Skip to main content

The value of conversation

Once a week we go to Casa delle Genti together with our Caritas mentor Margherita. Casa delle Genti, translated as "House of the People", provides accommodation and meals for homeless men for a period of 15 days. During this time, Caritas staff also provides guidance to the guests to work out what options are available according to their needs.


When we go there, we offer our company. The residents are invited to sit with us, play games or talk. Open and informal. Our Italian language skills are only basics, but it's nice to talk in a mix of Italian, English and gestures with people and get in touch with them. For us ESC volunteers, it brings us closer to the people we work for in the kitchen, warehouse and the clothes distribution. The small talks turns the faces into personalities. 


With Margherita, the residents can have real conversations in Italian. They can share their thoughts, talk about their worries and tell stories about their lives and families. Even though I understand almost nothing of these talks, I see the value of it in their faces. And I'm beginning to understand the importance of conversation for the quality of life. What it means to be able to share and get rid of what has accumulated inside you. What it means to have someone there to listen to you. It's kind of strange that I'm only realizing it now, during our visits at Casa delle Genti. Because it's no different for me. The value of conversation probably affects us all.

 



Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Arrivederci, Jesi!

I can’t believe time has passed so quickly. It feels like yesterday that I arrived in Jesi and got a tour though the whole Caritas facility. But since then, six months have passed. This experience has been valuable to me in more than just one way and I will never forget the precious time that I spent here. It’s hard to put into words how much this project helped me grow personally and how much I learned while volunteering here. I’m so grateful for all of the people I got to meet during my stay in Jesi. My ESC project here gave me the opportunity to make friends from all over the world who shared a lot about their countries and cultures with me. Therefore, they made it possible for me to widen my horizons and it’s their fault that so many places got added to my travel list 😆 Of course, I also found a lot of new friends from this area who introduced me to Italian dinners (something I’ll certainly continue after coming back to Austria!) and who often planned trips to show me around the a...
Post a Comment
Read more

Ciao, sono Emma!

Ciao! My name is Emma and I joined Caritas Jesi three weeks ago as the new ESC volunteer. I have only recently gratuated from school in my home country, Austria. After having studied for years, I could not picture myself attending university right away, which is why I decided to take a gap year. I wanted to use it to improve my knowledge of the Italian language, as I had already studied it at school. However, finding something suitable, even after I had learned about the European Solidarity Corps, turned out to be rather challenging. I eventually came across Caritas Jesi and decided to send in my application, which turned out to be just the right decision. After having completed all the necessary steps before my departure, I finally arrived in Jesi three weeks ago. As you can see, I haven't been here for long, but I already feel like being a part of the diverse, committed and unbelievably welcoming team of Caritas Jesi. At the beginnig, I had this fear of feeling alone in a foreign...
Post a Comment
Read more

Ciao, cześć, hallo, hola, olá, salut, szia, tere and terve!

Ciao! It's Louise and Emma. Today we would like to share a wonderful experience with you, which we have made last Saturday. But first, we need to go back in time a bit… About 4 months ago, I (Louise) was called for my "On Arrival Training" (if you're wondering what is the OAT, go see  our blog post on this topic ). There, I was lucky to meet other ESC volunteers who have the same coordinating organisation as us (Vicolocorto), and also live in the Marche region. I particularly bonded with Laura, a finnish girl who is doing her service at the Red Cross of Cingoli, and Madalena from Portugal, who is volunteering in Caritas Senigallia. After the training, we kept in touch and decided to see each other again... which we did. We visited the Frasassi caves, Ancona, and -more important for our story- at the end of August, we organised an ESC lunch at our appartment in Jesi, where we all cooked traditionnal dishes from our home countries. From that day, we had the idea to do s...
Post a Comment
Read more