Hello :)

well so far for my first week in poland the biggest change for me would be the cold 'shivers', though apparently this is warm weather???

I've come in a group of 30. 8 from New Zealand 20 from Australia and 2 from Canada. To celebrate the beginning of the trip, the volunteers and I got together and made a family meal. (we are not the best cooks!!)

Walking through the centrum we got lost sooo many times and occasionally crossing the road while looking the wrong way, but now we've settled into our homestays and things are becoming more and more familiar so hopefully by the end of the week I will no longer find myself in the wrong village or town :P

Dominique. 

Hey Warsaw 306 kids,

I hope you’ve all been getting on well these past couple of weeks. It’s now only a month until Christmas. I expect you’re all very excited about that - I am too! I personally can’t wait to experience a traditional Polish Christmas. I don’t know much about what that might be, but I’ve been told that there’s definitely lots of delicious food. I also hope that it will snow soon. I know that snow is very normal (and sometimes annoying) for Polish people, but for me it’s pretty special. I’ve never had a white Christmas before and I’ve only seen snow 3 times in my entire life! Fingers crossed!

So, what have I been up to? Well, a couple of weeks ago I visited Budapest in Hungary. I spent three days visiting different attractions. I also ate lots of Goulash, a typical Hungarian soup made from capsicums and sausages. It is completely delicious!

As soon as I arrived, I noticed how different the Hungarian language is to Polish and lots of other European languages. It didn’t sound like anything I had heard before. Apparently Hungarian is the hardest language for English speakers to learn. Now I understand why!

I visited the National Museum and saw a very interesting exhibit. It was about how Hungarian culture has changed over the past 2000 years. There were some very pretty clothes that Kings and Queens used to wear, as well as some very old weapons from 400 years ago.

My friend and I also visited on of the famous bath houses in Budapest. They are beautiful, warm, outdoor pools. Even though it was freezing and raining outside we were nice and warm in the baths. It was a very nice way to relax on a Saturday afternoon.

We also visited a flea market just next to the bath houses. It was very interesting as they sold things from WWII and Communist times, as well as lots of other curious junk. I bought a thick leather belt, so now I have a souvenir from Hungary and my pants don’t fall down!

Oki doke*, well that’s all from me for now. I’ll see you in classes!

Sarah

*This is a very Australian way of saying “okay”

Captions for photos:

A dress that a Queen once wore

The beautiful Margaret Bridge at night time

Howdy students!

Well here’s a crazy fact for you, I am officially half way through my time here at Warsaw 306. I have sadly had my last classes with some of you, but I’m also very excited to meet the other half of the school starting Monday. I never knew that two months could pass so quickly! There’s a very popular english phrase “time flies when you’re having fun.” This definitely sums up my time in Poland!

I hope you’ve all had a lovely long weekend and enjoyed the All Saints holiday. I went for a walk on Friday (All Saints) and was amazed to see the huge amount of people out visiting their loved-ones’ graves. I thought that the ceremony of the day looked very beautiful - all the flowers, candles and decorations. It was quite special for me to see this day because we don’t have anything like this in Australia. My family visits my grandparents’ graves on their birthdays, but their isn’t any national holiday to pay respect to the dead.

Another recent holiday was Halloween on Thursday. While I didn’t go trick-or-treating, I did experience some spooky Polish celebrations at my host sister Nina’s birthday/Halloween party. All of class 4d came to my host family’s house on a Friday evening dressed in lots of scary costumes. There were witches, skeletons, mad scientists, wizards and more! Earlier in the day I helped Magda (my host mum) to prepare some creepy treats for the party. These included jelly worms, witch finger biscuits and some (very Australian) fairy bread.

The kids played lots of party games including Singstar, apple-bobbing and freeze dance. The food was also very popular. I was very pleased to see that Polish kids also like Australian fairy bread, as most of it was gone by the end of the night Everyone seemed to enjoy themselves greatly and it was a pretty creepy and fun night!

Now I better head off to bed to get up early for school tomorrow. I look forward to meeting all my new classes!

See you all around school (feel free to come and say hello ).

Sarah

Captions to accompany photos:

Some very Australian fairy bread
Delicious witch finger biscuits

Class 4d looking spooky and scary for Halloween

Me giving my best scary look

Sarah

Hi everyone!

Well, I’ve had a rather fun two weeks. I’ve really enjoyed teaching you about Australian schools, sport and food. I hope that you’ve enjoyed learning about them too!

I haven’t done a lot of travelling, however a couple of weekends ago I visited Berlin. It is a very beautiful city. I arrived at about 8 o’clock in the morning on a Thursday and spent the day wandering around the city. Although it was raining, and my backpack got soaked (in other words: very, very wet), I was still very happy looking at all the old buildings and interesting little shops in the north of Berlin city.

I visited the KW Institute for Contemporary Art, which was a very beautiful contemporary art gallery. I saw lots of paintings made recently by German artists. I didn’t understand all of them but it was still fun to go look.

In the afternoon I visited the house that my grandmother grew up in. It was very cool to walk down the same street that my grandmother walked down when she was 16 years old. She lived there with her parents until they all moved to Australia. I took some photos of the house to show the rest of my family when I return home.

During the rest of the weekend I visited a couple of different museums and galleries. These included the Egyptian Museum. This place had lots of different objects from Ancient Egypt. They had an entire room which was filled with mummies! There were 27 all together and they were all once Egyptian kings and queens. It was very spooky.

For dinner one night I ate at a Turkish restaurant. I had incredibly delicious falafel* with hommus** and fresh, crunchy salad. The decorations inside the restaurant were very pretty and middle-eastern looking. There were coloured glass lamps and red, orange and brown patterned carpets. I was very happy with my meal.

This past weekend I stayed in Warsaw. I visited the University of Warsaw to have a look around. The buildings are very beautiful and I was interested to learn that the university is almost 100 years old! I also went for a swim on Saturday and caught up with some of the other volunteers for dinner that night. It was a very relaxing weekend.

See you all in classes!

Sarah

* Turkish balls made of chickpeas.

** A dip made of chickpeas.

Hi kids!

Gosh, the past two weeks have gone by super quickly! I’ve spent them doing lots of different things, including getting to know a lot of you. Thank you for all your brilliant class introductions. I’ve tried to remember names and favourite colours, but please forgive me if I muck them up every once in a while.

I hope you liked learning about Australian animals this week. I really like animals and they are one of my preferred topics. For the record, my favourite animal is the Great White Shark. Although they are very scary and have giant sharp teeth, I am very impressed by how big and powerful they are. In the next couple of classes I would love to hear which animal was your favourite, if you would like to tell me.

Last weekend I took my first trip outside of Warsaw. I spent Friday, Saturday and Sunday in beautiful Krakow. All of my volunteer friends came with me and we had a lot of fun. I am now addicted to pretzels, they are so delicious!

I went for a walk on Friday evening around Old Town and saw the big Market Square. Apparently Krakow has the biggest square in all of Europe, so I’m very glad I saw it. I think it’s really cool how all the buildings are lit up at night. It looks like the statues and decorations on the buildings are glowing.

On Saturday I visited Auschwitz-Birkenau. This was a very sad and moving experience, but also very informative. It was very surreal* to walk around on the same ground where so much terrible history has taken place. I went with 4 other volunteers, so we were able to comfort and support each other. Returning to the hostel that evening we were all very worn-out from the day.

That night we all ate at the hostel restaurant and I was starving. I had a big, delicious pizza. It may have been the best pizza of my life. It had lots of cheese and delicious vegetable toppings. 5 stars for that pizza.

The next day I got up early to explore some of the town. It was a lovely, bright, sunny day. I visited the beautiful cathedral in Wawel Castle and a market near the Market Square. At this market I saw some traditional Polish singing and dancing, along with some traditional games. My favourite game was one where the competitors used a broom to push a cabbage along the ground. I thought that that was pretty funny, but also looked like a lot of fun too!

Although I did a lot over that weekend, there was lots I missed out on. I will have to go back to Krakow again soon.

I look forward to seeing lots of you in class next week. We’ll be learning about Australian schools which should be pretty fun.

I’ll be sure to write again soon!

Sarah

Hi Warsaw 306,

I’m Sarah, your Australian volunteer for the next 3 months. I am very excited to be working at your school and I hope we can have a lot of fun together.

Back in Australia I live in a city called Melbourne. It’s on the south-eastern coast of Australia and has a population of about 4 million people. It will be summer in Melbourne while I am here in Poland and, believe me, it can get very, very hot. Some summer days are over 40°C!

I arrived in Warsaw a week and half ago and I have spent most of my time learning about teaching and eating pierogi, yum! For my first week I was staying with 12 other volunteers from Canada, New Zealand, the United Kingdom and Australia. Together we explored Marszałkowska Street and the Old Town. One of my favourite things that I have seen so far is the mermaid statue in Old Town Square. I was very interested to learn about how she came to be the guardian of the city.

So far I have had a great time in Warsaw. I’ll keep you updated on this blog about my other travels too!

See you all in class,

Sarah

Here I am (that’s me in the stripes) with all the other volunteers learning about teaching!

So my time in Poland is almost up. Today was my last day at school and I will be leaving Poland on Saturday to embark on an adventure through Europe before heading back to the farm in New Zealand. In my time here, I have seen the beautiful beaches in Gdansk, Sopot, and Hel, the amazing Old Towns of Warsaw, Krakow, Torun and Gdansk, the stunning forest in Bialowieza and the steep rocky mountains in Zakopane. Yet, there is even more to explore here in Poland. I have experienced more snow and colder temperatures than I have ever before. I have eaten a lifetimes worth of soup and have drunken plenty of tea. Poland is a beautiful country. It need not to compare itself to other countries and instead embrace the beauty that is Poland. I'm not ready to leave and therefore I really hope one day I can return and explore a little more. I haven't ever travelled as much as I have while I've been here and I have thoroughly enjoyed it. I've seen some incredible places.

 

Thank you for welcoming me into your school and a big thank you to Beata for being amazing, supportive and a joy to work with. Also, thank you all very much for the album you have contributed towards for me. I will treasure it. I hope you've all learnt something about New Zealand and I welcome anyone who wants to travel to New Zealand one day. Have a great summer holiday, stay safe and good luck with your future adventures.

Amber:)