A Year in Slovakia: Ja som tu.
On August 20th, I departed from the Jacksonville airport and began my journey to Slovakia. Four flights and 28 hours later, I arrived in Košice, SK, where my host family waited with signs and big smiles. Alongside my host family was a girl who had come to act as a translator for my family. I realized then how much more difficult my exchange was going to be than I had initially suspected. But that is what exchange is all about — being flexible and open to change.
After I arrived at the airport, we headed to the embassy / police station. All the paperwork was in Slovak so it took a lot of mistakes and paper for me to finally complete it correctly. Then we drove to my host families house, which is located in a village outside of Spišska Nova Ves. I was glued to the window the entire drive as the layout of the country is so different from America. The buildings are packed together, creating it so the cities are very condensed and the land surrounding is vast. We drove through hills and tunnels and then broke into the mountains. We went past Spišska Hrad, the largest historical castle in Central Europe, which my host parents promised to take me to. I felt like everything was straight out of a fairy tale.
Now I have only been here for a week but I already know that this is going to be the most rewarding experience of my life. It was so hard to leave my family behind and to live each day without knowing exactly what is going on but it is okay. Because in the end, it will all be SO worth it.
My family and community here are so kind and patient with me. I have two host siblings, one younger sister and one younger brother. My sister helps me with the language the most. She has labeled everything in the house and we go through story books together where she tells me the names of animals and things in Slovak. My host mom’s parents and sister live right next door too, so we have spent a lot of time together. They don’t speak any english at all so our communication is mainly hand signals and pointing.
Due to my lack in ability to communicate properly, I haven’t been able to immerse myself in the community yet. Due to this, I have really struggled in asking how I can serve this new place I am living in and really had no clue what to do up until yesterday; my host sister brought me to school with her where I met the english teacher who asked if I would be willing to help in the school. YES YES YES. I was so excited because that is exactly what I wanted to do. Now after school starts, I will begin assisting the primary school’s English class whenever I can. Later in the day I also met with my host mother’s friend in the next town over. We began talking about FSU Gap Year Fellows and I told her about my desire to volunteer and she told me that she works in a local school that assists those with visual, mental, and physical impairments. As this is something that I have been doing for the last 3 years, I was so excited to hear about this that I immediately asked how I could get involved! She said she was going to ask her director and I would have an answer by Thursday. I was so ecstatic. Two days ago I had no idea what to do and now I have two new projects to become involved with. I love how life works like that!
Now I am off to go on an adventure into the mountains with my host family. Dovidenia!
