6 months in Bolzano Blog dei volontari

31/03/2022

So, half a year has already passed but there is still half a year to go and  I couldn‘t be more excited for what will come.  

Ciao, my name is Maya, I am from Germany and currently volunteering  in Bolzano (South Tyrol).  

My experience started in September 2021.  

The realisation that half of the time is over came to me during  quarantine. 7 days of relaxing and processing after beautiful weeks of  non stop travelling, partying, snowboarding, seeing my family and  working in the meantime. 

It can be definitely said that I am living one of the most intense and  influencing experiences of my live. Starting to write this I thought about  the ´letter to my future self’ that we were writing at out first Inco reunion  in November and it is crazy to think about how much has happened and  changed since then. Imagine how shocked I will be when I will open the  letter in 6 months. I am aware that I am experiencing much more  personal growth than I could have ever imagined. Mostly I owe this to  the people around me, especially to my volunteer friends. I made some  of the closest friendships of my life here.  

Being a volunteer in a big association as mine (VKE) can be very chaotic  and confusing. On the other hand it is a big chance 1. because I am  able to join a lot of different projects and 2. because I could choose the  place I want to be working at, out of some projects. My work contains  mainly entertaining children. In the first months I struggeled with finding  my role as a volunteer meaningful also considering my absolute lack of  the italian language. (In fact I was also expecting to learn the language  faster - my vocabulary is still on a very basic level). 

Now that time has passed I enjoy my work a lot and I keep feeling more  comfortable every day.  

So, half a year has already passed but there is still half a year to go and  I couldn‘t be more excited for what will come.  

Maya