La Gomera

As it is quite clear from the title, I visited the first island. I may have mentioned in the very first entry that one of my aims here (beside the surfing which could be considered as an achieved one) is to visit all of the Canary Islands. The closest one is La Gomera, which is a perfect place for hiking as it has some nice mountains and a beautiful flora and fauna. Unfortunately I didn't have the chance to experience the forest, because I had another mission...

I was selected to hold a presentation about the European Voluntary Service (EVS), the programme I am participating in. Isla CreActiva (http://www.islacreactiva.com/) is my coordinating organization had a stand in the First Youth Fair for the young people of La Gomera. In this event we informed the local youth about the exchange and volunteering opportunities in Europe and I was the living example for EVS.

After my first presentation in Spanish (which was super scary by the way), we had a little bit of free time so we went for a walk in the capital: San Sebastián. The word "capital" may sound a little exaggerated in this case as the place has only one main street and the population is 9000 people.

This small city is famous of one historical moment, when Christopher Columbus had a short break here in his big journey. In the beautiful park of the centre I found the first so called ruin, a tower which made me feel like a tourist again. So I grabbed a map and visited some sights and believe it or not, even if it is a tiny place, I didn't have enough time to visit everything.

For me the most amazing part was the port with this fascinating background: the Teide. It is a hardly describable feeling when you can see an island from another one.

This trip was an unforgettable one even with the fact that after my presentation the only question (from a 15 years old) was: "Is it really true that there is snow in your country during winter?" :)

Water adventures

In an island it is not a too big surprise that the beach is part of our everyday life. It is very new for me. I have to admit that I was always a "princess" on the beach, taking care of my hair not to be sandy or my clothes not to be wet and creasy. This period ended 7 weeks ago, when I arrived here and I had to realize that it is impossible to really enjoy the amazing beaches and the ocean with keeping my hair dry and nice:) So I decided to participate in every type of "ocean program" with all of my enthusiasm. That's how I started to take surf classes and it gave me the opportunity to experience how many different parts of your body can be hurt by a surf board:) Our teacher was a professional who is a perfectionist with his students, so we started on a beach where the waves were huge, enormous, giant! And exceptionally now I am not exaggerating. I would call these classes as fights against the waves, but it was really worth it. I could experience the power of the ocean and my own endurance. Finally I could stand on the board a few times, which made me really happy, but I think I am going to wait with the next try until the spring comes and gives us back the normal-sized waves (because these ones now are already the signs of winter).

The other water adventure supposed to be a little bit drier, but finally it wasn't:)!

We visited one of the most famous sights of Tenerife which is called Los Gigantes. These huge cliffs look also beautiful from the beach but the experience is incomparable from the ocean side. It is an incredible feeling when you are there at the foot of the extremely high cliffs and there is nothing else around you: the water, that huge amount of stone and a silent kayak (or not even that if you swim away a little bit from the group). 

Less than two months was enough for me to become addicted to the ocean and to make the coast the only place where I can really think about the important decisions of my life...

A perfect weekend

I have never thought before that these kinds of weekends exist. It was exhausting but amazing! It all started with a 3 hours long hiking as a warm-up on Thursday morning, because we had to discover this old-new route as a possible next activity for the exchange students, so it was strictly part of my job:)
The real challenge started on Friday (very early in the) morning, when we had our first real, long and difficult hiking with a lot of creeping, climbing and jumping... But it was worth every single moment for this incredible view:

The beach where we arrived was also breathtaking, not to mention the motorboat trip which we had as a perfect end.

On Saturday we became real tourists and visited the "must see" of Tenerife which is the Loro Parque. During some fascinating dolphin, seal and whale show we were wondering how cruel this is and how small aquarium they have to live in. But anyway, they were extremely cute and I was so keen on touching them (obviously I couldn't) so I decided to marry a dolphin (or reindeer) trainer:)

As the closing of the week finally we visited the southest points of the island which was a big surprise. The most famous places los Cristianos and las Americas are simply belong to another world. The most touristic place I have ever seen (maybe after Disneyland). The sad thing about this is that most of the people leave Tenerife with the impression that this is it... But that part has nothing to do with the real island! Anyway, we didn't let this strange experience effect us and we enjoyed every step of our way back from the South part to our precious North.

Only hotels

Reality

The best of Tenerife

Here come some of my favourites in pictures...

The bluest beach

 The most unique products

(strawberry and orange vinegar)

The funniest girl with the funniest rice:)

The most colorful market

       The most beautiful flower                           The most special morning

The most creative street art love message

The most disgusting but most delicious typical Canarian dessert

(Gofio with honey and almonds)

 The most interesting fruit

The nicest small town

The biggest paella

The highest point

In a grey and quiet morning...

...when you are walking to your workplace and wondering "why do I have to do this so early in the morning?". You suddenly see that a homeless woman is sitting on a small chair next to the wall, she is begging for money. I can't give more than a quick smile. But there is someone who can give much more. An old lady is coming from the morning shopping with lots of plastic bags in her hands. She steps next to her, they start to talk, the homeless lady stands up immediately from her chair and sits down to the street.

When I take the last look at them I can see real love, a homeless woman on the pavement and an old lady on a chair. We will never know who had the bigger need to that particular conversation on that cloudy Tuesday morning.

This is the magic of the streets of La Laguna.

The real magic is still in this world

Let me prove this with my newest experience!

As an international relations student I can really appreciate when people from different cultures love each other. Unfortunately nowadays we can hear much more about the fights and disputes between people who have different origin, religion, color or traditions. Yesterday I participated in a local event which was the small prototype of a perfect world without all of these prejudices.

The story started with Tanja, who is another volunteer girl. She teaches English and Spanish for immigrants in Taco, which is a special district between La Laguna and Santa Cruz. The people who live there came to Tenerife from 15 different countries. They were celebrating this diversity in a street festival with music, dance and of course with food:) We could try the typical food of Senegal, Morocco, Papua New Guinea, Ghana and a really yummy drink from the Dominican Republic. It was an unforgettable experience to see the enthusiasm of these people. They were so proud of their cuisine and culture, what is more they were extremely happy that they could share it with us.

It was amazing to see that the people are so interested in each other. Everybody wanted to get to know the recipes, the ingredients and simply the other person. The people were talking, laughing and eating together with friends and with strangers. To be quite precise, I am not sure if I can use the word “strangers”, because I felt like a new family member immediately. Surprisingly in this community I felt as comfortable as I do at home. I had some really nice conversations in Spanish (!) and I learned a lot of new thing about African culture and people.

One of my favourites: couscous with chicken and couscous pie with jam from Morocco

I feel really lucky that I could experience this pure happiness without any interests and ulterior motives. It was a perfect afternoon with heavenly dishes, delicious teas, colorful African traditional clothes, and most importantly with constantly smiling, incredibly nice people. 

I was looking for it so badly and I found it in this peripheral district: the magic of the people which still exist. 

And I really believe that not only in Taco.