The challenges and plans of the new AUBG hiking club Xaia
On 6th of February 2019, the hiking club Xaia officially became a member of the AUBG club community. The three founders of the club Alexandra Khrustaleva, Asset Janabekov and Rinat Tashpulatov are also heads of three different departments — Organization, Art and Guides. However, they did not want to have the typical club hierarchy and none of them became officially a president. The purpose of the club is also not solely connected to hiking and the founders seem to have found a way to create a very warm and friendly atmosphere around their club: “I wanted to make this club a cozy one. All other ones are too official. We try to promote carrying for people, nature and improving ourselves within the world,” said Alexandra.
The founders sometimes face challenges in the everyday management of the club since they do not have much experience with organizing a team and the amount of responsibilities they have to take care of is overwhelming. Nevertheless, their enthusiasm and seeing that people around them are motivated and dedicated to the cause gives them the reason to keep running the club and learn on the go. The club is currently not funded by the university but it is managing to raise money for food and medical kits needed during the hikes.
The first event opened for the entire AUBG community, organized by Xaia was the Earth Hour which took place on 30th of March, 2019. The students gathered to sing songs under the night sky on the lawn in front of ABF. “The Better Community club gave us some suggestions on how to organize the event. They also offered us to plug in some microphones and guitars so people passing by could hear us and join but what would be the idea of Earth Hour if all the electricity is plugged in” Asset said.
The future plans of the club for next year include 5 events in total: one big hiking event open to all AUBG students who want to participate, overnight hike during the weekend, a second Earth Hour event next year and organizing poetry and story nights around the bonfire in the nature with the possible participation of AUBG professors.
Rinat shares the other founders’ challenges of organizing people from different departments and arranging meetings. Also, as the head of the Guides department, he sometimes faces unforeseen obstacles: “When we go to a destination sometimes we get lost and people can get frustrated” shared Rinat.
However, he always consults the official adviser of the club Professor Clark and other experienced hikers from the AUBG faculty. Professor Clark is passionate about hiking, mountain biking, and backcountry skiing. He usually gives suggestions for the routes and destinations which the hiking groups of Xaia can use: “What is good about this club is their multilevel system of leaders training others to be guides. I hope I will join them sometimes for a hike” Professor Clark added.
The club operates for only one month, but it managed to organize two hikes to the Logodaj lake, the Stob pyramids and organized the Earth Hour event. Xaia keeps attracting the attention of new people who support the idea of having such an active, nature-loving and enthusiastic club as part of the AUBG community and it looks like it will have new exciting events in the next semesters.
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Vesselina Tasev is a bachelor degree student majoring in Journalism and Mass Communication and Business Administration with interest in content production.
