Good day, Nevers!
My name is Ekaterina! I come from Russia. I am an EVS volunteer in Ville de Nevers!
I have never had an opportunity and necessity to write blog, so, I guess, now I do.
Time. The time is running fast and three weeks passed like one day with the help of emotions, changes, information and people. The head is full and after numerous meetings with people there is no name left connected with the concrete face! It is hard, it was always hard even in Russia. The difference is that in Russia I could at least say some names which I had heard recently, but here… none! That makes me feel ridiculous and confused, I can not forgive myself, but I will do my best!
Action. I really do things! I feel myself useful in Mission Jeunesse and I enjoy what I am doing. For now it was slow because of language. I am not a fast reader in general, more over in French it goes even more slowly. It needs time before the French text becomes a normal picture, without berets, baguettes and oysters in my head. The bigger problem is writing! Thanks to Microsoft Word my French nouns are getting proper genders, and the prepositions are often changed automatically, but even the master of correction Microsoft not all the time guesses the word I tried to say, and the long list of proposed variants of correction is often hopeless!
People. The biggest difference with Russia is people. They smile to me! In the shop, in the office, even a person in the car who was disturbed by me crossing the road smiles and shows with his hand “Come one! Go, my dear!”. Sometimes it looks really suspicious: “I’ve already met this person? She knows me? He wants to ask me something?”. But NO. People are just used to smile to each other here! Just because it is like this! In Russia it is not often, mostly you know straight that the seller in the shop hates you, the driver had better plans than to stop and let you cross the street, and if the person in the street smiles to you he is probably just insane! But I get used to smile very fast, it is easy!
Weather. Nevers is very particular! The weather is too different during the day, and often I have no idea if I take my jacket, or I put on just a sweater, or it will really be storm! It is easy to see people in the street wearing coats and others wearing T-shirts! But it is normal here, they just left their homes at different time of the day! But what is also fun that here, in Nevers the weather forcast can sounds like this: “Tomorrow in Nevers will be raining! Five times!”.
I am still here, I will be here and I will let you know what happens around me!
Have a nice day! Smile!