From Warsaw to Jesi

My name is Kamila, I came from Poland and I'm 19 years old. I've started volunteering in Caritas in February.

The story of me coming here is a little bit complicated. I really wanted to do an ESC project since I was... a little bit younger teenager. I was inspired by my sister, who did it after her studies, a few years ago, but since I was probably around 13 years old during that time, I was definitely too young.

During my last year of high school I was really overwhelmed and decided to take a gap year. I didn't want to stay in Poland during that time, and I recalled about ESC programme, so even before the exams I began searching. Initially I wanted to apply for a project in Ireland, but in the meantime my parents convinced me to go to university so I threw that plan away. I was studying for few months, and during that time I was doing some works in community, like Food Not Bombs, but I still wanted to do the ESC project, so I've decided to temporarily drop out of university and do some project.

It was really important for me to do a project that could inspire me and allow me to find a new ideas that I could propose to the local governments/organizations especially if it was related to the people living in poverty or the refugees, which is why I eventually chose to apply for a project in Jesi.

I think the last really important thing that motivated me was that I wanted to be out of my comfort zone - I wanted to try living in a country in which I knew basically no-one, and see how would I handle that, which was kinda funny idea given that I am the second most anxious person that I know.

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From Europe to Jesi

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