The decision to participate in EVS

Participating in an EVS is an once in lifetime experience. On the one hand, it is a huge decision to take in a young age, to quit home for a long time, to go to a place you don't know, where you are in confrontation with a new culture, perhaps a new language you don`t understand, unknown people and for some the new situation of living alone for the first time and carrying more responsibility than ever before. On the other hand it's an immense chance, to get to a new place, to improve your intercultural understanding, to learn more about the world and more about yourself by taking you out of your all day life and putting yourself under completely new circumstances. It's a possibility to improve many different skills, participating in projects, working in teams and giving your own input as part of the group. Furthermore it can be a great possibility to learn a new language.

During this post I wanted to give the volunteers, staying in Santiago de Compostela, the possibility to introduce themselves, to explain what they did in life before arriving here and how they came up with the decision of taking part in an EVS.

Louis Schartz (Luxembourg) 

My name is Louis Schartz, I'm 23 years old and coming from Luxembourg. In winter 2016 I took for myself the decision to interrupt my studies in "Germanistik" (German Language) as, after three years I arrived at a point where I was pretty sure, that I took a wrong decision for myself by choosing this branch. Even if I had facilities in the different courses and passed every exam I was registered to, I had two big problems. Firstly the step from college to university was to huge for me, especially considering organisational stuff, which leaded me to missing two entire exam sessions. Secondly, and which was more important for me, I couldn't imagine myself in doing something with this branch in my future professional life. That's why I decided me against doing my Bachelor in 4 years. I took the decision to work as replacement teacher in Luxembourg for one year, earning some money, and going back to university one year later to start in a new branch.

During this year my girlfriend came up with the idea of participating in a Volunteering Service. After thinking about it we decided trying to do this together, nevertheless we knew it would be difficult and we were ready to go to different places too if it wouldn't be possible. After completing the first pre-arrival training in Luxembourg (there you have two which is not necessary in every country) we started looking for a project. As we couldn't find one, we decided to take an appointment with the Luxembourgian Youth Information Center , also our sending organization, to ask for some help. Our coordinator told us that it is pretty difficult to find something for two people, but came up with 2 projects, of which one was the one in Santiago. We were very exited about it as it fitted quite perfectly in view of the work we wanted to do. As I was teacher and furthermore football trainer for little children for many years, I really wanted to work with children, especially doing sports activities with children. Now this is exactly what I do in my center Don Bosco. Furthermore it gave us the possibility to work in different projects as she's working in OS Tilos but in the same city, so that we can live together.

Nadja Vujacic (Serbia)

Hi, my name is Nadja and I´m from Serbia. In the last 2 years I was living more or less like a nomad.:) During that period of my life, I traveled pretty much and changed my place of living every few months. This gave me the opportunity  to gain priceless new experiences in different countries of which i'll benefit my entire life.
Few years ago while I was studying, I wanted to do Erasmus student exchange in Spain, since all my life I liked Spanish culture and language, but it was more or less impossible because knowledge of Spanish language was mandatory. And that´s how my departure to Spain remained the desire I wanted to fill somehow.

Truth be told, I didn´t know too many things about EVS program, and somehow I always prefered learning by doing. Reading and collecting information about EVS in advance can help you feel more secure and anticipate what will be expected from you during your volunteering, but I don´t like it too much. So, I came to Santiago not knowing too much about what I'll be doing in my organization and how. Nevertheless, now, after two months, I can say that I´m more than perfectly satisfied with my obligations in Don Bosco, the city, the people around me, our apartment and also with my knowledge of the Spanish language.

As regards of my studies, I finished Sports and Physical Education and I worked a lot in different fields of sports. I was working with kids as a karate coach and as a trainer in a sports school for kids for many years. Based on the experiences I´ve gained during my university days, I didn´t have any difficulties considering my duties here in Santiago. 

I hope that everything will remain like this and even better!:)

Despoina- Anastasia Kritikou (Greece)

As a recently graduated teacher of Primary School, my main goal is to enrich my academic knowledge and gain experiences in the field of Education. That’s why since I entered to the University of Patras (in the West part of Greece), I try to achieve my goal.  Except from the courses that I attended to, I had one year practicing in a greek school. It was one amazing experience because I had the chance to teach children. Also, I had an Erasmus+ studies experience in Masaryk University of Brno, Czech Republic, which gave me the opportunity to live in a different educational system. I taught English for some weeks and I have to say that it was something special for my educational career. Furthermore, parallel to my University studies I was helping children with their studies for school and I was working as assistant of traditional dancing in a center. 

When I graduated from the University I was wondering: And now, what’s next? EVS was my answer on the question. I wanted to achieve my goal, to enrich my experiences in the educational field. I wanted to share my culture, but also I wanted to live in a different culture and learn from it. For me Spain and especially Santiago de Compostela was a place I wanted to discover for a long time to get to know its cultural identity. Spain and Greece are two countries with similar lifestyle but also with some main differences that make both of them unique. So, an EVS in Santiago de Compostela was more than a great opportunity for my life. The context of the program in combination with the locals and the general Spanish culture made me just say: I’m gonna live this experience to the fullest.

Alena Semashko (Belarus)

If I retrace my steps to how I eventually came to Santiago, I have to start with the year 2015, when I first visited Spain. It was a mini trip to Madrid with a friend of mine for a weekend in May. There were two things that occupied my mind at that point, firstly, the people spoke very little English and it was my first time when being able to speak English did not help at all abroad, secondly, i just fell in love with the culture, the weather and the attitude to life here. So, this first observation was a very strong incentive to start learning Spanish just when I came back home, and the second made me obsessed with experiencing what it is like to live in Spain. 

One spring morning at an English class the topic of volunteering came up, and a student told me that he had been at a presentation about how to become an EVS volunteer. He has advertised it so well that as soon as I got home on that day, i started searching for information. If to fast forward, he didn't apply but I did. 

So why particularly this project? Before coming here I was working as an English teacher for quite a long time, I had some experience of working in a state school, but most of the time I was a teacher in a private language school, no doubt the best one in our country. I had perfect students, a lot of opportunities for professional growth, job satisfaction, and great friends, but for the last couple of years I was feeling a need to expand my experience, to see how they do it in other countries, what could be the approaches that we do not know of but others do, and on the whole how different the systems and the learning processes are. 
So now I am observing, comparing and analyzing, for sure there is a lot for me to learn as well as there is a lot that I can contribute. As I see it, this is the main purpose of my staying here besides meeting new friends and spending a very good time with them. 



Patrik Pospisil (Czech Republic)

My name is Patrik. I am 27 years old. I am from Czech Republic. I graduated on Bachelor's degree in Czech Republic. My study program was Social education. During my study I was on Erasmus in Slovakia and a football campaign with people from Kenya. After my studies I worked in England. Later I returned to study and work in the Czech Republic. During the Master's program I was "Buddy", volunteer, for Erasmus students in my hometown. Since December I decided to travel because traveling and working with foreigners is my dream. During my travel I visited Budapest, Berlin, Croatia, Italy, Spain, Latvia etc.

I wanted to try long-term EVS and the priority was to go to Spain or Portugal. Why I chose EVS in Spain? Good question and I can say it because of lots of things like language, weather, people, etc. When I was accepted for this EVS project, my coordinator offered me short-term EVS before my long-term EVS. I did EVS in Latvia before coming to Santiago. It was great experience. In the future I would like to live in Spain or Canada.