EESTEC WILL on WHEES 12.-14.10.2006

Ingredients:
2 happy fellows from LC Krakow
6 from LC Tallinn
12 from LC Tampere
27 from LC Helsinki
1 bus
3 companies
1 amazing party
scenery of Southern Finland
good will and charity work

Background

Under the great summer sun in Finland, LCs Helsinki and Tampere got not only sun burned but also an idea about how to activate Finnish LCs and try something completely new to attract more people in EESTEC activities. WokShop 2006 gave birth to a concept of a 3-day-trip, free for all its participants but still full of action and experiences. EESTEC WILL on WHEELS got its name after the purpose of the whole event: to travel around the South of Finland by a rent bus having fun and then doing a good will action, thus charity work in the center of Helsinki.

Singing and fancy toilet seats

On Thursday the 12th of October, 29 EESTECers from Helsinki, including Jakub&Jakub - our Polish reinforcements, plus 6 girls and guys from LC Tallinn packed their selves in a bus and started the journey. The bus took the group first to Onninen, which is the second biggest wholesale dealer of electrical gadgets in Finland. Onninen has also markets in Sweden, Norway, Poland, Russia, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, so it had the business sense for our foreign guests and their countries as well. In Onninen we first got the see their express sales unit and a fine gallery including ready solutions for home bathrooms, saunas etc. Some counted that there were over 20 different toilet seats to be seen! Then they took us to their headquarter where we heard more about the logistics and human resources, e.g. how to get to work there. The climax of the visit was, of course, the dinner and a great amount of wine afterwards. One could say that it was very well planned excursion and they were very tolerant to our singing and everything. Actually, they even sent email afterwards asking if we could perform in a party of their company in a month or so :)

The trip continued to Tampere, where their LC had a sauna warm and beer cold for us. When you add in the equation old EESTEC farths Jaska and Raipe and even an older farth Hapo the results was of course less than 2 hours of sleep before taking off the morning. But it was well worth it!

Freshening up with drinks and swimming

Next morning the bus took us to Lahti, to Hartwall, a Finnish refreshment drink manufacturer with a wide selection of different non-alcoholic and alcoholic drinks such as beer, cider, long drinks. An energy bunny gave us first an insight to the markets and answered to our weirdest questions (for some reason there happened to be many of them concerning refreshments…). The she took us through the full-automated factory and let us taste some of their specialities. All this happened within an hour, so you can understand were she got the name Energy Bunny.

The rest of the day was spent in Porvoo as guests of Ensto. Ensto is one of the most remarkable Finnish providers of electrical systems and solutions and it has also local offices and customers in 16 other countries. In Ensto we heard about Cuboctics, which is a new and flexible concept for dealing with enclosures. The president of the board of the company also shared with us her views about good leadership and the features of family-owned-companies. One especially unforgettable encounter was with the founder of the company, who wanted give us some of his old wisdom and tips for the future. The evening was spent at Ensto’s private pool pavilion with water games, sauna, good food and refreshments. I think everybody thought there couldn’t have been a better way to relax after three company visit and a lot of kilometres on a bus. But the adventure wasn’t even close to finish. The trip continued again early next morning.

The heavier the better

The thrid and last day was something we had been curiously waiting for. It was time to head back to Helsinki and get in charity action. From an organization for kids and teens who have cancer, we got official boxes for collecting money for young cancer patients. And so we ran to the city to carry through the mission. We had a special technical student type of an aim: to collect so much money that we could afford buying DVD-players for 10 rooms in the cancer clinic section, where the patients have to spend weeks in quarantine. We set the goal in 2000 euros. Collecting money was made more appealing with a little game: we would measure the weigh of every box and the heaviest would be awarded.

26 141 grams of good will

We collected all together 26 141 grams of money, where the heaviest box was 3 557 grams. The box was so full that it wasn’t possible to fit any more money in there! In cash that was 2649,68 euros (plus one air balloon, a paving stone and a rose..), so over 600 euros over the goal. With that money it was possible to get digiboxes for the whole section as well. We had promised not only to pay for the gadgets but also buy, install and write easy manuals to them so it after the event it still took some weeks before all the work was done.

The money wasn’t the only thing that was earned during the day but doing something good for others gave both the collectors and the donors good mood and joy. It was nothing better than seeing the collectors gathering back together after 4 hours with their cheeks red and mouths with a smile. If you don’t believe me, try it yourself! And if you do, there’s even more reason to try it! J

Ultimate party time

Even though the bus was sent away after the charity campaign, EESTEC WILL on WHEELS wasn’t still over. There was still left an ultimate party for all the participants and other technical student for free. Music in the party was taken care by Paleface, a front row rap artist in Finland and one has to say that there’s hasn’t been a party like that in the campus before! The dance floor was full of crazy moves from the beginning till the end of the night and the party got praise and amazement from various visitors.

Epilogue

Even though there were those, who did not believe that it would be possible to pull through a 3-day-event for free and also do something good at the same time, WILL on WHEELS came true better than we expected. Thanks to all sponsors who not only gave us money but also let us get to know their business and fed us well, we did not need to worry about the costs but we could just concentrate on learning new things, getting to know each other, having fun and letting good things circle. I think WILL on WHEELS just gave an additional meaning for the words “EESTEC spirit”.

Written by: Emmi Rautkylä