Mikroworkcamp

We started this week in a very active and useful way. Our little team of  ten volunteers had a mikroworkcamp in the course of which we planted more than 1,400 trees. But before going into details let’s see how this activity was made possible.

 The idea of cooperation with Nadleśnictwo Pułtusk is not new. One of the last steps towards preparation was a trip to the forest with the kids from the Social Care Centre at the end of September where we were also invited. While we, volunteers were playing with the kids, important decisions were made in the background. They heard about our activities and proposed cooperation.

With the head of Nadleśnictwo, Pani Ania, the
head of the Social Care Centre and the kids
in September

Another important element was the training organized by Centrum Zrównoważonego Rozwoju „Horyzonty”as participants joined us for our mikroworkcamp. It was also a good way for them to practice English, as the day after they went to Italy for a study visit. Two volunteers from SPW, Pia and Tom also joined us.

So now, let’s go back to what happened yesterday. The day started with a meeting in the office, where Sylwia presented the participants the activities of our organization and the idea of workcamps. It was followed by ‘getting to know each other’. After a quick introduction, we played our favourite name-game but soon we had to leave. Those trees can’t plant themselves!

After arriving to the venue, we split into teams of two. Hayk was our leader, he translated us the instructions that we got from the forester (the man who works in the forest). He showed us different methods of planting and kept an eye on us to do everything well. While working, we had the chance to get to know each other and this way, working was more enjoyable. In our coffee break, the head of Nadleśnictwo came to visit us and he thanked us our work here and every participant got a package with a book,  keychains and some flyers to remember this day. When we were done with planting a trees, a bonfire was waiting for us with bygos and kiełbasa.


What have I learnt?

We were lucky enough to learn different methods of planting trees. While working the Polish participants challenged us to say some Polish tongue twisters and we also learnt some new, useful phrases in connection with working outside.

Impact on the local community

The effect of our work won’t be felt soon as trees need time to grow but we still felt that we did something useful. The ironical part of the day was that as we were leaving the forest, we saw a big truck full of trees. Also, as a continuation of this project, there are going to be more workcamps at Nadleśnictwo.



Do zobaczenia,

Zsófi

How to celebrate the European Day of Languages

‘The European Day of Languages is 26 September, as proclaimed by the Council of Europe on 6 December 2001, at the end of the European Year of Languages (2001), which had been jointly organised by the Council of Europe and the European Union. Its aim is to encourage language learning across Europe.’

Our partner, Eulingua Centrum Językowe decided to promote languages that are not so popular to learn. From Monday to Wednesday we were visiting different schools in and around Pułtusk. On Monday, our target was Publiczne Gimnazjum Nr 1 and Liceum Ogólnokształcące im. Piotra Skargi. The next day we moved to Obryte, where we visited the primary school and also the gimnazjum. Finally on Wednesday our audience became a class in Pniewie. The students had the chance to get to know some more about Romania, Ukraine, Russia, Armenia and Hungary. It was not only about boring presentations and giving students the chance to skip a normal lesson! After introducing the country itself and its language, it was time for some quizzes and games. This way was also a good method to get their attention and to make them remember the new information.

Thursday was the day of a teachers’ conference, where we had the chance to present ourselves again and to convince teachers to work with us.

This chain of events will be closed with a city game in Pułtusk tomorrow.

What have I learned?

I hate speaking in front of many people but during the days at the schools I realized that it is not that scary to have an audience listening to you. It was also interesting to see how different people talk about their own countries. At last but not least my international vocabulary also got bigger thanks to all the presentations. 

Impact on local community
It was great to see that students were interested in getting to know these not so popular languages. They also seemed enthusiastic to learn new words.

Zsófi

EVS weekend

Pułtusk is usually a quiet little town but for some time it turned into a lively place with many programmes and a lot of people hanging around. During St Matthew Days the market square turns into a place of a festival with a huge stage, many trampolines and other facilities for kids to play.

Our part in this celebration started a couple of weeks before, when we started to plan what kind of activities we could carry out. Then, we decided to invite the new volunteers from SPW in Warsaw. We did not expect such a big enthusiasm but finally all of them decided to participate. We did a lot of brainstorming and planning, everyone worked really hard to make the best out of this weekend. We collected, invented and tested a lot of games. New sleeping mats, sleeping bags and pillows had to be bought to be able to host the volunteers. We also got T-shirts with the logo of Centrum Międzinarodowej Wymiany Młodzieży i Wolontariatu. 

Testing games was the funniest part of the preparation

We had a final preparation meeting At SPW office on Friday where we looked through the whole plan once again and also collected some more international games. After having awesome pierogi prepared by Gosia we joined the EVS Hotspot. It was an event organized by ex-EVS volunteers and the National Agency. We took part in a debate about the needs of young people and after a little break, we had an international evening concentrated on dances and songs. Unfortunately, we had to leave early as we did not want to miss our bus to Pułtusk.

On Saturday, after finalizing everything, we decided to surprise Sylwia for her birthday. Our version of ‘Sto, lat, sto lat’ was not the best one but seeing our finally 18 years old coordinator happy was worth it. Afterwards, it was time to go to the market square as the parade was about to start.

Our team of international volunteers at the parade

All schools, institutions and organizations of Pułtusk represented themselves and we took a walk around the square. We prepared with T-shirts, flags and some face painting. Some of us only had a little flag on the face, while some turned into cats and tigers. We reached our goal: we catched the attention of people. We also spent our free time actively. Cooking and playing fun games together were initial parts of our days.

The next day, the market square became a huge fair with schools, institutions and organizations presenting themselves at their own stands. Our stand was common with the Social Care Centre (MOPS).

When the person standing in the front turns around
the others have to freeze, The winner the one who
touches the wall first.

The tent was divided into zones. There was one for information about the two organizations, one for toys, books and home decoration exchange and at last but not least the unplugged zone. There the idea was to show young people ways of spending their free time without computers and TV. We had a lot of games inside and outside the tent and some music, as well. Face painting was also very popular.

Bubble-making was also one of the favourite activities, besides zośka and badminton. At the tables kids could play cards, board games and Korean game called gonggi. The volunteers were divided into two shifts and we also had two Polish helpers, Gosia and Adrian. We were happy to see that many children came to play with us and some of them stayed there almost the whole day. I was lucky enough to meet some of my little friends from the time of the workcamps in July.

Zośka is flying high. 

Now it is time to say a bigbigbig THANK YOU for everybody who somehow helped in making this happen, it was a really great weekend! J

What have I learned?

New games, how to survive an active Sunday with a little sleep the night before, how to motivate young people to spend their time in a more playful way, how to fight with the wind that is trying to destroy the tent and also ways of effective communication and exchanging ideas to cooperate with others.

Impact on local community

Thanks to these events more and more people got to know that this organization exists and I hope to see people being interested in our activities. It was a really good way to spread information and to get attention.

Zsófi

Volunteers in Pułtusk, where are you?

Cześć!

This Monday Centrum Miedzynarodowej Wymiany Młodziezy i Wolontariatu ran an announced meeting about Voluntary Service in Pułtusk. As you might know the aim of the meeting was promotion of voluntary service and involving young people from Pułtusk to active voluntary work. Firstly I’d like to admit family atmosphere of this meeting – we had 50% of 2 signed people this time. Of course, it changed our initial plan a little bit (we had to postpone a workshop about PR in Voluntary Service with Dorota Braziewicz from SPW), but it didn’t stop us from discussing important questions! So our project coordinator Sylwia prepared a program consisting of 2 parts. We skipped quickly theoretical issues about voluntary work and a role of volunteers and start with presenting the idea of Pułtusk Voluntary Center. According to the idea it is a place where any organization searching for volunteers could find people and for volunteers searching for work. The second topic was about so called “Bieg Mateuszowy” (annual running race – obligatory part of upcoming Pułtusk Days Celebration) and specifically about role of volunteers in assisting in that event and recruiting of volunteers.

What else? During a coffee-break we degustate delicious Hungarian sweets called “kókuszgolyó” made by Zsófi and meanwhile speak about culture and traditions of our countries. By the way we discovered that this “kókuszgolyó” has Polish analogue called “ziemniakie” and Russian one called “kartoshka”.  

             

What have I learnt and how did people react?

I decided to put these two questions together because this time they connected to each other more than ever. Of course I knew that most of young people are not that eager to participate in social life of their towns actively, but anyway it was a surprise for me that just 1 person came which basically means nothing because Olga has already participated in some of our activities! And it’s really strange because in my opinion all the informational cannels were involved. Anyway now we have a food for thought how to attract youth for activitiesJ! And that’s why I’m really looking forward to have this meeting with Dorota and learn something new about promoting and PR, because I feel lack of knowledge in this sphere.

P.S. by the way, do you have some ideas how to involve young people in our small Pułtusk to participate in voluntary service? If yes, please, share them in our Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/fiyepolska?hc_location=stream

  

 Daria

                  

                  

New month, new adventures

September usually means the start of the school year, but not for the seven newly arrived volunteers in Warsaw! SPW organized a little integration meeting for them and us in order to get to know each other. The newcomers were provided all needed information about their new life in Poland concerning accommodation, work, Polish lessons, etc. etc. We had the chance to discuss our hopes, fears and expectations in different creative ways and we also had some team-building activities. Monday was devoted to non-formal education and the eight key competences and YouthPass. All workshops were based on group works and discussions and as I noticed everybody was having a good time. We got to know a lot of important and useful pieces of information and knowledge. This day all mentors were also present at the ‘Academy of Non-Formal Education’.

Mr. Octopus helped us to discover our skills

Before you, dear reader start to think that all we did was working, I will have to disappoint you. We had a lot of fun games and energizers to make us even more lively and able to listen during the workshops. We also had an international evening and a bonfire the next day. The last day a psychologist visited us and she gave us tips on how to work with disabled people. She also insured to help us anytime we need to talk during our EVS projects. All I can say is that I feel happy to have met so many great people and I’m looking forward to see you at the EVS weekend which we already started to organize. Details are coming soon! ;)

What have I learned?
I have always hated speaking in public but during this meeting I felt more comfortable as it was not such a big group of people to talk to. Also, during the workshop about skills and competences I realized how much I have already benefited from EVS and it was a great feeling.

All SPW volunteers, mentors and coordinators

 Do zobaczenia,

Zsófi

Let's run back to August! International Youth Day 2013

Hey! Today's my first post and it's devoted to International Youth Day, an annual event that celebrated at the 12^th of August. It was created by United Nations in 1999 with the aim to draw attention to youth issues worldwide as far as young generation is a reserve of development and positive social transformations. Every celebration is dedicated to a special topic, and the topic of this year is “Youth Migration: Moving Development Forward”.

Series of Activities were prepared by youth organizations worldwide. We, as volunteers from “Centrum Międzynarodowej Wymiany Młodzieży i Wolontariatu”, decided to contribute to IYD celebration and made a video in a well-known format “50 people, One Question” (http://fiftypeopleonequestion.com/). So, at 12^th of August four people with a camera stopped young citizens of a small Pułtusk asking “Where do you see yourself in 10 years?” 

The question is not an easy one but our respondents gave us honest and sometimes surprising answers. Follow this link and you will see a result of our work: http://vimeo.com/73611513

  

 What have I learnt?

It was my first activity as a volunteer in Pułtusk, so I was really interested to get known local youth. And I was suprised that many people connect their future with their native town, which is mostly different for my Irkutsk. One more thing - only few young peoplespeak English despite of the fact that there are a lot of schools of languages.   

How did people react?

People were ready to answer the question but when they see a camera they start hurry and leave. Well, it’s a YouTube century, not everyone wants starring here J 

And by the way, it also was great to know that some of them were really interested in our activities!

Daria

EVS On-Arrival Training

Before going into details about the exact events, let me tell you in a few words what an on-arrival training is. This is an obligatory training for all EVS volunteers during which they are given more information about the host country, they learn how to overcome their fears concerning their projects and get to know other EVS volunteers. It is all happening in the form of interactive workshops and group works.

We were really excited to finally arrive to Hotel Agrykola which was our accommodation and main place of activities. We had lunch altogether, then it was time to start our first workshop. After a quick introduction, our trainers, Marta and Wojtek took us to Łazienki Park as it is in the neighborhood of Agrykola. The task was to form random groups of three and until the next stop the group had to discuss certain questions.  It really helped a lot to get to know some things about the other volunteers. Then came a little Geography test. Firstly, we had to form the map of the word on the basis of where we are from and then, the map of  Poland, on the basis of where our hosting organization is. In the evening some of us decided to take a walk in the city and we ended up in Stare Miasto.

The next day, in groups the task was to have a little role play and to find solutions and give advice to volunteers who are not happy with their project for some reason. After this, we were focusing on our own projects. We made posters, booklets and then presented all the positive and negative things about the flat, work, language support, mentor, etc, etc. We also had the chance to explore the differences between our cultures and to find out why some things are the way they are in Poland.

Wednesday came, the programme included a guided tour in Warsaw. As it was raining quite intensively, we finished our journey earlier then planned and went to the Historical Institute where our guide showed us interesting pictures and videos about communistic times. In the evening we got a little surprise from the National Agency: we had dinner in a fancy restaurant.

On Thursday, we were exploring Warsaw on the basis of a chosen topic. The where I was member of had the topic of young people. We visited the university, the library of the university, some cafes and Łazienki Park. In the afternoon it was time to edit all the materials and information that we collected and the next day it was time for presentations. But before that we had another nice surprise. A traditional Polish dance group was waiting for us in the meeting room after our coffee break and gave a performance. We also had the chance to try Polish dances like polonez, krakowiak and we we also sang together with the band and dancers.

Time was going really fast, everybody was having a great time and it was our last but one day. We started with presentations of the previous day’s group works. The topics were finding similar organizations in Warsaw, alternative Warsaw, religions in Warsaw, young people and Poland after the Second World War. After all these, we were talking about some practical information concerning YouthPass and then the activities continued at different places of the hostel. I was participating in the workshop about activities for kids and then went upstairs where we had a little Polish lesson. Then, we were watching videos and presentations of the volunteer’s countries.

The last day, we had some teambuilding games and discussed methods of learning. After the final evaluation it was soon time to say goodbye. Us volunteers could stay in the hostel until the next morning, so after lunch most of us went for a little sightseeing in Warsaw.

All I can say is that this week was one of the best things so far during my EVS. I got to know very useful things, I learned a lot even without realizing it. A big big thanks to our trainers and all the volunteers who participated. I hope to see you soon!


What have I learned?

I learned about Polish culture and history, how to live with 5 other girls in the same room at a hostel and how

to get lost in Warsaw. After this week I feel more conscious about how to do my EVS service in the most useful and still enjoyable way. 

How did it affect others?

Probably the most effect we had on each other. With the help of our great trainers, we had the chance to develop ourselves. The employees of the hostel saw happy people, trying to speak Polish. (with more or less success) They might have not enjoyed our company during the evenings when we were up late and talked a lot. We also met a lot of people during our discoveries in Warsaw. Some of them did not care what we are doing there but most of them were really friendly and eager to get to know why we are in Poland.

Zsófi