Pakkastalven huumaa, digitaitoja ja pulkkamäkiä

Konneveden 4H-yhdistys ry on saanut Erasmus+ -rahoituksen vapaaehtoistyöntekijän työllistämiseksi. EVS-vapaaehtoistyöntekijä saapui Konnevedelle marraskuussa 2018. EVS tulee sanoista European Voluntary Service.

Vapaaehtoisen työjakso Konnevedellä kestää helmikuun 2019 loppuun. Vapaaehtoisemme on kiinalainen Mingchen He ja hän saapui meille Unkarista. Vapaaehtoinen voi työskennellä 4H-yhdistyksen lisäksi myös Konneveden kunnan ja sidosryhmiemme palveluksessa.

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Lumikenkäilyä Marjan perheen luona.

During the Christmas time, I visited Seinäjoki and Tampere. Seinäjoki is not a big city. Unlike most other Finnish cities, there are not many lakes around city. But still I found a lake nearby the local central hospital. Walking around lakes and having some peaceful time by just sitting by the lakeside are my favorite things to do. Of course, because the weather was chiily, I couldn’t sit there still. I chose to have a walk. Soon I realized that lake is an artificial one after talking with the local. I didn’t check out what is the real reason behind digging this lake, let me just assume lake has an crucial position in Finnish people’s heart. Until backing to Konnevesi, I got to know Seinäjoki is called “Strawberry Town”. I guess the lake also plays an important role in the water supply for the growth of strawberry J. And Tampere is bigger than I imaged. I am not doing to write in detail, as I was more like a tourist.  

Maijan perheen luona perinteisiä suomalaisia ruokia.

Last few weekends, I visited my mentors - Marja’s family and Maija’s family, I had gotten the chance for first time to try snowshoeing, what’s more, first time to walking on a lake equipped with them. Even though that day was an extremely cold, it was a fabulous experience. I also visited a cinema (which seems the only one within Konnevesi?). At the beginning, I was worried if there are enough audiences to watch out there, as it is located in the small village, but soon I cleared up the doubt by talking to the one of owner there, who had started that business since he was 12 years old. What an unbelievable story. I tried to recall my memory backing to my age of 12, I am the boy who used to be excited for whole day for watching an open-air movie. In addition, I learnt how to cook some Finnish dishes and dessert from Maija. Margit also visited me to visit her family, and shared their stories with me, the most amazing thing to be here for me is getting to know how people live their life here and how this big community works.  

Laskiaispullia, nam!

There was one day in the Lapunmäki school, which is called “Digi Open” (not sure if it is right), which is part of a national program including several Universities. Pedagogical students in University of Jyväskylä joined with the teachers in Lapunmäki school to apply some digital methods to help students for learning, like Typing practice, Swedish language study and so on. It was nice to visit there quickly!

Kyllä hätä keinot keksii!

Finland should be one of the best places for the winter sports. People start skiing at a very early age, even though there are not many mountains. But the heavy snow can make skiing a sport easy to operate. As you can see, there are so many things for me to have a first try, skiing is also a new sport for me to join, although I have watched it on TV many times, it always looks far away from my life, as a person living the places with a little snow. Frankly, it looks very easy to get speed to move forward, but I ended up like a snail. Obviously, there must be something wrong with my skiing skills L. Furthermore, I have to mention sled ride, with mates of international club, we had a sled ride on the hill. I had seen the kids in daycare playing with sled, but never tried it by myself before. The experience proved that sled ride is an very interesting, not just for the kids. Although I didn’t prepare well for clothing ,and have to use the plastic bags wrapping my shoes, this sled ride did bring me to the childhood with a great joy.

Stay tuned,

Mingchen J

Mingchen He työskentelee Konneveden 4H-yhdistyksessä vapaaehtoistyöntekijänä marraskuusta 2018 helmikuulle 2019. Mingchen, tutummin Minski, kertoo työviikoistaan ja kokemuksistaan Konneveden 4H-yhdistyksen blogissa.

Kyläkouluihin tutustumista ja kirpputoreja - Mingchenin kokemuksia Konnevedellä

Konneveden 4H-yhdistys ry on saanut Erasmus+ -rahoituksen vapaaehtoistyöntekijän työllistämiseksi. EVS-vapaaehtoistyöntekijä saapui Konnevedelle marraskuussa 2018. EVS tulee sanoista European Voluntary Service.

Vapaaehtoisen työjakso Konnevedellä kestää helmikuun 2019 loppuun. Vapaaehtoisemme on kiinalainen Mingchen He ja hän saapui meille Unkarista. Vapaaehtoinen voi työskennellä 4H-yhdistyksen lisäksi myös Konneveden kunnan ja sidosryhmiemme palveluksessa.

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 I spent few days in the Hytölä school and Istunmäki school this month. As they are located in the village,the school size are relatively small, compared to Lapunmäki school. But it let me feel closer with the students there. The pupils are adorable, friendly and full of curiosity. Although there was a language barrier, it didn’t influence us to understand each other. They are not just curious about the stories from me, also would like to share their talented skills with me, like gymnastic skills J. As there is no separate dining room for people to have meal, classrooms are turned into dining room which give students and teachers more time to stay together, and helps to reduce the sense of distance between teacher and student. Anyway, I like the harmonious teacher-student relationship in the village schools.

For the break time, we played games together in the field,f rom playing football to sliding down from icy slope, which recalled my memory from  childhood. As the Christmas is approaching, the pupils were preparing for the Christmas party held by school. They invited me to watch their rehearsal in their classroom, where were chock-full of happiness and vitality, it was a pity that I couldn’t join them in that evening. Before leaving, in Istunmäki school, I joined the pupils to assist them to make a mini house out of their prepared gingerbread. And in Hytölä school, I joined their voluntary cooking activity in the kitchen after school to cook some traditional Finnish foods. It is not difficult to imagine that Finnish are good at cooking J.

In addition,thanks Janiela and Hilma giving me these portraitsJ

In a nutshell, it was amazing experience with pupils in the village schools. Actually, it help me spark an idea to work as a teacher. Working with this lovely group of people, it worth all the efforts.

Apart from school, I also visited nursing home, which gave me some impressions from the other side. I still remember the first time, I got the virtually conception with nursing home was about two years ago. My Danish friend shared her family story with me that when her parents need others taking care of them, they will go to stay in nursing home, because they are more professional, she just need visit them now and then. I was confused about this thought at the time. As in my country, there is a strong family bond between children and parents (sometimes it goes too muchL), and it is the children’s responsibility to taking care of their parents who get old.People need more emotional connection.

Now I have better understanding, despite in the nursing home people may miss their home/family, but they can work together to make the place with the atmosphere feel like home. This May, my Finnish friend told me the loneliness is a big problem for the elderly in Finland. In the nursing home, people seems living in a small community, during the meal time or coffer time, people will gather together in the dinning room, having the meal together and talking to each other, even joining some activities together to make the life colorful, for example sing together or some visitors come here to give a performances for the elderly to enrich their life, which is fantastic for the mental health. Here I want to introduce my “Finnish teacher”— Helmi, she is 100 years old, will turns 101 next month, but she could stay young at heart. Although we can’t communicate in Finnish or English, her positive energy can always beyond the language barrier. Sometimes she taught me with Finnish pronounce, and end up with my clumsy way J. Happy to see they have good life there. Certainly, the workers in nursing home contribute a lot for the daily caring.

What’s more, I also visited a second hand shop here last weekend, and I was suddenly in awe of them when I learnt about the story behind of this shop. The owner of the shop is a doctor who volunteered in Africa years ago, after that she didn’t stop providing assistance, which has lasted 20.5 years. When I visited there, the owner’s parents were working there, and friendly provided free tea/coffee and cakes for the consumers. It is easy to perform a good action, but not easy to acquire a settled habit of performing such actions. I love this land, because there are so many golden heart people.

Mingchen J

Mingchen He työskentelee Konneveden 4H-yhdistyksessä vapaaehtoistyöntekijänä marraskuusta 2018 helmikuulle 2019. Mingchen, tutummin Minski, kertoo työviikoistaan ja kokemuksistaan Konneveden 4H-yhdistyksen blogissa.

Joulupukkeja ja kulttuurieroja - Mingchenin ensimmäinen kuukausi Konnevedellä

Konneveden 4H-yhdistys ry on saanut Erasmus+ -rahoituksen vapaaehtoistyöntekijän työllistämiseksi. EVS-vapaaehtoistyöntekijä saapui Konnevedelle marraskuussa 2018. EVS tulee sanoista European Voluntary Service.

Vapaaehtoisen työjakso Konnevedellä kestää helmikuun 2019 loppuun. Vapaaehtoisemme on kiinalainen Mingchen He ja hän saapui meille Unkarista. Vapaaehtoinen voi työskennellä 4H-yhdistyksen lisäksi myös Konneveden kunnan ja sidosryhmiemme palveluksessa.

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This time I would like to start writing about schooling in Finland, which I was curious about. Before heading to the school to see the pupils, I had talked with Finns about the most respected jobs here. It was proved that teacher is absolutely on the list of best jobs in Finland, which provide the guarantee of enough fresh blood to keep the Finnish educational system at world class level.

During the last few weeks, I had gotten the chances to visit different classes in Lapunmäki School and do some breaktime activities for the students. The first impression for me is the courses students involved in are very practical. For example, The Home Economics, which seems like one of the most popular courses in the school. As a compulsory course for the 7^th students, and an optional one for the 8^th and 9^th students, this course provide the students with the chance to learn culinary skills they could practice for life. I felt regretful that I didn’t have this course when I was at their ages, otherwise I could have taken care of myself and others much better J

Although I have been cooking on my own quite often recent years (There is no choice L,under the condition of living alone), but still not a good cook. It is “safe” way to observe them to practice their cooking skills. To make the class a little bit different, I introduced the Chinese culinary culture (including how to use chopsticks) and shared some snacks/tea from my country. We continued the activities at Kukkula youth house on evening time.

By the way, woodworking course is another interesting one,students could boost their creativity through using different tools.

What’s more, there is nothing special with Lapunmäki School looking from appearance at first sight, but from the inside, the high-tech teaching methods gave me a surprise. When a school equipped with tablets for students, big touchscreen for the classrooms, cloud platform for education involving everyone in the school, I have to say the digital era brings the conveniences people couldn’t imagine years ago. Of course, it could not happen without the support from the municipality.

Konnevesi is a small town, but it doesn’t mean there must be a boring life staying here. People can find quite a few activities/interesting clubs to join easily, which is even more approachable than the big cities I was living. The only issue is sometimes people lack of interest/passion to join, but I can understand usually people get used to stay in the comfort zone, me either J

Youth house seems always a popular place for the youngster to have fun, every time I visited there, there were always a bunch of people. Besides that, I also took part in the cooking club, hobby craft night and Christmas Opening Event (can’t believe half inhabitants of Konnevesi did join, amazing!) 

By the way, I met a real Santa Claus here for the first time in my life, at beginning I wrongly though someone from the local dressed up as Santa Claus. Please forgive my un-professionalism, but I felt how important is Santa Claus to Finnish people.

Sirkkamäessä Mingchen tapasi ihka oikean Joulupukin!

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!! :)

Stay tuned J

Mingchen

Mingchen He työskentelee Konneveden 4H-yhdistyksessä vapaaehtoistyöntekijänä marraskuusta 2018 helmikuulle 2019. Mingchen, tutummin Minski, kertoo työviikoistaan ja kokemuksistaan Konneveden 4H-yhdistyksen blogissa.