Hello! My name is Daria.
My work and my main hobbies are related to nature and plants.
I work as a florist, design private gardens, create green interiors and make various interior and exterior decorations.
In my free time, I like to make decorations and interior things from natural materials found in the forest or brought from traveling.
In addition to this, I certainly have a lot of ordinary human interests) I love theater, cinema, sculpture, travel, animals and much more.
My friends advised me for a long time to try volunteering or internship abroad, and I subscribed to one Telegram channel Brain Drain which is daily replenished with various programs and internships, but I did not find any interesting for me programs on the subject.
One sunny day. I stood in a dull traffic jam and leafed through updates on instagram, facebook and decided to see updates to this channel, and then-WOW, I could not believe my eyes!
I have an environmental education, and I have long dreamed of combining my floristic skills and environmental knowledge, and implementing a Land Art project in my country, but I could not find like-minded people. So when I saw this ESC project, I said –‘It`s for me!’ And I was happy to realize that someone else in this world of thought is in the same direction with me.
Therefore, I really wanted to implement this project and transfer this experience to my native country and bring the idea of eco friendly life style by art to the wider masses.
What is volunteering for me? In my motivation letter, I wrote like: Globally, for me, volunteering is when you have something to share and you are ready to do it for free, when you`re having internal / moral / physical resources and do someone’s life a little better.
In the context of this exactly project, volunteering is primarily an exchange and gaining experiences that can be transferred to other parts of the planet and once again draw attention to a serious problem.
I still think so, but now, I want to add that this is an incredible opportunity:
- An immersed trip, you not only visit and learn new places, but become a part of their real life, a five-star hotel all-inclusive will not give such emotions.
- Move life off the bat. This is a great way to get out of your comfort zone and look around. It destroys and breaks your stereotypes about life in other countries, about people, culture and most importantly about yourself.
- Teamwork, with people of different cultures, professions, perceptions, perfectly shows how you can listen, how attentive you are to people, how flexible you are and a lot of the most important things not only for work, but also for life and relationships.
- And the most important thing is people. God! it’s so great to have friends who are close in spirit, who lives on the other side of the planet! After this project, I have at least 20 favorite people with whom I look forward to meeting
Message to future volunteers …
Do not put off until later and do not neglect time, be as much as possible included in life. Learn new things and fear nothing. Believe me, time is very fleeting. Do not have time to look around as the project ends and you are already sitting in tears on the plane taking you home.
Hi! My name is Clara and I’m from Spain.
I got my Bachelors Degree in Audiovisual Communication in Madrid, and I spent my Erasmus year in Lille (France). Nowadays I’m more focused on working on arts and cultural management, however a few months ago I started to think about the idea of participating in a ESC short-term project. Despite the fact that I was open for all kind of possibilities, the topics in which I was more interested while I was looking for the ESC project were: arts and culture, media and communication, ecology, and gender equality. Moreover, in terms of volunteering work I already had some experience in NGOs such as Greenpeace, cinema festivals (Filmadrid), music events (Sofar Sounds), and workcamps.
During my research on the Internet I found “Let Your Creativity Out”, a combination of promotion of environmental protection and Land Art creation. Thus, since I first read the description and information I was sure that I wanted to participate in such a project promoting eco-lifestyle, raising awareness about ecology in local communities, and organizing a Land Art Festival. Furthermore, there was the challenge of working with people from other ten countries with a completely different and heterogeneous background.
What is more, “Let Your Creativity Out” is a LEARNING OPPORTUNITY in capital letters; learning about the project itself, ecology, volunteering, breaking personal barriers, art, Land Art, communication, learning how to be more flexible and tolerant, about other cultures, respect, conflict resolution, English, Turkish, team work, soft skills… the list could be really long. Finally, I would like to add that this project in Bodrum has been and unforgettable experience for me since the first day.
Labas!
My name is Leticija and I am from Lithuania.
I am currently studying in Šiauliai Didždvaris gymnasium in 11th grade. This year I started to pay more attention on ecological issues like Greenhouse Efect and fast fashion. Also, every day I am trying to change my old habits. And luckily our school’s project coordinator suggested me to atend to this project. I was really happy about this opportunity because I wanted to understand what is Land Art. Basically, I chose to participate because of some reasons. First of all, I wanted to gain more knowledge about eco-lifestyle and how each of us can contribute to that every day. Second reason why I decided to participate was the desire to get know turkish culture better. Before going to the project I had few goals. One of them was to have bigger understanding about the global issues we have today and other was to get know other cultures. Both of them I achieved and I hope that these goals will grow every year. Personally for me volunteering is an activity where I can get out of my comfort zone and improve skills in that sphere where I am not good. Also, volunteer work is a great chance to make an invaluable change in society.
I wish future volunteers to be brave and always share their strange ideas with other participants.
Photos by: Daniel Dluhý