Höfn - workcamp no. 1

Hi,

I am now in Höfn a beautiful, fishing village in the east part of Iceland.

This is the first of the workcamps I will be leading and it is also part of our trainning as EVS volunteers at Seeds. Therefore the group of volunteers is quite unusual: 6 EVS volunteers and 2 short term volunteers. The EVS volunteers (like me) staz for 6 months in Iceland and coordinate the workcamps where short term volunteers take part. The short term volunteers for this workcamp are from England and South Korea.

We are working in a peninsula which was a former IIWW airport controlled by the british and the american. To get there we need to take a boat for around 5 minutes, it is pretty near.

The work mainly consists in cleaning up the coast line, setting a walking path and fixing some stuff in the base of the airport but beyond that we also have to paint signs to mark the runway, plant grass and probably other tasks we dont know yet.

I have uploaded some pictures of this last week and will for sure write more about what we have been doing here, about our hosts, our activities and our freetime activities with the local community.

Kisses,

Ready ... set ... go!

Hi,

it is pretty difficult for me to have free time and internet access at the same time eh eh but now it looks I have got 2 minutes to keep you up to date with the plans for the next 3 weeks!

Our training will end tomorrow and it has been really good.

The people at Seeds are amazing, they explained everything very clearly about the volunteer work and prepared several very good team activities like the city game!

The city game was a healthy "competition" between teams of 2. We had a set of questions about the places e were passing by. It was not a regular game where you have to find out when the church was built or take a picture of the city hall. It was prepared in a much interesting way. The route was given to us and while we were walking we had to find the answer to the questions. The questions were mostly related to shops and other places in the city but in a funny way like by using icelandic words or translating them literally to english. We had to talk a lot with the people and to enter all kinds of shops!

Yesterday we had a barbeque at the hostel together with other evs volunteers from another organization. We had very good icelandic lamb and other food.

Today it is our first volunteering work, 7 of us went to help the australian circus group Strange Fruit in the Reykjavik. Me and other 3 are going to help cleaning a house in the city.

Tomorrow it is our last da at the hostel, we will have a brunch with the mentors of our group. I still have some port wine, tremocos and olives eh eh

On monday we split into 2 groups. My group is going to Hofn to help the local community in some tasks. We stay from the 18th until de 1st of June.

Also on the 1st of June we will go to the on arrival training organized by the national agency. We stay until the 6th. After that I still dont know, we will be assigned to the projects and I will keep you up to date later.

Kisses,

Did you know ...

Hi,

when you live in a foreign country there are many things to learn, to understand, to see, to listen and some of them make you question your own habits, your own culture and your own knowledge. After adapting to the new environment you will maybe import some of these foreign habits to your regular life.

I remember the first year I lived in Germany, my bedroom had no curtains to really keep the light out! At first I was surprise and questioned myself "how will I be able to sleep here?" after some days I noticed that I really slept very well and enjoyed waking up with the light and not with the alarm clock!!

Now I prefer to sleep with the curtains open and let the suns light come in in the morning. Sometimes I still need the alarm clock... unfortunatelly :P

In these first days in Iceland I have learned already some interesting facts. Facts related to history and culture of the country and its people. Did you know that:

• Iceland stills hunts whales and this year decided to increase its quota to 150 fin and 100 minke whales?
• Leif Ericsson, an icelandic explorer, reached to north america before Colombo being the first european to do it?
• the government is not independent of the church being the national church of Iceland luteran?
• 70% of Iceland's energy production is based on renewable energies (99% geothermal), being the country with the highest rate of green energy production?
• there is no railway in Iceland? there were some tries but none succeded.
• the number of yearly thefts doubled after the current economical crisis passing from 2 to 4? ;)

Well, this is just a small sample of the discoveries we are making everyday :)

Kisses,

Reykjavík

Hi,

today we left the hostel after lunch to visit the centre of Reykjavík. The hostel is quite 'far' from the centre, around 25 minutes walking. We took the ocean walk and could enjoy the fresh wind, the sound of the waves and the beautiful mountains full of snow/ice.

We passed the famous house where Reagan and Gorbatchev met in the 1986 Reykjavik Summit. This meeting probably played an important role towards the 'end' of the cold war.

We also took a 'ride' in the viking ship monument
.

During our walk in the city we entered the flea market where one can find lots of things with very good prices (similar to the portuguese Feira da Ladra eh eh). I specially liked the dried fish business, there are really lots of people selling fish!

The harbour was also very interesting, we could see some ships and also one of the Reykjavík Harbour Railway locomotives, one of the few that ever existed in Iceland.

We continued walking through the city, the colorful houses, the main church, parliament and other known places.

Our visit ended with a spectacular ultimate frisbee game between the national team of Iceland and the national team of foreigners :P

The walk back to the hostel was interesting, we were all tired but we talked about interesting topics like politics, society and gender differences :)

Back in the hostel we cooked a tipical portuguese Bacalhau à Braz with fresh codfish bought here. There is actually a lot and is very cheap (around 7 euros per kilo).

Kisses,

First Images

Hi friends!

This is my first post in the new blog about my experience in Iceland.

I decided to write in english in order to share it with more of my friends :) I am sure you can all understand it!

Has you know I am a volunteer in Iceland. I was accepted in a project of the European Voluntary Service which is one of the actions of the Youth in Action program from the European Comission.

Together with 12 other volunteers I will work for 6 months at Seeds, a non governamental icelandic organization. All of Seeds work is focused on the environment and we will be organizing and coordinating environmental work camps for short term volunteers coming from anywhere in the world.

The goals of these projects, lasting normally 2 weeks, are very diverse and can be for example cleaning the coast line, reflorestation, marking walking trails in natural parks. So we will be travelling a lot around the country.



Right now we are having 2 weeks of training and icelandic lessons. Everything is very well organized :) We are living at the Reykjavík Youth Hostel which is perfect.

So, I am waiting for your questions and comments :)

See you soon!