My little sunny spot in Spain

Some say I left my old self in Berlin...
I think I saw things in perspective.
When I was getting everything ready for my project (and that took me six months, as I wanted to have everything perfectly organized) someone told me that EVS changes YOU and YOUR LIFE. That it was the most important thing that she had lived and that I should enjoy every moment of it. Immediately I thought “Oh come on, don't be overreact! Of course it's awesome, but calm down...”

I had a very good job as Entertainer, friends, my father, my boyfriend, a car, a place in sunny Spain. Everything went as expected, and in September 2010 I flew to Berlin to start my project in a Jewish kindergarten in Germany.
I knew what I was leaving behind, but I was hoping that everything would be the same when I came back...If I ever did.
My life in Germany was hard (low temperatures, different culture, different way of working, food and language...) and until the end of the year I didn't realize something really important. It was when someone asked me if I felt that I had adapted in German society and culture and I said no. “Well, of course if what you understand by adaptation is being happy all the time in a new place with new stuff and people you will never be adapted!” she said to me. She made me see that even when not everything is perfect, everything has a learning if you know how to extract it and take positive profit of it. I could learn German, meet new people, work and get one year experience in a kindergarten, learn a bit of Hebrew, meet nice people from Germany, Israel, America, Russia and many other places, learn cooking recipes, songs, and thousands of things that I cannot mention here because of length limits!
Even though, right now, I'm back in Spain and I can see in perspective again. First, when I came back it was only to visit my old friends and continue traveling (Bolivia, Brazil, Mexico...) but when I arrived I noticed something had changed. The ex volunteers where right, it's difficult finding your place again after one year! (I have to start believing what experienced people talk about stuff...)
Slowly I found my place and I noticed that not only people had changed, and for good, but that all the things that made me go away and take distance were not there any more (or I didn't see it as bad stuff anymore, as my value scale changed) and my friends where still my friends, my boss offered my job back to me, and I realized all the love from everyone that accepted and didn't judge me for going away all the time...
After one week in my “new-old place” I had a conversation with a friend, and she made me see something. The conversation was about “doing what you have to do”, and the fact that I always have to travel, meet new people, change house, change place, change job...don't get bored, change all the time! After so much traveling I'm really tired, I said. But it will be so amazing! And it's what I have to do, now I can't change my mind, it's what I wanted to do since I'm six, going to South America! And then she said the magic sentence: But what about what you want NOW?
And then for the first time in months I stopped and realized what I wanted and not what I had to do, or what thought I needed.
I decided to stay in my sunny spot in Spain, with my friends, and I have to say it's more scary to stay and find a job until I get my old one back in some months, find a house, pay for all, and survive day by day, than going to new places all the time, not being responsible for your relations with people.
That's only one of the things that I've learned in my project: to see and value things in life from another point of view. I also traveled all Europe, learned languages, met new people that have taught me amazing things, changed and learned to live in a totally different culture...
I personally think that nothing is a waste of time if you are doing something you believe in. Even if it goes wrong, it gets canceled, you change plans...you learn from that, and therefore not everything is lost!
My EVS experience changed me as a person, and this decision I took will change the course of the rest of my life path, I hope for good.
And I'm happy for it.

Enjoy your life your way, but listen to the voices around you, sometimes they have a hint of what they're talking about!