Mein allererster Besuch in Deutschland………..

Being a Theatre Director, it’s your prime responsibility to absorb the situations going on around you and in your world. By doing this you get energy to do something new, get impressions of society and some time you get new ideas. I met Ms Cathrin Blöss from Assitej Germany in Birmingham-Uk where I was participating in Next Generation Program organized by Assitej Uk in July 2016. She invited me straight away to participate in 26th International Director’s Seminar from 12th to 18th June 2017 at Oldenburg Germany. Its look like a dream comes true. For me Germany is always a dream land. In Europe if I wanted to go anywhere, that place was Germany and now I am getting the chance to visit Germany and also I got more excitement when I came to know that I will be the first Pakistani Theatre Director who is going to participate in forty years history of this international seminar. In this Seminar 26 directors are going to participate from 23 countries and all continents including Canada, South Africa, India, Nepal, Sri Lanka, Germany, Switzerland, Austria, Kamron, Zimbabwe, Serbia, Latvia, UK etc. So I was expecting this experience as a week of sharing, learning and understanding of theatre. The only hurdle in my visit was my travel support. Goethe-Institut Pakistan then was ready to give me travel support for this participation and that was my first interaction with Goethe. I am still so impressed the way Goethe treated me although I was new for them, like I got very warm response every time I touched them for any question. As soon as I got my visa, very next day my travel arrangements were done by Goethe-Institut Pakistan.

This seminar was full of practical experiences, like theatre games, sharing of theatre techniques, sharing of theatre experiences, and sharing of different thoughts of humanity from different continents. Theme behind the seminar was Streets & Crossroads. So every activity was designed like revolving around this theme. I had the opportunity to watch five German theatre productions for children and youth. This seminar was organized by theater wrede+ with Assitej Germany in a very wonderful style. So over all this one week of seminar was full of new experiences of sharing and learning.
 
I am now looking for more opportunities to work with both organizations, especially with the Goethe-Institut Pakistan.