Goda about her experience- "Things usually happen unexpectedly here."

Two months passed since I arrived in Rustavi and many things already happened here. With the other volunteers we already visited some beautiful places in Georgia.

Mountains, mountains aaaaand again mountains, that is how Mikio described Georgia on the first

day when we came here. And its true, the first thing you fall in love with when coming to Sakartvelo is these majestic gorgeous mountains which attract your eyes immediately. I am from Lithuania which is known to be one of the flattest countries in the world, so maybe that the reason why I love mountains so much. So lets start my first blog about impressions which I already incurred in these two months.

On the first weekend we had an unexpected trip to “Pona” campsite in the north of Georgia with an exchange project of Norwegians and Georgians. And now guess where...in a place surrounded by huge and of course beautiful mountains. It was my first time to climb in the mountains and moreover reaching the mountain top where there was a waterfall! After 8 kilometers by walk we finally saw it and the view of the waterfall was amazing.

During the second week we went to On-Arrival-Training in Kobuleti for 5 days. The training was dedicated to volunteers. I met new people there from different countries and we became friends with them. Our trainers prepared many activities for us and I can really say that all of us got new knowledge and motivation to go forward on our chosen way to be volunteer. ...I almost forgot to tell you about my swimming experience in the middle of the night in the Black Sea under the dark sky with lots of twinkling stars above. It was really wonderful and it wasn't cold at all. It was September and then the weather was still warm, around 20 degrees at night. Such temperature in autumn is very unusually for me too.

“Hi girls, we have a trip with Latvian project tomorrow to visit the countryside school and see

canyon, do you want to join us? We leave at 8.30 a.m.” - Nana (our leader and mentor of GYE

organisation...actually she is like an older sister for us) This is the offer we got around 9pm the day before the trip and of course we accepted it. That night I was thinking: yeah, I am in Georgia now and things usually happen unexpectedly here so I will need to get used to this part of the Georgian culture. In my country we normally plan with a lot of time in advance and how I already found out Georgians love surprises.

Of course we cant forget Tbilisi. It would be a shame to go to Georgia and not visit Tbilisi, so I've seen it already. That is where I fell in love with the second thing here: the Chronicle of Georgia,

which is I guess one of the calmest places in Tbilisi. It was a peaceful and magical place.

Rustavi has a hill with a cross on it that shines green during the nights when its dark and now I can

proudly say that I saw this cross up close. Not long ago I climbed to it with other volunteers.

I have my clubs in GYE a few times per week. I work with children to improve their English

vocabulary and also I continue living out my passion for dancing in preparing training for girls who are interested in it.

These two months here were challenging and full of new experiences and impressions and I am sure it will definitely be more.

Goda