Photo: Ioana Burtea

What's it like to stage a play in a bus?

The answer came from Daniel, who is a videoartist in Dortmund. He suggested – and we all approved – that if we keep running around from one city to another and just focus on staying awake until the end, this tour would be a waste. We've been under an incredible amount of pressure and we've been trapped together in our Driving Jail for several days now, so it's been very difficult to sink in what we've been seeing on theatre stages or to clarify the questions we were left with after debates. We all had topics we wanted to discuss in more depth or questions that remained unanswered because of the lack of time.

The alternative Daniel proposed was to use the hours spent on the bus, driving from one city to another, to talk together as a group and address these issues. Furthermore, we agreed that since we've been lucky enough to be part of such a diverse and creative collective – poets, playwrights, journalists, theatre directors and actors – we should continue our collaboration after the tour ends. What we intend to do in these last days is to take some time to really think about what where we could start – Create a platform for collaboration in theatre? Make a project? Get involved in each other's existing projects? -, what key issues we want to tackle and how we can help each other achieve our professional goals. Maybe Anne and Gina could stage the play they began developing, Daniel could help with the visual arts, Ivor could help with the research and I could write a review of the final product or contribute with my writing skills in some way. We are convinced everyone has a part to play. The fact is, after this intense tour we will be the lucky possessors of certain knowledge about the state of the European theatre, the differences at a national level, the themes that are being addressed (and those which are ignored), so we will be able to create something from an unusually informed perspective. What is painfully clear is that if we don't act and continue what we've started here, our efforts on this tour will have been for nothing.

After making this very passionate decision to work together, we arrived in the picturesque city of Maribor in Slovenia, where we saw a performance of Dangerous Liaisons. The topic on everyone's minds was our earlier discussion on the bus, though. As we called it a night, we decided we would start thinking about options for us on the following morning, on the way to Bratislava. What followed and the course of action that we took will only be revealed to you if you keep an eye on E&M for the diary of day six.

Two more days of the ETC Spring Tour and our wonderful journey in the Driving Jail will come to an end. Hopefully, this hectic week will only be the beginning of several beautiful friendships.