Środa Śląska and a lot of rambling

On tuesday I faced the enivetable, the first snow did arrive to Kłodzko after all. How convenient it should happen exactly on the morning of my departure to Środa Śląska, to go visit a school in
Szczepanów. I was surprised to see the train arriving to the station no more than 10 minutes late. Anyway it did stand in the station for more than hour. I was so annoyed, but at the same time I felt like home back in Finland with our very winter adaptable italian plastic trains. I was going there with Enno, and we missed our train in Wrocław. We did get another one later, but I really feel the railways have something against me.

We arrived to Środa Śląska train station from where Iwona, the lovely teacher organizing this and hosting us at her house picked us up. We got to meet her amazing children, 2-year-old daughter and son 4 years old. So full of light and happiness. And most of all so cute and friendly. On that evening we went to the swimming pool with the group of children who atteded Euroweek last september. We got to know each other a little bit and after that we went to a pizzeria. I'm really warming up to polish type of pizza. We had a nice evening in the house and next morning went to the school.

Getting ready for the presentation of Indonesia. I had not seen it before so it was very interesting for me also. This first group of children were primary, so at first they were a little bit shy about communicating in english. Later they were actually raising their hands to get a chance to speak during the last game.The fact is that most of the children can talk in english, but are just too afraid of messing up or making mistakes. This is the point we are always trying to make: we don't care! I mess up when speaking english all the time but as long as I can communicate internationally, perfect grammar is secondary.

Can you show us where is Indonesia? 

After primary school we moved on to gymnasium and my Finland presentation! I have actually only done it a few times and just in my own school to children I already know. So this experience was something new and instructive for me. The older children should have more knowledge on the english language, but they are actually just in the point where they are deciding whether to study it or not. It's very easy to pass school without knowing any english and I know when you're 14 and have no use for it, it might feel just like extra homework. It makes me really happy to see the change and isnpiration in children at Euroweek and in school and I can just hope I could affect this also in situations like these. I always tell the children that in my opinion, and what I have seen and learned during my years of living; speaking english language is the most important talent you can acquire from school.

I was really surprised to see that a student could read the longest finnish word much better than I ever could. Polish people are actually really good at pronouncing finnish in general. People are often very curious about the finnish language, because they've heard it's hard or something. I have to say that my finnish is actually really awful. I don't know my grammar, but in finnish you can get far just by the simplified language. My approach is the same to my own mother tongue than english actually.

I really enjoyed our visit at the school. I really want to go back and visit them and my awesome host family again. This was again a thing to remind me why I'm here. Making me remember the things in life that are really important. How beautiful life can be - each and every one of them, of every child, every adult, every unique person on this earth. How full of opportunities the world is. How simple and dull your life can seem and be and still it affects so many things and is just as important as any other. And the fact that from that you can make anything is just mindblowing and full of hope.
The work I do here might not seem like much to someone watching or even to the children. At my own-arrival training one of the volunteers told me that I'm an egoist for telling about my work to people, for admitting that what I do makes me happy. Well, yes my motivation is also that it makes me feel good about myself. But it makes me just as happy to see someone else do the same. Still, I have to admit that I am proud of myself. I think it's just a positive thing, pushing me forward. I don't see myself as a better person for being a volunteer. This was just for me the way to find out what I really want to do. Something to investigate my own competences and strenghts. I won't even say that I'm particularly, or especially good at what I do, but I'm learning everyday and I'm loving it.

So once again I'm back home and back at my own school. The weather is freezing, and I'm happy that the heating is fixed now, even though our washing machine did break and I feel like all the light bulbs are burning out one after another, and right now my food supply is consisting of noodle soup and finnish hard rye bread (näkkäri) because I'm too lazy to go to the shop.

My fauvorite polish family. These kids absolutely stole my heart. So sweet. Next time I will just pack them in my backpack.

Life is good.