Life at VANT: March

My March by Denisa

March was month, when several quite important things happened. Firstly, it was month of my mid-term, secondly, at the end of March, there is Easter (even though, as I have just witnessed, Estonians are not so passionate about it) and thirdly, it is month, when it is my birthday as well.😃

Naturally, this month I had to come up with my own event for youngsters. Since I found out “cooking classes” are the most comfortable for me – youngsters pretty much always show interest, because eating is involved, I repeated this activity again. My initial thought was to bake traditional Slovak Easter pastry, but I dismissed it in my head immediately, because of my poor baking skills.

I came to conclusion that I wouldn’t ruin anything with brownie. To make it more Easter-ish, my idea was to put some mini chocolate Easter eggs on top, but at the end, we decided just to put some M&Ms on the top, since all of these colours looked bold on brown cake, while brown chocolate eggs wouldn’t stand out on brown chocolate cake.

Moving on to the next thing that happened in March, there was my mid-term. It lasted for three days and my mid-term, unlike on-arrival, took place in cabin in forest close to Türi. In many ways, it was quite similar to on-arrival like the activities, games, music that we listened to, sharing-experience circles etc., but this time it was way more chill overall. Even name indicates it, on-arrival was actual training, whereas mid-term was more like chill get together.

The highlight for me personally was canoe trip. It took me and my “canoe-partner” quite some time to figure out how to move the canoe straightforward without going from side to side and crashing into rocks or bushes. Except all of these accidents, we really enjoyed the views and nature surrounding us. Let’s see what April brings us!

My March by Ilia

March was a really nice month for me in Estonia, especially because the weather was sunny more often than usual. At the beginning of the month, I went to Paide Gymnasium, where I participated in an event about the European Solidarity Corps.

I met a lot of young people and shared my volunteering experience, which was really enjoyable. After that, we visited Karksi-Nuia Gymnasium and did a workshop with students. They created their own volunteering project ideas, which was fun and interesting to see. We also had a visit from other volunteers and their mentor in Viljandi.

Together, we went to the Viljandi Museum. Even though I’ve been living here for a while, it was my first time visiting, and I really enjoyed learning more about the history of the city. We also walked around Viljandi and showed them the town. Another activity was spring cleaning at the youth center. Together with the kids, we cleaned the garden area and collected bottles for recycling. It felt good to make the place cleaner.

In the middle of the month, I traveled to Vilnius with my friends—volunteers from Germany and Spain. We had a really great time together, and the city was very beautiful. At the end of the month, I organized an Easter event. We boiled and painted eggs, and the kids really enjoyed it. We also played the egg tapping game and ate the eggs together.

I also shared Georgian Easter traditions, which made it more special. Overall, March was a good month with many nice activities. I’m looking forward to the next months and more good experiences in Estonia.