question of the transnationality of a social society were addressed by suggesting common banks, insurance companies and transport systems.
Following on from this, the social space in Europe was also addressed with regard to the existing possibilities for development, especially for people with disabilities. Migration and integration were also mentioned as aspects of a social society and put into perspective in a comparison of countries, by example of Italy.
The issue of migration was then reapplied, but in the external actions of the EU and on the issue of specifically a possible European army and in general increased armament. All in all, the aspects were linked to the extent to which we as citizens are being heard or have opportunities to participate.
In this respect, it was finally discussed whether and how direct democratic methods could advance the shaping of a social society according to our ideas at this point and in the future.Some weren’t willing to come in, but still shared their ideas about Europe, a more social society or our project in general, just outside the dome. This way, we remained in conversation constantly and had to remember to eat something or buy more water. The day just flew by.
Soon it was already 19 o’clock and time for the dismantling. This again worked out quite quickly, with again two diligent helpers. At this point, we owe a big thank you to Heike from THF Vision, who made this event possible and actively supported us in every step.
Finally, when the last wooden strut had landed in the car, we could observe the sky changing color. In this regard, we could see what one person had reported before: “Where else can you still see the sunset in the city? – on the Tempelhofer Feld for sure.
After having traveled through Poland, having arrived in Berlin and already thinking about our last drive back to Cologne, we couldn’t have finished the 3200 km tour in any better way.
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Some impressions of our event:
