Dedicated to Akhtem, Angy, Augustin, Azu, Bayan, Bea, Berto, Daniil, Elene, Enrica, Jessica, Juliette, Klaudia, Landa, Lika, Lola, Lu, Maria, Martina, Matilda, Nancy, Ombeline
Hei everyone, my name is Hannah and I´m really happy that you are here and interested in my thoughts about this project and how it’s possible that 11 months can change your life - probably forever. I decided to write about three days I had here in Szczecin, the first one when I arrived, another one in the middle of the project, and then the last one when I left. I put some thoughts in between as well, or general things about this project. Maybe take a coffee or tea, some food, or put on some music, and take your time to read. :)
I want to start from the beginning, two years ago when I thought the first time about the typical “doing something else” after the high school graduation in Germany (Dresden, if you want to know). At this point, I was 17 years old, already tired of school but didn’t want to go to university either. I thought about a lot of options, just staying home and finding a job, doing voluntary work in an animal shelter, traveling around Germany. It was later in 2019 when I finally decided to leave my country and go abroad – Denmark, Italy, Austria, France, Netherlands. My sending organisation send me a lot of working places and opportunities, one of the last ones they found was “#activeeurope long term ESC project” in - POLAND??? I never thought about going to Poland, so close to Germany and similar culture and weird language and the same weather,at least we have the Baltic Sea… those were my first thoughts. I agreed anyway to fill in the document and applied because why not? And what a coincidence, it was the first and last project that both replied to my application and agreed to me working in this project (after I had a rough time trying to talk to a Polish man named Jakub who asked me questions while my microphone was completely dead). To be honest, I never expected myself to work in a kindergarten, but this was the most fitting option for me instead of working in a school or office. I liked working with children, and I wanted to do a different thing. Since it was almost summer, at this point I could not be happier to finally have a project as a volunteer in another country. And this is where my journey started.
Dresden, 31. of August, 11.30. After I packed the last things in my suitcase at three in the morning, had my last breakfast and espresso, and said goodbye to my dad, my siblings, my grandparents, and the chicken in our garden, I was waiting with my mom for the train to arrive. No matter how happy and excited I was at this moment to leave some things of my life behind me, I could also feel a bit of fear and doubts inside me, especially when I looked at my mom being a hundred times more nervous than me, seeing her oldest child go. The train arrived and we said goodbye, I sat down in the train seat and waved goodbye through the window. I remember one old couple sitting across from me, smiling and talking calmly, which gave me a soothing feeling throughout the trip. After I changed the train in Berlin and realized it was only two hours left, I started browsing through a tiny Polish-German dictionary I bought two weeks before, just in case because you never know. I looked out of the window and saw the Odra River and a lot of nature, and finally, I was in Szczecin!
Szczecin, 31. of August, 16.48. I got out of the train and looked on my phone. I was supposed to meet Agata, a woman from Polites. I remembered she told me where and next to which car she was, so I got out of the station and started looking for a silver Toyota in Kolumba street. I was very happy when I found her after few minutes of being lost, she held up a sign with my name and smiled at me. We hugged, talked a bit, and got into her car, then we drove through the streets of Szczecin (for the second time, the first one was in summer, when I visited the city with my family for one day). Agata showed me some places and the office, and then we arrived at the flat, Władysława Łokietka 20. The house looked exactly the same as the one I saw on Google Street view, and I really liked it. Our apartment was the last, so we walked all the floors up, Agata withmy suitcase and me with my heart beating like it was about to explode because I was the first one of my flatmates to see the flat. The first thing I noticed was that we have two doors, and both with several locking systems from inside. Then we got inside, and Agata showed me the four rooms, the two bathrooms, the kitchen, and the balcony. It was smaller than I expected, but I still wasamazed by it. Agata, lovely as she is, gave me a lot of food for my first day here, she said I´ll see you later when I bring your flatmates and gave me the keys as she left. I was going again through all the rooms, was a hard decision between the room with the balcony and the one with the biggest bed, but finally, I chose the last one because it was the total opposite of my room in Dresden. After I was on the balcony calling my family for one hour and eating, I heard Agata and some other voices at the door.
Szczecin, 8. of February, 08:10. Good morning from Łokietka 20! I was always the first one to wake up. Maria was leaving half an hour after me, Ombeline usually left some minutes before 10. And if Akhtem didn’t have lessons for the school he could have been sleeping all day long. I put on my shoes and went down the stairs, a bit late as always. Tram 11 was waiting for me. I met Lika, together we went with the tram until the stop Matejki and then took our daily walk through the park. Żagielek kindergarten is close to the famous Wały Chrobrego, next to the river. Inside, Matilda was waiting for us, we had a short talk and said hello to the other kindergarten workers. Then everybody went to his group. Every morning, when I came to my group, I shouted “Czeeeeść!” to my two teachers, they smiled at me and shouted the same back. Some seconds after, I had around twenty small children running to me, screaming “Ciocia Hannah!!” and trying to hug me, everyone at once. And this was the moment when I knew, it’s the small moments each day that make you happy.
During the day, it was never getting boring for me. After the children finished playing with the toys, we were going outside. That means helping them putting on their shoes, their jackets, their hats, their scarfs, their gloves… and this for all 25 of them. We went out to the playground, a huge place with alot of things to do and to explore. The teachers and I watched the children while they were running around, playing games, and letting go of all their energy. After going inside, they washed their hands, and then it was story time, like a fairytale or story about animals, told by my teacher while waiting for lunch. After eating, the children go to sleep – time for me to enjoy my food too and chill a bit. I loved petting the children’s heads while they were silently snoring, even if there were always some who needed to go to the toilet ten times, to clean the nose, to put the sheet right again. At 13:30 it was time for soup, we woke all of them up and they went to have kind of a second lunch. I can happily say, I was never hungry while working in my kindergarten,food all day long. After soup, it was playing time again. I watched the children and settled disputes, I drew Anna Elsa and Olaf three times a day for them to paint it, I laughed together with my teacher when she explained to me what a child just told her in Polish. At 15:00 I finished my work time, I said goodbye to everyone, waited for the others and we went back the same way as every day. Although it is a daily thing, it was still fascinating me a lot, the park and the tram and all the people around me.
Szczecin, 8. of February, 17:33. I was sitting on my bed, looking outside through the big window and just enjoying the time while trying to slow it down. The snow was slowly falling in the backyard, it was making a comfortable atmosphere together with the dark sky and the orange lights from the neighbours’ windows. I opened the window. It was freezing cold, even worse than what I already knew from winter. I light an incense cone, my mom sent me some from Germany. Somebody put on the kettle in the kitchen, so I decided to go and make myself a tea. I knew this is my home, it was not in the past and will not be in the future, but in those moments, it felt like a forever place to stay.
Today is one of my last days here in Szczecin. I´m writing this while the people around me seem to be busy all the time. Some volunteers already left the project, some will leave in a few days like me, some decided to stay until it´s no longer possible. People are moving around, sorting and packing stuff, saying goodbye to other people, places, things. The time seems to fly fast like never before. I still need to do so many things, but I want to get a bit lost in the moment too, in the here and now.
When I look back, I can clearly say that a lot has changed in those eleven months.
My children taught me to change my point of view. In kindergarten, we had a binoculars toy. When the children were looking through, they always turned it around the other way, as I thought “the wrong way”. I tried to show them how to do it the other way, they were only interested in some seconds and then turned it again. They looked at me and smiled. I took the binoculars aftersome time, and I turned them. As I looked through, I could finally see why it was all the time me who was wrong – this way it looked so much more interesting. It may sound weird, but at this point, the children really taught me a lot. In all this time I spend here in Szczecin, I learned how to change my perspective, and I’m not only talking about the binoculars. I look at different things in many ways, my Szczecin could never be yours. I have a different impression of Szczecin than you may have, and it is amazingly interesting to know that there could be millions and billions of impressions, and all of them fascinating in their own way.
My big family, known as the volunteers, inspired me. We knew from the beginning that we have to spend almost one year together, maybe that’s why we got along so well since the first day. When you are living together with people you never met in your life but you know that you will see them every day from now on, the relationships and boundaries are evolving faster and also more strong. You get used to seeing them a lot of hours, every week. With time, I got to know all of them so good, that I started seeing parts of me in them. May it be in their personality, in their way of talking and acting, in their way how they behave in front of others, but also in their routines, cultures, ways of living. They fascinated me with all their varieties, but also similarities at the same time. I love them for what they are, no matter how different we all are, we inspire each other and at this point, I need to say that I love them and will miss them.
I taught myself a lot. I learned how to let go of my normal environment and get involved in something completely new, to just let myself fall and let unknown things happen. I learned to take responsibility for others and for myself when it comes to living (this doesn’t relate to the microwave in our flat, greetings to my flatmates). I learned how to communicate with people when I can´t speak their language and they don’t speak mine. I improved being more confident with strangers and talk with other people in a more free way. I´m separating things by their importance, not by the time they take or by how tortuous they seem to be. I focus more on really deciding what I want and what might be the best for others also, not keeping a lot of time for making decisions. This year taught me that I really need to do something of the time Ihave, not just let it go and wait for tomorrow. I couldn’t be happier having this huge opportunity to jump in and out of a different life, going in without any expectations and going out as a new person.
Szczecin, 20. of July, 08:47. After I packed the absolutely last things in the early morning, said goodbye to my home, and took the bus with all the luggage, we were waiting at the PKS Szczecin bus stop. Ombeline and I are going to the airport in some minutes where she will take the plane and me the bus,and now it was the moment I was most afraid of all this time since I started the project: saying goodbye to the people I love. Nothing could have ever prepared me for this, neither time nor experience. I don’t even have words for this situation and don’t want to describe it here at this point, it would be like living it again. It was like a rollercoaster of emotions, I think I never felt so much sadness before.
Crossing the border Poland-Germany, 20. of July, 09:13. I sat on the bus and looked out of the window. Fields, cows, trees, more fields, cars driving by. Ombeline was sitting next to me, overwhelmed as me by everything happening in the last 30 minutes. I was so glad I had someone at this moment to give me strength and talk to me. Because I only slept two hours this night, I decided to close my eyes for a while.
Berlin, 20. of July, 14:12. Ombeline walked through the security check. She was all I had left, and some minutes ago we said goodbye over and over again. And now there was me, alone in Berlin, being lost in my head and in the airport too. I went to search for a viewing point to see the planes fly, but it was not open, so I decided to find a way out of the building and wait outside for my bus. The fresh air and people talking in a language I understand made me feel a bit at home at least.
Dresden, 20. of July, 23:48. I am sitting in my bed and thinking about life. My afternoon went like this: my bus from Berlin was 30 minutes late, but the driver was nice and funny and on the bus, I sat next to a kind old lady talking to me. I arrived at six at the main station of my city, my mum came in the car and we drove through the center so I could see it before going home. At thehouse, I hugged my family and my grandparents and talked with them, made a walk in our garden, and cuddled with my chickens (yes, I missed them a lot, cutest animals!). After I ate something and sorted some stuff, I put on a new David Bowie vinyl I bought in Poland on my record player, and now I´m sitting here and questioning so many things. The day went by so fast, but at the same time, it felt like everything took so much time to finish. So now I´m sitting here, tears in my eyes but a warm feeling somewhere inside me. Because even if everything and everyone seems to be far away, I know that I have all in my heart, always with me.
Thank you for taking your time to read! I hope you enjoyed learning about a bit of my life in Szczecin and how it changed. Now that I´m back in Germany, it´s time to say goodbye – only for now. Because this is not a goodbye letter, this is a reminder that even if things seem to finish, they are not ending. I´m taking so many memories and experiences of all this, and I´ll keep them, they will stay with me and never end.
With love, Hannah
Volunteer ESC in Polites, 2020-21
