First Challenging Experience in Portugal and Weeks of Intense Work
Last weeks in Rato I had a lot of work to do. We all were getting prepared for Jah Moment, which took place both in Rato office and in Casa Amarela. The first day of the event (that was Wednesday) was a lot of fun, because many students came to Rato to participate in activities. I haven’t seen so many people in our office so far! There were activities about Euro Desk (opportunities to travel abroad as a volunteer), Arduino workshop, Polish workshop and a yoga class. Students seemed to be quite interested in everything that was going on.
The second day of event was in Casa Amarela. We were passing by this building many-many times as this is right next to our apartment, although we were not even sure, if it’s open and accessible, so I was very surprised, when we entered it for the first time and I saw what’s inside. It turned out to be a youth center, where you have a lot of space for some classes and other activities. There we had a workshop in photography and sewing class. Although due to the fact that this event was on Saturday, there were no students from outside taking part in it, but it was still cool for us to change the environment for a little and move our office to a new place.
Besides preparations for Jah moment, I’ve been editing the podcast all the time. It turned out to be not as easy as I though, even though Gonçalo made this workshop for us about editing audios, I still had to ask him for help. But I really liked the process of doing it, although the more I listened to it, the more I disliked the quality of it (both content and sound). Yesterday I finally finished it.
Gonçalo and I also have been working a lot on the Russian vocabulary playlist. First we were searching for a place, where to record videos, then we spent a lot of time arranging the position of a camera, then I needed a few attempts to say everything correctly and without laughing, then Nuno rejected all we did, so we had to start from the scratch. It’s an extremely interesting experience as I haven’t done something similar before, so I had to face many difficulties like behave myself naturally in front of the camera, speak slower than I’m used to, accept how my face looks like on the screen (especially when it’s zoomed in so much!) and so on. Also we had a lot of questions as none of the volunteers has done videos like that before, so we had no examples on Rato channel in front of us. Despite everything that was mentioned, I still like that idea a lot, because it seems much more amusing than doing a routine job. I hope it will look great in the end!
Two weeks ago I also had a quite challenging experience here in Portugal. I had to go to the doctor. As I considered that issue pretty urgent, we were not able to find English-speaking specialist, so I agreed to go to a Portuguese-speaking doctor without any hesitation. Monica made me an appointment and after checking a few of the most useful words I went there. Well, I didn’t realize the whole potential of my Portuguese before that moment! We were able to understand each other with a nurse from the registration desk, although when she asked me about the address (morado) I confused it with the word “husband” (marido). So I immediately answered “Não, não. Não tenho morado. Eu sou solteira”.
But at the doctor’s it was even more fun as we were trying to show each other something with our hands, or I was trying to use Google Translate, which was not so helpful at that moment. At some moment of physical examination, I realized that I haven’t checked in advance how to say that it hurts. “Well, then it probably doesn’t hurt so much”, – I thought. Anyway it was a very impressive experience, after which I also had a chance to get to know how expensive is any health care in Portugal, so I finally met that bad side of living here (thanks god, we have an insurance!).
Besides it, I also travelled to Porto as my Polish friend was coming there. We had only one day there, but I really liked that city as it didn’t look similar to Lisbon or other cities I’ve been to in Portugal. The buildings there were mostly gray, and it created a totally different atmosphere. We spent an amazing time together hiking in Cabo da Roca and exploring Lisbon together, so after her leaving I felt truly homesick for the first time being here.
