My first work camp in July 1999 was still pretty close to Belgium. We did some renovation works in an old monastery in the South-East of Czech Republic. In our group, there were 6 people from Flanders, the Netherlands, Germany and Czech Republic. Pater Ubald was the technical coordinator. In the neighbourhood of the monastery we made some beautiful walks, we went to village parties and in the weekends we made some trips to Prague and Brno, the Moravian capital.

"Porta Coeli" is one of the oldest Cistercian abbeys. After WW II, the German speaking population of Czechoslovakia was exiled to Germany and the abbey was expropriated by the Communist government. During 40 years the sisters of Porta Coeli could only witness how their abbey decayed. After the end of the Communist regime, the sisters of Porta Coeli could move into their abbey again, only to find most of the buildings in ruins. The past years, volunteers of the Internationaler Bauorden (IBO) have been working during their holiday to renovate the abbey.

Pictures: Erik van Ooijen