Merry Christmas!! Joyeux Noël!!

Merry Christmas and all the best for my readers, their family and friends and everyone in between for who health, joy, good fortune and work will bless them in the coming new year.

Here is a map of all the countries I received visits on my blog. It might not be 100% accurate but pretty close. The darker it is, the more visits I received on my blog.

Interesting Facts - the keywords to look for my blog

Here are all the keywords I've found from people who visited my blog. Some are  normal, some are really weird or just unsual. 

Blog estonia or estland, Love after sauna, pärnu

I’m talking with my, european voluntary service pierre, the first independence, fromparnuwithlove

evs training experiences, rekord tó, spinach lasagna, thoughts about parnu

sauna experience

evs estonia food and pocket money, free ladies pärnu

speaking international French, french yogurt cake for kids

french yogurt cake apple, maria european voluntary service Estonia, minu nimi on

Eesti 2€, estionian linedance, French food speaking activities, Francia 4-5 aug festival

private russian teacher pärnu, evs all year application, recipes made with yogurt

wheelchair dancing, blog Estonia, parnu gelato, Tallinn hotel de ville, tutvustus prantsuse keelega,

Estonia Line Dance, Line dance Parnu Estonia, Parnu sauna, mama toni Gelato, Line dance festival Pärnu 2012, line dance parnu estonia august 4

Sauna drinking, blogspot Pärnu, talinna lovelinks, volunteering in parnu

Wingate university choir, mama don gelato parnu, electric wheelchair dancing.

Baltic in winter, tere wheelchair, open air pärnu 4 august, Estonian linedance 2012,

Parnu gelato, parnu city orchestra, wheelchair activities, parnu volunteer, Estonia,

How to paint on porcelain, petit camembert whis, pärnu chocolate cake,

baltic sea fishing spears in fish, Mai Kolossova

Experience from Estonia by Hanka

Hanka, the new volunteer in Nooruse Maja my organisation, has made a new blog about her experience in Pärnu. She just arrived so for now there is not much. It is up to your people, especially from Estonia to make it lively, suggest places she can visit in Estonia or other Baltic countries, etc.

Don't Hesitate to visit her blog and comment.

Experience from Estonia

They will be sad when I will leave.

    Last week we launched the exhition about our pictures and art in our organisation. We had the surprise to have some TV reporter from Estonia national channel coming to shoot something to make a short news report about our event. so if you want to watch it, just click on the link below. It should open in another window. Tell me it is not playing in your country. 

News Report on ETV1, Wednesday Sept 12th, 2012.

all right reserved.

Porcelain paiting - Tinga-tinga technique

Here is some of my artwork I did, I started during our Porcelain Days in late July. I was helped by the other participans as it was my big painting and I woul like to thanks in particular Mai Kolossova, our porcelain painting teacher who came earlier on saturday last week to help me.

Dinner's Ready!!!!

    A few days after I arrived in Estonia, I was invited to a cooking class for a dinner with a south-african Chef working in Tallinn, Paul Senosi. Uudo told me then I had to see how he was doing since I would need to do the same sometime in the future. When I was what Paul did, I was a bit worried of what I would have to do as we had a feast that night. I ended up with all the rest of food in doggy bag since nobody wanted it. I had enough food for one week!! Some months passed without notice about this until Uudo asked me to think about what I would do for a training he will have a few weeks later. So I had to think about one or two dishes to do for around 25 people.

   He advertised very soon about the French and Macedonian cooking classes as he knew since October last year. The people divided themselves like 2/3 for French cuisine and 1/3 for Macedonian cuisine. As we expected nice weather for that day, I had to prepare something really French, easy and cheap for a barbecue. That BBQ part was the most difficult one. I couldn’t think about something we are doing especially for bbq. Uudo went to France last year and he told me he really enjoyed the brochettes he had there. When he told me that, I thought it would be a good idea to do it since in Estonia, they don’t really have it the way we do in France. 

    I didn’t want to use pork in my recipe as I had enough and beef was a bit too expensive for so many people. So I choose marinated chicken as it was easier and I finally had an occasion to try it. I went online to find good recipes, mixed them somehow and ended up with something I like. I decided to try it a few days before just in case I had to change it. I used Provence Herbs and this proved to be quite successful. All participants took it in picture to try to find it in Estonia. I was sorry to break it but this mix of herbs is hard to find outside France. It is used for BBQ mainly but it is not imported in Estonia where BBQ is like a national sport in summer. Everybody participated more or less actively in cutting the chicken, the peppers, press the lemon and lime, pour the olive oil and leave it to rest for one hour at least. Then we prepared the brochettes before grilling them. It was actually the longest part of the whole day since everybody eat it in a snap!!

Minu Eestimaa - L'estonie et moi

    Now, I'm in the final month of my European Voluntary Service in Nooruse Maja. So I have to think about how to arrange things to go back to France and how I can leave a footprint here. The latter being of course exceptional because I will do it. XD

   When I arrived here in Estonia, my tutor Uudo told about an exhibition we should do by the end of our EVS with Katerina. He told us to think about this when we are travelling around the country to take some very good quality pictures to be used for this exhibition.

   And now have come the time to do it. We agreed on the dates (Sept 8th-19th), the preview (Sept 8th, same day as our open door afternoon). I selected about 19 pictures from which I should only take half since I have to share the frames with Katerina. I also asked for some help from Hana, the new volunteer from Czech Republic who will take our place. She did a really great job for the photo montage I kindly request her to do for the exhibition. You can see it on the poster i made today. It is a montage made of pictures I took, except one I must say (thanks Daire ;) to recreate a map of Estonia and its provinces. 

   I'm trully happy with this work. The montage also shows the effort of dissemination and collaboration between EVS, the handover of our work here to the new person volunteering in our organisation. During my EVS, I had to help Uudo about reports for projects he took part in and lots of times we had the question how we could do follow-up and dissemination. Having Hana preparing this with my pictures can be also a good presention of her skills. 

    So if you want to join us for this exhibition, please come in Nooruse Maja, roheline 1b, Pärnu 80036 from Saturday Sept 8th to 19th and enjoy our pictures and arts about how we see Estonia, the places we visited. I haven't thought much about it, but if there are some pictures you like, it might be possible to make a reproduction so you can get it back home for a fair price.

Estonian LineDance Festival - Pärnu, Aug 4&5th

    We had a great time this week-end with all the participants of the linedande Festival in Pärnu. thanks to some our volunteers, we could have this video. One more is coming and I'll post it when I will receive the link.

Just a little bit more...

Hello dear readers,

    Just a reminder about our Linedance Festival. I've juct checked and we should have a normal weather, not so hot but not rainy. So please come and join us. 

    Not only we will have this record attemps but also a nice concert on sunday in Vaalikaar. Our visitors will be able to buy food and drinks from Kaia and her kitchen. I've been here 6 months and not a single time she disappointed me with the food she made for us in the organisation. 

    So please come, better if you register before but not necessary. Check our facebook page to know the latest updates.

A little help for my friend Gaia

Hello dear readers,

Today I bring you the video of my friend Gaia, an italian volunteer in Tartu. Her project is to make videos of NGOs, organisations, youth centers, etc, etc to make them visible. I asked for her help to shoot the video of our linedance festival and in particular of our Guiness world record attempt. She kindly accepted to do it so I return the favor for her project.

Please people of Estonia, share it, like it or sleep on it if you like but Help her. She needs our help.

The Porcelain Days (July 27-29th, Parnu, Nooruse Maja)

    In my early days in Nooruse Maja, I was doing some porcelain painting with a very nice lady who came earlier to the office to teach us some porcelain painting. At first I was ok, let’s do it once. But she kept on coming back. We did a few things like a tea mug, some plates and one jewelry case. The latter was proposed by her since I did something for my mum for her birthday. Mai, the porcelain teacher told me I had to do it. We did over a few weeks as it needed different layers of paint. I was a bit afraid it would continue too long as I would like to take everything back home when I will get back to France. 

    The main event for her is the porcelain days we are organising in Nooruse Maja. During days, people can come have some classes on different styles, techniques from teachers coming from other countries and Estonia. We even had a few years ago, a teacher from Japan. They made some calligraphy on porcelain and it was so beautiful. A Shame I wasn’t already here because I would have participated in this workshop. 

    Now, the porcelain days are just in a few days. People will have the chance to study how to paint nostalgic country houses, small animals and the tinga tinga technique or how to paint berries. Visitors can enjoy an exhibition of the items painted during those workshops, arts brought by people from our winter classes. The exhibition is free so you can come and enjoy a nice drink.

Open-Air music concerts are for summer!!

     In my home town in France, I love summer time, who doesn't??? I'm especially wiating for the "Café de l'Eté" or Summer Café which is a music festival spread over end of june until early august. Music groups or singers come and entertain us in the townhall garden, just behind the main square.  I always go to one or two concerts at least. This year i won't be able to enjoy it as I'm in Estonia. but not anywhere in Estonia, in the summer capital, Pärnu. 

    That means lots of activities, festivals to attend after work. As I'm missing those open-air concerts in France, I was very happy to see they organised the same thing here. This one is every week on wednesday at 7pm, close to the beach. They decided to focus this year on swing and jazz music and they asked groups from around Pärnu or close to the city. That's really cool they opted for that. This way, groups will have at least a few dates to promote and will be enjoy a wonderful public. 

Estonian Linedance Festival (Aug. 4th & 5th, 2012): record broken!!!

Dear Readers,

We received a thrilling news a few days ago. A group of people in the USA broke our record by around 200 people, the official number being 2569 beating our record of 2354 people. So now we definitely need our 3000 people to come!!!!

Please register now in our website (linefest.com) for the chance to get a  discount for registration before July 1st!!! You can contact us through our website, or write us directly at kaie@estonianlinedance.com or info@noorusemaja.ee or simply drop me a email.

Come one, join the fun!!!!

Share the news with your friends, colleagues, families.

We can accomodate people in wheelchairs if needed!! 

Parnu International Choir Festival and the Wingate University Choir

     When I was asked by Uudo to take care of a group of American students coming to Pärnu for this Festival, I decline coz I already planned to do some activities with two groups of pupils learning French. With those two classes, I just played « Drawing is winning ». I show them cards with words or expressions on it they had to draw. Of course they couldn’t speak or use any letter on the chalk board. It was really fun with the second group since they were really looking for the clock (each person had one minute to draw and make his/her team mates guess), they were really into the game. The team made only of boys were a bit disappointed not to win, especially since they lost to a group of girls !

     So when I had to go back home I decided to go the gelato shop who happened to be open for the first time just that day. So I decided to go there and check out the new flavour they had. I couldn’t resist the Belgian Chocolate, Kiwi and Vanilia flavour. It was awsome to eat it. When I had to leave, I met some of the students who were chaperonned by Katerina in the end. They were really friendly. So we decided to go meet again after their performance of the night somewhere to grab a drink or two or three or…… We ended up on one of the playground on the beach. We basically talked until 3 or 4 am, when the sun was coming up.

    The next morning they had to be on the beach to take some group pictures before their performance on Ruutli square. Let say some needed more time to freshen up before taking the pic. ;-) At some point I had to leave them for lunch and after eating just before going back home, I stumble upon a small group of them. They were looking for the donuts place famous in Pärnu. So I took them there. They couldn’t get away from the counter and kept on ordering again. Of course, they had to share the information to the rest of the group. After their performance in a Tori Church, a few kms away from Pärnu, some of them came to the little bar where we were enjoying our evening. To get some music, some people decided to put on the tv to watch the eurovision song contest. Those American students who came were surprised some of our group were so much into this show !! 

video of Walking the Light by the Wingate University Choir and Finland's Phonik Choir

    (sorry can't post the vids directly for now)

     The next morning, they had their final perfomance at the City Hall with a group from Finland. They managed to get their hands on some estonian choir music while in Tallinn, song they practice while on the bus to Pärnu or to the diffrence places they performed. It was very nice of them to do it even they were not obliged. It was a great gift to the Estonian people who great them. They made another surprise. While they were in Tori Church, they decided with that fininsh group to do a song in common (video above). Their last performance of Sholosa (video below) was just before the reward ceremony where they finished first place !! congrats to them, they deserved it.

video of Shosholoza by the Wingate University Choir

(sorry can't post the vids directly for now)

Pakri Island, Estonia

Two panoramic pictures taken during my mid-term training when we went to Pakri Island, 

at about 60km from Tallinn, next to Padilski.

Just a few picture from places in Estonia

Tallinn - view of the old town on the right

Tallinn - view by (almost) night

 Tallinn - Kadriorg Park

Finally a good selection of French cheese

     What was my surprise to find this good selection of French cheese in this supermarket. I wasn’t looking especially for that, just trying to find some place where I could be covered from the rain. By chance, I stumble upon that fine area of the supermarket.

     We already found a small shop in the big market next to the bus station where they were selling French cheese. I didn’t know Latvians enjoy so much this national treasure the world envy us.

     We couldn’t wait to buy a cheese in each of those shops, one of lunch and one for dinner. When I say lunch or dinner, we litteraly eat only this with some good bread. Some turkish bread went with the first cheese and a ciabbata bread was used for the camembert for dinner. We bought it around 5pm but we didn’t get home before 10pm. So the camembert was very runny, so much we could eat it with a spoon !

     I almost forget about the other culinary treasure I found in Riga. That friend who knew Riga brought us to this French café where I could find some really nice croissants and « pains au chocolat ». They really tasted like home. The first day we went there even though I had my breakfast, I could’nt resist having one of each. My body and my mind would never thank me enough for that. I had to go back there before I took my bus back to Pärnu to get some croissants and « pains au chocolat » for my breakfast.

Riga

     When I went to my on-arrival training for my voluntary service, they reminded us not to focus only on working. I couldn’t agree more on that. I know for a fact if I don’t have a way to relax somehow, I’ll go crazy and won’t be able to work properly. So when I was asked to go to Riga, capital of Latvia for a few days, I jump on the occasion as this city was one of the things on my list of prospective visits.

     (Side note in the middle of the text : one tip to remember in which order the baltic countries are located on the map if you mix them together. You have to take them in alphabetical order –Estonia, Latvia & Lituania- and place them from north to south on the map, next to the border with Saint Petersburg, in Russia)

     I also didn’t hesitate to come as my friends already took care of the accomodation finding someone for couchsurfing. I didn’t have a clue about the cost of living there until I met this group of american students who came to Pärnu for a Choir Festival. They told us the exchange rate was 2USD for 1Lat. i found later for €, it was 1.4EUR for 1Lat. So In decided to be on a budget time. Luckily for me, one of us knew the city and showed us where to go eating for a cheap price. Next to the bus station there is this huge market where in one of the four halls, you could find some bakeries which offered snacks for a cheap price. We went there for our breakfast and some time for some of the other meals.

     Concerning the visits, we essentially went to the old town on Thursday afternoon and nothing much the rest of the time as it was very cloudy and rainy. It’s sad as I wanted to see the different parks in the centre. Unfortunately there isn’t much very old building due the bombs in the 2^nd World War. The remaining building are still very nice to see. On a lot of them, we could feel the russian influence. They are in serious need for a renovation. They already started but i twill take time to renovate everything.