Rusia

Last year I was working as a volunteer in Turkey to rebuild a school and it was an unforgettable experience. Why not to repeat this year? I thought “Let's go to Russia”.

First I was in Frankfurt, visiting the city and eating the typical sausage, due to the fact that it was cheaper go to Germany and take another flight to Moscow instead of going straight from Madrid to Moscow. While I was there, I had good weather and took some pictures.

The challenge began when I arrived to Moscow, where I would be one and a half days for tourism, I don't speak Russian language and I don't understand Cyrillic letters. At the beginning was difficult because, although I was with another Spanish volunteer called Barbara, it seemed nobody wanted to help us or they didn't speak English. We were tourists speaking in English language, enjoying our holidays, and most of the Muscovite people seemed always angry and sad, maybe because they had to go to work or because they are used to being angry, I don't know.

If you go to Moscow, I recommend you visit the underground, yes the underground, there are very deep stations that they were used by the army in the second world war, they are amazing and beautiful. In addition, you must go to the red square, see the Lenin's mausoleum, visit the Kremlin and not forget eating pancakes and blinis in the Arbat street.

In Moscow you can find a lot of banks, open till the night, plenty of sports cars and luxury shops. In Russian most of the things are cheaper than in Spain; petrol (50 cent/litre approx.), cigarettes (80 cent/package approx.), alcohol (5 €/bottle approx.). Things are cheaper due to the fact that salaries are lower than ours in Spain, now the average salary is about 400 €/month. However, the unemployment rate is about 6%, lower than our 25%, and women are the main working people in Russian. Probably, because there are more women than men and the average death age for women is 76 years old while for men is 64 years old. This last figure could be because men have an unhealthy life style.

After tourism, I had to go to the camp in Yaroslav. This would be my first time working with kids and it has been a wonderful experience. I was there for 20 days working with children between 8 and 16 years old. My main task was teaching Spanish and English language, teaching our culture and traditions and not less important, play with them. It was like to return to our childhood. Kids gave us a lot of hugs, sweets and they also taught us Russian words.

I wasn't the only volunteer in the workcamp but I was with my travel mate Bárbara, who has put up with me during whole travel, my room mate and inseparable Kyle (Carl for friends), and another three great girls, Valentina from Italy, Duda from Serbia and Angharad from Wales. In the camp had about 300 children, besides animator teams, dancer teams, leaders, cooks, photographer, life guard, nurses, administrative staff, etc.

Although we only had two days off to go to the city (Yaroslav) for eating and drinking good and tasty food, not kasha jaj, I'm not going to forget the funny activities we did, like the wedding day, the fear night and all dances we saw and learnt, there were dances almost every day.

With regard to technology, most Russian people use yandex.ru as search engine and email, and vk.com as social network, instead of google.com and facebook.com. Curiosity or not, but when I returned to Spain my SIM card of my mobile phone didn't work and I had to ask a new one.

All of us know the powerful Russian army. The military service is mandatory for them, unless you have a family to take care, this is the reason why they take the plunge to have a family before us in Spain. It's easy to see men wearing as soldiers in the street, even I saw a man wearing with anti chemical bomb clothes in a raining day. And later I could see inside the camp anti chemical bomb mask. However, I didn't feel insecure in any moment.

I would like to give special gratitude to Marina, who works as a leader of the volunteers, Tania for her job as a coordinator and good friend, and Ludmina for her great helpfulness as a translator and teacher of Russian language.

Greetings friends, and see you soon!!