IYC 2024 started a day earlier for me and a lot of other participants, as we spent an evening together in a small city near the campsite. I didn’t know anyone by then, and it gave me a first impression of the lovely people I would become friends with over the next two weeks. The campsite was a beautiful place. Surrounded by trees in a small valley with a stunning view of mountains and a refreshing river flowing through the middle of our camp (the staff literally built a bridge over that river). Far away from the next city and “in the middle of nowhere”, with the most breathtaking night sky I have ever seen. I immediately felt that I wanted to stay here for a long time.

After two days of building more infrastructure and decorating the campsite, making this place our home for the next two weeks, we split up in groups and went on a hike. At first, I was a bit anxious about not knowing where we were going to end up sleeping and if we would even find a place. But in the end, we were very lucky with our shelter for the night. A lovely Romanian family welcomed us in their house and treated us like old friends they hadn’t seen for a while. Without us asking for it, they cooked us a lot of food, and we played with their two very sweet children. I was surprised by the hospitality of the people and I’m grateful for every bit of it. And just within these two days of being together with my hike group, I felt a had become very close to them already.

The day after that, we were given the chance to go on another tough hike up on one of the mountains we could already see from day one. It indeed was a tough hike with a lot of altitude meters to climb and it even got very misty and started raining in the middle of it. It was incredible to experience the group fighting through this together and at the end it was completely worth it. The sky cleared up and we got rewarded with one of the most amazing views I ever had. And for the rest of IYC I looked up to that mountain every day and could proudly say: I was up there!

After the hiking days, we came back home for a week full of workshops, singing together, playing games, theme evenings and deep talks at the campfire. I was given the amazing opportunity to participate in the kitchen workshop, where we cooked lunch for all the hungry campers every day. Between cutting and frying stuff, we also had fun with techno music, gossip and snacking food here and there. It gave me a heartwarming feeling as we were receiving thankfulness for the food from the other participants. Being in the kitchen tent every morning with this great team quickly became a routine I didn’t want to leave anymore, even after just a few days.

IYC was an out of this world experience for me. I spent time with the most amazing and
lovely people our planet has to offer. Everyone was so open-minded and just nice to each other, and it amazes me how deeply I’ve been able to connect with people I’ve just met. The people created a safe space where I could be entirely myself and I think this is what I miss the most about IYC. It was like living in a parallel universe for two weeks, where no one was worried about what was going on outside of this camp. I’m not exaggerating when I say IYC was the best thing that ever happened to me, and I fully recommend this experience to everyone!

•  Anton Feldtkeller, participant of IYC 2024  •

If you enjoyed Anton’s story you can read more articles here.