My first week and a half in Lahti

Hello, I have been here in Lahti for about one and a half week and it has gone really fast :) I really like to be here, everybody are so kind and nice :)
I arrived November 15th and my mentors Lauri and Vesa picked us up from the bus station. Then we went to the apartment to sign some papers and do talk and to get some information.

The second day contained more information, basically the first few days was informative. That day we walked around in the market square and then we made a quick visit at Ohjaamo, the place where I'll be work during my stay here in Finland.

Later that day me and Lasse, the Swedish coordinator,
 went for a walk to Sibelius Hall

This is Sibelius Hall from the inside

Thursday 17.11: first day at Ohjaamo. More information about what Ohjaamo is and what my work coaches, Riina and Susanna do. Then tour in Ohjaamo. At the office there is a turtle called Orbi :)
I don't have a picture of Orbi right now but i will take one and put it in the blog.

Friday Riina and I went to Multi-Culti to meet my finnish teachers, then to Tiimari to buy material for the window decorations for the FIS Nordic World Championships in feb/march 2017.


On Saturday me and Irene went to the market square to see Santa arrive in a helicopter. It was many families with kids there ofcourse.
Then after that we went for a Coffee and it was a nice day :)


Sunday I went with Susanna and her son to one of her sons schoolfair. We went through everything  then we watched a play, Snow white, played by 5th graders i think ,in  finnish ofcourse. It was nice to hear finnish and i understood pretty much everything :) then we went to one of the Cafes. It was really nice of Susanna to ask if I wanted to come with her and her son :)
The kids at that school do really creative stuff

Second week is almost over but it started on monday with a mentor meeting and work at Ohjaamo. I started doing Finnish flags that are supposed to be window decoration at Ohjaamo during the FIS Nordic World Championships.

On Tuesday I had my first finnish lesson here, it was fun and I'm excited for the up coming lessons because I already understand some finnish but I want to be able to and get the courage to also speak finnish. We'll see how it goes :)

The rest of the days i continued doing the flags and on Thursday I was finally done :)
I also started with my other task which is to translate powerpoints from English into Swedish.

Aerial Yoga

 On Thursday evening I tried Aerial Yoga for the first time with Susanna. It was a lot of fun and relaxing. At first I was like 'what have I gotten myself into..' but it turned out to be a really good experience and I would like to try this at home in Gothenburg and bring my friends or my aunt who I think is in to Yoga :) so thanks Susanna :)

I have probably forgotten something but i feel that this text is very long now..

Until next week
Linnea

Meet Linnea- volunteer from Sweden

First name:

Linnea

Where am I now?
I am now in Lahti, Finland

Age
19

What am I expecting for my time in Finland?
I would like to improve my Finnish, this is a good experience for me that also can be used in the future.

Is there something that I find exciting?
To see a new part of Finland since I have only been in the northern Finland. To meet new people and learn new things.

What are my hobbies? what kind of stuff am I interested in?
I like to watch TV-series for example The Vampire Diaries and others, I like hanging with friends and I like to read.

What is the most important thing I am going to take with me?
An open mindset and my phone

What would I like tell about  Sweden to people I'll meet in Finland?
I don't really know but if anyone have questions I will try to answer them. I live in Gothenburg, the second largest city in Sweden.

What do I wish for my future? What is my dream?
I would like to study or work abroad in a warm country in the future.

Coordinators regards!

Hi everyone!

We coordinators just realized that our project Here we go again! is allmost in it's half way! Oh how the time flies :)

We have had three good periods; Allu and Juuso in Ireland, Teja and Denis here in Lahti and Mikko in Slovenia.

And in this week Lahti will have two volunteers from Sweden, Jacob and Linnea who will be working in Ohjaamo for a month. They are arriving tomorrow with their coach Lasse. Yay! Lasse will be with us for a couple of days, just like Vesa and Susanna were in Ireland. We all are looking forward meeting them, welcome to Lahti!

At the same time when we have planned in our EVS-team the Ohjaamo period, we have been looking for volunteers from Lahti to go on a two month period in Slovenia in the beginning of next year. We have founded three awesome dudes, you will hear about them later on. And in the to do-list for us, is still interview youngsters; two volunteers are going to Slovenia later on the spring. Luckily we have good candidates for this also :)

We had our EVS-team meeting a moment ago. There we planned the coming period here in Lahti, when the volunteers from Ireland are coming in spring. Team spirit - yes we have!

We coordinators have been doing the administrative side; booked flight tickets, updated the volunteers guide, checked the budget, send emails to Slovenia and Sweden etc. Also we spend a day doing the receipt rumba and updating the Mobility Tool+ which is an online tool for administrative work. We made it!

Kaisa with the receipts!

Terhi with the Mobility Tool+

Luckily the project isn't over yet! 

Terhi & Kaisa, coordinators