Language, culture and tradition during the “La Caramella” scouts and guides gathering for Catalan-speaking territories

The 4Vents project calls for participation at “La Caramella”, the scouts and guides gathering for Catalan-speaking territories. This initiative aims to be a space to raise awareness and strengthen ties among different scouting and guides’ associations in the Valencian Community, Catalonia, Alghero, Majorca, Menorca, Andorra and the Catalan-speaking strip of Aragon. The gathering will take place in Calders, in the Moianès county in Catalonia, for youths aged between 16 and 21 coming from all these territories.

The 4Vents gathering date back to 1995, and this year’s edition of “La Caramella” marks the seventh edition. “We are scouts and guides united by shared ties from sharing a cultural background, sharing a language, a history and tradition”, say representatives of 4Vents, adding that “we wanted to strengthen existing ties and consolidate those elements that are common to us all”.

Originally, “La Caramella” has going to be held in 2021, but the outbreak of the pandemic delayed the project for two years. With a more stable health situation, the gathering will bring together the leaders (volunteer instructors) and those in charge of different scout and guides’ association for four days in April 2023, during the Easter period.

As in all scouting and guides’ gatherings, nature also plays an important role. From 4Vents they tell us that the aim to “include nature as an essential component” building bridges with the village hosting the gathering. They also welcome the positive relationship with the town council of Calders, “which has shown a will to collaborate in organizing this gathering”. “La Caramella” will be a camp and will combine different areas in the village to carry out different activities.

Seven territories, one language, four days to strengthen ties

Scouts and guides attending the gathering will spend four days to get to know each other better and participate in activities, all of which have a strong focus on the Catalan language and folk. Activities will include trainings, projects to serve the community and leisure. “We place a special emphasis on activities that contribute to a deeper knowledge of the Catalan language, folk and culture, traditional trades and crafts, etc.; we also aim to underscore the values of scouting”, they add from 4Vents.

Besides the Catalan language and culture, training activities will deal with matters of a social and general interest around gender, feminism, spirituality, nature and educating through leisure, with keynote speeches and group activities.

Not all will be work. “La Caramella” also plans to include leisure to work on strengthening cohesion around scouts and guides from the Catalan-speaking territories. This will include games, dances and live music.

4Vents Scout and Guide project

4Vents is a collaborative project between scout and guides’ associations from Catalonia, Menorca, Majorca, the Valencian Community and Alghero. They all share common ties through culture, language, history and folk tradition.

The mission of 4Vents is to strengthen the task of each of the scouting associations in their territory. By creating synergies and boosting cultural, language and methodological traits that are common to them all and that can contribute to bringing greater quality into their actions.