On Tuesday, the 12^th of November2024, the Auditorium Maximum Hall in Cluj-Napoca hosts the "Opera Fantastica Gala", an event dedicated to raising funds for the Autism Transylvania Association, which celebrates 18 years since it opened its doors. On this occasion, Nicoleta Niste, president of the association, spoke with our colleague Ioana Țintea.

Ms. Nicoleta Niste, Opera Fantastica Gala marks the 10^th anniversary edition of the "Colourful Soul" Project. What does this anniversary mean for Autism Transylvania Association and how has the project evolved over time?

For Autism Transylvania Association, this gala represents the kindness that the community chooses to offer us, because it is dedicated to a project of our association, "I want to be independent - Together we get wings"- a project through which we want to offer children and young people with autism the opportunity to get in touch with various jobs through four vocational workshops.

You might think that finding a job is a challenge for absolutely anyone, but this task becomes almost impossible when it comes to young people with disorders like autism who want to take that step. And if we think about the benefits for the community, they are tremendous - these young people to be able to find a job and companies to be encouraged to hire them. That's what we want to do through a print and personalization workshop, a creative workshop, through music and movement and a candle workshop. We want to give these young people the opportunity to feel fulfilled. That beyond the therapies that they have been doing for years, they can also make friends, put into practice everything they have learned, and even apply the socialization and communication skills learned in therapy and develop their working skills in order to find a job.

Of course, we are thinking long term, if we can dream that far ahead, about a social economy unit, so that our young people - whether they will be partially or fully supported, or, of course, the dream is for them to be independent - have the context to look for a vocation already at the age of 12, 15.

With the help of some collaborators, we already have a workshop room. And those who choose to be with us on the 12^th of November at the Opera Fantastica Gala will feel like part of a project that we want to extend in the long term, they will feel that they have also put a brick in the process of development of these children and young people, and the community will only benefit.

We will use the funds that will be raised by the sale of these tickets to support the activities in our workshops.

What impact does the collaboration with artists and cultural institutions such as the one through the Opera Fantastica Gala have in supporting the initiatives of the Autism Transylvania Association?

These extraordinary names who have chosen to give their time, to come from several corners of the country or even of Europe to Cluj-Napoca, to bring such an extraordinary gala with professionalism and joy of giving their time to be on stage, help us to reach as far as possible, to the Cluj audience and not only, who, for sure, in the long run will leave a mark, will leave their soul and the work they are doing for us now to remain through all the media coverage that was done at this concert, through their participation, through the fact that they will already be our ambassadors.

We think so and we hope so. Wherever they will have the opportunity to advocate for the support of these children and for their development, I am convinced that they will do it, because they will get to know us and realize how important it is. They already realize how important it is, otherwise they would not be on the stage in Cluj-Napoca.