Hello, I’m Alpay İlhan. I have had more than one volunteer experience in our country for years. Therefore, I know the principles of volunteering pretty well. But before I started my project, I was very worried as I had no experience of volunteering in an another country or living abroad before. I contacted with Pi Youth Association as my sending organization for the preparation process of my project. They were very helpful in visa procedures and in all other fields. They looked after me a lot during my time within the project, so, I never felt lonely and I didn’t have any worries thanks to them. Also, they organize events for the special days of our country, even though they are far from us. For example, they prepared a special video with us for the last 19 May.
If I talk a little bit about my project, I volunteered in the “Planet Heroes” project for 1 year in Veliko Tarnovo, Bulgaria. The subject of my project is environmental cleanliness, informing children about the importance of recycling through games, creating social responsibility projects, and seeking solutions by explaining what causes climate change without any age-mass limits.
The aim of the “Килеръ / The Closet” -one of our social responsibility projects- was to collect unused items and deliver them to those in need, free of charge. Apart from that, by enabling us to participate in the “Fun Навьн” project, which was an another short-term project of my coordinator, it provided us opportunity to meet with new friends and new cultures.
I’d like to also share the values with the person who was the project coordinator for the friends that are willing to participate in the “Future World Association” projects in Bulgaria. First, she coordinates the projects “Planet Heroes” (ESC) and the short-term one “Fun Навьн”. The name of my project coordinator was Margo. If I try to write about what she has done for me here, my fingers will not endure it ?. If you remember, I explained in the first lines of this text that “this was my first experience abroad”. This made me very nervous, but during the time I was on the project, it never made me feel alone, Margo approached me like a mother, helped me a lot regarding my health problems. She supported me financially, morally, and everything else you could think of. It is maybe the most important factor for me to finish my project happily.
The Volunteer of AGH-161 Bulgaria Project “Alpay İlhan”
Pi Gençlik Derneği (Pi Youth Association)