Gvozd - Our New Home :)
May 30
After we settled in with all of our stuff in the Japanese house, we went to Suncokret, which is the community center that we'd be working at. The center was situated right next to the city park, so there was plenty of room to play soccer, ride bikes, and have fun!
We also got to meet Maja and Predrag, who work together to run Suncokret. Maja is a very sweet, intelligent, and passionate woman and Predrag is so caring, genuine, and hilarious. On our first day, she explained what our responsibilities would be at the center. She described what past volunteers have done, and gave us suggestions about what our group can do. We were really only required to do what we wanted to do and what we were comfortable with. The kids loved the fact that we were even there. If we had any type of project we wanted to do, we had to run it by Maja to make sure that we had the supplies we needed, and we didn't have them someone was usually sent to Zagreb to get the supplies. This was something we had to get used to - when you live in America, you can usually get what you want when you want it, but this was not the case in rural Gvozd. Someone had to drive at least an hour to be anywhere to get what they needed.
Maja said one of the reasons she loves having volunteers is because it teaches not only the kids communication skills such as brushing up on their English, but also that "people are people, and we're not so different after all. Ethnicity is based on geography..." and it really can allow for us all to be more open-minded. Kids really are kids, no matter where you are in the world. Some are shy, some are loud, some are extremely outgoing, and some are soft-spoken. They LOVE playing outside - they will do anything and everything! I think as Americans, we've really lost touch with the outdoors, but in this community, it's what they live for. They gather to play soccer, volleyball, basketball, and frisbee. Every night, kids of all ages and their parents would come out to the "playground" which is located behind a school, to socialize.
Today at Suncokret, we played frisbee - when we passed it to one of the girls, they would translate a word from English to Croatian or vice versa. It was a lot of fun! The kids invited us to watch their soccer game tonight, and we ended up playing a lot of icebreaker games with the girls. The boys wanted nothing to do with us... yet.
When you travel, you really realize how alike we all are as a human race, and that differences we do have should be embraced, not ignored. I had no expectations for this trip - I basically got on a plane and just went, but I was pleasantly surprised. Maja and Suncokret were so wonderful, the town and landscape are beautiful, and all the people are beyond words...
Downtown Gvozd
After we settled in with all of our stuff in the Japanese house, we went to Suncokret, which is the community center that we'd be working at. The center was situated right next to the city park, so there was plenty of room to play soccer, ride bikes, and have fun!
We also got to meet Maja and Predrag, who work together to run Suncokret. Maja is a very sweet, intelligent, and passionate woman and Predrag is so caring, genuine, and hilarious. On our first day, she explained what our responsibilities would be at the center. She described what past volunteers have done, and gave us suggestions about what our group can do. We were really only required to do what we wanted to do and what we were comfortable with. The kids loved the fact that we were even there. If we had any type of project we wanted to do, we had to run it by Maja to make sure that we had the supplies we needed, and we didn't have them someone was usually sent to Zagreb to get the supplies. This was something we had to get used to - when you live in America, you can usually get what you want when you want it, but this was not the case in rural Gvozd. Someone had to drive at least an hour to be anywhere to get what they needed.
Maja said one of the reasons she loves having volunteers is because it teaches not only the kids communication skills such as brushing up on their English, but also that "people are people, and we're not so different after all. Ethnicity is based on geography..." and it really can allow for us all to be more open-minded. Kids really are kids, no matter where you are in the world. Some are shy, some are loud, some are extremely outgoing, and some are soft-spoken. They LOVE playing outside - they will do anything and everything! I think as Americans, we've really lost touch with the outdoors, but in this community, it's what they live for. They gather to play soccer, volleyball, basketball, and frisbee. Every night, kids of all ages and their parents would come out to the "playground" which is located behind a school, to socialize.
Today at Suncokret, we played frisbee - when we passed it to one of the girls, they would translate a word from English to Croatian or vice versa. It was a lot of fun! The kids invited us to watch their soccer game tonight, and we ended up playing a lot of icebreaker games with the girls. The boys wanted nothing to do with us... yet.
When you travel, you really realize how alike we all are as a human race, and that differences we do have should be embraced, not ignored. I had no expectations for this trip - I basically got on a plane and just went, but I was pleasantly surprised. Maja and Suncokret were so wonderful, the town and landscape are beautiful, and all the people are beyond words...
posted by K-Run at
11:58 AM
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