EVS in Latvia - OPEN MIND OPEN HORIZONTS - STORY OF VANIA

My EVS, took part in Cēsis, a small town in Latvia and it was for one month, during August of 2016. We were eight volunteers from 5 countries of European Union, from Portugal, Spain, France, Italy and Hungary. And Latvians volunteers also participated in the project. The main aim of the project was organise an art festival and the theme was "Open Mind - Open Horizons".
I participated in this project because when I was looking for some project to do during the summer, and this project was proposed me I realised  that it cloud be a great opportunity because it was to work with creativity, with manual work, with art and with imagination. So, I felt really excited to accept it. And I decided accept it, even knowing that it's  in Latvia, in a completely different world for me. I challenged myself.

When I arrived in Latvia, I was really nervous, eager and curious to see what was going to happen. At the beginning I felt like a stranger in a new place with new people, everything was really new and different for me. But even eager I was very opened to get involved in the project, to discover new things and to meet new people. And after some days, I started feel more close from the other volunteers, because we and the mentors of the project played a lot of games and talked about ourself and they were very important to knowing each other.

During the EVS I had a lot of different type of tasks, and for me this was the strongest point of the project because, everyday was different. I chose what I wanted to do, remembering the main goal, but at the same time giving preference to what I really wanted do. My main task with my team was organise a workshop of "Mandala" and explain to the visitors of the festival the meaning of "Mandala". And I had other tasks like do dream catchers and lanterns for the decorations of the festival, and many other things.

As the theme of the project was "Open Mind - Open Horizons", the project showed me exactly how to be "Open Mind - Open Horizons", because I learned a lot of things, for example how to be more tolerant and patient, how be more open to new ideas, gave me tools to understand other ways of life, etc. And it opened my horizons because it gave me new tools for my future, for example it make me feel more interested in this kind of festival and gave me ideas to put on practice in my own city.

And sharing this experience with other volunteers was really important for me, because I had opportunity to show my own culture and to know other countries and cultures through them. And as we lived together or we spent a lot of time together it allow us share so many things and I think I can say this experience brought me friends for life.

Vania

The project was funded by the program Erasmus Plus under the number: 2016-1-LV02-KA105-001111