Our history

Background and origin of the project

The 10th year of the KGS Hemmingen (Carl Friedrich Gauß School) visits every year the neighboring country Poland. One stop here is a visit to Melitta Sallai, the director of the "Hedwig Foundation". This foundation runs a charitable kindergarten and houses a German-Polish academy whose goal is to promote international understanding. This educational institution has been active since 1994. In 1999 she was awarded the "POLCUL Prize" awarded by the "Foundation for Independent Polish Culture". In 2001, she received the "German-Polish Prize" for special services to the development of German-Polish relations, the award of which was agreed in the 1991 agreement between the Federal Republic of Germany and the Republic of Poland on good neighborliness and friendly cooperation.

Because during our annual visits to Muhrau / Morawa some students always document the conversations on video (which will be presented after the journey of parenting in one evening), the idea arose with Melitta Sallai, but a larger documentation about the structure of the Hedwig Foundation to have the activities in Muhrau / Morawa done by our school. We realized this project together with a Polish group during a school meeting. Our partner was a student group of the ALA (Autorskie Licea Artystycze) from Breslau / Wrocław.

Both groups, as "regional peculiarities" in the run-up to the meeting, made street interviews in their respective hometowns. These interviews reflect people's images and ideas about each other's neighbors and themselves. In Muhrau / Morawa we then looked at and compared them, although our discussions were not always conflict-free. The historical past played a not insignificant role. It also became apparent how "regional identities" are subject to change.

About the project and Melitta Sallai

In 2011, a binational film project was launched as part of the seminar subject film in the upper level of KGS Hemmingen. At the invitation of the "Holy Hedwig" Foundation (named after the patron saint of Silesia) we traveled to Muhrau / Morawa (near Breslau / Wrocław) in Lower Silesia to learn about the activities of the Foundation, the life of the Silesian landlord's daughter and the head of the house Melitta Sallai to make a documentary. Also included in the film are the encounter between Germans and Poles and "making-of" footage of the shoot.

The foundation is based at Muhrau / Morawa Castle, a neo-classical mansion from the middle of the 19th century. Melitta Sallai was born there on 2 October 1927 as the daughter of the Silesian landowner Hans-Christoph von Wietersheim-Kramsta. Shortly before the end of the war, she fled with her family to the west. What Melitta Sallai did in France, Portugal and Angola in the following decades and why she returned to her Lower Silesian homeland, what a kindergarten has to do with all this and what the Poles think of the Germans (and of course vice versa) , you will learn everything in the 90-minute film "From Muhrau to Morawa - A German-Polish Student Project".

The shooting took place from 27.5. until the 3rd of June 2011 at Morawa Castle and surroundings. The project was supported by a professional camerawoman.

The project received further support from the Bürgerstiftung Hemmingen, the Förderverein der KGS Hemmingen, the German-Polish Youth Works and the Media Center of the Hannover Region. Special thanks are also due to Małgorzata Miedzińska-Staszkiewicz for the Polish translation of the film and other project-related materials.

Heimat - A German unique selling point?

A central term in this film is the term "Heimat". What makes the Heimat, how do you define it? Although the plural (according to Duden) is not common, according to Melitta Sallai this should be so, because "[...] you can have two Heimaten". The German word Heimat can not be natively translated into any other language in the world. English dictionaries, for example, use home, homeland, native country or roots for "Heimat". But all these words only describe a part of "Heimat" because they do not contain any emotions.

From the 17th to the 20th of June 2012 a small part of us traveled to Muhrau / Morawa again to visit Melitta Sallai.

Photo of June 20, 2012 - from left to right:

Tanita Lau, Nora Lau, Felix Schulz, Melitta Sallai and Isabel Bothe

- and Reinhold Baaske at the camera

Also in 2013 we visited Melitta Sallai. This time from the 17th to the 21st of May, exactly 11 months later and one day longer. Like the two years before, the weather was on our side; it was sunny and warm.

Photo from 21 May 2013 - from left to right:
Lisa Rometsch, Tanita Lau, Nora Lau and Felix Schulz

By contrast, we met Melitta Sallai in Hanover in 2015 - at the "Culture Prize Silesia 2015", during which she and the Hedwig Foundation was awarded a special prize.

Photo from 5 September 2015 - from left to right:

Reinhold Baaske, Tanita Lau, Felix Schulz, Melitta Sallai, Nora Lau and Isabel Bothe

Source: Nds. Ministry of Interior and Sports