The second month of this European Solidarity Corps project, started with a visit from my parents to Bratislava. Even though it’d only been little over one month since I left Portugal, I already missed them both. It was nice to spend a few days with them and also to ask them to cook for me, as I already missed proper food as well. During their stay we also took a day trip to Brno in the Czech Republic. There we visited Špilberk Castle, where a Carnival celebration was taking place.
At the office I started publishing my first ESC project’s promotional material under INEX’s Facebook, and I also learned how to post and create stories on Instagram, this was a first for me. Now I feel like a truly young person for the first time in my life!
The following weekend, we attended the first part of the Leadership Academy for Workcamp Leaders held in Modra and supported by the Visegrad Fund and the Ministry of Education. Here we got to meet very interesting and like-minded young people, and we learn a lot about how to run a workcamp. Everything from how to plan shopping for groceries, the cooking and cleaning teams, the menus accounting for any allergies or diets that the participants might have, what style of leadership to adopt in each circumstance, how to plan free-time activities, contact the participants and the local partner, best ways to get feedback from participants, to the deal of planning the actual activities to do during the workcamp.
My mate João was kind enough to visit me in Bratislava for a few hours, where I got to introduce him to Bratislava’s nightlife. It was one of the best nights ever, until I got home and tried to cook for myself. I managed to drop a pan in my face and burn my had in the oven, leaving me with a black eye and red hand.
The following week was also quite eventful. Prešporkovo family center celebrated its 20th birthday, and we also got to celebrate it. Despite my terrible Slovak language skills, I manage to make a few new friends through playing with LEGO. These new friends also taught me a few new Slovak words like pes, mačka and, hladny. This last one wasn’t a problem as there were a lot of tasty snacks, pastries and cakes.
On the 19th, Sarah and I held our Tea Meeting on France and Portugal. The whole evening was a bit of a laugh, but also one where everyone got to learn a bit about ourselves, our countries and cultures. At the end there was also a tasting of some traditional food and snacks and even the ones I cooked got quite positive reviews, which was very surprising and, I believe, a first for me.
Next weekend I was lucky enough to go to Mariazell, a small town in the Austrian Alps, with some Erasmus friends. The location was perfect, just of the Naturpark Ötscher-Tormäuer, with its breathtaking lake, surrounded by snow-capped mountains. It was an extra exciting trip for me as it was just my third time seeing snow.
On March’s last week, we also organized an activity in Haanova kindergarten. We were joined by another group of volunteers that helped us trimming some bushes and repainting the school’s playground which, in the end looked really, really nice, and much better than before.
And on the weekend, I got the chance to go on day trip to Prague with a friend of mine. We visited some sites like Charles Bridge, John Lennon’s Wall, the castle, and the national museum, with a very interesting exhibition on Czechoslovak 20th century history. It was my first time in this amazingly beautiful city, which I hope to come back to.
To sum up, this month was quite busy, both in the office, other activities, and trips around Central Europe. Looking forward to an equally busy April 
