Head, Heart & Hands: finding a balance between them

Abstract

"At this point of writing up the acknowledgements, clear thoughts of gratitude and excitement are crossing my mind. When, 3 years ago, I was studying in Italy as an exchange student, I had a small talk with a friend talking about our future plans. She asked me whether I would do my master s in Greece or abroad and I just responded automatically Me and master are two different stories. I could never do a master s degree, let alone in English! Recalling this moment back in 2014 I can just say that people like coincidences and me especially love accepting challenges. Moving to the Netherlands I hadn t my mind set on a specific research plan, however months after visiting various cultural centers I got deeply inspired by Pakhuis de Zwijger in Amsterdam. After a couple of months researching their various workshops, campaigns and workings, I realized that my ethnographic focus will be on Cities in Transition and how this transformation scheme could ideally contribute to the city s Social Sustainability. Challenge after challenge, with a lot of peaks and lows throughout a three-month-long research period, I definitely feel grateful to all this experience, family, professors, friends and colleagues that always stood by me offering great help, support and faith in me. Special thanks to the University of Utrecht for all this academic knowledge and boost that supplied me and my fellow students with. Special thanks to my supervisor, Annalisa Butticci for her professional and psychological support for my research plan and pursuit. Special thanks to my friends that kept believing in this thesis even though they couldn t grasp the content of it and, however, kept on motivating me despite the challenges. Special thanks to my co-workers and research participants from Pakhuis de Zwijger that believed in this thesis, trusted me and gave me a lot of information, data and access to their files. Special thanks to Charlot for welcoming me on her board and Monica for helping me out with writing articles and teaching me numerous writing tips. Last but not least, Great thanks to my family for all the support before, during and after the research period! Closing, I want to express a deep gratitude to all this experience and share with every reader that accepting the challenges that might occur can make us more faithful, self-confident and motivated for the future!"