Monthly blog (December)

 Hei, hei

This is my second and last blog. I cannot believe that time flew by so fastly. It feels like I came here just a week ago. But now it is time to sum up my experience. 

This month I already felt like I am local, Turkish. I always drank tea, asked for an indirim (discount), crossed the streets like native and listened to a lot of Turkish music. 

I had a chance to discover Ankara more: we visited Ankara Castle, Ataküle, did some Ice-skating and a lot of shopping. For me exploring those places with other volunteers will always be a core memory. 

This month we had to say a lot of goodbyes and the hardest ones were with school children. Teaching them English, playing with them, answering their questions… We bonded so much with them. They loved us, we loved them. My biggest hope is that we motivated them to learn more English and also to do volunteering in the future. 

My Turkish got better with each day and with that helped Duolingo, Turkish songs and of course Turkish environment. This combination is the best for learning language. I believe that when I come back to Estonia, I will continue with learning it. 

I will lie if I say that I did not miss my home. Actually the second month was much harder for me than the first one. But what really helped me to overcome my home-sickness was staying in contact with my family and friends, listen to my native music and watching beloved films. Like that I always had a way to connect with my regular, before project, life. 

The Christmas of this year was not as I expected, because Turkish people do not celebrate it, and there was no snow, to which I am very used to  and which is for me the biggest christmas identifier, we still celebrated it by watching ‘’Home alone’’ in a cozy atmosphere. Definitely a different experience, but definitely not a bad experience. 

When I came here, I did not have big goals, my goal was just to experience. And I did! Living in a new country, far away from home and family, learning about other cultures (which are very different from mine), meeting all those delightful people… It is an extraordinary experience, which is very important for me. 

When I will be home, I will miss a lot of stuff: Baklava, other volunteers, people I met in Turkey, school children… But at least I will have those happy memories and if something, I can always come back.

Görüşürüz, Türkey - Hello, home!