50 shades oF ukraine
HOW A 46 DAYS TRAVELLING EXPERIENCE CAN CHANGE YOUR LIFE
We Are
AIESECERS
AIESEC is one of the biggest globally non-profit organizations which allows University students to travel, create bonds, work abroad, make self-developement and being a World Citizen.
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One day I went to a local presentation of Global Volunteer programs and i realized it was close to my aims for the summer:
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travelling ,making new friends, finding out about other cultures and challenging myself.
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AIESEC is nationally, regionally and locally organized and everyone has a task and role. My local commette, AIESEC Bologna(Italy) gave me an EP manager who helped me to find the better solution for my volunteering travel.
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After being matched with some ecology projects and English courses projects in Ukraine, Poland and Danemark something inside me told me
that I needed to choose Language School in Ternopil: a 6 weeks project in western Ukraine to teach English to teenagers,
being absorbed in ukrainian culture and share italian costumes and traditions.
Ternopil became the city where I've lived and where I found a new family: other 4 interns coming from China, Egypt and Turkey.
It was destiny that we all met in Ukraine. And I am not the only one saying it! :)
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"You know that you can make a change in the life of these students? Some of them have never met someone who's not ukrainian"
These were the first words that deeply penetrated inside me during my interview to being matched with the project. I'd had never imagined how close I'd have been to the one who said them in the end of my intership.
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The interview was done by Ira Batiuk,(vice president of AIESEC in Ternopil) with which I had a connection from that day, via Skype, 1500 km far
away from me.
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Once in Ternopil I met the other guys who created the project we were all part of: Khrystina, Maxim, Iryna, Andriy...
and it was just the beginning!
Wanna give a chance to AIESEC?:
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how
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IRYNA
BATIUK
vice president
AIESEC LC vice president is the head of different teams in her/his town, doing their best to create international projects. Each team has a team leader and all of them refer to the vice president, who's just one step lower than the Local commette president.
So, vice presidents are not so personally involved within the projects but this wasn't Ira's case!
She was a guide and a friend in the most intense and most important moments! Ira is a young english teacher, a deep lover of Aiesec, she loves chocolate cake and she is very present, warm and charismatic.
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She is headstrong, determined, lovable and multitasking and she's been
our ukrainian big mama because all of us were matched by her for our project of Language school!
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If you'll ever meet one person like her in your life, you cannot imagine how lucky you'll be!
khrystynA
tryhub
president
Big up for AIESEC in Ternopil's president!
Khrys is a kind of Aiesec addict who spent her post university years travelling around the world thanks to AIESEC internships.
As a Local Commette president she had many projects to manage and we (the interns) didn't have such the possibility to see her everyday.
But, believe me, her motivational presentations were kind of illuminating for her capability in empowering others.
We can say that she's a girl who never stops herself and who internalized Aiesec habit to set - achieve goals for personal and team development.
She was there whenever there was an International Kitchen presentation , Welcome party and all the others big moments of the internships, or just in those nights when we shared a beer near the lake and looked at the stars.
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Luckily she managed to do a break this spring to travel with our mutual friend Julia (love you,malyshka) in Italy, meeting me in my home town!
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maxim
martynyuk
team leader
Max is the one who actually thought and made our Language school project after Ira and Khrys' approval.
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Blue eyes, a guitar and a music talent, studying to be a lawyer , he threw himself into this big Aiesec project as a brand new experience, being actually his first one in the organization.
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He united the interns, showed us the city and he joined our students to tell them about the great opportunity of learning English by 20-year old guys coming around the world.
He's more impactfull than he thinks and he told me some anecdotes about his grandma, who moved to Italy many years ago.
I couldn't stop laughing about an old ukrainian lady teaching her nephew how to swear in Italian!
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Hopefully I'll meet him again somewhere in Ukraine or Italy.
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andriy
nasypany
team member
Andriy's been a team member of Max's team and the two of them were the responsible of partnerships and our hosting families.
They created the internship plan and Andriy's been also my buddy: the person who's supposed to follow you as an intern in a foreign counrty.
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I feel that his serious attitude hid something softer and he was very present in our every day life during the internship.
He followed me in some of my italian and english lessons, improvising himself has a translator from English to ukrainian when I couldn't communicate with my students.
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His way in Aiesec is just at the beginning and he upgraded to team leader and vice president this Autumn.
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Thanks to him our International Kitchen events in Scorini restaurant will remain in Ternopil's city history!
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andriy
nasypany
team member
Andriy's been a team member of Max's team and the two of them were the responsible of partnerships and our hosting families.
They created the internship plan and Andriy's been also my buddy: the person who's supposed to follow you as an intern in a foreign counrty.
​
I feel that his serious attitude hid something softer and he was very present in our every day life during the internship.
He followed me in some of my italian and english lessons, improvising himself has a translator from English to ukrainian when I couldn't communicate with my students.
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His way in Aiesec is just at the beginning and he upgraded to team leader and vice president this Autumn.
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Thanks to him our International Kitchen events in Scorini restaurant will remain in Ternopil's city history!
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Something about the interns is coming soon! :)
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why aiesec?
Because AIESEC gave me hundred of possibilities from the ground up.
Because AIESEC people who helped me were quick: they didn't force me in nothing but help me with everything.
Because AIESEC is a NET whose components believe in the positive impact, in empowering others, in international exchanges' unique value and in becoming young charismatic leaders achieving goals.
Because AIESECERS encourage other millenials in becoming World Citizens.
This page is dedicated to Julia, who was former part of AIESEC and who's now part of my heart.
why leaving?
Because of the new air you can breathe by leaving;
because you can dive into another culture and you can change your life for 6 weeks as I needed to do.
Because of the meaning of the word "PLACE" and to find its most intense essence, which is set in the journey. Because by leaving my place I could find the real "me" in a new place and
because after all the question is not "Why leaving?" but "Why not?"
why ukraine?
Because Ukraine is a beautiful country, indipentent from URSS since 1991. Because I didn't know much about the nation and I've noticed a huge GAP between Ukraine and Italy and I've said "Let's fill it!".
Because since my interview I've understood the opportunity of having a powelful impact on the people there.
Because I wanted to give a WITNESS: both the witness of a young girl exploring a new country and the observation of Ukrainian culture and life.
Because cultural exchanges bring awareness and because there's been a UKRAINIAN REVOLUTION that nobody in Central Europe is talking about.
