What to do when an EVS opportunity comes up?

From 24 June to 1 August 2016 in Mladinski center Krsko, in Slovenia, the EVS short-term group project “EVS VOLUNTEERS IN ACTION” took place. It gathered 24 volunteers from 6 countries and the main aim was to promote EVS as an opportunity for young people and celebrate 20-year anniversary of EVS. CVS-Bulgaria was the sending organization of two Bulgarian volunteers – Asen Dzhugdanov and Tsvetan Iliev.

The project is financed under the Erasmus+ Program.

Enjoy the stories of Asen and Tsvetan! 🙂

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What to do when an EVS opportunity comes up?

by Tsvetan

The simple answer is – go for it. Do not overthink it, because if you go, chances are you will love it. But before jumping to conclusions, let’s follow my story with EVS and the project in Slovenia which I attended.

Tsvetan

My name is Tsvetan Iliev and I am a 29 years old Bulgarian. I learned about the Erasmus+ programme just a few months ago and immediately decided to go on a project while I still can. So I am not the typical EVS volunteer. Not only did I learn about these opportunities quite late, but I also had a full time engineering job when I started looking for a project and had already completed my undergraduate and postgraduate studies quite some time ago. This is as opposed to the majority of volunteers that I’ve met – recent high school graduates, university students, recent graduates, or youths with no stable careers yet. Anyway not willing to make any huge gaps in my CV (because volunteering may be a great addition to some people’s resumes, but let’s be honest – engineering managers don’t care about it too much) I found myself a nice, short project in Slovenia and towards the end of June 2016 I ended up in the small town of Krsko.

The project I joined was a 40 days EVS for 24 volunteers and our goal was to organise a few sports events for the local youths and to spread the word about Erasmus+ (that’s what I’m doing now, right?). So upon arrival we were welcomed to Krsko’s youth hostel, which was where the local sending organisation was based. Anyway to keep things short – people started to arrive and soon we had 24 people aged between 18 and 29 from six different countries creating some very positive vibes in the old building, which I would expect is a bit boring and empty when there are no volunteers staying there.

Now the thing is that our voluntary service was definitely not only work (actually there was very little work involved).Well yes, we were kept busy, but a lot of it was to created bonds between us – the volunteers. For instance, our first organised event was participating in some local, village games. This was a fun experience and by the end of the day we already knew the names of all of our fellow volunteers and we were already starting to feel like some sort of a small community.

Pictures from the Village Games

Pictures from the Village Games

We had good fun on daily bases too – from going to the swimming pool, to visiting a castle in a nearby village (also going to their youth centre), going on picnics, and tons of other activities. I would say that most of it was like one huge teambuilding, which prepares you to work well with your team and create  a good end product – this being the sport activities in our case.

At Sevnica’s Castle

Having a short lecture in Krsko’s nuclear power plant

So this whole thing culminated in three sports events – a sport event in the park, a sport event at the swimming pool, and a sport event for people with disabilities. However I have to say that the success of the whole EVS was not making these sport events happen – it was turning all these people from across Europe into friends. That’s what Erasmus+ is all about.

A short rest during a long hike

And me? I am very happy that I took a break from my nine to five job. It was refreshing, it was fun and I now recommend EVS to every single one of my friends and especially to the ones feeling a bit lost in their plans and desires about the future.

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EVS as a life-changing experience 

by Asen

Asen and the other volunteers

Without exaggerating, I could easily say that it was a life – changing experience. Personally, it was my first time going abroad for such a long time, and even more, on my own. So, that was a huge step for me, which I was not sure if I wanted to take, but I decided that I shouldn’t miss the opportunity.

And I’m glad I didn’t.

All together

In Krsko I had the chance to meet people from six different countries and spend 40 days with them. Therefore, I was able to get an insight on each one’s culture and develop my English skills, as well as learning a bit of Spanish. We were also involved in a large variety of sports activities, some of which include canoe – kayaking, organizing games for people with disabilities, pool games and so on. Also, we used our free time to travel to some beautiful places such as Trieste and Ljubljana. Probably, though, the most important part for me was learning to live on my own. I was able to learn how to cook, do the washing – up and effectively learn to manage my time and money.

That being said, I believe that EVS is a great prospect for every young person, looking to make a change in his life.

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