Dear friends of YIP,
We hope this newsletter finds you well!
The passing of time always feels different in the last month of YIP: the days are full and long – metaphorically and literally as the sunset hour becomes later. Yet looking back at the end of a week, it seems like the week has flown by in a blink of an eye.
We ended the month of May on a high note – with a week of witnessing each of the Yippies take the stage and shine in their own unique way as they presented their personal initiative projects. It was a beautiful and emotionally intense week for many. We carried this appreciation for each individual and headed off into the Swedish woods for a week of canoeing and camping. For six days, we cooked over fires we made and found a sense of calmness and togetherness in the embrace of nature and the company of each other. We were blessed by the Swedish weather gods and on the last day, some literally, sailed toward our destination.
We returned from the outdoor experience to long, sunny days, and blue, purple flowers that had peeked their heads out while we were gone. We launched straight into the closing week. We deep cleaned the spaces we’ve used throughout our time here and enjoyed different activities hosted by Yippies in celebration of our time together coming to an end. It was a busy and intense time, but as our glasses clink for a final toast during closing dinner, our smiles were big and hearts full.
Slowly, all the Yippies said goodbye to each other and the beautiful Ytterjärna, and headed off on their own future journey, but always carrying the love of each other.
written by Jasmine Pan
In this newsletter you’ll find:
– Personal Initiative Project: Presentation Week Written by Matvey Melnikov
– Outdoor Experience written by Anousha O’Malley
– Yippies’ Reflection written by Bobby Brown and Matvey Melnikov
– After YIP written by Nele Goertz and Isawara Ulh
– Alumni Project: Fakt21 written by Felix Swiatek
Personal Initiative Presentation Week
In the last week of May, the Yippies had a wonderful opportunity to present and process their own creations and the work of their friends. For me personally, those five days—each filled with seven presentations—opened my eyes to the people I’ve been living with: their projects, interests, and struggles.
These five days gave us a deeper insight into each other’s lives. From storytelling, singing, and exhibitions to the analysis of paintings, this beautiful week allowed many different interests and worldviews to come together in one event.
Some of us revealed sides of ourselves that I had never seen before. There was passion, struggle, and questioning, all received by the audience in a truly wonderful way. We didn’t just practice our presentation skills—we also practiced the art of listening.
From 9:00 to 16:45, we had seven inspiring and diverse presentations each day, with tasty fika breaks in between, often prepared by the participants the evening before. We had focaccia, banana-chocolate cake, cinnamon rolls, and more.
All the personal growth and evolving group dynamics were reflected during these five informal and deeply meaningful days.
Written by Matvey Melnikov
Outdoor Experience
In rows like birds, we glide and paddle,
Where silence grows, we flow,
Through mirrored lakes and pine and birch—
A dewy breath, the world our own.
We glide and paddle.
We carve a path and sleep on mossy ground,
As wind dances on the lake like stories whispered.
In firelight, we make no sound,
Yet glide and paddle.
A heron, a spider, a squirrel, an ant—
Such ghostlike grace. The ospreys’ nest.
The lake is quiet.
The water understands.
The trees lean in to watch and listen.
Beneath vast sky and quiet heart,
Laughter shared in drifting rain—
We dry our socks beneath the moon.
With songs and smiles, we skim the surface
As shoulders ache.
As quickly as we pass, we are forgotten.
We swim in biting cold,
As breath becomes a mist of living.
We smell of sun and bark and smoke—
It clings to our sleeves and the backs of our hands.
The paddle dips.
The fire is out.
An everlasting thought.
The soil is warm,
The water stands still.
So glide and paddle—
Not fast, but full.
Written by Anousha O’Malley
Yippie’s Reflection
Woahhhhh woah. What the hell. What the helly. Its over? Already? What does that mean? What else is there besides this secluded magical world? Will I ever find a group of people with such similar values and style of life? Will I ever feel so free again? Will I ever have such a lack of responsibility?
I’m going back into the “real world”. The stressful one. The noisy one. The unkind one. The one that in most places seems to be doing so little with what aligns with my values. The one with people that live so unconsciously of their impact on the earth and other people. Where am I going to find as much hope, meaning, and fulfillment as I have in YIP?
Beautiful beautiful beautiful beautiful beautiful beautiful beautiful beautiful beautiful beautiful YIP. Beautiful people. Beautiful places. Beautiful living. Beautiful intentions. Beautiful growth. Beautiful community. Beautiful food. Beautiful nature. Beautiful emotions. Beautiful hope. Beautiful service hour. Beautiful fjord. Beautiful souls. Beautiful human beings. Beautiful smiles. Beautiful laughs. Beautiful joy. Beautiful depth. Beautiful connection.
YIP has been my world. My small secluded reality that I’ve come to love so much. I’ve put my heart into YIP and it’s put its heart into me. LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE. There’s so much love in YIP. Has there ever been a bully at YIP? YIP holds me so well. Maybe too well. I’m not sure how to return to normal life where I am not supported constantly and there are responsibilities that I don’t see the value in having and adds weight, stress, and burden to my life.
I’ve learned so much through YIP: through experience, through the people, through being inspired, through asking questions, through diversity, through becoming aware and attempting to face my fears, through listening, through talking, through having the space to learn to listen to myself, through being able to take space for myself, through relying on people, through people relying on you, through taking initiative and through not.
Thanks to YIP and the community it hosts: I feel more connected to myself through this beautifully emotional experience. I feel more connected to others. I feel I have a deeper capacity for gratefulness for my opportunities and the people I meet. I feel more confidence in my abilities and my sense of what’s right and wrong. I have a stronger sense for my values and what’s important to me. I have a clearer vision of how I do and don’t want the future to look and how I might want to play a part in that. I feel more confident in my abilities to socialize and connect with people. That and so much more has given me the impression that YIP is exactly what I needed in my life and from what I see, what so many others are missing in theirs. It’s a program that is relevant to these times in the world, and to my times in life. Now I’m on a journey of finding the YIPness in myself, and hopefully, but maybe less obviously, in the world around me.
Written by Bobby Brown
The modern world seemed
Big, untouchable, unchanging —
Moving in an unstoppable process.
Just the thought of facing it…
No.
There was no space for my potential.
There was no room for what’s essential.
A storm stirred by climate change,
Mistreating a beautiful oasis.
The walls were high, the edges close.
The window shut, no matter what.
I tried to run my own way through.
I did not know how to see.
Then — I met new friends from all around.
They were different from what I knew.
Some open, some closed.
Some young, some older.
Youth from all around the planet
Gathered in a Swedish house
To learn, improve, and spread.
We travel, grieve, and sing together.
We learn, practice, and change together.
We learn this guiding truth:
From inside to the outside.
From local to global.
Now the world seems green and sunny.
My restrictions — gone.
My opportunities — visible.
Privilege is seen and worked on.
Vulnerability was held and opened for growth.
The year was beautiful, anxious, and inspiring.
Written by Matvey Melnikov
After YIP
I remember, in the beginning, the question about my time after YIP really freaked me out. I had no idea, and I didn’t want to think about it. But throughout YIP and especially during the outpost in Cesci (India), I realised my huge interest in education. I believe education, which supports the individual and therefore communal growth into its honest form, can be a solution for many problems humanity is facing these days. As I had a school time that didn’t teach me more than being insecure about myself, I would not like this to happen to my children. And I see it happening to so many young children and teenagers around me. The school system is just not supporting the individual and the communal aspects in a timely manner. It seems like it got stuck in the last century.
Somehow I came to the conclusion to study educational science in Marburg, Germany. It all seems quite exciting and surreal as it is still in the future. But it takes away some of the weight of YIP ending as I have something new to begin with.
And as much as I will miss the YIP experience, I will also carry it within me. YIP gave me trust, openness and willingness to step into the world again. If I have moments of grieving YIP, I know I just have to feel into my heart and it will all be there. Things wouldn’t be special if they would be everlasting. Change is what makes life exciting and fruitful.
Also YIP gave me confidence that I can do whatever I want to do. For such a long time I want to learn how to sing. And I never dared to try hobbies I’m “not good enough” at. But YIP showed me that I can! And it’s great to learn things you are not good at. I will be exploring myself in every interest possible. And I’ll be allowing myself to not be “good.”
I’m looking forward to applying all my skills I’ve developed in YIP into my future life. As I will hopefully be living in another kind of community of students, I’m excited to bring some of YIPs aspects.
Written by Nele Goertz
A little about Tsu-En:
Sailing across the Atlantic :
I will share with you a bit of my story it’s starts sad and finishes full of hope.
In April 2024, while I was applying for yip, my grandma was dying of cancer.
Before she left us, she kept repeating “tout est possible” – everything is
possible. And it stuck with me. I was very close to her and accompanied her till very close to her longest sleep. My father inherited off an apartment that none of us wished to keep. My grandma loved beauty and the wonders of the world. So to carry her curiosity as well as her desire to see the world my father decided to sell the apartment and buy a sailing boat. At that exact moment a seed was planted, it will be carried by the strong wind of life to be spread across the Atlantic to land in Columbia. Where a dream, an impulse, a project was born. Sailing the Atlantic Ocean to meet the Kogis and support the creation of a natural healthcare dispensary.
The Kogi, descendants of the Tayrona, themselves descendants of the Maya, are an indigenous tribe that have kept the memory of their origins and the way of listening and speaking to the Earth. They see themselves as guardians of the Earth, preserving its balance through their rituals and way of life. They say they are our big brothers and have decided to share their knowledge to help us remember and stop doing stupid things that, according to them, cause the world to become unbalanced and lead us towards planetary catastrophes that we will suffer sooner or later.
Having just finished YIP, this project made sense to me. To carry forward all the learning and teaching I received during this time. Wherever I go I want to keep understanding and meeting the world as an interconnected and living organism.
Carrying through me the wisdom of 10 intense full months, courses, meetings, connections, interests, learnings, conversations… I feel ready to meet whatever comes along this journey.
This initiative in La Sierra Nevada, where traditional and modern knowledge meet, we will be co-creating, learning, raising fund, building a foundation in service of the whole to preserve ancestral knowledge. Reminding ourselves what is our impact and what can we bring to places we go to.
The team on the boat : my father Thomas the initiator of this project, my partner Alex who also did YIP, my brother Louka, his girlfriend Clem and my dad’s friend Nacho, our captain.
We will depart on the 1st of November, meanwhile we will be training, working, preparing … for this long voyage.
The crossing should take around 1 month and we will come back at the end of march.
What an ambitious project right ? When we still don’t have a sailing boat, none of us can sail and have never been to South America, it seems almost like a joke.
But what would stop us from meeting the world ?
Our will is strong and I remember one thing from a wise human : tout est possible.
Written by Isawara Ulh
Alumni Project: Fakt21 – What Could a Contemporary Educational Centre Look Like Today?
My time at YIP instilled in me a deep appreciation for the importance of thoughtfully shapingprocesses, rather than simply focusing on outcomes. At Fakt21, a social education center in Bochum run by YIP alumni, we explore how to foster and innovate the processes that give rise to new cultural impulses.
Fakt21 develops participatory learning formats grounded in social and cultural engagement. Each year, we support the delivery of approximately 1,200 hours of educational courses.
Earlier this year, I stepped into the role previously held by Christopher Becker (YIP13). I now work part-time — two and a half days a week alongside Philip Stoll (YIP1), who has been leading Fakt21 for the past five years. Together, we continue to explore one central question:
What might a contemporary educational centre look like today?
Although Fakt21 is based in Bochum, most of our activities take place in Witten, which quietly serves as the YIP alumni capital. I believe there are about twelve of us active here in various corners of the city.
I’d like to share some reflections from the transformation process we’re currently engaged in:
1. Learning in motion
Instead of hosting courses in our own venue, we aim to bring the right ideas to the right places within the city. We see ourselves as facilitators of cultural processes embedded in the urban fabric.
2. Making what’s already there visible
We’re not just organising events; we’re curating and articulating what already exists. On our website, courses can now be booked on demand — an approach that could also serve as a model for other educational networks.
3. From prototype to initiative
We design new formats that invite people to try something for the first time, while also supporting grassroots initiatives with funding strategies, project applications, and integration into broader ecosystems of impact. Alongside the more creative aspects of our work, we also navigate Germany’s bureaucratic landscape as a state-recognised organisation. That should explain how we’ve surprisingly found a lot of joy in automating administrative processes and integrating AI into our workflows.
I’d also like to share four current success stories:
● Regeneration Training – exploring water retention and biodiversity through sensory exercises on
local farms
● KULTURA+ – a prototype platform for cultural self-organisation
● Money Learning Journey with GLS Bank – diving into our personal biographies around money
● Witten musiziert – a community concert format connecting local musicians
You are all more than welcome to bring your own Prototype to Witten!
A great opportunity for a visit would be the upcoming “TWIIIINS concert on July 31st”
.
We’d love to connect, collaborate, and continue this ongoing conversation.
Warmly from Witten,
Felix
Written by Felix Swiatek (YIP6)