Discovering Helsinki

Last Sunday we (25 exchange students from Estonia) came back from our wonderful trip to Helsinki. Our adventure started at the port in Tallinn Saturday morning. We took the Tallink ferry to Helsinki. Most of the time we spent in a restaurant eating breakfast, because the food has really been good. 

With full stomachs and excitement we took our first steps through Helsinki. First impression: There is a whole lot of wind! Since the hostel was on the other side of the city we already had the chance to see a lot of Helsinki, while walking there. We slept in a nice and comfortable youth hostel in the east of the city. So very close to the Baltic Sea. At about 2 o'clock we started a city game. In groups of five we had to solve 9 Challenges in 9 different places plus 2 extra challenges and would get a certain number of points, when doing it correctly. This was a nice way for getting around the city and gaining a further impression. But most important: It was a lot of fun! Have you and your friends ever sung three national anthems at a time? Or have been trying to take a picture of the most weirdest thing on a market place. For getting around our group chose to take the tram, which was an easy, fast and cheap way. 

Through all this time we discovered the several interesting and beautiful sights. The first ones you will probably notice are the two Cathedrals, both very close to the central market place and the shopping streets. They are situated higher than the rest of the city, so that you have a beautiful view. The market place itself is at the Baltic Sea. Except weekly, and currently Christmas markets, there is also the market hall opened every day, except Sunday. (We wanted to go there on Sunday, but sadly it was closed). The city game also send us to the Love Bridge, where we had to find the lock that was placed there by YFU exchange students.

In the evening we met to eat dinner in the city center. So we had plenty of time. Some exchange students even got to go ice-scating or taking a ride on the Ferris-wheel near the harbor. But after dinner we still went on, but now freely, and discovered the city in the dark. Currently Helsinki is lightened up by Christmas lights and decorations. All the streets were decorated an when standing in front of the cathedrals (remember: located higher) you had an amazing overview. Most amazing was a shop window with snow, and moving puppets and trees. You can see it on the picture. After another couple of hours we returned to the hotel, where we ended our day with a lot of fun.

The next day was free time, so we divided into smaller groups and went back to the city center to go shopping, do sightseing or just hanging around. Our group also decided to look around again and then go shopping for Christmas presents and souvenirs.

Last thing to mention: Helsinki is a very musical city. We listened to gorgeous street musicians, such as two women playing classical songs or a man playing songs on bottles partly filled with water, which created an unique sound. All around Helsinki was music.

As you might have noticed, I completely love this city and would like to go there any time again. We had such a great fun with each other and have been sad, that this amazing trip only lasted two days.  

Andrea from Germany

Exchange student in Estonia 2014/2015

A special exchange year in Estonia – it´s all about the MUSIC

Every year several of exchange students come to Estonia to the music program we offer. Today we have a chance to see how are two of those students living they dream today:

Lara with her cello

„Hello I am Lara and I am 16 years old and I come from Germany. I am doing right now an exchange year in Estonia. But my year is not ordinary, my year is very special. YFU gave me the chance to play music in a foreign country for a whole year.“

„Hi, everyone! My name is Sophia, I am sixteen years old and I'm from Switzerland. I've already been in Estonia for two great months now, eight still to go.“

Lara and Sophia both attend the Heino Elleri nimeline Tartu Muusikakool (Heino Eller music school in Tartu: http://www.tmk.ee/en ). Besides usual subjects as mathematics, natural sciences, history, English and Estonian, they have music theory,solfeggio, music history, three instrumental lessons per week and the ones whose first instrument isn't the piano, also get one piano lesson per week.

Lara: „I play the cello and the piano and one of my biggest dreams is to become a musician. I am living in Tartu which is the second largest city in Estonia. The school I am going to is a really highly educated school. The school is very modern and everything is about music!”

Sophia with her violin

Sophia: „Of course, the music program is perfect for people who dream of becoming a musician, but I don't want to be a professional musician, and I can recommend it to everyone who simply likes do music a lot. I chose the music program because I wanted to spend more time with my violin and learn more about music in general. It's motivating and not (too) intimidating to be surrounded by students who are very ambitious and already very good musicians and I like the overall atmosphere because everyone is there voluntarily and willing to learn, to practice and to improve and of course crazy for music.

Even though I have to practice a lot (in view of the first violin exams), I still have time to learn Estonian, dance and experience my exchange year. I think the music program is a nice extra to your exchange year that doesn't take anything away and everyone who loves music should at least consider taking part in it because it is a truly amazing opportunity!“

In 2011 Monique from Australia attended the music program exactly in the same school. Here you can see and hear yourself, how much this experience have influenced her way to be musician :

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WHvqecbh-QU

So, if you want to become a professional musician one day or you just love making music, then Estonia can offer you very much and you should take Lara`s advice: „The music program from YFU is one of the best possibilities for those who want to improve their skills on their instruments and for those who are dreaming of their dream profession as musician like me. It is also the best way to get to know the cultural side of the country. I regularly go to the theater and the opera and to many concerts. Every day I dive deeper into this country and learn to understand it better. But not just the country, I also learn better to understand me. You can learn to trust yourself, to be able to do things you never thought you can do. To see your own progresses playing your instruments every day. To be on stage...and to make music! This is the moment for which it pays to work hard.

If you want to make such a musical exchange year, you don´t have to play like a really good musician, you just have to love your music like a really good musician.

PS. you can follow Lara and Sophia in Instagram as well for one week: https://instagram.com/yfuestonia/   

Autumn meeting in YFU

Autumn is here and so our first Host families and Students Day with YFU arrived safely.

Autumn meeting is a part of YFU year events and gives the opportunity to meet other host families and students.

This year the event took place in Tallinn (http://www.kullo.ee/Kullo_Lastegalerii ) and Tartu (http://www.dorpatensis.ee/) on 10th of October.

Almost all host families were joining YFU day with the whole family, so over 60 people were in both cities to meet each other. The day consists of group works – all the family members are asked to join different groups - hostmoms with other hostmoms, hostdads with other hostdads... As for smaller siblings there are some fun activities as well – in Tartu we visited the famous Toy Museum (http://www.mm.ee/) and in Tallinn they played a lot of different board games.

hostsiblings in front of the Town Hall in Tartu

After group works we have a tradition to eat lunch all together and it will give more time and opportunity to talk with everyone you want to or haven´t had the chance on previous meetings. 

For sure this is one day that Exchange students love – finally they can meet with each other again and talk in native language for a while. But also to discover city of Tartu and Tallinn.

Next time they meet is at the end of November, where YFU organizes the extra trip to Helsinki – as it is first Advent weekend, there will be a Christmas Market already open. Who wouldn´t love that? 

About experiencing Estonia

We love to travel. We are pretty much addicted to being in other countries and experiencing other cultures and coincidentally we both ended up in Estonia – at the same time!

But let’s start from the beginning with: Who is “We”? We are Alexa from the US and Lola from Germany. Both of us are former YFU Exchange students – Alexa went to Germany and Lola went to the US (we know we are total clichés) – and now we are interns at the YFU Estonia office. Even though we haven’t met before we immediately clicked and our adventure started.

Alexa came here on May 16th and Lola followed about a month later on June 12th. Since Alexa had already a month-worth of experience on Estonian life it was rather easy for Lola to adjust here in Tallinn. But there was still a lot to discover. The first day we met we made so many plans to where we have to go and what we should really do – but admittedly most of our “To-Go”-places were restaurants. Estonian restaurants are delicious, and we should know, because all we talked about all day was food!

But of course we didn’t come here only for traveling – we actually came here to work for YFU Estonia. And we can honestly say this office is utterly amazing. Every single girl (yes, only girls work for YFU Estonia right now) here is a fantastic and lovely person. They are always up for a good joke or some random storytelling and we have never seen anybody in a bad mood – ever! Whenever we needed help or advice we could ask anytime – no matter if it was work-related or if we needed instruction to some new restaurant we wanted to try! Our work tasks

varied since Alexa was working with the inbound students whereas Lola was working for the outbound program. We did everything from creating quizzes and games for fairs to designing a “Welcome”- brochure for the inbounds and social media work. But of course there was also some office work to be done – Lola once spent a whole day shredding old application files and Alexa had to prepare over 1,000 letters at once. But we still had a lot of fun. There was always music playing in the office and most of the time there were YFU volunteers, who stopped by to finish some work or just to have a little chat with the office people. 

Our weekends were filled with experiencing Tallinn. The city has so many beautiful places and interesting sights to see that at some point we got the feeling that almost three months wouldn’t be enough to see everything we wanted to. But we did our best. We went to every viewing platform to get every possible view of Tallinn, we walked through almost every park (and believe us, Tallinn has a crazy amount of parks), we went to the beach, we did a sightseeing tour through the old town and strolled through that part of the city so many times that we are sure we could find our way through the streets blindfolded. We went to the “Hipster”-part of the city “Kalamaja”, we visited the harbor and we tried quite a few bars throughout the whole city. All in all, there is no part of the city were we haven’t been.

But we also got to see quite a lot places outside of Tallinn and those places didn’t fail to amaze us any less than Tallinn. Estonia has a really beautiful landscape. You can find anything from wild forests to a rough seaside. From cute country houses to lively cities. You might wonder how we got to see so many places outside of Tallinn. That has a really simple reason. Estonians are very welcoming and they

are very proud of their country. So whenever someone from our surrounding - host families, co-workers, volunteers or new found friends - planned a trip they would always ask if we would like to tag along. And of course we accepted those offers. 

All in all we can only recommend Estonia and YFU Estonia to everyone. It is a beautiful and unique country, and definitely worth a visit! 

10 Things to do before you leave for your exchange year!

Visit your dentist and other doctors.

Dental care in a foreign country can be expensive and you probably don’t want to deal with health problems during your exchange year. Therefore pay a quick visit to your doctor and make sure your teeth are ready for a year abroad. 

Make sure to say goodbye properly.

You won’t see your family and friends for almost a year. So make sure to say goodbye to all of them and don’t leave in a dispute with anyone. 

Visit your favorite restaurant/cafe.

You will probably miss it. 

Money, money, money.

Pay a visit to your bank and find out whether you can pay by card and withdraw money in your exchange country and how much it costs. Also, do a little research about how expensive is life in the country you are going to (the cost can also depend on the town). 

Take more money than things with you.  

First of all, paying for extra luggage on an airplane is very expensive and secondly, you probably will need or see many things that you absolutely have to purchase here. This will only result in higher luggage fees.

As for the things you do take,...

Choose wisely. In Estonia warm, water resilient clothes are a must and a camrea will probably come in handy as the nature is extremely beautiful and you will make many adventures here. You will probably also need a winter coat because what you call a winter coat at home is most likely an autumn coat for us.

Choose one or two things that remind you of home.

That could be a picture of your family or your favorite stuffed animal. The things should mean a lot to you and they should help you calm down whenever you might feel a little homesick!

Communicate with your future host family.

Try to create a future bond with your future host family before you arrive – this will make blending in easier and you will already have something to talk about.

Think of a nice present for your Host family.

Little presents are always nice to show your host family that you appreciate them hosting you! As a present you could bring for example a picture calendar of your hometown or some traditional food from your home country. Be creative!

Learn the language.

Of course you will learn the language here but wouldn’t it be great if you could already say „how are you doing“ and „what time it is?“ in Estonian?  Also, you will feel less lost in your first language classes and will be able to adapt faster at school.

Almost there!

Exactly one month left until our inbound-students finally arrive in Estonia. We can’t wait to meet them. Even though they still have a few weeks left in their home countries we would already like to introduce them a little to you. We’ve prepared a few statistics for you, so here you go:

First of all, these are the home countries of our inbound-students. It is always stunning to see from what places the students come.

Some have quite a long journey while others only have a couple of hours to get here. But anyway, we are happy to have such a variety of students!

So let’s move on. What else could be interesting for you? Maybe what languages our students speak? Well, you might think that that is pretty obvious since you already know their home countries, but you might be surprised about the next statistic.

Even though the students come from eight different countries they are capable of speaking fourteen languages. That’s pretty amazing, isn’t it?

Let’s see what else we have for you! How about some facts about the student’s leisure time activities?

As you can see our students are pretty busy during their free time. Every inbound-student has on average 1.97 hobbies; we think that is awesome. That means no slowpoke among our students, only very active young people.

And last but not less interesting we have a statistic about our special programs. Of course, the students pick the special program according to their hobbies. So let’s take a look.

Thirteen out of our thirty students have decided to participate in a special program and as you can see you cannot really make out one most favorite program, they all enjoy pretty much the same popularity.

That's all we have for today. We hope those statistics help you to get to know our inbound-students a little better and maybe you are just as excited to meet them as we are.

So let’s hope the coming few weeks until their arrival go by fast. We wish all our inbound-students a safe journey to Estonia. 

See you in August!

Your YFU Estonia

YES 2015- The biggest one yet!

Young Europeans’ Seminar is an annual YFU Event that takes place in Werbellinnsee, Germany. It’s a seminar for European students who go to another European country on an exchange. YES 2015 gathered 505 students and 131 volunteers! There were 40 students and 6 volunteers from Estonia. The International Group Leaders this year were Martin Arro, Henri Lempu and Sandra Järv.

Every year there’s a certain topic that concentrates on an important factor of today’s society. This year’s topic was Human Rights in a Digitalized World. Students got to listen to different guest speakers who talked about human rights, data privacy, and the right to information. YES also has another very important aim besides the educational one. It’s the aim of making the return to student’s home country a little easier.

This year the organizing counties were Lithuania, Germany and Romania. Everything was very nicely organized and the topic was interesting for everybody.

All in all we can say that YES 2015 was a big success

Sandra Järv
YFU Volunteer

Dear host family

First of all thank you for choosing me to be part of your family. I appreciate it very much. When I found out that your family has a lot of members I was kind of scared although I have a lot of family members too. But then I realized that how good is it -  I never felt lonely.

I spent a lot of time with my two host sisters Pille and Margit. We always hung out together and they look after me: they were always asking whether I'm feeling well, whether I’m hungry, etc. And my host mother is also very kind – she is the best mother. She is very kind, always smiling and she knit mittens and socks for me. And believe me – I don’t tell people they are the best too often so I really do mean it! My host father is also very kind and strong.

In the first days I did not speak a lot to my host brother. But once we started talking I felt like we had known each other for a long time.

I should also pay attention to my other host siblings. Annette - you're so beautiful. You are the one that made me try all kinds of different things as you are enthusiastic and funny. You made sure that I don’t forget important things such as Eurovision, making Christmas presents, etc. I know that you will go very very far. Lukas - your smile is intimidating and at the same time makes me smile too. Lukas and Annette – you are very lucky to have such an amazing mother.

The last thing – I am sorry that I had such difficulties learning Estonian. I did try very hard though. I want you to promise though that you come visit me in Thailand!  J I love you all and hope to see you soon.

Piangphet from Thailand, Exchange Student in Estonia 14/15

"We all take different paths in life, but no matter where we go, we take a little of each other everywhere." - Tim Graw

I had to say goodbye last year to my friends and family in Germany. Last year I thought that it was difficult for me to say goodbye. Of course it was hard to leave my home country but what I didn’t know was, how it would be to say goodbye to my host family, to you. 

I remember the time before my arrival here in Estonia. I used to think about all the things I’d do. I thought about how I would learn the language, what I would play with my host brothers and how I would manage to find friends in school. And look where I’m now. I’m able to speak Estonian and that’s just awesome. I have so many new friends, favorite places and of course: a new family. I got a new home. And that’s all because of you. I don’t even know how to thank you. Right from the beginning you opened your hearts and your home to me. You gave me the trust that I needed to feel comfortable. You changed some of your everyday habits just to make me fit into your home. You showed me so much of the country and the culture. We travelled together to Finland and Sweden. You helped me see as much as possible. I will never forget those moments.

I thank you for the trust that you gave me. That is one of the things that I like the most. You let me go out with my friends, even though you didn’t know exactly what I was going to do. 

Another big thing for me was that I got two little brothers. I was so excited! And you know what? I don’t call you “host brothers” anymore. You are my real brothers (even though you are annoying and childish sometimes). I really will miss you. But no, I didn’t only get two new siblings. I got three. My little sister was born at the time when I was here. Her name is Heliis Jasmina. That means she got my name. I don’t really know how to express my feelings. I just want to say thank you. I’m so happy about that and I love my new siblings with all my heart.

Soon I’ll have to say goodbye. Soon I’ll go back to my home country and leave my second home: Estonia. I know it will be hard but I also know that I will come back soon. Thank you for everything, I will never forget the time we had. Thank you for the most amazing 10 months of my life. I love you all.

Jasmina, Exchange Student in Estonia 2014/2015