Day 1 (Saturday, 29th of October)
The big introduction
The big introduction
Day one, waking up after the arrival. Plenty of new faces and no working queue-system for the bathroom. Confusion in general until we were all summoned to the office in the other end of the building for breakfast. Tired like never before after the travel the coffee tasted like the sweetest of ambrosia.
We started by making a big circle and introducing ourselves through a name game that involved both our names and gestures.
During the morning and up until lunch we had a general discussion about the rules of the project as a whole and teambuilding in general trough some different activities along with making our nametags and getting separated into smaller keygroups that’ll last throughout the project.
At lunch we got introduced to the local cuisine, the cheese and bread we later got to know as khachapuri.
After the lunch we assembled into our keygroups and headed out into the rain with a list of task and an envelope with some money and a couple of gloves. As we were learning how to find our way around the city, we also got to meet the locals as some of the tasks involved purchasing fruit from the bazaar and take pictures with smiling Georgians.
We finished off the day at one of Rustavi’s restaurants, and once again we were introduced to both the cuisine and some of the country’s culture, and especially the wine. So, so much wine.
Day 2 (Sunday, 30th of October)
After delicious breakfast we met in the key groups and shared our impressions about the 1st day of the project. Then each national team presented youth policy in their country and highlighted main problems. Country presentations were really interesting and useful for us to understand that we have common problems of youth in our countries to deal with. We choose four problems and worked on solutions in groups. Here’re our results:Solutions to problems in Youth politics
Problem 1 - LACK OF GOVERNMENT SUPPORTSolutions:
•Involve youth in policies – decision making process (youth lobbies);
•Improve youth knowledge in the field of politics in the school (tools to know and defend their rights);
•Visible goals in order to motivate;
Problem 2 -YOUTH UNEMPLOYMENT
Solutions:
•Development of labor market;
•Practical skill learning;
•Educate people about the benefits of volunteering;
•Mixed “work” (practical) and school education;
•Government should finance youngster ideas to help them;
•Make voluntary job as an official job experience;
•Motivation to participate;
Problem 3 - LOW MOTIVATION
Solutions:
•Encourage information;
•Education;
•Bonus system in work;
•Job must be interesting for person;
•Previously volunteering experience;
•Feeling useful;
•Small surprises from colleagues;
•Be brave to get every kind of experience.
Problem 4 - LACK OF INFORMATION
Solutions:
•Spreading info in social networks (Facebook, twitter, etc.);
•Social commercials;
•Street actions;
•Spreading info in schools;
•Specialized websites, homepages for volunteering;
•Informational centres for volunteering;
•More projects -> more people will get person-to-person information.
In the afternoon we played role games, showing to each other different kind of volunteering. After having fun with role game we had brainstorming about workshops – sharing ideas to make great movies, brochures and project blog. We came up with a lot of good ideas, and later on, after making workshop groups, we worked with these ideas, so hopefully in the result to get done nice brochure, blog and several short films about this project and volunteer job. In the evening we get to know better Sweden, enjoying national food and drinks and learn funny national dance.
Day 3 (Monday, 31st of October)
After very tasty lunch we got back to work. Workshops pick up the speed and we continued to develop ideas generated during previous day. We started to generate more specific ideas for videos and writen materials such as flyers, brochure and blog. Many great ideas rose and main part of them were started.
The day of hard and creative work was awarded with cultural relaxation during Latvian evening. Evening started with hot and welcoming Latvian drink – warmed black currant juice with Riga’s black balsam. Evening was followed with introductory video, but to earn food tasting all of us had to do a quiz and other exercises which let us learn more about Latvia and prepare for following traditional dances.
Latvian table:
Black bread (with honey and hamp butter)
Dried carrots, pumpkins and quinces
Home made chokeberries limonade
Marinated mashrooms
Black bread toasts with garlic
Cherries and plums in chocolate
Cranberries in powder sugar
Day 4 (Tuesday, 1st of November)
Today we went on a day trip to see some different places here in Georgia.
Our first stop was Mtskheta. This was the capital of Georgia during the 3rd century BC - 5th century AD. There we visited the beautiful church, Svetitskhoveli in the centre of this small town. Mtskheta is positioned right next to where the Mtkvari river split into two and is surrounded by mountains on all sides.
Day 7 (Friday, 4th of November) – The DAY of big event
This day was welcoming us with the sun and very nice weather. After everyday morning meeting-breakfast, we moved to meet Rustavi Youth Department representatives to learn more about youth policy and situation in the city and also to give some suggestions and examples from each of represented country.
After very tasty lunch we got back to work. Workshops pick up the speed and we continued to develop ideas generated during previous day. We started to generate more specific ideas for videos and writen materials such as flyers, brochure and blog. Many great ideas rose and main part of them were started.The day of hard and creative work was awarded with cultural relaxation during Latvian evening. Evening started with hot and welcoming Latvian drink – warmed black currant juice with Riga’s black balsam. Evening was followed with introductory video, but to earn food tasting all of us had to do a quiz and other exercises which let us learn more about Latvia and prepare for following traditional dances.
Latvian table:
Black bread (with honey and hamp butter)
Dried carrots, pumpkins and quinces
Home made chokeberries limonade
Marinated mashrooms
Black bread toasts with garlic
Cherries and plums in chocolate
Cranberries in powder sugar
Day 4 (Tuesday, 1st of November)
Today we went on a day trip to see some different places here in Georgia. 
Our first stop was Mtskheta. This was the capital of Georgia during the 3rd century BC - 5th century AD. There we visited the beautiful church, Svetitskhoveli in the centre of this small town. Mtskheta is positioned right next to where the Mtkvari river split into two and is surrounded by mountains on all sides.Then we went to Gori, Stalin’s home town, to visit their fortress and one of the eight youth centres in Georgia. In the youth centre we got some information about their work and what they are doing for their community.
The last stop on our day trip was Uplitsikhe, an ancient cave city.
I think that all of us appreciated this day very much although it was a tight schedule.
Today was the Italian evening, they were making pasta bolognese and to tell everyone about it I decided to put it on our blog.
Pasta bolognese:
- You take a pot and lightly fry finely cut onion (use olive oil).
- Add fine pieces of carrot and celery, these ingredients are only for the flavour and should not be effecting the texture of the dish.
- Add meat. The meat should preferably be a half beef, half veal blend of minced meat. If this is not easily accessible, ”normal” minced meat is also okay.
- Add tomato sauce and a pinch of salt.
- Let this cook for 3 hours.
- Boil the pasta ”al dente”
- Mix the pasta and the sauce before you serve it.
- Add parmesan on top of the dish as a nice finishing touch
/ Albin Fernheim - EVS volunteer in Rustavi, Georgia
Today we went to an orphanage, but we didn’t get to meet the children because they were in school.
Then we went to an elderly home but we weren’t allowed to meet the elders because we needed a permit from city hall.
Then we went to the park and filmed with some kids at the playground for our movie.
Then we went out for some street actions in the new part of Rustavi. It felt a bit dumb because the kids were a bit scared I think.
Then it was the Italian evening and we had some Italian food and saw a presentation from Italy.
Overall it was a really fun day and I think everyone was enjoying themselves.
Day 7 (Friday, 4th of November) – The DAY of big event
After a great and adventurous week of working, getting to know each other and learning new cultures, we have reached day seven. Day number seven is THE DAY – finally we go to the city square for NGO market to present our countries, participating organizations and voluntary job in general.
Day has started very busy – everyone was preparing, packing materials and games for presentations at city hall square. We did follow up brainstorm and finalizing of energaizers, dances and other activities we have talked about during the week.
After great and strenght providing lunch we were ready for few hours of activities at NGO market. At market place we met other organizations representatives who also participated in the market. Everyone put a lot of work to make NGO market fun, active and highly attended. Also Super Volunteers were ready for work – “flying” through the streets of Rustavi Super Volunteers were inviting people to visit and try some activities at NGO market. At NGO market everyone could find something suitable and interesting to do: bracelet factory where different bracelets were done by visitors, puzzle task were everyone could try to fix huge map of Latvia, different dances and games, sweets from different countries, many information materials about each country, volunteering and organizations. We were also opened for photos with visitors.
Needless to mention that many of people already recognized Super Volunteers from previous day’s promo action with “Maaaa – zunga!”. It means that we did great job in last days. To sum up street action, I think we did very good. Weather was friendly and we managed to attract people.
This was a long day, so the evening was free. Guys decided to arrange football match, so they went to the city stadium for the game. Also support team went with them. Others who did not go to watch the game played some table games or used a lot of tea and honey to fight against flu.
Day has started very busy – everyone was preparing, packing materials and games for presentations at city hall square. We did follow up brainstorm and finalizing of energaizers, dances and other activities we have talked about during the week.
After great and strenght providing lunch we were ready for few hours of activities at NGO market. At market place we met other organizations representatives who also participated in the market. Everyone put a lot of work to make NGO market fun, active and highly attended. Also Super Volunteers were ready for work – “flying” through the streets of Rustavi Super Volunteers were inviting people to visit and try some activities at NGO market. At NGO market everyone could find something suitable and interesting to do: bracelet factory where different bracelets were done by visitors, puzzle task were everyone could try to fix huge map of Latvia, different dances and games, sweets from different countries, many information materials about each country, volunteering and organizations. We were also opened for photos with visitors.
Needless to mention that many of people already recognized Super Volunteers from previous day’s promo action with “Maaaa – zunga!”. It means that we did great job in last days. To sum up street action, I think we did very good. Weather was friendly and we managed to attract people.
This was a long day, so the evening was free. Guys decided to arrange football match, so they went to the city stadium for the game. Also support team went with them. Others who did not go to watch the game played some table games or used a lot of tea and honey to fight against flu.
Day 8 (Saturday, 5th of November)
This day started exactly the same as the previous ones, except this was the last day of the project.
Instead of meeting in our small key-groups, there was a big office meeting to set the goals for the following day and to reveal overall impressions of the project. Participants were asked to value the project in different sections, such as accommodation, food, logistics, leaders etc.
After a few last hours spent for finishing the movies and blog everyone had a few hours of free time until the evening. Since during the workshops we didn’t have much time to visit the capital, a lot of people wanted to go and see Tbilisi. And so did we!
General impression – Tbilisi and Rustavi had a lot of differences, but the people still made it a pure Georgian city.
One of the goals of this trip was to visit the bazaar of Tbilisi. And just like expected – grapes, churchkhelas (Georgian snickers) and spices were all around us. Just a quick glimpse to get some coffee and the shopping was done!
Then came the best part of this small trip – climbing to the Narikala Fortress. Seeing the capital at night from this spot is something amazing and memorable.
This was also the evening of the fair-away party where everyone presented their workshops. We were lucky to see 4 movies connected with different fields of volunteering, an informative brochure and this blog as well. Conclusions – previously set aims were fulfilled! And everyone was satisfied with the result and with the smile on others faces.
