Finland - a journey to remember

Daniela Mihova, Kardzhali, Bulgaria

The plane takes off, I see beneath me Helsinki, with all its lights it`s like the city asks me to stay but I have to go and take with me all these beautiful memories. I close my eyes and try to relive these amazing days. So let`s go back to the 21^st of October in the exact moment that we arrived in Nummela a small town near Helsinki that I will remember r for long.

I recall waking up up after a quick nap in the bus and just being so excited for what`s to come. So I exit the bus and I see all these finish students and parents and I try to find my girl. Soon enough I find her mom and we go to their house that by the way is really cool. While traveling we got to talking and than in the she introduced me to Liisa's dad and Liisa's brother Matti. They were really nice and we chatted a bit before Liisa got home from her swimming practice. It was so exciting meeting her because for the past few weeks we had exchanged a couple emails and got to know each other slightly. After that we had dinner and played a few boardgames. All and all the meeting of the family was really exciting and interesting to me.

It's now day one. I'm waking up having breakfast and I'm going to school with Liisa. I had an hour before my workshops so I went to Liisa‘s math class. After that I met up with my girls and we waited for the day to start. P.s. you'll see this patern almost every day for the rest of the week. And now.... the teachers open the doors of the classroom and we get in.They welcome us all and start talking to us about the things we are going to be doing and we go through the program and then start with the best part-the ice breaking games.This was one of the best parts of the week. We not only to learned something about other girls but also about the countries sometime between the games we got to lunch but then continued that was overall the day at school. And after I got to the house I went to watch Lisa on her swimming practice. When we went home it was already too late so we ate and played some games before we went to sleep.

On day two we went to “FAZER” candy factory. It was a great experience and to be honest I had never been in the same room with so much chocolate. After the factory we visited Helsinki did some interesting interviews and we even were in the EU office. By this point I saw that we started to bond with the girls from Italy and Germany. We got home after a long day.

It was Wednesday. Pretty much the same happened I wake up and go to school I have some workshops then get lunch at the canteen. The interesting thing I felt I had to mention is the international snacks that we got to eat and what better than snacks from 4 amazing countries you can eat while talking to your new made friends from around Europe. This was the best part of the day.

On the fourth day we have really bonded with all the girls and even found big table at lunch so we can sit out together. The workshops were really interesting we got to do some green screen videos and also play “Kahoot”. Another good part of the day or may I say the evening with the sauna in the house. It was great trying out some Finnish sauna and experiencing all of this with Lisa whith whom I also bonded. As I said it was a great night and we both went to sleep.

It's almost the end of my journey. My last day. I got up had my usual breakfast with the family and then me and Lisa went to school. There I was pretty early so I said in front of the

room and chatted with one of the German girls. By 9 when the workshop started we all sat patiently and did our stuff we edit it some videos and blade some games before the lunch and in a bit we all went home. Luckily that wasn't the last time we saw each other we had a sauna evening that was absolutely amazing. When we got there we started making some dinner we all ate and then went to the sauna. After the dinner we jumped into the lake and it was evening so one can imagine how cold it was. This sauna evening was amazing. We all said our goodbyes then and got home.

On the 27^th of October I woke up had breakfast said goodbye to the family and then went to the bus station. From there we got to the airport went throught security and the we were at the plane on our flight back to home.

So that was it my amazing journey to Finland and back. It was quite the experience and I can not be more thankful for all of this. There are many great memories that I will treasure forever.

2. Anna Chorbadzhiyska, Kardzhali, Bulgaria

Thanks to the ERASMUS + project, I realized one of my dreams - to go to Finland. Finland is one of the most beautiful countries I have ever visited. I have read so many interesting things on the Internet before going to Finland, which I have not heard before. I was most impressed by the topic of Finnish education - one of the best in the world. It seemed so different to me and I was so excited about this adventure .

Our flight was on October 20th from Bourgas to Helsinki. I was very excited and impatient because I was going to fly for the first time. It all went well and we arrived in the Finnish capital late at night and went to the hotel. We were very tired and we needed a lot of energy for the next day because it was the day that we had to meet our host families.

We traveled with bus and train to the city of Nummela, where we spent the next week studying the life of the Finns. When we arrived the children were waiting with their parents. I was so excited to meet them. I was pleasantly surprised because they were very nice. After 15 minutes I was in their house. I was impressed that they, like most of the Finns I met, lived in the suburbs. The house was not so big, but it was very cosy. They gave me a typical Finnish food-everything was so different from what I was used to. I can say that they eat very healthy and in small portions. They prefer fish to meat and they like vegetable soups. They also eat mostly fruits instead of chocolate, drink milk instead of water. The families are very cohesive – they have dinner together, communicate with each other, watch films together, play games. Many of these things are overlooked in most cases in Bulgaria, because maybe we don't have as much free time as they do.

I had the opportunity to visit and see how a Finnish lesson goes and I was amazed by what I saw. On each unit the teacher had a presentation, and the students had special attachments, for example, in math class you work with very strange-looking calculators. Also in the curriculum there are many additional prerequisites, which we do not study here - like a first aid learning and religion, a wide variety of languages. Each student can choose which classes to attend. In their free time students go to the school library, where they do their homework and teach tutorials. They have no grades, but a few times per week they are assessed by points. In my opinion, this is a great example, because in this way students have the motivation to learn. I noticed that they want to be perfect in everything.

I was surprised that many of the Finns know quite a lot of languages-English, French, German, Swedish. We went sight seeing in Helsinki and we visited a few shops. In Finland the standard of living is high and it's very different. Also, the weather was cold.

Over the next few days, we have been developing various projects-videos with the green screen, we wrote speeches, statistics, we made our own games at the Internet. Schools in Finland have expensive laptops, tablets, each room is equipped with multimedia, electronic boards and many other technologies.

I was able to visit famous Finnish saunas.Actually there is at least one sauna in each house.

I am grateful for the chance I got, not only because I was able to visit, to see, to learn more and to be a part of the life of a Finnish family, but also because I met people that I will remember for the rest of my life with their responsiveness , purposefulness and kindness. Knowing people from all around the world helps me learn and build a new worldview, which will certainly help me in the future. I also had the chance to introduce my home country -Bulgaria and to realise the differences between the various Nations. This unforgettable adventure certainly taught me a lot. Even though I was at another country I felt like I was home.

3. Aleksandra Ruseva, Kardzhali, Bulgaria

Aleksandra Ruseva, 15 years old

The adventure in Finland was one of my most interesting travels. I had the opportunity to see one foreign European country and to get to know their everyday life and education system. I made a lot of friends. They were my age and came from not only Finland, but Italy and Germany too. They had the same opportunity from the project ERASMUS+. I spoke to everyone in English which wasn’t hard for me. The fins were very kind and friendly and did the best for us to see the most interesting places in Helsinki and Nummela and to try the most delicious finish food. I was impressed by their school which was big and modern. The pupils did their homework at school with personal laptops. It was clear that many of them love to learn.

There were mother, father, dog and two daughters – Veera and Saara. There was one another exchange student – Merve in the house from Turkey. All of them spoke English which made the communication easier. Their house wasn’t located in the center of Nummela, so we had to travel every day for 10 minutes to the school “Vihti”. The girls studied there. If the parents were both busy, we used the bus. The house contained all comforts for living (sauna included). I and Anna, my classmate from Bulgaria, both slept on the second floor in a room next to the girls’ rooms. We had dinner and breakfast at home, but the lunch was in the school. Many finish traditional dishes were actually delicious for me. At dinner we all sit together and talked about our day. The parents communicated with the children like one strong family.

The first day we saw the school, presented Bulgaria, met the other participants and join some classes. After the ice breaking games we visited the shop “Globe Hope”. Their modern recycling really inspired us.

The second day was set for visit to Helsinki, but we saw the candy factory ,,Fazer’’ in Vantaa. There was one European office located in the capital of Finland. The people there gave us

information and presents about Europe. The most interesting part of the day was the free time when we walked around the city and interviewed random people. We asked them how many languages they know and if they use them in IT.

We had workshops the other two days, joined the PE class, where we played “ice hockey” in the sport hall. We tried Finish, German and Italian sweets and shot and edited some videos.

It was time for saying goodbye the last day of our exciting journey. After classes at school we had a party and sauna evening. It was the final get-together and I was a little bit sad. It was one amazing week with a lot of good times. I will miss my new friends and the beautiful country Finland.