Dobrý den!
My name is Jenny, I am 19 years old and I am currently volunteering at Dečko/DDM, in Rychnov nad Kněžnou, in the Czech Republic.
I am from a city called Tønsberg, in the southeast of Norway, not too far away from Oslo. In 2022 I graduated high school, but instead of going straight to university I chose to take a gap year. My hopes for the gap year were to gain new experiences (preferably a bit "out of the ordinary"), travel and meet new people. Also, culture and language are big interests of mine, therefore moving to the Czech Republic for 6 months seemed to me to be a great opportunity. And so far I am happy I did it!
My hometown in Norway has approx. 60'000 inhabitants, so Rychnov is smaller with its 11'000. I have now lived here for about 5 weeks and find that the town certainly has its charm. My favorite thing is the beautiful park right across from Dečko, and the big castle right next to it. I am not used to these kinds of grand castles being everywhere, but in the Czech Republic it seems to only be appropriate that every town has its own castle:-)
It is no secret that the Czech language is a difficult language to learn. It is what you make it though, just like with any other language, so the more effort you put into it the more you are going to get out of it. Everyone here understands that I do not speak the language (yet!), but I notice that they are very happy when I show that I want and try to learn. After being here for 1 month I already notice a big improvement in my czech skills, so I am optimistic for the future. You learn a little everyday!
What I like about my job here at Dečko is that it is so varied. I have office hours, which is when I work on my own projects (such as writing this blog), and in the afternoons I have courses. Throughout the week I attend many different courses, e.g. cooking, ceramics, animals and yoga course and many more. I also use office hours to help colleagues with projects, such as a few weeks ago when we prepared for an upcoming carneval Dečko was arranging. So my work week is very diverse, which I appreciate.
I am excited to see what the upcoming time holds. Some of the things I am looking forward to are working on creative projects, traveling more in the Czech Republic and continue learning the language, which also will enable me to speak more to the children here at Dečko.
Čau!
- Jenny
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