Rifugio Re Carlo Alberto
My EVS project took place in Luserna San Giovanni, a small village near Turin, in home for Alzheimer and dementia-Rifugio Re Carlo Alberto. At the beginning we went on arrival training in Napoli. There we had very intensive Italian course and team building. All week the atmosphere was great. Very useful experience to develop social and communicational skills.
Rifugio Re Carlo Alberto is a great place to do EVS, because the center received a lot of volunteers and they know what we can and cannot do, so there’s not too much stress. Susanna is a volunteer tutor, every Friday we had a meeting with her, so we could ask and say whatever we needed. All together this project went better than I expected. This EVS for me was one of the most interesting and useful experiences I had. Every day we did different activities with patients like taking walks, drinking coffee, playing cards, playing cognitive games, reading, drawing etc. Then there were other, more fixed activities like gym, mass, music therapy, art therapy, pet therapy, creative handicrafts, tombola, birthday parties, karaoke etc.
I worked in a department where people were mainly able to walk and eat independently, just a few people needed help with meals. In the morning we would help to prepare breakfast, clean the tables and after we would take a short walk with someone from our department until the daily activity begins. During lunch we helped with serving food and feeding people who needed help, cleaning tables and then we would go to lunch. After lunch we had a break and the afternoon activity would start at 15h.
Italian language course
The school was half an hour away from the Rifugio, in Torre Pellice. We went to school mainly by bicycles. Course was in the afternoon and at Wednesday volunteers wouldn’t go back to work after lunch. Teachers spoke in Italian, so for me was really useful to learn some Italian before in order to keep a track with a material. In Torre Pellice and Luserna there are many volunteers, so the school was an opportunity to meet other volunteers on different projects.
Time passes too fast when you’re in Italy, in a group of 6 volunteers, it seems unbelievable that for 6 months I lived here. I had a great time!
Ivona Marusic (Croatia, Volunteering in Rifugio Re Carlo Alberto for 6 monthsin 2019)