Justyna took part in individual volunteering project in frame of European Solidarity Corps Programme. She was volunteering in Associação Académica da Universidade da Madeira, Funchal, Portugal

1. “The power of youth solidarity - capture a moment, capture a history”.
My project experience
Justyna Baran

2. The beginning
I always wanted to try living abroad or to participate in some
voluntary project outside of Poland. I finished my studies, was
working in tv production, time was passing, COVID started
and I finally decided to change something. In the worst time
possible for travels and changes like that :D I started
searching for job offers or projects in Portugal and finally a
project on Madeira “found me”. In a few weeks my whole life
changed. I left my job and a quite stable life in Warsaw to
move for 10 months to the island in the middle of the Atlantic
Ocean that I have never visited before.
Since then my life has changed completely and I hope it will
not quickly come back to the stability that it had before :)

3. The power of youth solidarity - capture a moment,
capture a history
The project I was participating in was one of many projects offered by
European Solidarity Corps. My sending organization from Poland was
“Fundacja Rozwoju Społeczeństwa Przedsiębiorczego”. My hosting
organization on Madeira was “Academica da Madeira” based in
Madeiran only public university, the youngest one in Portugal.
I was living in a student’s apartment in the centre of Funchal and
enjoying the beautiful sea view from my living room (making a lot of
photos of sunsets from my window as you can see on the photo) :)

4. My tasks
During my project I was working as a photographer
capturing the beauty of the Madeiran heritage. My job gave
me a perfect chance to see new places during my “working
hours”. I was responsible for the content of 4 Instagram
accounts: @aaumadeira, @madeiranheritage,
@colegiojesuitasfunchal, @thehistorytellers.
Because of the pandemic many events were cancelled,
many places were closed, so my activities looked different
than for the volunteers before me but still I had much to do
:)

5. Working in the city
Part of my time I was spending walking around Funchal,
visiting museums, viewpoints and places that could be
attractive to show tourists on our Instagram accounts. I
was also working with other volunteers, tour guides,
making photos during their tours to promote them on sites
like GetYourGuide.
I also had a chance to take photos during student
graduation ceremony in the Cathedral of Funchal. It was
happening later than it should because of the pandemic,
so I was really happy that I could be a part of that :)
Photo of our tour guides during promoting tours activity :)

6. Office work
I was spending another part of my time at the office, at the
university campus Penteada, editing photos that I took,
preparing them for publication. I was also responsible for
Photoshop editing of the digitized products for university’s
online shop (gaudeamus.pt) that was created during the
pandemic for students. So now when you are buying
something online from Academica da Madeira online shop
and a picture of a product looks good, shadow is nice and
you really feel like buying it… it’s probably because of my
perfect editing skills :P (thanks to Pedro, graphic designer,
who was always there for me to help and answer all my
stupid questions).

7. Special tasks
Sometimes I had special tasks like
preparing posters promoting The History
Tellers guided tours or making photos to
the book “História da Madeira. Volume 6”.
But the activity that I really liked the most
was the monthly visit in Parque Ecologico
do Funchal where I was taking pictures of
tree planting (but also of course planting
my own trees!).

8. Free time :)
During my free time I was enjoying
what Madeira has to offer. Met a lot
of great people, went for road trips,
levadas, hiking, watching sunrises in
the mountains together. I tried
horseback riding, playing padel and
paragliding.

9. Girl Gone International - Madeira
During my stay I contacted an international travelling girls community Girl Gone International and we
started a group on Madeira. I ended up meeting many wonderful girls and starting a book club together.
People say that many guys were jealous so they were planning to start one only for boys :)

10. People Helping People
I was very lucky to find also another community - people
attending Catholic holy mass in English in Penha de Franca
chapel. I started helping in their charity project “People
Helping People” organizing support for poor people on the
island. We organized together a charity dinner for them and
collected more than 700 euros! Just before Easter - another
big success - we organized “collecting Easter chocolate eggs”
action for kids from Madeiran orphanages and families in
need. We collected and delivered sweets for 121 kids!
Easter eggs delivery team and
photos from an article from
chapel’s newsletter about charity
dinner

11. Estimei - modeling episode :D
Another free time adventure on Madeira allowed me to be on the
other side of the camera. For a moment, me and girls from other
projects became models. We wanted to promote a local, really nice
second hand shop Estimei so we offered them making photos in
clothes they were selling to promote the idea of buying in second
hand. Of course we also found many clothes for ourselves :)

12. Porto Santo Easter trip
During the project I also had a chance to visit the neighbouring island of Madeira - Porto Santo and
spend my Easter there. The Portuguese come here during summer because of the 11km long
sandy beach. Renting a quad for the first time in my life was a perfect idea for sightseeing the
island :)

13. How it ended? Tuk tuk adventure!
If someone would have told me 1,5 year ago that I would be living in
Portugal like I always wanted - I would laugh out loud. But dreams
come true! After my project I moved to Lisbon and became a tuk tuk
tour guide. How did I end up there after being a journalist in Poland? I
still don’t understand :D But if you need a guide with Polish in Lisbon
or on my lovely Madeira (where I come back a lot)… you know to
whom you should write :D You can find me on fb - Tuk Tours with
Polish.

14. If you have any doubts if leaving everything
behind to go to Madeira was worth it - just look at
the view and my face :D
Send your application right now! And be prepared
for everything!