The photo exhibition “Jordan – An Old Fairy-Tale in a Contemporary Version” by Slim Messedi, a volunteer at the Youth Development Center Mutual Aid (YDCMA), was opened at the Dr. Peter Beron Elementary School in the village of Ovoshtnik. In nearly 30 photos taken by phone, Slim captured the rhythm of life in Jordan – in the Aqaba Bay and the Dead Sea, in the capital city of Amman and at the ancient Jordanian city of Petra: people, historical sites, religious temples, city and seascapes typical of Jordan dishes.
In front of the students and teachers of Dr. Peter Beron Primary School, the Mutual Aid volunteer recounted his experiences during his stay at these cities and places, the history, culture, and life of today’s people there. During the meeting, the children had the opportunity to ask Slim something about Jordan and volunteering, and some of them also expressed their desire when they grew up to work for the cause of volunteering.
Slim Messedi is a native of Tunisia. At the opening of the exhibition, he emphasized that he always wanted to visit Jordan: “With this exhibition, I want to show that this country is one of the most hospitable, to the young I want to show that you can always find a way to travel. I want to encourage them to travel because this way they will be able to get to know other cultures and peoples, religions and reality. “
Slim has been in Kazanlak for six months and one of the things he likes about Bulgaria is the friendliness of the people. He is impressed that the local people speak English very well and this allows him to communicate freely with them. The youth is also impressed by the fact that in Bulgaria cohabitants of different ethnic groups as a whole coexist – Bulgarians, Turks, Armenians, Roma, Jews: “Unlike in Western Europe, these societies live together, they are cosmopolitan. I like the Balkan countries and in that sense, I am happy that I was chosen to come to Bulgaria. “About his plans, Slim shared that he wanted to visit Malta and Greece.
The Jordan Exhibition – An Old Fairy Tale in the Contemporary Option is part of the activities of the Interaction and Integration Project of the Center for Educational Integration of Children and Students from Ethnic Minorities, which the Ovoshtnik School has been working on for the 2019/2020 school year partnered with YDCMA. This exhibition also gave the idea to the students to capture with their phones beautiful moments of nature, cultural-historical and religion-related objects in Bulgaria, everyday life, as well as the relationships between people with all their diversity in everyday life and in the holiday. An exhibition with the photo works of the children from the school will be opened on the occasion of May 24 – the Day of Bulgarian Enlightenment and Culture and Slavic Literacy.

SLAVIANA GAIDAROVA