Six months almost passed since I arrived here in Ramnicu Sarat, and I’m trying to remember all the things that happened, in order to share with you this wonderful experience. It’s since yesterday that I’m thinking about that, but I realize that it’s not easy, not simply bacause things are many, but also because this task is making me evaluate this six months and, believe me, even if I thaught many times about my EVS in this period, now I’m getting nervous. Nervous because my time here is almost finished, bacause I’d have many things to do, still, many people that I just met, and I’d like to know better. These months passed too fast, and even if I’m starting to miss something about Italy, my country, that I love so much, I think that it’s not time for me to go. Nervous also about the future, because unlike my collegues, that had a job, or were students in their countries, I’m totally free, and now I have to choose what I want to do. I don’t have a plan, I never had a plan, even when I chose to leave Italy I didn’t have. For one year I tried to go, looking for any chance of work, volunteering or internship abroad, and now I feel in the same situation, but in a more conscious way, I want to volunteer, and I will try to do it. But this is out of the topic, let’s talk about my six months.
I remember my first day, or better, the zero day, when I took the flight from Bergamo to come here. I was really anxious (of course!), and I had no idea of what would have happened (normal, again…). But the thing that made me more anxious was my English, because even if I studied it, I had never had the chance to experiment it, or maybe just because it was a practical thing. Let’s come back. I took my plane, and during the flight I was trying to figure out what would have happened that night, how would have been the city, and the people,… But I could not think at all, I was trying, really, but at last I focused on the music in my mp3, and I left my thoughts fly free, in that stream of counsciousness that always happens in this kind of situations. When I arrived at the airport in Bucarest, I found Georgiana waiting for me. She started to talk, but I was totally disoriented, and I think I just smiled and said “yes” or “not” to her questions. I remember also we talked long about the weather. Than we went out of the airport, and she told me that Volodea and Francesco were coming to take us with the car, because it would have taken more that two hours to arrive to Ramnicu. The trip with the car was very long, Volodea and Gy were talking in Romanian, and of course I didn’t under stand, and sometimes in English with Francesco. I understood everything in English, but I didn’t speak almost for all the trip, just sometimes Francesco was telling me something in Italian.
When we arrived in what would have been my town for six months, we went in the hostel, and there were the other three guys waiting for me, cooking in the kitchen of the restaurant. I great them, and then I went upstairs to see my room. Then I don’t remember exactly what happened that night. I just remember that there was another Italian guy in the hostel, that had the great idea to go to smoke a cigarette. It was since the morning that I didn’t smoke, and with all that adrenalin circulating in my body I was getting mad.
As I said I really don’t remember the rest of that night, but it was a good night, and I remember exactly what I thought about the place and all the people around me, and now I can say that in few days everything was changing, and thinking now to these thoughts and these feeling is so strange…
The next week passed fast and happy. We were in holiday, because the school were closed, and I started to acclimate in that new city, and to the habits of my team. They brought me in the city, making me know the places they usually went, and the people they knew, most of all the local volunteers in the youth center. We spent much time there.
Of these first days I remember the very cold weather, even if they usually say me that “I was not there in December, when there were two meters of snow, and minus twenty degrees”, and a wind that could easily cut your nose, and that all the people in the streets were greating them like it was their hometown, and also me, because everyone knew about the new volunteer from Italy that had to come.
After this week of holiday the school started, and also the routine that accompanied us for these three unforgettable months. We were like a family, everyone had his task, and everything was going in the right way, even with some little problems that every family has.
The period that has been totally separated to our routine was April. April was the crazy month, we had here in Ramnicu, and more, in our hotel, three projects, and also we all went to trip, me, Umran and Semih in Serbia and Bosnia, and Francesco and Sabatino went back to Italy.
When we heard about the projects we were happy of course, because it would have been a really good experience full of new people to know and things to do and learn, but we were also a little bit worried, because these people had to stay in the same hostel as us, our home. I cannot forget the little nervousness that preceded the arrival of every new group. It was amazing, everytime we were sitting since the morning on our sofas, in the hall of the hostel, waiting for the first participants coming. The questions were always the same: “Will they be nice?” “ Will they speak English?” “Will they be shy, or sitting immediately on the sofas with us?” And everytime was so interesting for me looking at all this new people, and try to study them, seeing them arrive in this new place, starting to get to know us and the Romanian guys, and waiting together till night the arrival of the other participants.
As I said, this was the crazy month, and also the sad one in its ending part, because Selim and Semih were coming back to Turkey just after the last project, and after less than one month also Umran and Francesco. I was the one who spent less time with them, but it was not easy for me, because I found some really good people in my project, we lived together twentyfour hours per day, and especially in the first time was difficult for me to adapt to their absence.
After everyone left, everything changed in my EVS life. In one week the school closed, and I started to go just in the kindergardens for the summer course. Moreover I was alone in the hostel, and if were not thank’ s to Sabatino, that at least in the evening was there, probably I would got mad. Even if this month was not the greatest, it passed fast, and then the new Turkish people arrived for a new short EVS.
I was in a local training course in Poiana Pinului when they arrived in Romania, so me and a Romanian guy went to the airport to take them, and go together to this place, and pass there the last night of the training, before coming back to Ramnicu. The first impression was good regarding the girl (Berna), but about the guy (Tahsin) I was a little bit worried, because he didn’t speak English at all. And also now. But since when we came back to Ramnicu and we started to live together, I discovered that even if we cannot have a discussion, we under stand each other about every important thing, and he’s also a very funny guy. The first night that we went out all together, we came back at two and a half in the hostel, and till five o’clock he was trying to teach me the Turkish, pointing me things, and telling me which was the name in his language, I cannot forget these two hours and a half!
After two weeks other two new Turkish participants came (Murat and Gamze), and I went again to the airport, because also Umran and one italian friend of mine were coming for one APV. This was another amazing week, I split my time in my hostel, and that one where the APV people lived. It was a week really full of things to do, and new people, and I was very happy because I could spend again some time with Umran, and this friend of mine.
Now they went back, and I’m again alone in the hotel, bacause the new Turkish team is in Sinaia for the On Arrival Traning.
There is another project here in Ramnicu, but I spent just a little time with them, I took some time to prepare my things, because in few days I’ll come back in Italy. I’m sad about it, but now I’m still living and experimenting, here. And I want to continue till the last moment, like this EVS would never end, and then we’ ll see!
