HOW BIOSPHERE CAN CHANGE YOUR LIFE
by Daniela Tindl, Germany & expedition Oman
There is a beautiful sentence which is an important guide for my life: “Your thoughts can move mountains”. It is something like the law of the universe! If you really want something with your heart, you will find it!
I was at a point in my life when I was thinking about a very important question: What do I really want in my life? Is what I’m doing making me happy and does it make sense for me? It seems to be a long-term-project to find this out. I took a semester off from my studies. At that time I was studying sport and geography. I’m a very nature-loving person, so I decided to make a few trips with my bicycle and my tent. A few days before I left, a friend of mine told me about the organisation “Biosphere Expeditions” and that it was possible to win an expedition to Oman working for something worthwhile. The next day, I visited the Biosphere Expeditions website. I was amazed at the great projects they had and sent them my application. Actually, all I wrote was coming from within, so I wrote what my heart was telling me. I had a good feeling and started a trip the next day from Beograd to Greece. After that, I went cycling in Ireland for six weeks and then a hitchhiking tour with a donkey in the Pyrenees (I wonder how that wored? Ed.). I thought ok, I don’t have a lot of money for making big environment projects, but I can do my own little project, so I put a sign on my bike: cycling, ecologically friendly, being fit, respecting other cultures and nature instead of sitting in the car was the motto behind it. And lots of people started talking to me because of the sign on my bike, so it was a success, very small, but it was a start. Because I met a lot of cyclists in Ireland, I started to ask them if they are interested in forming a sort of association. So they put a sign on their bicycle as well. After a while I though there must be something bigger, where you can reach out and touch more people like a chain reaction! For me this beautiful chain reaction is called “Biosphere Expeditions”.
On the way to Greece, somewhere in Albania, where it’s not easy to find a computer, I checked my e-mails and found a beautiful message, which made me very happy. Biosphere Expeditions had invited me for the final selection day in Germany. I was so happy to get this chance!
Oman competition
On 1st September I went to Düsseldorf by car, slept in a tent on a playground for children and went to the competition on the next day in the morning. I had such a great day and enjoyed it so much that I nearly forgot the word “competition”. For me it wasn’t really a competition, because even if I didn’t win the top prize of going to Oman, I would be a winner at the end of the day, since the experience itself was already a big prize for me. And so it was. I won a lovely day and great experience as well. I really enjoyed building the bridge together because for that you need team work! Team work is such a great thing. In my opinion this is what any great company is based on! If I have a great, powerful, positive thinking and homogenous team I can reach every goal with them.
Oman expedition
In one sentence: It was great, brilliant, fantastic, wonderful, powerful. I had a lot of great experiences and the most important thing is that we worked for a good cause - The Arabian leopard!
I could write pages about this expedition but it would exceed the space I have by far. I would like to give you a few impressions on the way. It was such a great feeling to do something important and valuable for nature and its animals. To live in and with the nature was great. I LOVED IT! For me the expedition was one of the best things I did in my life and I would love to support projects like this again. The wonderful memories you have after an expedition will always be in your mind. I would really recommend to everybody to be part of an expedition! Don’t miss this great experience in your life to do something for nature. •
