Skills are never too much. Skills provided by international experience are never enough. Once you did your first step in intercultural environment then you want more and more! I did my first EVS step on July 2018. It was time to challenge myself in a new country and forget a little bit about the comfort zone. I and my lovely friend Yelena succeeded together ”Language and Cultural Challenge” EVS program in one of the lovely corners in Central Europe: Szeged, Hungary. In the framework of the EVS, we organized two summer camps for Hungarian teenagers. We taught them both our culture and English. The diversity of volunteers made the program richer. We all had different ages, academic backgrounds, and nationalities but we manage to create a friendly atmosphere. During the camps, kids learned about Armenian, Italian, French, Estonian and Turkish cultures: traditions, national cuisines, languages, and dances. We were doing many activities, energizers, learning new words in each other’s languages, cooking together and living together…

I would like to speak about our crazy lifestyle, which was the most favorite part. We all were living in a unique and old Hungarian dormitory with other students in Szeged. One of them, who was studying in a popular University of Szeged, was historian and knew almost everything about Historical Armenia. So, we had many common topics for speaking after our working days.

Szeged is a tourist-friendly city with typical European architecture. The integral part of our Hungarian life was Farmers’ Market, where we were communicating with Hungarians who didn’t speak in English and buying Hungarian delicious fruits and vegetables. Despite the fact that we didn’t know the Hungarian language, we had fully integrated into their society. And it was more than interesting. The other surprising fact for us was Hungarians’ big love of ice-cream. They eat it a lot anytime and everywhere. It’s really worth to taste!

This project gave us chance to be part of a world without limits and stereotypes, a world of friendship and adventures where you can just grow and learn a lot, every day.

For our unforgettable days, we are thankful to our sending organization Gyumri “Youth Initiative Centre” NGO and host organization “Talentum” Foundation. Both of them have made our EVS easy, productive and enjoyable.

Best,

Asya and Yelena