Elu on ilus/Life is beautiful
European Voluntary Service in a kindergarten in Tallinn, Estonia
September 2009 until May 2010
- not a guide but a collection of thoughts and memories -
Elu on ilus/Life is beautiful
- The quest –
Autumn
- Where is your place? -
You arrive – tired, excited and with a strange feeling. There is no known face in the streets you get lost in every second moment. No place holds any memory, signs and people do not talk to you. You feel frustration because it seemed easier when applying and confusion because you actually miss the known.
But what else do you feel? What to do to be content?
Let your gestures and drawings speak another language for you. Fill all the new places with fresh memories. Share your thoughts and feelings with the people around you because most likely they understand you. Discover the big and small differences in your new everyday life. Be open for challenge and surprise. You have to work to find your place even if the great people you meet welcome and support you in whatever way they can.
You feel motivated and proud because there are those moments: when the first few words add up to the first conversation in the new language, when the shy children suddenly ask all kinds of questions and when you cannot stop smiling the first time you are actually considered someone else than a tourist. Then, day by day you feel closer to being a part of everything.
- Your place is everywhere admist of everything. –
Winter
- Where is the light? -
Everything is dark. Do you still remember the feeling of sun on your skin? Even your home is freezing just as your mind, body and soul. You cannot get away because people in the streets are nearly as cold as the rooms, glooming as much as the grey clouds that seem to cover the sky for an eternity.
Do you feel like giving up? Be careful! You could miss the most wonderful moments. Just look around and you can find the light.
Look into the sparkling eyes of a laughing child. Feel the loving hug of a friend. Relish in the happiness inside yourself after you achieved one of your aims. Admire the beauty of lonely nature, of a place with only you and miles of nothing. Listen to music that was written by someone’s heart. Enjoy the exhaustion after a good fight in the snow.
Explore and search your own moments of light.
- The light is everywhere. -
Spring
- Where is your home? -
You feel the moment of saying goodbye coming closer. You have to think about return-tickets and what jobs to do at home. But do you really “go back home“? The thought of not seeing your children, your friends, your city every day hurts you. The time abroad minimized the number of friends in your country of origin.
Where do you go back to? Well – why do you care?
You just do what you feel like. The European Volunteer Service made you stronger, more independant, it broadened your horizon and enabled you to feel empathy, do good and appreciate everyone in their own special way. You have (nearly) nothing to loose.
Enjoy every minute of your time, do the things you wanted to do since the start, do silly things everyone laughs about and plan your next trip if you want your final moments to be easier. If you want to go home it is just as good as wanting to stay. You decide for yourself where you put your heart and soul into.
Some people did not take their heart with them, some leave it at the volunteer’s place but some – hopefully most – leave bits of their heart all over the world, wherever they go, they give to whoever they meet, create good and feel home when they are themselves.
- Your home is everywhere. Your home is where your heart is. –
My European Voluntary Service is finished but the experience still lasts. I hope that you understand or maybe even relate in your own way.
By Laura Mewes, Germany
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