I lived for a year in the Greek mountain village of Kryoneri in Corinthia. There, I worked for FILOXENIA, an intercultural environmental organization.
My work was very varied. A significant part of it involved office work, which I did mainly during the winter months. The atmosphere in the office was very relaxed, and we handled many different tasks. Over the winter, my fellow volunteer Jette and I, for example, worked on a project to spruce up the office space with some artistic touches. Otherwise, I spent a lot of time maintaining and developing websites; for example, we translated one website into German.
Another important part of the work was the tandem exchange. As part of this, we taught English or German to people from the area once a week, and they, in turn, helped us learn Greek. This brought us into contact mainly with many children from the village, with whom we would often play soccer in the village square.
Starting in the spring, our work focused on seminars. That year, more than 15 groups with participants from all over Europe came to Kryoneri. The topics of the seminars were as varied as the countries the participants came from. They covered sports, the restoration of a watermill, graffiti, nutrition, feminism, history, and much more. One particularly important task—which several seminars focused on—was the maintenance of hiking trails through and around the village. Our tasks varied from seminar to seminar. We always showed participants around the village and taught them about its history. For some groups, we, as team leaders, were directly responsible; otherwise, we mostly handled preparatory tasks or helped out in other ways.
In addition, there were many, many smaller tasks throughout the year. Among other things, we were partly responsible for taking care of the garden surrounding the hostel grounds, where the seminar participants were staying. Meeting so many different people has probably had the greatest impact on me over the course of the year.
Through a wide variety of activities—from painting walls and gardening to teaching and leading groups—I’ve gathered countless memories and experiences that will stay with me for the rest of my life.
