{"id":30138,"date":"2021-02-03T16:56:01","date_gmt":"2021-02-03T14:56:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.arsis.gr\/?p=30138"},"modified":"2021-02-03T16:56:01","modified_gmt":"2021-02-03T14:56:01","slug":"ilaria-miaoli_december-2020","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/arsis.gr\/en\/ilaria-miaoli_december-2020\/","title":{"rendered":"Ilaria Miaoli_December 2020"},"content":{"rendered":"

December means\nChristmas, and I have been lucky enough to spend it with my family in Italy. Giusy,\nanother Italian volunteer, and I took the same flight on the 20th<\/sup>\nDecember and I am writing this December monthly report from home actually!!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Although this Christmas is a bit anomalous\ndue to the limitations imposed by the Italian government to limit Covid 19\ninfections, I am experiencing it with great serenity and fullness, trying to\nenjoy as much as possible (and with the necessary precautionary distances) my\nparents, my sister, my grandmothers, uncles, aunties and all cousins! We are a\nvery close family and I really hope that they will be able to visit me in Greece\nbefore the conclusion of my volunteer project to visit at least the beautiful\nThessaloniki. The city was extremely beautiful all made up with lights and with\na cute Christmas tree in Aristotelus square! You could really breathe a\nChristmas atmosphere but the call of home and family won over magnificent\nChristmas Thessaloniki!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Not having been able to celebrate Christmas with the\nusual big family lunch, I can’t attach a photo of the wonderful table that we\nusually fill, but, to compensate, I’m happy to show the four-legged member of\nthe family, Jessie, who has been extremely spoiled for nature walks this year!!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The month of December is ending in beauty but\nit was certainly not easy. Being stuck in a\nsituation is always difficult, especially when you didn\u2019t choose it and when\nyou are in the middle of a lockdown due to a very serious pandemic, far away\nfrom home and your family. Even if my natural attitude makes me feel always\npositive, it doesn\u2019t mean it is not a struggle.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the difficulty,\nI tried to build my own new routine.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I really enjoy waking\nup early in the morning and starting the day doing some yoga. I cut out\nabout an hour a day for studying Greek, a language that is very exciting to me,\nbeing extremely musical and pleasant to listen to, and an hour a day for the\nstudy of Arabic, my personal challenge, being the language spoken by many\nasylum seekers that I assist.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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I also try to cut\nan hour a day for a long walk: an oddity that distinguishes me is the fact that\nI love reading while walking, and the Thessaloniki seafront is perfectly\nprepared for this habit of mine. The walk is totally flat, and I would say\ncompletely free of obstacles, and that made me concentrate on the story that I\nam reading, while avoiding the few people on my path.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This hour is very\nmuch precious for me, it is the perfect way for me to free my mind, to feed my\nhead, to recharge myself. These physical activities make me feel full of\nenergies all day long!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I started this\nactive routine a month ago, and during the walks I realized there are a lot of\nhomeless around our apartment: I then started to feed them with some food that\nwe don\u2019t eat at the apartment, or that we decide not to eat to give it to other\npeople. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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There are many of them near our house, and\nthey are always very grateful when you leave them even a piece of bread or a\ndessert to eat. Unfortunately, in my home town, I don’t have this habit because\nit’s very small and there are actually no homeless people. Every time that for\nsome reason I move to a big city, I try to contribute as much as I can, though.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Moreover, with a great pleasure I have found\na custom in Thessaloniki that I actually found elsewhere before, such as in\nGaziantep (Turkey): to leave a meal or something \u201cpending\u201d (literally) for\nthose who need it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I find it a wonderful thing that helps to\nunderstand how in reality it takes very little to help others, to feel useful\nand active parts of the civil society in which we live, wherever we are.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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I schedule my\nonline activities within the ARSIS project at the beginning of every week and I\ntry to stay strict to the plan, even if it happens that the guys and the girls\nare not always in the mood to attend the activities. I recall to myself that I\nam here to help, and it is right that everybody decides when and how to let\npeople help them. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

5 December was also International Volunteer\nDay. When I feel helpless, useless and almost angry because something\nuncontrollable is somehow ruining this experience, I realize that I am a\nvolunteer who has come here to help people who are in need, no matter who, no\nmatter how, it takes little to help others, it takes a big heart to be\nvoluntary.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I look forward to go back to Thessaloniki,\nrecharged by my beloved ones and full of energies\ud83d\ude0a<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Stay safe.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ilaria Moioli \u2013 ESC Volunteer (Sep. 2020 \u2013\nMay 2021)<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

December means Christmas, and I have been lucky enough to spend it with my family in Italy. Giusy, another Italian volunteer, and I took the same flight on the 20th December and I am writing this December monthly report from home actually!!<\/p>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":30139,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[37,36],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-30138","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-erasmus","category-european-solidarity-corps-solideers-ii-solidarity-actions-empowered-volunteers"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/arsis.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30138","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/arsis.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/arsis.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arsis.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arsis.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=30138"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/arsis.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30138\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arsis.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/30139"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/arsis.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=30138"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arsis.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=30138"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arsis.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=30138"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}