10 months have passed, and I can’t believe it was that fast. During all these months, I’ve been through a variety of moments that I never expected to spend in my life and it had a big impact on me. I left a big city and began to live in a small town, surrounded by silence, without the confusion and the usual daily traffic I was used to, in a smaller place where everyone knows each other. Even the fact that I have to speak another language everyday that I’m not used to or to sew puppets and do theater plays in Croatian (or trying at least). I had to adapt to this whole new environment and now I can say that I reached the balance that makes me feel good in this city.
At the beginning was not easy, I spent a complicated winter due to the whole process of habituation. But, like I always say and people from the association know that it is one of my favorite expressions, “this is all a learning process” and I learned how to give more value to the small details.
In all this experience, one of the things I liked the most was with no doubt the organization of Socijala festival. It was another of the reasons I choose this project in Croatia, and it was totally worth it. We started with the preparation of the festival always with the expectation that it would be better and bigger, and so it was. The people who cooperated and made an effort to make this happen, always participative, from the decorative materials, the spirit, the initiative, the good energy always surround us in any activity we made, the yoga class, the balloon war, the paintings, Tonka singing at the first night, the 80’s, the techno party, swimming in Kupa during the day and even at night… everything. I love being at summer festivals and I can tell, for sure, that this one has a special meaning to me. And this group, I have no words to describe. People from different countries, all together, having fun and with such a good energy. I’m so glad I met all of them.
Oh, well… I didn’t present myself after all these words. My name is Sofia, I’m 27 years old and I came from Lisbon, Portugal, to spend one of the best years of my life, in Petrinja!
This article was put together by EVS volunteer Sofia from Portugal for her project Puppet theatre – Exploring and unveiling youth potential through volunteering “IKSplore”. The project is cofinanced by the European Union through the Erasmus+ programme.
Članak je sastavila volonterka Europske volonterske službe Sofia iz Portugala za njen projekt Lutkarski studio – Istraživanje i otkrivanje potencijala mladih kroz volonterstvo “IKSplore”. Projekt sufinancira Europska unija kroz Erasmus+ program.
The Agency for mobility and EU programmes is the contracting authority and support for Erasmus+ projects in Croatia. Agencija za mobilnost i programe EU je ugovorno tijelo i podrška projekata Erasmus+ u Hrvatskoj.
Views expressed in this article are the sole responsibility of Association IKS and the European Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein.
Stajališta izražena u ovom članku isključiva su odgovornost Udruge IKS i Europska komisija se ne može smatrati odgovornom prilikom uporabe informacija koje se u njoj nalaze.