AN EXPERIENCE FULL OF EMOTIONS

Hey hey alle sammen!!!!
I´m writing finally...  I can't believe it! :)
Here I go!

My name is Laura, from Vera (Almería) in Spain. I´m 23 years old and I´m one of the four volunteers in EVS 2018!
This is me...

Ok, is not my best picture 😳 I will try again...
This is me:

I´m at work at the moment. Really soon in the morning. That´s because my shit face :)

Well.... Is so difficult to choose how to star this! I have decided to title this blog "Experience full of emotions" because it's how I'm living. 

I started this experience on 27 September. I was afraid and so excited at the same time. I was beginning to live for the first time away from my country and my people. 

How would this be?

All my worries were over when I went inside to the home where the volunteers are living together.

These guys.... wow, I really love them!

They received me kindly. Even though I didn't feel confident speaking English for weeks, they were patient with me and they are always helping me.

Our first "trip" together!

The same thing happened to me at work. I'm working in two clubs, Gausel and Hundvåg. I want to say that I was impressed to see the equality between bosses and workers at work. They are not bosses, they are not above you. They are leaders and are your work colleagues. They help you in whatever you need. 

And you wonder ... what are you doing in the clubs?

I´m going from Monday to Friday. We play games with the teenagers, sell food, play music, prepare parties, etc, etc... In my opinion, the most important is to talk as much as you can with the teenagers.

And I have to admit something, it's not easy!

Most of them feel shy to speak to me in English. My Norwegian is not good yet... So is a challenge!

In the beginning it was hard for me, but I've never stopped trying and today I feel much more confident when I communicate with them, I can even say that I love them! :O

Well... I have a lot of things to say, sorry! 😈

SOMETHING IMPORTANT... THE WEATHER! ☀☂🌈🌚🌚🌚🌚🌚
This is an important topic. Everyone is always asking about how is the climate in Scandinavian countries...
Well, in my opinion... is not easy! winter is dark and is raining many of the days. I´m from the desert (not kidding) so for me is hard sometimes.

I have to admit that month of January was really heavy for me. I was upset a lot of time.
It changes when we went together to Oslo in the beginning of February. We spent 4 days with more volunteers who are doing EVS in Norway.

Really.... this travel recharged my energy!

Beatriz (Portugal), Dorothea (Germany), Francesco (Italy), Patricia (Spain), Kriszti (Hungary), Laurenz (Germany)

Iryna (Ukraine)

Dario (Belgium), Ciro (Argentina), Emmanuel (Italy), Janis (Germany), Serhat (Turky)

(The most stylish guy in Norway......)

The trip finished... And we came back to Stavanger with new friends, new experiences and a lot of fun!

As you can see, we try to spend the best time we can when everything is frozen ...

And sometimes is sunny, is amazing how this affects in the mood of people!

When this is happening, your brain screams at you.... CAMOOOON HURRY UP! GO FAST THERE OUTSIDEEEEE 🏃🏃🏃🎉🎉🎉

I'm happy to be here. 

I am grateful to surround myself with good people with whom I spend a lot of great moments!

ONE OF THE MOST SPECIAL MOMENTS FOR ME:

We met at home to surprise Moussa with a flight to his country in April! It was awesome...

I think his face explains everything hahaha

Of course, I can not finish this blog without naming one of the most important people for me in Stavanger. She is my great friend Cristina. Thanks to her I am doing this EVS. She is an amazing person and I will always be grateful to her!

HASTA PRONTO AMIGOSSSSSSSSSSSSSS

Velkommen!

First I have to say sorry for waiting nearly half a year writing my first entry! As well I have to admit that this is my first try to write a blog in my life. So please don`t expect too much 😉

But after this nice introduction (thanks to Kriszti!) I had to write somehow something. I will start this by introducing myself a little bit more. I am Laurenz, 18 years old (the baby in the appartement 😉) and coming from Germany, from a city called Essen. I just finished school last year and went afterwards straight to Stavanger. During our meetings with other volunteers from all over Norway I noticed germans are the only ones just finished school before. So I could introduce myself just by saying I am a typical german volunteer.

This was enough to my person, now the more interesting part: the EVS in Norway.
Kriszti told you already how Kriszti and me spent our first weeks in Norway. So, I can skip this and will tell you a little bit more what exactly we are doing at work and in our free time.
All of us are working in different youth clubs all over the city. I am working in Tasta and Bekkefaret. For me a typical working day could be for an example preparing some food for the youth, playing some board games, table tennis or other stuff with them and just having some nice conversations. Of course, not every time it is that easy, they are youths ;). I think I don`t have to explain what that mean, annoying loud music and 13-17 years old, who do not want to listen to you! But I have to admit that during these 6 months I got to know them and kind of really like them.
Still in September I did my first trip with the youth in Bekkefaret. We went surfing. Although I was more falling and laying on the board then really surfing it was a super nice trip. I got to know the kids and of course they had a lot of fun!

On the picture you can see Kristine, Pavel and me (on the left side). I know I am not looking really excited. But this is just the fatigue, it was exhausting! :)

This was my first "working" trip. Now I can tell you something about my first hiking trip in Stavanger. We did one really nice hiking trip in Balestrand. 

But my first trip in Stavanger was to the world famous Preikestolen! 

For a weekend we had a visitor from Slovenia. Neža is a friend of a girl, Kriszti and me met in Balestrand. And of course she wanted to see the Preikestolen. On a sunday morning we took the ferry and the bus to come to the Preikestolhytta. From there it was a beautiful hike up to the pulpit.

Fortunately the weather was really good, but unfortunately that means a lot of tourists from all over the world wanted to go up. The pulpit was completely crowded, so we decided really fast to go to the top. 

So, this was my first blog-entry. From now on I will try to keep you up to date and tell you more about my last and next 6 months in the north!

Snakkes neste gang!

A bit delayed introduction

Hei folkens!

Sorry for the late update, but we were very busy arriving here (some of us had a real adventurous time getting to Norway), settling down, working and having fun!
Let me introduce the crew from left to right though. We are Laura, Moussa, Laurenz and Kriszti.

Welcome to the land where you meet polar bears at the airport (not alive), and to a city named Stavanger which is for hard-core people. I say this because of its crazy weather. No jokes, it is raining horizontal. Not to scare anyone too much I also have to admit that it's a lovely town with many faces. Old wooden houses in the center, a nice harbor, Norway's oldest cathedral, a lot of stunning nature around the city and cool street art to spice it all up!

The career of half of our crew started with an arrival seminar a little bit north of Bergen. Laurenz and me stayed at a place called Cider House (yummm) where we got to know other volunteers in Norway, gained information about EVS, explored the outdoors a bit (hiking in the mountains and kayaking across the fjords), played lots of games and ate delicious food. Sounds good, huh? :)

Balestrand

We spent a week at the seminar and returned home with lots of great memories. Work started the next week for us and was time to get to know more and more people and places in Stavanger! That is all for now, will write soon and try to catch up with all the happenings so far. Keep reading!

Kriszti

Winter in Norway

Hello!

After long and rainy winter in Stavanger spring came, last two weeks was full of sun ( I hardly could believe that I'm still in Norway!), but before I will write about spring and summer is also good to write something about winter time!

In December I was on Christmas in Poland. That was good time, full of meetings with friends and family, good food, some dancing classes and theater. (that's what I miss the most).

After coming back I had quite difficult time, I felt homesick and depression after coming back to Norway. Weather didn't help me, In Stavanger was dark, rainy and windy.

In the end of January me and Viktoria signed up for en extra Norwegian language course. I realized that one of my EVS goals are to learn Norwegian, because If I cannot learn it in Norway so neither in Poland. My motivation was higher because I could see that I became better and better.

In the end of February we had mind-term seminar in Oslo, so our Stavanger Team fight there. We had 3 days seminar where we were having fun together, visiting city, sharing our experiences with 49 other EVS volunteers which are in Norway. We stayed longer in Oslo, with other volunteer, we visited city together ( we couldn't see anything because all day was snowing), in the evening we was eating together.

My and Victoria dream was seeing the northern lights, so next we flight from Oslo to Tromsø. Tromsø is located 350 kilometers north of the Arctic Circle and is the largest city in Northern Norway. We spent there 4 days and 3 nights. We were hosting by wonderful couch-surfer. Second night he drove us out of the city ( enough far from city lights) so we could see the northern light even it wasn't so strong according to Kp scale, it was only 2 or 3. You can see how awesome it was on the photos which Amalia Pop took.

Next night we were on the hill from which you could see the view to Tromsøya island. We were lucky, the Northern lights was even stronger and we were closer to sky! Climate and landscape was so different then in Stavanger, It was good to see snow during winter ;)

What's more about winter?

I was with my youth club on skitur, so together with kids we were in Sauda. That was whole 2 days of skiing! What surprised me was that you can ski off the roads, of course that is much more difficult and you can easier fall down, but that is not forbidden ;)

The closest ski center to Stavanger is Sirdal, even that I was there in the end of April and beginning of May, there was still a lot of snow! I was there with SAPS (Stavanger Active People Society), international people who are living in Stavanger. That's cabin trip was great opportunity to rest after intensive Ester time in Poland but also to ski, play board games, party, eat and sing happy birthday probably in 13 or more languages.

Make it short, that's how I spent and enjoyed winter time!

Greetings!

Magda