“The women are all very different and every woman is so impressive,” says Laura Gudd, a social worker at the Asylum Center in Tübingen. Together with Dana Pietsch and two psychologists, she works on the project “Biography work. Culture-sensitive empowerment of vulnerable and abused refugee women”. Biography work involves participants thinking positively about their own life and developing perspectives for their personal future. This method is often used after a crucial experience in one’s own life, such as having to flee one’s country of origin. Women who fled their country of origin on their own often experienced violence, coercion and… Read More
Category: Diverse
Against heat and cold: Architecture in the Middle East
By Youssef Kanjou In the Stone Age, humans inhabited caves and discovered fire. They used it to generate heat that helped them reduce the cold during the winter. Many thousands of years later, humans were able to abandon the caves and build the first villages near rivers. They were now able to build houses that protected them from high or low temperatures and thus adapted to the natural conditions. Examples of this were found during archaeological excavations in the northwest of Syria in Tel Al-Qaramel, where the archaeologists uncovered various fireplaces and rooms with walls. They were built using construction… Read More
Could you please spell your name?
Martha, Anton, Heinrich, Friedrich, Otto, Ulrich, Zacharias: This is the way, I have to spell my name in German on the phone, so my interlocutor can spell it right – M A H F O U Z. What is the meaning of all this and where do these names come from? The first official German spelling alphabet was introduced in 1890 in Prussia. The reason for this was the newly invented telephone. The Berlin telephone directory, however, still used numbers at that time in order to designate the letters: A = 1, B = 2, C = 3 and so… Read More
Volunteer experience with refugee aid
“What did you personally experience during your volunteer work for refugees?” The volunteer coordinators in the Tübingen district and the readers of tünews INTERNATIONAL are looking for responses to this question. People who have been involved in supporters or otherwise between 2015 and today are invited to write down experiences from their volunteer work and send them to the refugee officer of the district of Tübingen, Hanna Hahn. She reports that she has already received “wonderful gems”, from somber reports to very colorful stories. Tünews INTERNATIONAL plans to publish the contributions in a special magazine. In addition, the volunteer coordinators… Read More
Swimming season has started with restrictions
Public pools, thermal spas and swimming lakes in Baden-Württemberg are allowed to reopen from Saturday, 6th of June, with controlled access. This was decided by the steering group of the provincial government on Thursday, 4th of June. Nevertheless, there are restrictions: Only a certain number of guests may rest on lawns or swim in the pool at the same time – depending on the size of the area. Also, in the pools and swimming lakes, people have to keep a minimum distance of 1.5 meters. The operators have to prevent people from gathering in crowds and cuing in front of… Read More
The youth centres are opening again
The city youth centres in Tübingen will gradually open their doors from Monday the 8th of June. Information about the services and how to register for them can be found on the respective websites and in the social media. “We are happy that after three months of shutdown, we can once again offer young people places outside their parents’ house and school,” says Mayor Dr. Daniela Harsch. The youth café Bricks is already open and is offering a punting boat sailing school in the second week of the Whitsun holidays. The Waldhäuser Ost Youth Forum will open on Monday, June… Read More
Beware of caterpillars on oak trees
The oak processionary moth is a type of a butterfly. Its offspring is a caterpillar, that emerges starting end of May. Its “stinging” hair can cause skin inflammations with strong itching, inflammations of the eye or the upper respiratory tract and more. Especially risky is the direct contact with the caterpillar and its webs, within which they reside. The wind can spread around the caterpillar’s hair from the trees. The caterpillars have spread so widely during the last view years. Therefore, they can be found in almost all tree populations. Within the forest, the oak processionary moth is not being… Read More
How Syrians Celebrate Eid al-Fitr
Youssef Kanjou Eid al-Fitr, the Feast at the end of Ramadan, is celebrated as a religious and social ritual that lasts for three days. We prepare everything during Ramadan. This includes baking the various sweets for the celebration, buying clothes, organizing family visits and cleaning as well as decorating the houses. On the day before Eid al-Fitr, mothers work particularly hard when it comes to preparing for the next day and often it includes working through the night and into the morning. The Eid celebration begins with the children and the men going to the mosques shortly after sunrise without… Read More
Naldo charges less for student subscriptions
Families of students, who travel by public transport, can save two monthly installments if they have kept the monthly Naldo student card for May. The May rate will not be debited. The same rule applies to the month of June. Due to the long-standing bonus scheme in the district of Tübingen, schoolchildren who have purchased monthly passes for the whole school year do not have to pay their own share in July, according to the transport association Naldo. For monthly subscriptions 25 (issued by the school) there are no monthly rates for May and June. Schoolchildren with a monthly pass… Read More
Integration Representative promotes women’s project
“Without women, integration cannot be successful”, said Annette Widmann-Mauz in September 2018 at a conference in the Tübingen District Office. The Integration Representative of the Federal Government and Tübingen’s CDU Member of the Parliament already spoke out at that time in favor of supporting refugee women on their way to integration. The Integration Commissioner is supporting a new project by the Tübingen Asylum Centre intended for refugee women. The project “Biography – Identity – Integration” is to receive almost 130,000 euros for this and next year, as Widmann-Mauz announced in April. This project is intended to empower vulnerable women who… Read More