On April 3rd, students from Serbia embarked on a 1,400 km cycling journey to the beautiful city of Strasbourg. They set out on a diplomatic mission to Strasbourg to deliver letters to European officials. These letters contained reports on the ongoing student demonstrations in Serbia against government corruption and the peaceful fight for justice, freedom, and democracy.

After thirteen days of cycling, covering around 100 km each day, 80 students from Serbia, with their support, arrived in Strasbourg. Along their journey, they crossed many European cities, including Budapest, Bratislava, Vienna, Linz, Salzburg, Munich, Ulm, Stuttgart, and finally arriving in Strasbourg on April 15th. At each stop, they were greeted with a warm welcome by the Serbian diaspora and local town officials, leaving many people in tears of hope.

I was happy to document just a tiny part of their brave journey with my camera. Even though I am a cyclist myself (with racing experience), I was skeptical whether all of these 80 students would make it to the final destination. This wasn't a cyclotouring adventure where you and your buddies would go and enjoy the beautiful scenery of Europe, stopping for a gelato whenever you felt like taking a break from pedaling. Nor was this a professional cycling team that would, after a stage, hop onto a bus worth hundreds of thousands of euros and be transported to a five-star hotel, where every rider would be greeted by their dedicated nutritionist and physiotherapist - all for optimal recovery. Not at all.

After each full day of pedaling in a bunch, thousands of people patiently waited for them, with a red carpet leading to the stage where the students would address the crowd, full of tears. All present media surrounded the students from Serbia, hoping for a wonderful story told by some of them. Students knew that every word was being measured during their interviews in real-time, especially back home, by their own government which, like a hyena, waits for the smallest mistake in a student's public address to take the clip, spin the words and broadcast it in the worst inhumane way possible. After the day show was over, they went to sleep either in big halls of some public spaces or scattered across apartments of the local Serbian diaspora.

Regardless of how challenging and impossible their mission seemed at the beginning, both physically and logistically, these smart and brave young women and men delivered on all fronts. They made headlines, and they raised EU public awareness. The day after they arrived in Place Kléber in Strasbourg, they went into the European Parliament, where Irena Joveva, Gordan Bosanac, and Fabienne Keller welcomed them and to whom they delivered the letters.

As the peaceful fight for a civilized society continues in Serbia, a fresh group of students is preparing for a relay ultramarathon run with a final destination in Brussels. Their journey will be approximately 1,800 km in total, and they aim to put more pressure on EU officials to condemn the Serbian government's actions over the past five months in Serbia. In just a few days, 16 students will begin their ultramarathon from Novi Sad, where 16 victims lost their lives due to corruption. Follow their journey and give them your love and support if you can.