My name is Mira ; I am 20 and I come from France. I am currently a long term volunteer of the European Solidarity Corps for Pi Gençlik Dernegi in Izmir.
I arrived in Turkey in the beginning of September and I will be here until the end of August 2024. While some short term volunteers have already left, I am very happy at the idea that I will spend 10 more months here.
I have to say that I really enjoy the time I spend here and the work for Pi Genclik. The first month in Izmir was full of discoveries.
We first visited the city with Turkish volunteers who showed us the best of it.I had never been to Turkey before and I enjoyed visiting the different neighborhoods of the city and trying the amazing Turkish food.
We visited the different municipality centers to begin to plan the future workshops.
We received several trainings, including one by the national agency in Afyonkarahisar. It was a great opportunity to learn about ESC volunteering and to meet international volunteers in Turkey to share our experiences and learn about their projects and their cities.
Just as we arrived we took part in the Izmir International Fair, which was a major event. It was an opportunity to meet a lot of people and a nice way to begin the work with Pi Genclik.
In October the workshops began, with mainly English or French conversation clubs, plus, for me, a creative workshop with children. Doing these workshops is challenging but allows me to acquire a lot of new skills : creating and running activities of course but also being able to speak in front of groups for example. I enjoy sharing what I know with people and getting to know them during these conversation clubs. I also helped to organize the french culture night. It was very fun to share what we found interesting about French culture – cinema, music, or food. I organized a one time event about the environment to share information with people about it and discuss this topic.So far I absolutely don’t regret my decision to apply for Pi Genclik. Izmir is an amazing city. I can’t get tired of the ferry rides and I am very happy to have met all the volunteers.
