EVS Stories: Accommodating to changes, learning, working, and loss (II) – By Rosa L.

Three and a half months in Romania went by very quickly. I have gotten used to staying here and enjoyed it. Working with teenagers is more fun than I thought and daily life in Romania is not much different from Austria. During my service, a lot of things happened so far: I stayed at a four-star hotel for the first time in my life, learned to speak in public with more confidence, met a lot of people, found a friend and lost him.

Of all the tasks given to me, the most difficult is to learn the language. Romanian is a lot more complicated than English and also less similar to my native language. I am not able to communicate in Romanian and won’t be after four more months, but most people here speak English, so that was not a problem so far.

When you do EVS or any other youth exchange program, you have to get used to people coming and going. Other volunteers who work at my organisation or live in my apartment might finish (or quit) their project earlier than me. One thing I learned in the last two months is that losing someone is a sad but normal part of life, and I have to accept it. After all, you might see the people you met during your EVS again somewhen.

I look forward to the rest of my stay in this country with beautiful landscapes and interesting culture!

Rosa (Austria) is hosted in Baia Mare by Team for Youth Association, in the “IN4EVS” project, an European Voluntary Service financed by the European Commission through the Erasmus Plus Program.