NATURE CONSERVATION / One voice has the Somes and the Tisza…

17:00 – 18:00 Stories by the River. Romanian-Hungarian documentary, directed by Adi Dohotaru, Mihai Dragolea, Radu Gaciu, Gábor-Gáspár Kalamár, 2026, 54’
Riverside Stories comprises four short films and a music video exploring the multifaceted ways in which people interact with the river. The omnibus’s themes center on a single waterway, the Someș in the Cluj area, ranging from the passage of time and the river’s flow, occasionally marred by debris, to waterfront real estate developments, ghettos on crumbling embankments, and the lush gardens or biodiversity of the green-blue corridor. This 54-minute documentary is the first non-fiction omnibus in the cinema from Romania, the result of a collaboration between four directors, Adi Dohotaru, Mihai Dragolea, Radu Gaciu, and Gábor-Gáspár Kalamár, plus musician Danaga and the protagonists they encounter along the way.

18:00 – 18:30 Message in a Bottle: The Official History of the PET Pirates. Hungarian documentary, dir. Dávid Molnár Attila, 2018, 52’
For more than 10 years, PET Cup on the Tisza River has been organizing community river-cleaning actions in which protecting nature becomes an experience and collecting waste turns into an adventure. The PET Cup volunteers, better known as the “PET Pirates”, have removed more than 500 tons of polluting materials from rivers and their floodplains. The PET Pirates consider it their mission to treat waste as a valuable resource and find its way back into the material cycle. To this end, the collected waste is carefully sorted and then given a new life in their own workshop, with the help of partners. In this way, nearly 60% of the collected materials are recycled. The initiative has by now grown into a project that mobilizes hundreds of volunteers. The good example is contagious, and those who get a taste of a PET Pirate”s life, remained captivated forever. Many say it is addictive, because determination combined with creativity is extremely inspiring. New ideas emerge every day, both within the team and from professionals, companies, and artists who join the cause and support the work with innovative solutions. These collaborations produce fantastic results. The most valuable result of all, however, is the synergy itself.

18:30 – 20:00 Discussion with the creators, participants in nature conservation projects, ecologists, and activists. The discussion will be held in two languages—Hungarian and Romanian—with translation provided.
Participants: Krisztina Babos, biologist and journalist; Bendegúz Bachrathy, youth group leader for the PET Cup; Adrian Dohotaru, author, director, and civic activist, vice president of the Urban Nature Network (Rețeaua Natura Urbană). Gábor Gáspár Kalamár, director; Radu Mititeanu, environmental activist and director of the Napoca Cycling Club; Anna Szabó, biologist and ecologist; Kata Vészity, project manager of the river-saving PET Cup movement.

Moderator: Zoltán Sipos, journalist and editor-in-chief of Átlátszó Erdély.