Hey guys,

how are you? I hope fine… Well some time ago I posted my idea about the local project. Marco gave me some addice and I thought once more about it. It would be more complicated if the youngsters have to travel and much more easier if we will come to them. So I really would like to combine this project with the evaluation meeting in Maidla. Propably the evaluation meeting in maidla will take place at the 2nd of april, so far I know. It would be a good chance that on the same day the evaluation meeting takes place to make some presenations about the different countries we are coming from and maybe a short description of our EVS working place (what we are doing there and so on). First of all the youngsters get to know different countries and different tasks about EVS. So please guys participate. You all will come to the evaluation meeting in maidla, so maybe we can make the meeting in the morning and this project in the afternoon. So the trip will be reimbursed and you don´t need extra money to participate. I will try to invite as many youngsters as possible. Maybe we can also get some volunteers who have already done the EVS, such as Kai? Kai what do you think? I think this project will be a good step to motivate the youngsters to think about doing the EVS too.

Now I know allo f us have holidays and so I don´t want to hurry. But I write you very early because then you have enough time. I will write you in January an invitation too, so please think about this project and if you want to attend!!! The presentation need not to be longer as 15-20 minutes… Of course, if somebody wants to do the same at his/her EVS place, I would like to come and speak about austria…

Having said this, I wish you a merry Christmas and a happy new year!!!

Häid jõule ja ilusat uut aastat!

Tsau, tsau

Marina

Hello everybody, My name is Aleksei Shatunov, Im doing my EVS in Portugal (Lisbon) Im here almost 2 month, My project is in the foster house of Barcarena. Place have 48 kids who have no family (or different problems in the family) center help the kids to find another family (adapting), or help the real parents (with finding job or other ways)  kids are from 5 to 20 years old (the older kids stay in the centr till they find work and would be capable to have independent life)
   I have 2 main directions in my project: art and sports. Im artist and i do wall painting for the center, also I have big experience in Volleyball and Im training kids to play beach volley. It is a great place, it is like a big warm family. I have a lot of freedom and good relationship with workers and kids..only one problem is the language..
I live in Lisbon  with 4 other volunteers. 1 girls from Spain, 1 girl from Catalonia, 1 guy and girl from Poland. Lisbon is a small town, but bigger than Tallinn of course, topulation of Lisbon is near to 600 000 so, its not big. people are nice, but tricky..Portugues people call Brazilians malandras ( what means sneaky and tricky) and pretending that they are not.. well dont believe it.. they are the same malandras..if they will have a chance to trick you, they will do it, dont think they wont..:)) (if you going to speak english) Specially taxy drivers and bartenders they are the worst.

 The city.. I love the city!! City have a beautiful parts and views, have a lot of mountains so you have to walk up and down always. City is very international and mixed, you have all skin pallet from white to black. Cant say much about the good climate, because its raining here alot because of the winter time :)) but in the march probably i will write how good is the weather here :)) Food is very good, a lot of fruits,fish and everything alse, prices are the same that we have in Estonia.
 Negativ stuff.. Lisbon is one of the dirtiest cities that I have seen in Europ, people have a strange habit to leave the garbage on the street, I mean to take your garbage from home in the garbage bag and live it on the street..and of course a lot of different trash everywhere.(like dogs shit..is everywhere.. I dont see much dogs..but some small smelly things are always reminding me that they have a lot of them..) what Else..oh yes drugs..drugs are everywhere, everyday on the street somebody asking me would i like to by some hashish or cocaine..maybe i look like drug adict i dont know..but i just look like a foreigner that's the thing.
 Language. I like the language  a lot, it is beautiful, but it is not easy to learn it. Main problem is people with whom you hang out..we always speak english, it would be much faster to learn the language if we would speak Portuguese  but its not happening so far.

So far Im very happy to be here, I like the people with whom I work, I have a lot of freedom, I like the country, city and the most important thing i like my project. A lot :))

Kallid sõbrad!

Sorry for answering so late, I have been a little bit indisposed.
I have to say I didn't really think of the idea to "unwrap" the monument after wrapping it.
But indeed, I think it would represent our message in a better way.

So we have to think of a way how we promote this project.
As there is the International Day of Volunteering the 5th december it could be a good beginning.
And right now I just start to imagine a bit.
Maybe we can start with "Jakobson", the man on the 500 crown bill and publisher of the first Estonian newspaper "Sakala". As he is a man of good taste, his statue is situatet in the beautiful town of Viljandi ;D
You could all come hereand we could make art happening. Thus, we go to the statue, wrap it and "dress up" up as journalists. Everyone takes a notebook and a pen. We go to the people we see on the street and ask: "Have you seen Jakobson?" - "Kas te olete näinud Jakobsoni?"
And dependent on the answer we can talk further, yes - he is right there, do you know who he is? have you noticed him on the500 crown bill? are you going to miss something when the Euro is there? do you think Estonia is losing some of its heritage? etc.
We can prepare the questions together, as well the Estonian translation in case people don't understand. Someone can also be the photograph an dtake pictures. In the end we can tell every questioned person to come back at a set time to the still wrapped sculpture. Then we can unwrap it again infront of the probably not very big - but still - audience.
This idea sounds very romantic, maybe it is not going to work like this, but maybe it is.
We can collect the stories people tell us and meanwhile doing an art happening.
Perhaps this could also be a good first promoting event.

Okay, now I have to ask again, what do you think?
Hääd Gerdalt

Tere minu sõbrad ;)

Hello to all of you…

I really think that Gerdas Idea is very great! In my opinion it´s very important to show estonians that they still can keep their identity, eventhough they are a memeber of the european union. But I also think, that it won´t be possible that all of us travel to those special places. Especially in my place I don´t have good bus connections, even at the weekends. But if there are any places in the near of my village or not so far away I could also go there. I don´t know yet where all of those places are ;( Gerda you know? And if we will have all of those pictures, Gerda what are you going to do then? You want to publish them in a selfcreated paper, make a blog or website or how do you want to spread this project? 

I also thought about ways how we can promote the EVS and I got an Idea. I´m sure that there are a lot of youngsters in Estonia who have never heard something about this possibility going abroad and being a volunteer. So it would be nice to increase their awareness. All of us are widespread through Estonia and we also have different working fields (youth work, kindergarden, school, center for disabled people, orphanage and so on). My idea is to show the young people in Estonia how different an EVS can be. How can we do this? Well, I think first we can go to schools, youth centers or any other places were we can meet our target group (people between 18 and 25, right?) There we can make a short presentation what the EVS is about and then give them the possibility to visit us one day in our working place (I don´t think it will be very timeconsuming). First of all they can get to know the work (what are the tasks of an EV and how does it go). Furthermore they can also meet people from different nationalities (US;)) So I think it would be possible to get some visits during our EVS time. What do you think? So we just have to make a list of our work and working places, at what times we are working and so on. I´m also thinking about making a blog for that, so we can share at what days we can recieve visits and on what days we have no time. And also the interested youngsters can contact us there. There is only one, maybe big, problem: The youngsters have to pay their travel to those places on their own ;( Marco and Jutta do you think there would be a possibility to get some support?

So guys, what are you thinking about this idea? In my opinion this is a good chance to motivate the youngsters to be part of the EVS and also to increase their awareness about the european union and projects founded by the european union… Let me know about your opinions!!!

Head õhtut,

Marina

Tere kõigile!

As I have already proposed my idea of the "money-project", here there are the details. No, we are not going to rob a bank or counterfeit some Euros. Not this time.

You probably have noticed that Estonia is full of national monuments, things that stand for the national awaking, the identity. One of those is the "Eesti kroon", the money. 

Estonia, is indeed not a big country. It unites the smallest number of native speakers of a language in one of the smallest national territories. However, this wasn't a reason for not developing a cultural heritage, a national conciousness, an Estonian history. After years of difficulties Estonia got its own money in 1992 and the awareness of being something special has probably increased.
But now this stage of patriotism is over and a new European one will begin. Crown is going to become Euro and the countdown has started. Maybe some are looking forward to this event, maybe some are regarding it as a mistake, at least it is a big change. This is why this nation should of course keep in mind its history, but as well look forward to possibilities offered by the community of Europe.

Of course, we as volunteers can't interfere in political issues, at least just in a very limmited way. But we can show to Estonians, that their national identity is not going to vanish, because thery won't see Estonian faces on bank notes.
Each of the pictured persons has a monument somewhere in Estonia. My idea is it to visit these places and "wrap" the monument. Well, the idea is actually related to Christo, an artist I can recommend to google if you want to see something really great ;D
Anyway, our wrapping would be done with another purpose, not the artistical realization, but the sense behind is counting. We can wrap the these monuments, cover them, to show that the intelectual property is not going to disappear. Lydia Koidula is still going to be in people's head although she is not on the 100 crown bill anymore.
I am sure someone will notice.
It was even noticed, when Gwen and me wrappen Jakobson just for some minutes for the picture.

Tell me what you think of the idea.
I am open for critics.

Musi ja kalli,
Gerda

GIFTS FROM THE PREVIOUS VOLUNTEERS - VOLUME 3

Hey hey,

here is some pictures that Stephan (from Germany) did about his experience in Käo Center in Tallinn.

Think out of the box!!!

Best
Marco

GIFTS FROM THE PREVIOUS VOLUNTEERS - VOLUME 2

Helo guys,

here I am with the 2nd Volume of the gifts that you received from our past EVS!!!

This one was made by João for our friends in Ida-Virumaa

Enjoy!
Marco

Back to basics

Just about a month and a year ago I got back from my EVS and even today i still am amazed and a bit confused about the crazy world we are living in...well, perhaps it’s me being Estonian therefore as according to most widely known stereotype “a bit faster than a Finnish person” (sry Henna :)) in understanding things or hell, probably it just me…anyhow, will leave that to you guys to figure out, you got nine months to see whether stereotypes about Estonians bare any ground and IF it seems they do, then challenge those bastards (stereotypes I mean).

Well, about the thing…I did my EVS in Rep of South Africa in one of the tree capitals called Cape Town and in one of the first black townships called Langa (meaning Sun in isiXhosa which is one of the twelve official languages of the country). Why I keep saying “in one of the” is merely cause this country is crazy and my first month went by in desperate endeavor to try to figure out when everything is “one of the” then where/what is the whole??? … well, during my 6 months there I did not figure out the One and Whole dilemma of mine, but I learnt a lot about one of the local cultures called Xhosa and people sharing it, I learnt a lot about myself AND most importantly got to know how some define life in Europe. Namely in one of the gatherings I notice a lady staring at me, I was confused cause…well, it was my first meeting and being only white person in the room with no black friends, there was no way I could have known her from before, so I don’t know how exactly I caught her attention, but she decided to approach. After little chit-chat she asks where am from and hearing it is Europe (SA is another country where Estonia is not working out) she practically yelled “aaahhh, it is where you have permanent toilets, yeeesss!!!”…so,no French Revolution, no houte couture, no Euro, but permanent toilets, that is how Europe seemed to some looking at this way.

Except going to meetings, really there was a lot of meetings and not the ones when you meet on the corner of the street to plan where to go next and then you actually go for it, not those constructive ones. They were just big gatherings which usually ended up with a conversation “what was offered for the snack” and it was muffins all the time, but people kept going. Not me though, I decided to sacrifice all the muffins for the time I had during the 6 months with the kids at the orphanage.

I worked in Siyaphambili Orphan Village (well, village was a wishful thinking, but starting big at least helps to start..) which accommodated 15 kids who had either lost their parents to HIV/AIDS or lived in such a poverty that they had to be removed from their parents. Honestly, Villages is really what Cape Town needs, what Rep of South Africa need for all the people in need, cause it was just a drop of sand what Siyaphambili contributed to the solution, but I was so proved to be part of that drop. Seeing those 15 kids getting help and living in conditions, which are not anywhere near to our standards here, once more corrected my perspectives and priorities in life. Well, another thing which helped a lot was the fact that I shared those conditions with them. Yes, I had my own room (after one of the house ladies removed her stuff and relocated to the children room).

Apparently they did not quite get what I was doing there and where exactly I was suppose to live, but it was sorted out rather quickly when I declared that I am to stay HERE for the next six months. I believe we got a long with that house lady just perfect and her food became the best I ever had (there)…which I take as a sign of friendship from her side as well, cause unfortunately she was the only lady not speaking the mix of isiXhosa-English, so I couldn’t ask her directly, whether we were cool…

Anyways, it is hard to forget my very first night there. I woke up with a peculiar sound and once I managed to peak out from the bars (for protection) covering the windows, there were huge flames, like really huge. Luckily they did not reach to our house. As I heard later then fire brigade got there 30 min later, though Langa is like 15 min away from Cape Town center (with very old minitaxi which is like Flinstones car where, ou so many times, I fought with the temptation just to put my legs on the ground and help the bloody thing to go faster) and on top of it all fire brigade got there with empty tanks and water was nowhere around…I truly hope it was a folk fable and in reality things are not so tragicomic, but the thing which was burning is called Joe Slovo, area for informal settlements.

At the same night, got back to bed thinking I have at least 5 hours left to sleep was my first wishful thought. Rest of the night I fought with a human finger size cockroach. Indeed, I could hear it running on the carpet, but Ii couldn’t see it at first (it fell on my face while I was trying to sleep and from the bounce it made when I threw it against the wall, I knew it was no flea am fighting with) so, I armed myself with hair spray left behind by the house lady and started the hunt. It was successful one as many others yet to come with all the  “domestic” animals in the room, but it was okay, cause I knew that I can return to the land of permanent toilets any time.

There were loads of things I had to readjust myself to, during every meal time I had to serve men and boys before women and girls (ou, how I got it wrong at the beginning, but it is another story), also had to do my washing with hands from socks to winter clothes (yes, there is winter is SA) for the whole 6 moths and it is very hard to try them during the winter cause sun is the only trying system they have, no heating system what so ever, and it gets cold, ou so cold and wet, ou so wet. Another skill was making strategies for going to bathroom while there was nobody around cause without the lock it was very common that I was caught while doing all the things I had used doing while locking the door. Well, it was a kind of a survival camp and I made it with a master degree in strategical planning. What I did not master and am ashamed to admit it to my friends back in South Africa was dancing to house music, I mean it is phenomenal how they sense every little rhythm and put it into accord with their body, like really. I was suppose to become an ambassador of one of the local dance moves and was suppose to spread it to masses in our night clubs, but I should have told them already back then that, cause obviously they were too nice to say it out loud, that I suck when it comes to dancing, when it comes to moving your feet, body, head and hands all together and separately at the same time and then not so at the same time and in way that it all looks nice, well, I just don’t have it in me…and I don’t go to night clubs, so I was a failure already from the very first moment. 

You are still in the beginning of your EVS, I dare you to make another round of evaluation and find things why you are here and things why you are not here as well…am sure there are things you are not able to go on compromises, it is okay too…well, it was hard for me to admit that no way am gonna dance like them, but it is okay :)

Ahh, my experience has become a sort of mosaic in my head and it is weird to write about it after so long time. Every time I’ve told the story it is a bit different, well, this time it came out like that…

Anyways, did you already book a coffee time with your mentor for the first gossip round? Did you learn the names of your staff members? Did I just hear you complaining about how difficult Estonian is???????? Well, I tell you, if you master this I will personally excuse you from all the estonain classes…this is what I was facing…

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q5c2EYPEs6o&feature=related

…and yet, I would do it all over again!

See you around,

Kai

GIFTS FROM THE PREVIOUS VOLUNTEERS - VOLUME 1

Hello guys,

I will post some documents, videos, photos that the previous volunteers did about their working places/cities.

I hope that you enjoy like I did!!!
Marco

This is a video made by our austrian volunteers Stephanie Sieber about the life of EVS!!!

Enjoy

If I could, I'd do it again! - my EVS

"FREEDOM!"

(I have been trying to get my thoughts together for nearly an hour now. It's been a bit more than a year since I returned from Scotland where I did 12 months of EVS and every time I need to summarize what it was like I'm struck with the awesomeness of it all - including problems and hard times. So here it goes.)

When explaining my EVS the short way I can say that it took place in Scotland, in a city near Edinburgh, in a organization (Firefly Arts) that delivered drama and film workshops for young people, including some with learning difficulties. I was a drama workshop leader but also worked in the office (paperwork, educational seminars etc), promoted EVS in the local schools, worked with LGBT (Lesbian Gay Bi- and Transsexual union) youth and did some other youth work policy stuff. 

Before I flew over to Scotland I knew I was to have two other volunteers with me (from Greece and Azerbaijan) but (unfortunately) the European Commission only funded one spot so I became the very first EVS volunteer for Firefly. Previous plans for us to live in Livingston (where my HO is situated) in a house for three people were not possible anymore so they found me a flat in Edinburgh which is about 30 km away from Livingston. That meant at least 1-hour long bus rides to work and back home. Sometimes it took longer as the traffic was horrendous. Sometimes I got lucky and took a car with my boss :) 

I did enjoy living in Edinburgh though. Livingston itself was not a pleasant place as a city whereas Auld Reekie (as they call Edinburgh) is THE city for me. I started to love the place the minute I got there. My flat was situated in the centre, about 10 minute walk from the ancient Castle! That was the main plus of the flat though. 

As I was the only volunteer for some time in my organization I shared the flat with people outside of EVS world (which was a welcoming change of all the volunteering but made it also hard to explain what exactly am I doing there and from time to time made feel extremely lonely). During my 12-month stay I had 2 Polish, 1 Italian, 1 American, 2 Australians and a Dutch person sharing the place. Some of them were lovely and others were... rather difficult. In the end I was the only girl and not trying to be rude, but boys are SO messy. I had pretty intense times with a flat mate about cleaning up, cooking, terrible techno music, loud parties at 3AM during week, obnoxious visitors and so on.

The flat itself was okay with some quirks I got use to pretty quickly. I had a tiny room at first and changed into a bigger one later. I had some furniture (a creaky small bed, a table and a chair, built in cupboard), but had to buy sheets, a new proper pillow, some carpets and other stuff to make it more comfortable. The first night I woke up to some kind of noise which turned out to be a mouse (and it's hungry family) who lived under my floorboard and had come outside for a quick snack of my delicious Estonian chocolate. Mice were a constant problem during the year as 1) it was a old house with some cracks in the floor and walls, 2) we lived above a pub, 3) the food trash left out by my rude flat mates (well, just the one person). Also, the flat got quite chilly during winter time as most UK's old house windows are single-framed and let wind through. Oh well, didn't mind that so much as the climate is much much softer than in Estonia. The third negative side of the flat was the lack of common space - the kitchen was a tiny corner without a table and we didn't have a living room - a designated corner in a corridor was occupied by this huge out-of-tune piano and a tiny rickety couch. So we all ate our meals in our own rooms which was quite lonely. Ah, and the view out of my window was the wall of a church (I heard organs playing every Sunday at 10am) and a beer garden of sorts that belonged to the down-stairs pub (live football matches & its fans on most weekends).

All in all though, the living conditions were alright - I mean, I wasn't expecting anything grand anyway and for me the location was already like a blessing. I did spend most of my time at work or in the city too.

A funny thing about the workplace was that it used to be a tractor shed and was pretty old and shabby. Luckily the staff in it and youngsters that came to do their workshops were absolutely great making it feel like some sort of hub of happiness and laughter. Firefly works in the most poorest areas of Scotland and Livingston, as said above, is rather ugly town. It happened so that the council was building a new house, a culture centre in Livingston, and Firefly was to have office and performance space there. Unluckily for me they postponed the deadline several times and so my last day at work was the moving day where I packed and unpacked all things to the new office but never had the chance to actually sit in the much brighter, warmer rooms. 

Despite all of this, the experience of the year was fantastic - I can't describe it so that you could feel the speciality of it. I think it's not even necessary as you will make your own fantastic memories and experiences. How I see a successful EVS experience is as follows: people are the essence of this service. There can be many little or big problems with things, but when the relations with people (your colleagues, your fellow volunteers, the locals, your clients etc) are good then everything is much much better (of course, problems occur with people as well but that is natural). Then, it is also important to be as unexpectant and unpretentious as possible. Try to have wondrous eyes and try to blend in. It is your responsibility to understand the culture you've arrived to and it is your honour to present your own culture to the people you meet.

Oh, and enjoy :)

Hannele, EVS volunteer in 2008-2009

TERE TERE VANA KERE - My EVS experience in Estonia

Hello guys,

I'm very happy to see you guys here and I hope that we will have great moments during your EVS. So as you know my name is Marco Santos and I'm the Project Coordinator of noOR since a year ago and I live in Estonia since 2008.

You can know about noOR in our blog (http://ngonoor.wordpress.com/) in our website (www.erinoor.ee) and in our facebook page but now I'm not here to talk about my work but about my EVS in Estonia.

I arrived in Estonia in August 2008 for a 9 months project in a organisation called European Movement Estonia. My work was mainly to help the coordination of EURO<26 youth card and to help in EURODESK network. I had to make some presentation around Estonia and promote those services. Honestly it was a very "office" job.. where I have some freedom but I was treated as a worker. I was the only EVS in this organsiation but I start to hang aorund with the EVS form Continous Action because we did the language course together.

During my EVS I felt like I was a bit different, I was not that often with the others EVS volunteers and very fast I had my own group of friends from Estonia. Of course that I was out with them from time to time and we even spent Christmas together travelling around Europe.

I also couldn't complain about money because I saw that I got more money than the rest of the EVS in Estonia (maybe during my EVS I made around 50.000 kroons of profit for my hosting organisation preparing people for different projects and making partnerships). Anyway, I saw that it would help me to stand up by myself for some time.

My accomodation was shared with 3 estonians in a house in Kalamaja. I live in that house since today. When I arrive here my room didn't have light, closet or anything. When I arrived there was a matress, a pillow and a blanket. It was quite funny that in the next month I used my luggage as a closet until I get a shelf. I went to a second hand shop to buy bed-linnen, towels an the other little things taht I needed. (I feel very proud that now I live in the biggest room of the house and I even have a bed hehehe). I never complained about the place because I saw my EVS colleagues living a flat with 3 bedrooms (they were 6 and sometimes 8) in that flat in Kadriorg. I saw how they had some fights because of that and how everything was tight, so at least I knew that I have my dark room (remember? without light.. I got a lamp for the room :-D)

During my free time I started to help noOR with some work and after that Juta invited me to stay longer in Estonia to give a bigger impact with noOR in the youth work. I felt challanged again and then I decided to stay. I guess I had the right choice because I feel challange constantly with my work and I really feel that we have a very gerat and positive impact in how the things are done in Estonia in youth field (I may be dreaming but that's a real feeling that I have).

I would like to invite all ex-EVS to share their experience and maybe we can discuss a bit more about it and find ways to have a great experience here in Estonia!

See you guys around and feel free to make me questions about my experience too!!!
Marco

 Yes, as Juta wrote - Gerda (on the right) and Przemek (on the letf) are already in Estonia, waiting for you :-) This is "Viljandi style", so Gwenaelle, get ready!

 Unfortunately we have only two pictures together and didn't know which one is better, so you can see both:

 

 

See you soon!

Tere!

I finally mentioned to log in as well =)
My name is Viktoria and I am from Germany. I am 18 years old and just finished school here in Berlin. I was born in Bavaria and lived there for quite a time before we moved to Berlin.
Like many of you I am also arriving in Tallinn on the 17th of September (only 3 days to go….and still so much to do – ahh)
I will stay in a small village called Habaja 50 km from the capital and work in a local kindergarten and primary school for the next 9 month. I am so excited to get to know everyone there, as well as the culture, language and the country. I tried to learn some Estonian, but wasn’t that successful yet =)
I started to pack my bags today  (which was a huge mistake!!!) this is just crazy, to only have 20 kg =)
Well, I am really looking forward to get to know you all!!! See you in 3 days =) can’t wait!!!!
P.S. I have a question to Juta: I was just wondering who is going to pick us up at the Airport, or do we have to meet a special place? =)
And to all the Germans/ Austrians: does your flight stop in Frankfurt? We might even be in the same plane… (mine starts in Frankfurt at 14. 30)
I hope everyone has great (tearless) 3 days and a good trip.