With the final conference held in Bruxelles at the end of June 2012, the project “Where the Rivers Meet” has successfully completed. As the speeches of the organizers and the people who took part at the conference as well as the interviews to the participants highlighted, the use of Social Theatre was a great success as a bridge between cultures, a means to overcome all forms of discrimination and exclusion suffered by the women third country nationals living in Europe and as a tool to strengthen their self-esteem.
The facilitation regional workshops and the creation and staging of the plays showed all the potential of self-expression and liberation of the social theatre: it created an environment for the women participants and their families where it was possible to bring to light and share their negative experiences without fear and feeling accompanied at the same time, strengthening their awareness of the importance of maintaining both their cultural roots of the country of origin, as the positive economic and cultural contributions they can give to the hosting countries.
Similarly, the great number and the enthusiasm of the spectators who were the audience of the International Festival of Social Theatre held in Valencia confirmed the effectiveness of social theatre as a means of communication to inform people and spread the values of tolerance, solidarity, respect, equality which should be the basis of any democracy, especially in a culturally and economically globalized word.

The final conference of the project takes place in Bruxelles, Belgium to present the products and outcomes of the project.

The International Social Theatre Festival takes place in Valencia, Spain

Each partner organizes rehearsals of their theatre play for the preparation for the International Social Theatre Festival in Valencia.

The second part of the project has started in Austria with a first workshop on 30th of September and 1st of October. 18 women are participating in this phase of the project to work out a theatre play which is based on their own experiences. With six women from different countries the origin entering in the project now the group becomes more colourful in languages, stories and expression."

1st of July the series of ten workshops (for hours each) ended in the training-place of the Intercultural Centre Arcobaleno in Linz with an theatre-laboratory opened for guests invited by participants. Since 4th of March a group of finally 20 women worked continually together. They developed their capacities of acting and with knowing each other better the workshops become a place to exchange experiences, and based on them create images and little stories focused on the objects of the project. In the final reflection very often women told that they developed their own possibilities of expression and to act in their daily life. The workshop was a good place to bring in difficult experiences, to make visible conflicts, also to laugh and to enjoy the possibilities of physical expression. In September the second part of project will start with a smaller group (till now twelve women decided to continue) with the aim to produce a theatre passed on the scenes and stories of the first workshop series.

Il Giardino dei Viandanti has believed from the beginning in the value of the Where the rivers meet project, because it is strongly convinced that this path of social theatre represents for Italy an occasion to create ties between women of Italian origin and those of foreign origin that live in the Province of Mantova.

The first part of the theatre workshops of the EU-funded Project "Where the Rivers Meet" in Valencia have finished until September. Last Saturday, the theatre workshops finished until September 2011, when the teacher and the group of immigrant women will come back from their deserved holidays. Women have highlighted that they have learnt a lot and that they have already started to experience the benefits (social and personal) from participating in these classes. They have a very good relationship between them and they are starting to become future potential actresses. They are all looking forward to the final festival that will take place in Valencia.

La reunión de lanzamiento del proyecto "Donde los ríos se unen" en Valencia, España.

El inicio del proyecto, "Donde los ríos se unen", coordinado por la La Secretaría Autonómica de Familia y Solidaridad en colaboración con cuatro países europeos.