English introduction - Associazione VITA Onlus

This is our full name, an articulated name to define the complexity of life and the commitment of the Association, through members and volunteers, in protecting it in all its expressions.

The VITA O.N.L.U.S. develops from the ashes of the Balkan War and from the direct experience that the promoter of the Association has shared with those who have suffered, in addition to the horror of the War, the consequent prejudices, marginalization and discrimination in a new land, reached in an attempt to rebuild your own future. In 2006, the promoter's idea became reality from the meeting with other people who, like him, intend to dedicate a considerable amount of their time to supporting others, their difficulties and fragility, especially in the field of health; using, in addition to material and concrete aids, the levers of culture and sporting activities as starting points for the reconstruction of oneself.

Associazione Vita Onlus has therefore set out two missions: to protect human life by developing interventions and activities on its own in the social, medical, cultural and sports fields; create synergy in national and international cooperation between associations, volunteers and projects, with the "synergies for volunteering" protocol, supporting with spot actions and interventions, according to the skills of its human resources, nascent associations or aggregations of people united for social and humanitarian.

For these projects it relies on the support of selected partners. Together, combining experience, professionalism and social volunteering, they help the take-off of social and humanitarian projects which, in addition to the good will of their promoters, require management methodology, information, communication between the subjects involved, development ideas, in short, Social Culture.

The full name of the association tries to clarify our mission:

As you can see in the following pages and in the brochure, the activities carried out often combine several elements and develop in synergy with each other. This is because defining an intervention to protect life without considering its components risks deviating the result from expectations and not rebalancing the vital parameters correctly.

Our stakeholders are truly extensive: from the direct beneficiaries of the intervention, to volunteers and associates; institutions and other associations and organizations; the welcoming community; even the suppliers - often - are chosen from local operators to make a contribution to local economic development. In short, our actions must consider the whole community and require constant supervision and monitoring of the effect-cause-effect correlation to monitor the value of the expected direct and indirect effects, whether positive or negative. Yes, the actions must be sustainable over time and therefore the undesirable effects are always around the corner and it is necessary to know them, prevent them and name them adequately.

It may also be for this reason that we tend not to donate money, but resources and concrete solutions. Ours is a complex activity, but at the same time fluid and dynamic; essential and concrete.

Health is one of the attentions we must always have: without health there are many limitations and consequences, so we always keep it close to our hearts. The medical aspect, for us, concerns both services, care, and infrastructures, places, environments and machinery. We have dealt with the medical sector with various interventions. We have mentioned the first in the social sphere, because pet therapy has concrete implications in personal care. We also remember the donation of an ultrasound machine to the Romano di Lombardia hospital. Oh yes, sometimes we are inclined to do good only outside the home, far away. As they say: the grass on the other side is always greener, or in this case, drier. Yet, often those in need are our neighbors. In this sector it is not always true that large funds are needed to do something: drug delivery and collection are other nuances of social activities, but which can be included in medical activity and which have no costs. Direct activities of volunteers at no cost to the Association. It is also true that we incurred the greatest costs in this field when we restructured an entire ward in the Kasindo hospital in Istocno Sarajevo (BiH). The initial idea was to define a neonatology ward, but the vicissitudes of the war in the 90s led us to listen to the local population before deciding: this allowed us to better understand the needs and so we opted to do the neurology department. Years of work before and years of verification later to prevent the structure from being abused or abandoned. They put it to good use and many people received better care thanks to the completely new ward. Furthermore, the local authorities had to listen to this need and over the years they have also restructured other wards of the same hospital. This then opens up to interactions with international cooperation, but we will see it in the specific page.

To remain in the medical field, we have the donation of defibrillators in Sicily, to the volunteer firefighters and to Mercy.

The social sphere is the most extensive, because it can include almost everything. From work, to relationships; from education to respect and well-being to acceptance in society.

You have to be very careful when dealing with social projects because every community is founded on universal values ​​and traditions, but also on characteristics. This uniqueness of social gender can feed the interpretation and vision of deviant behavior and any "corrective" actions must be limited in the cultural world of the community.

Without pretending to go into the specific theme, of extensive considerations, we report some examples of the interventions. On the annual recurrence we organize creative workshops, often called "creative snacks", which aim to bring together young people, children and even adults, in order to relate, share, develop imagination, develop manual skills and creative art. In the various editions we have accompanied the user in the creation of soaps, creams, Christmas decorations and carnival masks; tickets for holidays and birthdays; drawings and bracelets; works with dry leaves and recyclable waste materials. Without forgetting courses for the finest palates, such as chocolate tasting and preparation courses.

Social is also support for the Volunteer Detachment of the Fire Brigade, which we had the honor of supporting in Romano di Lombardia; Cute; Maletto, or the Mercy of Catania. Social is also education: for years there have been various activities that have brought us into the world of school. Social is also the defense against all gender-based violence and against women, such as the intervention in Palermo on May 27, 2023 entitled Regina: "Scacco al Re". Or the service (anonymously) to accompany women victims of physical or psychological abuse within the family to safe places to regain their freedom.

Actions in favor of earthquake victims in Reggio Emilia and L'Aquila in past years were also social interventions. The intervention inside the prisons of Alba and San Vittore in Milan was also social. The first concerned pet therapy and the second books and cultural activities.

Sport, a moment of personal, mental, physical, but also social and relational growth. Well, you see, sport also reminds us of its educational and social values, which is why we believe that we should always support events that are as transversal as possible. On this topic we can tell about the support for women's volleyball teams; activities carried out within a football team in Milan (still at the level of chicks); activities carried out in collaboration with AVIS Milano - cycling section. But perhaps the most complex activity we organized on the occasion of fundraising for the Reggio Emilia earthquake when we involved a private company present in a specific district of Milan; a sports association present in the local parish and a representation of the Army present at the Perrucchetti barracks. A sporting and social event of high value for what this sport can express in the positive sense of healthy competition. A football match between the three representations to welcome the military to the local community and contribute to fundraising. Sport is also a way to support aspects of integration (social) and health (medical).

Culture, education, knowledge, information and training ... how many aspects does culture include? Surely we don't feel worthy to elevate ourselves to professors or lecturers, much less to doctors of knowledge and yet, even in this we manage to make our contribution. We have often contributed with the collection and donation of books, both in Italy and abroad for books in the language or in Italian for those who were interested in learning more about this language. At San Vittore, the Prison of Milan for short detentions, we donated books, computers to take courses and we joined a project (Free to read) which involved our presence to represent a book (published on our behalf) and on it makes a comparison on emotions, feelings, reflections and even more cultural considerations, in fact. Culture easily recalls the school, many initiatives that have revolved around this world ... Cultural was also the event in Milan, at Palazzo Cusani who saw us firsthand in the organization of the event on the prevention of Cardiac arrest in life and sport. A cultural and scientific moment, with interest in the world of sport (several sports federations participated with interest). Also cultural is the Palermo event against gender-based violence and against women, with the extraordinary participation of Dacia Maraini and the high patronage of the European Parliament. The participation with Malaika to talk about Africa was also of a cultural nature... With CIRCLA and OCCAM to talk about E-Peru... Cultural was the very first event in Grinzane Cavour that saw us talk about pet- therapy, of aspects related to the context of Grinzane. An event that introduced us to the Bosnian Consulate and was the forerunner for the subsequent event in collaboration with WineLove, which allowed a Bosnian excellence to present its products (wines) in an international context held in Milan. Cultural are the meetings that we organize or to which we are invited to talk and compare ourselves with other associations and organizations; volunteers and people who want to have support to enter the world of the third sector and volunteering accompanied in the first steps...

work in a foreign country; create synergies between associations, organizations, bodies and institutions; collaborations to participate in tenders of wide interest; support smaller associations and organizations with complementary activities to ours.

We believe that it is important to network and join the collaboration offers. Making synergy means collaborating and growing together for the good of the end users; it means raising the value of the service and actively confronting each other to exchange ideas.

Even the form of patronage, for us, is a form of cooperation, because the value of the event and of the subjects who participate in it is recognized.

We have operated in international cooperation with the Dominican Republic and with Bosnia; in synergy with Malaika for Africa and other small activities with other organizations on the occasion of the Spirit of the Planet. Synergies between associations with Volunteer Firefighters; Let's recover them for pet therapy; Assea for the event in Grinzane. With the MarcoSacchi Association for the activity of Palermo Regina: "Check the king" . Collaborations also with Dacia Maraini herself to give more emphasis to the action of the intervention. We have come to have more than ten sponsorships of associations with the Palermo event, as an example of the need to network.

In Milan we joined the Forum of Associations and drafted collaborations with the D.I.F. (Defense in the Family). We have collaborated with the Mariuccia nursery school and many other local associations.

We have an important collaboration and synergy with the public institutions of Milan: Municipio 7 of Milan; Municipality of Milan for the service 02.02.02 of Milan It helps and no less important is the multi-year collaboration with the House of Associations and Voluntary Work in Milan (House 7 and occasionally House 8).

It is important for us to be there, to learn and give our contribution and contribution to others.