Think Bigger Volunteering in Portugal Episode 2
Piyarat Kittiwat or Palm
A Thai volunteer who participate the activities in Portugal for 6 months. The last one of Thai volunteer who came back from abroad after Covid in 2020
Duration 10 September 2019 - 9 March 2020
Hi there I’m Palm again. It’s have been almost 3 months in Portugal for me. We are now having very cold autumn with lot of rain, like every day and it will be getting colder in winter T^T. But even the weather is really extreme for me, I still always love to be here.
I have lots of opportunities to roaming around Portugal, as Famalicão is placed nearby many nice cities. Porto is the second biggest city in Portugal. It was classified as a World Heritage Site by UNESCO in 1996. Not only fantastic view, Porto is also a city that inspiring the most famous magical novel called Harry Potter. There are several places you may visit if you are a big fan i.e. Lello Bookshop which inspired the stairs of Hogwarts, Majestic Café which J. K. Rowling started and finished her first book. And if you are walking in the city you may luckily find the university students wearing Harry Potter liked uniforms. Furthermore, for wine lover, Porto have tons of great wine for you to test.
Next, Braga, a very religious and antique city placed in mountains. Here there are tons of churches and chapels for you to explore, two of them you shouldn’t miss are Bom jesus and Sé de Braga. Night life there is also amazing, you can find 1-2 euro beer per glass.
A little farer from Porto, you can find other city called Aveiro which known as Venice of Portugal. With the canal in the middle of the city you can take a tour on painted boat called Moliceiro.
Not only a really nice city that they have, but they also have sea nearby with very unique style of the house. And the most important thing you need to try there is a dessert called Ovos Moles.
I may talk a lot about traveling but trust me, I also do some volunteer work here haha. I’ve join 4 different associations here.
First one is Re-food is 100% volunteering program that collect food from several restaurants, pastry shops, coffee shops, cafeterias, and supermarkets then distribute it to people indeed. If you looking for any well-organized volunteering association you can definitely come to Re-food.
Next is Dar as mão, an association that gather all needed stuffs for the people in community. As I mentioned all needed stuffs, I really mean it. Here you can find clothes, furniture, toys, books, and also food. And most of volunteer here are senior, they are extremely nice.
Third is Gerações, an association working to develop both children and senior. For kid’s side, we have English class, dancing class, and also helping on their homework. On senior side, we teach tehm about Smartphone, Computer, English, Painting, Photography, Dancing and Yoga.
Lastly is a school called JI Seide S. Miguel for kid 3-6 years old, their ways of teaching here is really unique. Here, kids learning through playing and sometime via going out to the forest. This school is also encourage and teach their student a lot about environmental awareness. The kids sometime go to communities nearby and promote about climate change.
That’s just a brief things about my life here. I’ll try to tell you more about it next time J