I thought I would give you a look into my everyday life with this blog.
Most mornings I wake up around 9. I usually wake up earlier but stay in be until 9 because I don't feel like getting up and I don't actually have to be anywhere until 11.
I never have breakfast alone and I rarely make it myself. Either my host mom makes eggs or sausages or some kind of bread or me and my host sister eat the bread she makes with cheese, meat, or tomatoes or even all three. We always have some kind of fresh bread in the morning!
I usually take my time in the mornings, so I'll take my time to eat and get ready before leaving for the centar at 11, because it is so close to my house and it doesn't take me more than a minute to get there.
On Monday mornings we have meetings with some of the centar's staff, they like to check in with us to make sure we are doing ok, not just in the centar, but in all kinds of things.
After meetings or if we don't have meetings, the four of us get together to plan activities for the kids. In the picture you can see the four of us with the posters we made that describe the activities we will have for the kids this summer. (left to right: Natasha, me, Magali, Élise)
To be honest we don`t always spend the time planning, but there hasn't been much of a rush to get anything done until now, because we start officially working with the kids next week! We've met a few of them already though and do our best to interact with the few that show up at the centar when school is still in session.
Around 1 we usually break for lunch, and take an hour because it is the most important meal of the day and we all usually sit down with whatever family members are home for lunch. Lunch consists of all kinds of different things, chicken, potatoes, burek, stuffed peppers, etc. My favorite so far is the stuffed peppers. But it is all usually really good. Sometimes we even make homemade pizza!
We head back to the centar around 2 for Bosnian lessons, not that my ability to speak the language has progressed much, but I know some words and my family gestures a lot so I can understand quite a bit. Lots of people also know at least a little bit of English.
Our lessons vary in length, but sometimes can last 2 hours, mostly because there is a lot of talking in between things. After lessons we mostly just do whatever we feel like, next week our schedule will change because we will work with the kids from 10-12 and 2-4. For now though, when lessons are done we are done for the day. It's kind of nice actually, we haven't had to rush into anything and for most things the pace of life is pretty slow which suits me well.
In the evenings, the four of us girls usually hang out, sometimes at one of our house's or my host sister and Natasha's host sister will join us. Sometimes we just hang out with our families, which often means I see Natasha because our host sisters' are good friends/we are neighbors. My host mom also loves to walk, so often we go on these long walks and I just marvel at the beauty of this country, it is so green and everything is hills and mountains.
We haven't done much volunteering so far, but I honestly think that's a good thing, because this has allowed us to really get familiar with the country and our host families and truly live out Intercordia's mission of "being with, not doing for". We have had so much time to be with people and build relationships with these people who are different from us and have gone through more that I can imagine, but we still can connect with one another even despite the language barrier.
I think that's all for now, hope everyone is well! :)
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