The Graz bits so far

I think its probably a good idea to tell a bit of the Graz story now, before it all gets too far away.. too crazy and none of us can remember what really happened.

Actually already the beginning part is a bit of a blur, when people ask why we chose Graz for our second location of CE, I have to scratch my head and think back quite a bit to the part where we were really making that decision.

It’s a huge story already, and its only just begun. You know you have been through some crazy times when someone asks you how it started and you just cant imagine having time to tell the story all the way through. No matter what happens with CE Graz, whether it becomes a huge success or… whatever else… for me its going to be a truly precious memory of fighting for what we believed in, struggling through many odds, faith , courage and teamwork. For each member of the CE team, its been a pretty crazy few years, and from every angle they could tell you a story that would be equally thrilling.. I can only say from my perspective of the things I went through up until this point, that its been unbelievable.

The outside

the inside being made

To answer a few questions one by one…

1.       Why did we choose Graz for our second location?  Well the truth is that when we were having to split up and leave Novi Sad (or most of the team anyways) most of us decided to continue with the CE project… even though most of the team members would not be allowed back in to Serbia, we wanted to build another CE. The question was where to do this, it was kind of like putting a pin in a map while wearing a blindfold. We all had different ideas of where we wanted to build the next CE… some said England, some said Italy, some said America… and some said Graz… The fact was that we had some links with Graz already, some good friends and some possibilities. So with the only main leads being here, we decided to push in that direction. Also Graz had some similarities to Novi Sad, being a small city, with a friendly environment.. and of course, we could pretty much all live there without the Visa hassle we got in Serbia. We also had good feelings from Graz (ha… sounds weird… oh well.. at least I did… )

2.       What were the CE crew up to during these  14 months that they have been out of Serbia… The original team that decided to keep on with CE are Daniel and Leilani, Simon, Mary and myself.. the others who were on the original team decided to do something different. We have also acquired new members, and the team has grown. In the time when Simon and Mary left Serbia they went to the States, and worked to earn the capital for CE Graz, Danny and Lani also did the same thing. Simon came back with his family around April 2014, moved to Graz and began work on CE2. Danny and Lani stayed in the states to earn the capital to start the project. I was between Graz and Novi Sad pretty much the whole of last year, working on both projects. 

Oh my goodness… I am so tired, its hard to finish this post.  To summarise, we are now in Graz… we are now working on CE Graz, we are covered in dust of every kind… the amount of dust resembles the Arizona desert…. We are working as a team on the building, paperwork and all that it entails to open the next CE… I will write more about it as soon as I get my energy back
Oh and one more thing, check out the link to the video we first made almost 2 years ago when we were thinking of making our 2nd CE, its really funny
http://vimeo.com/62684678