Today, we have said goodbye to the boys and girls at the international work camp in the Zülow Marsh. A great occasion: there was suddenly international flair and a Babel of languages in the otherwise quite peaceful wood in Rangsdorf. Hélène from France, Tamara from Russia, Irene from Spain and 13 more young people from eight different countries had gathered here with one aim, or to be more precise, with two aims: first, to revamp the green breathing space of Rangsdorf. And, secondly to finally get to know Berlin.

We truly believed that the first was a 'hard job' and the latter was 'real fun'. Six hundred hours of work in three weeks do leave their mark. They presented their work looking a little fatigued, but full of pride: they conjured up clean, passable sandy paths from two muddy, uneven tracks. And, if that were not enough: the volunteers also collected a wealth of rubbish, built nesting boxes for birds and erected nature reserve signs—to the delight of the Rangsdorf inhabitants, which they showed by distributing daily portions of sweets.

And now that the international guests have gone, there still remains lots to do in the Zülow Marsh. This is where the most extensive measures are to take place to compensate for and replace the natural conditions when Schönefeld airport is extended to become the Berlin Brandenburg International Airport (BBI).

Wersja drukowana berlin-airport.de (Copyright Berliner Flughäfen)