You are the writer of your own destiny...

“Every morning we are born again. What we do today is what matters most.”

What do you think about your life? What kind of people are you surrounded with? Do they make you happy? Are they there for you when you need them? Do you laugh a lot? Are you having fun? Do you follow your passions? Are you living your dreams? Are you happy? 

Do you ever ask yourself questions like these? Or you are on autopilot like most of the world. Tell me, when was the last time you did something silly, but in the same time meaningful? Something like a midnight swim, a long walk along the seaside, playing with your dog, eating tons of sweets, gardening, visiting your grandparents, watching the stars, travelling to some random destination you know nothing about or walking around without a plan... Sounds funny, right? But it isn't. It's the small things that we do that make our life sweet and beautiful. Small things that you do and share with people who mean everything to you. People who make your life path worth exploring and enjoying. 

How would you react if I told you that all that is happening in your life is your own fault? Would you be surprised, angry, sad, happy, disappointed? It's hard to acknowledge this fact. It puts a lot of pressure on you. Responsibility as well. Are you familiar with this saying: 

Do you believe in yourself? Do you truly believe that you, and only you can change your life? Think about it. Life is too short to compromise.

"Find a place in your life where you choose passion over skill, adventure over comfort, intuition over logic, and faith over fear. As you begin to break free from all the “should do’s” and obligations, your new life path will be revealed, and with it all your heart’s desires will become a reality!"

We wish you a marvelous week :)

                                                                               

Here we go!

Last Monday we all started with our weekly routine: working in the office or going to the Migrant centre in the morning, having and preparing our workshops in the afternoon.....but it seemed that we needed to energize a little bit before starting the week and....is there anything better than an African dance workshop? It was Saturday morning, too soon but....we enjoyed it so much! It's amazing the energy that the teacher had, and how she transmitted it to us! We were dancing and jumping as crazy, we didn't mind the heat...just wonderful!

And we had to chill as well before starting the week, some of us accidentally ended sleeping in a wonderful beach under a thousand millions stars, others chose to relax at home, or went to the beach, as you can see we have many ways to do it.

The week started with the language courses, on Monday Spanish, and on Tuesday Italian. It's the first time for both of us that we teach, it takes us a while preparing the lesson, decide what to do, how to explain....a lot of questions come to our heads, making us even hesitate about our knowledge of our mother tongue. But I must said that we are personally enjoying the fact of teaching our language, and we find it very interesting and productive for our personal development, and also we are getting important skills that can be used in the future, a Spanish and a Italian teacher can be requested anywhere in the world, isn't it?

On Monday we have as well the Theatre workshop, where we started with improvisation exercises and some ice-breakers, starting to prepare the field for further activities we have on mind, maybe there will be new movie stars after this workshop, there is a lot of potential!

And on Wednesday took place one of the most lovely events we have done. Despite the ammount of time it took us, the problems organizing it, the continuous change of plan, number of participants and so on; we must said that it was amazing and perfect our Veggie Kitchen! The atmosphere was great, and we discovered very skill cookers! We had three groups preparing the plate, and we cannot say which one was the best, all of them were delicious....we couldn't even take home any leftovers of the tasty and wonderful caponatina!

Finally, to finish the week, we had a special guest in our radio show, Tune your souls. We had a very interesting person in the studio, he told us about his experience in India, and how he understood that you don't need to have loads of money to be happy, even in the slum you can. We also talked about music, the first years of Stevie Wonder, the power of the bassline, the musicality of reggae music.... A very enriching conversation that ended watching a fado concert in Phaneromeni Square.

And then was Friday, time to rest and to prepare the weekend, it's Cyprus, so September is still summer!

And that was it fellas! Stay tuned for next post!

So it begins

We have been here for two months now. So it was about time to have the On-arrival training. The main aim of this trainig is to assemble all volunteers who arrived approximately at the same time and to help them know the country, the project and all the things they should know while being new in a different country. They all meet in a nice hotel, spend some time together and have fun. But...
It turned out that we are the only new volunteers on the whole island. And we will have our private on-arrival training. Just four of us. In our office. After 2 months of living together. Where is the point, right?
Well, the point is that you can always know someone better than you do now. And to really think about why did you even apply for this project and what are you expecting from it can help you to put your mind in a line. Big thank you goes to Eleni for preparing the trainig for us.

On Wednesday our daily routine started. Quite big part of our project is to go to the Holy Cross Church and spend some time with refugees and asylum seekers. We actually learn a lot about intercultural differences. Their stories are not always happy, but for sure they are eyes opening and the strenght with which the people keep going without giving up is incredible and inspiring.

On Thursday our workshops have began. The very first one was Spiritual session. We talked about ourselves and at the end we did a short meditation. The goal of these meetings is to relax and discover something about yourself not only through meditation, but also through singing and drawing.

On Friday there was the Secret event. The secret was Paladar dinner, originally from Cuba. The idea is to gather different people and make dinner for them while they are socializing. Variety of people around the table was pretty wide but still there were topics to talk about. And then we played some 'get to know each other' games. It all happened in Oliver Twist Coctail bar. Very nice place in the City Plaza Nicosia, which is a perfect place to play hide and seek.

And then the weekend came. Some of us went to move their body in the rhytm of african dance, some of us stayed in bed to not to move their body at all and some of us went to the beach. Later that day some of us went camping, whilst the rest of us sticked to their morning activity laying on the bed or being on the beach.

The best thing about this diversity is that when we meet up again we share our adventures and it brings us together. And it makes us feel home.

Dissemination of the last week, time for BORA-BORA now?

Kalispera people!

How's life treating you? We are great, thanks for asking ;).

Although I am not quite sure if the answer would be the same if you had asked us this question during these last couple of days... Oh my God, our schedule was crazy! Fun but crazy. New people, new projects, new ideas, fun, laughs, love, lots of tears, goodbyes and hope to see you soon wishes. In exactly that order. Spread the word training was an exciting and educative experience, for all of us. Now we are proud to say that we know the meaning of the word: DISSEMINATION. It's an important word, please take notes. That belongs to the formal part of the training, the informal part includes words like BORA-BORA and some other that need lots of explaining to be presented in the right context.

Now, let me show you the formal part of the training. It was like this:

We look nice, I know ;). And serious. And busy. But we really were! 

Want to see the informal part too? Ok.

As you can see we had fun, but we were working hard too, so I think we deserve to have some good time :). Basically we have more "formal" photos than informal, the thing is that our lovely Cypriot mum has them with her, somewhere in the deep depths of her memory card... If you know her then you know what I mean ;). 

So, let's also say something about the training itself. We are gorgeous on the photos, but Spread the word was much much much more than taking photos of ourselves, good-looking people ;). It was about how to disseminate (I just adore this word now! When I know the meaning and how to use it :P) project results. In normal language: how to tell people about your project, how to share and implement your ideas in order to help the community. How to engage other people and start something fabulous.

We had a lot of different and interesting activities, we were even on the radio! We spent a lovely day on CCMC with Orestis, poor guy, I think he needs vacation after that day :P. Thank you Orestis for having us there and patiently explaining us how to deal with that alien equipment. Big thanks to our trainers too, they are also on vacation now :D.

Sunday was our free day. We were spreaded around the island. Some of us went to explore Larnaca, some to Limassol, some to Agia Napa, and some stayed in Nicosia. We had some other plans for the weekend but the Universe didn't agree on that so he prepared other things for us. Unfortunately, thanks to the Universe, donkeys will stay donkeys, at least for now. Why am I mentioning donkeys? Well, you have to read our previous post if you want to know ;). 

So yes. This was our week. Heads filled with new ideas, hearts filled with love and soul with peace. Why? Because there is hope. Thank you, you wonderful people! Young people in action! Young people who are willing to sacrifice their own free time to improve our world. Together with a lot of patience, creativity and wisdom. Keep up the good job guys! You are an inspiration to us all :).

We have to end this day/session/post with something good, as we were taught, so here it goes ;)

Have a great weekend! ;)

Anna, Doris, Lenka and Pablo

SUCCESS, KATYDATA, SPECIAL NUTS, DANDELION, AND ... DONKEYS?

First of all a 10 minutes clapping and a standing ovation for us!!!
Why? Because we are very proud to announce you that we all managed to pass our Greek exam and (as some of us like saying) we conquered the Greek language...or at least the very fist step of it!
We know that the way to the top is still long and difficult, full of grammar perils and vocabulary tricks, but we enjoy the journey more than the view from the top!

It's been more than a week since the classes ended and we miss our classmates, but many other things crossed our path since then. First of all, we did not even have the time to realize that the exam was over, because we left Nicosia right after to discover Katydata.
For those who do not know about the existance of Katydata, it is a very small and very quiet village in the mountains, where the Windcraft Festival took place last weekend. Of course we were there, volunteering in the festival, meeting new people, listening to some concerts (somebody was lucky enough to work in the inside bar and enjoy all the music, somebody just sneaked in when the music was too good to be missed!).
It was amazing seeing this little village come to life, filling with colours, people, music, different sounds and fragrances...especially the aroma of the best felafel ever! (Even just the thought of it makes you feel hungry). Not to mention the warm and generous hospitality of the family we were hosted by, and the special meals they prepared for us. A huge thank for that!
On Sunday the festival was over, but those of us who still did not have enough, ended up in the concert of Thanasis Papakonstantinou in Limpia, positively impressed by this great artist and his music.

After the festival we were tired enough to enjoy a couple of days of pure relax. The second one was kind of special because we went to discover the wonders of Troodos. No hiking this time (after the last experience under the sun of midday, we prefered to leave the hiking for a cooler weather). Anyway, we had a lovely and relaxing tour by car through villages and curvy roads (thanks to the driver who held back his rally-instinct and reduced the speed just for us). We stopped to have a drink, to take a look at some interesting places such as the Kykko monastery, where the girls experienced what it feels like to be dressed as a Harry Potter character!
We also witnessed a kind of a magic, because somehow we managed to have a pic-nic without food, since we did not have the time to go shopping and our fridge was as sad and empty as any fridge could possibly be. But some special nuts made the trick, especially after the huge bagels we had for breakfast.

Adventures go on, and this week we have been in a training which has a lot to do with dandelion. Maybe more magic is coming, too: somebody may turn a donkey into a prince just by kissing him!
But I am not telling you more, if you want to know just wait for next week and you will see...

Ending of the Greek courses and........EXAM!!!!

Everybody was on holiday in Cyprus this week......except for us! Alea iacta est my friends.... This week is the last week of our Greek lessons, and it means that we have an exam.... our first big challenge in the EVS program!

This week passed as fast as the other ones, even faster, as the date of the exam gets closer....so many hours at the University have to be worth a passing grade! If you were to come to our house this week, you would see each of us studying Greek in the living room and going mad with so many papers and things to remember......να μας δώσει ένα διάλειμμα, παρακαλώ!

After our wonderful weekend in Akamas, it was back to reality on Monday to face the last stage of our course. We knew it was going to be a difficult mission, so we decided to find the motivation to do it. What is better than throwing a party with our beloved classmates? Obviously, life is not just studying.....especially in the summertime, right?

It was a great pleasure to host them in our place. We had a lot of fun and we could finally watch the wonderful play that our first teacher, Olessia, prepared for us in our last lesson. It was wonderful to share such a great night with them, and also with our lovely YEU people! About the party......what can we say? Some of us woke up the next morning on a beach, somewhere in Larnaka, anything else?

We also had a dancing lesson with our classmates! It was very fun and interesting, despite it being very hot, and it was amazing to see the professional dancers move their feet so elegantly! Maybe we will become the new Cypriot theatre and dancing stars.....who knows!

Now it's time to say goodbye to the Greek course adventure. They were four wonderful weeks, that, at the beginning we thought it was too much, but as soon as we started and got to know all the people there, we knew that it was a great idea to take the course. Apart from the language knowledge, we take from this course lots of memories, and most importantly, new people and friends who will take part in more episodes of our adventures here on this island.

August is finishing, people will go back to Nicosia and we'll be here ready to offer great workshops and activities.....all the information you need will be on our Facebook page: EVS YEU Cyprus Create your own world II.

https://www.facebook.com/createyourownworldII

We'll be back next week with a very interesting post.....stay tuned!

Exploring the island

Aaand it is August. It's true what they say, when you are having fun, time flies much faster. Except for Greek lessons. No matter how hard you try not to look at the watch, it's always just one minute more than it was when you looked like ten minutes ago. But do not get us wrong, we like our Greek lessons. Some of us may even aspire to be professional Greeks.

Truth is that we spend a lot of our time in the lovely company of Greek language. Not only in the school, but when we come home we just quickly cook something so we can finally do our homework. That takes us about two hours and after the all day with Greek you just cannot say goodbye that easily so we turn on the TV and we watch some series or movies, just to motivate ourselves that maybe one day we will understand what they are talking about.

But when the weekend comes obviously we want to have some time without Greek. So naturally we hang out with our Cypriot friends. Last weekend our mentors took us to Pafos. Finally. We heard so much about it and now we can confirm that it is about 95% true. No matter what you heard about it, it's true.
We were in Petra Tou Romiou, Akamas, Latsi and Polis. Everything was so beautiful. When we were at one of the beaches in Pafos we had the opportunity to board a small boat owned by a nice couple from California. They have spent about 4 months on that boat, just enjoying life and travelling around the world. At least something to look forward to when we retire.

Actually, the main idea for the weekend was camping. It was just for one night, be we still had a good time and we will definitely be back to explore all of the camping possibilities that Cyprus has to offer.

But the biggest fun came on Sunday. First, we had breakfast under a 170 year old tree. The energy of the tree was enormous. Like it knew what is waiting for us... We started with a bath in the Aphrodita baths. And then the walk started. We walked for ages and we still weren't there. We walked for a hundred years and we were bit closer. Then we stopped for one minute to refresh ourselves and then we walked for another thousand years. We saw lots of goats. And then we saw this.






Perfect view, isn't it.

And we walked just for fifty years to swim in the sea down there. Still it was about another five hundred years to get to the place where our cars were parked. We started our journey back, but cars were passing by and that inspired us to just stop one. So we tried. And a car stopped. We saved about one million years, which is the approximate time that it would take us to get there by walking (it doubles when you are really tired). The ride was interesting too. There was a cliff and the road was quite narrow and there were cars going the other way. But we survived. Some of us then had the best sandwich ever, and some of us had quite a good burger.

We would like to mention that all the hiking parts were only Sotiris' ideas, but we are not mad at him at all. He tried his best to kill us but he only made us stronger. And we cannot forget to say that Giorgos knows where all the best sandwiches, food, coffee and ice cream are! But we want to thank both of them for taking such a good care of us and helping us to discover another part of this island.
Oh and speaking about ice cream, almost forgot. Ladies and gentleman, we truly tasted the best ice cream ever.

And one day we will tell you where.