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.

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!! 

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.

Estonian LineDance Festival (Aug 4th & 5th, 2012)

Hello everybody,

     As Summer is coming very fast, you have to decide what to do for your holidays. Here is an excellent idea. You can come and enjoy a few days in the Estonian summer capital dancing with lots of people. We need your participation as we want to beat a guiness world record, the longest single line dance. So please visit our webpage to register or send me an email,  we will do you best to answer you as fast as possible. Do not hesitate to share the poster or any information about our festival to anyone who might be interested.

A new italian ice cream shop in Pärnu!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Hello dear readers,

As the summer is arriving fast here in Pärnu, I will need some ice creams. It's impossible for me not to enjoy summer without ice-cream. I have very fond memories of this italian ice-cream shop in Pompei where I went when I was about 12 years old. This is where I had two scoops of melon and kiwi for the time in my life. Since then, I try to have those flavour as much as possible. 

some of the flavours at Mama Toni's gelato

When I arrived in Pärnu, I met an American woman, Toni, who is opening a gelato shop close to the beach of the city. I am waiting anxiously the opening to try them. This joyful moment will be this week on Thursday, May 24th around 7pm. I don't know how many people will beat me at waiting in front of the door but they won't be a lot, trust me on that!!!!!

Just a little help to translate english into estonian

Has you might be aware if you read this blog, I'm in Estonia. Since it's a complicated language (I speak Mandarin Chinese and I think it's almost easier then Estonian!!), here is a little help in case our best friend for online translation is not giving you satisfaction. 

This little website help me and my friend this morning to translate some words in English for the two articles that were published beginning of March about my EVS projects. Just one little warning: the translation only works for single words and not whole sentences.

if the link doesn't work for you, copy and paste this:

http://enet.animato.ee/

Mr Spring is here, will he stay?

Everything is possible, even "hot temperatures" in Estonia. Let's hope it ill stay that way.
edit: no he didn't stay. someone must have scared him away.

On-Arrival EVS Training - Day 2

       After a (short) night sleep, we started our second day of training. This day was focused on the idea of volunteering, our rights and duties as an EVS, the impact on communities.

     The reason why we were all here was obviously the will to be a volunteer in a community or a group where they need someone to help them out. During those two hours we thought about ideas or obvious facts that were normal or just logical for us like Organisations choose to host an EVS a cheap employee. We had to think about it and find a common ground in our duo and then show and explain it to the rest of the group. We had to position ourselves on a line drawn on the floor depending if we agree or not. With Alicja, we agree on almost everything and we didn’t have to talk much about the common point of view we had to adopt and then show to the rest. The only time when I decided not to step on the line was when I had to answer a question when I couldn’t agree on the statement. After, we talked about what the EVS was really about, its definition, objectives and some question we had like for our insurance.

      One of the main objectives is to interact with our local communities. Our main exercise was to go on the streets, find someone to needed help and then find someone who could help that person. We couldn’t be the latter as it would have been too easy. With Simone, we decided to go to a supermarket where we could find an elderly person and may be a teenager who could help the former. It wasn’t that easy as all elderly women we saw were pretty active or didn’t have much to carry with them. We finally succeeded in finding a girl teenager who could help someone just a bit younger than the person we thought about at first. As we were in a supermarket, we decided to offer a chocolate bar to the girl to thank her for the help. Two last things: we completely forget to ask for her name and we met a local celebrity who was doing a show sharing the same objectives as us.

     We finished this day by watching a movie about the 2^nd independence of Estonia, in august 1991. It was very fascinating to watch it, see how 30 000 people singing in a single voice. When I think about this, I still have goosebumps. Without going into too many details not to spoil the movie, The Singing Revolution, You can see how people can change the face of history with their only arm available, their songs, without shedding a single drop of blood. After the movie ended, we couldn’t speak or say anything. We were so impressed by the intensity of it we stayed in the room talking about the movie, the consequences of what happened and some clarifications about how it really happened by asking our Estonian trainers.

Trailer of the Documentary, The Singing Revolution

for more information, visit http://www.singingrevolution.com

Minu nimi on Pierre!!!

      I so wanted to start my Estonian classes. It’s been 2 weeks I’ve been here in Parnu and it was frustrating not to be able to talk to people in their own language. You feel like a stranger in a room full of people. I hate this situation so I prefer to be able to understand the local langue people talk when I’m staying long enough in a place or in a country. Talking the same language makes contact easier and you are more integrated. You can have good laugh when you try to say some difficult words!!

     So this morning after passing at the bank to get my card, we arrived at our organisation and finally meet our Estonian teacher, Katre. It’s a shame Katerina and me are not both French or both can speak this language as Katre is also a French teacher. It would have been easier to have the teacher using your mother tongue for a new language. We started our class by spelling words that are very similar to English or French, like bus, coffee (kohv in Estonian), and move to the alphabet. That will be the hardest part for me as some letters are very similar to what we use in French but they make it harder, lol. For example, U is pronounced as the same sound OU in French and if you want to pronounce it separately, you will need to write Ü. They also have the ~ in some vowels. The “J” is pronounced like a “Y” but they don’t really use the latter. Or is it simply because I haven’t met one word using this letter?

     The book we will use is not the simplest one but the more efficient according to our teacher. It has some kind of vocabulary at the end for Finnish, Russian and German. That may sound weird to you but Estonian is very close to Finnish and Russian but also to German as they were a German territory for centuries. I will need to be very good and work hard during the classes as the previous volunteer in just 3 months could speak very good Estonian and was able to write almost on his own the small exhibition he prepared for the French Speaking day he organised last year. The next one is next March, 20^th but I will talk about it in due time!! As they say here, Nägemist !!