What a great weekend! On Saturday we visited an art studio and all tried a turn at the pottery wheel, then we went off to the Banja for a nice relaxing time! The weather was a lot nicer and we even saw some sun on a lovely walk through the woods. It was nice to relax and enjoy the nature and Lativan culture. It was also a pleasure to be so warmly invited to meet some AIESECers families. It definitely made us feel very at home! 
We can’t believe that we are now over halfway finished with the project! Only one more lecture in Daugavpils tomorrow, then it is off to Liepaja for a week.
Today we were at Raina Daugavpils 6.viduskkola. The school was a bit of a hike, but it was nice to cross the Daugava and get a better view of the river. The lectures went smoothly, no technical difficulties, and the students really seemed to enjoy the videos we played. Another bonus was the shining sun on our walk to and from the school! It was even warm enough to take off our coats!
Casey Piquette: For my fellow interns, it is halfway through, but for me, the journey is still beginning! I can’t believe it has been almost a week! Every lecture I learn so much from working with my peers and the students. It has really been a very rewarding experience so far.
I had always wanted to try a pottery wheel, and it was so cool to learn from Lasma’s mother! She is such a great artist! The banja was also a very cool experience. I loved meeting JLo’s family and dogs (haha ).This weekend definitely helped me to start out the week right! (Special shoutout to Lasma and JLo for a GREAT weekend and opening up your families to us!).
We started our morning with our traditional breakfast and coffee/tea at Vesma. I will miss that place when we leave! Then we headed to the school. The walk was very nice because it is finally warming up, and we were able to see the sun! The school was very welcoming to us, and we enjoyed a nice chat with the Headmistress before beginning. Some things were a little challenging because of the students english level. It was a good challenge though, and we had to be very animated and explanatory in our presentations. Alina had a great idea of changing the order and time that we show our video clips, and I definitely think it helped out! The students really seemed to enjoy the cartoons and it made it easier to explain our message with the pictures.
I am sad Daugavpils is coming to an end, but I am very excited about going onward to Liepaja! I really love to be by the water, and there should be some great views in this next city! Until tomorrow…au revior!
Saurabh Gandhi : Yeah, I agree with Casey….what a lovely weekend. Our journey through Daugavpils is coming to an end. I will remember this place as “Land of Beautiful Mornings” (you should see the view outside my room, first thing in morning…its mind blowing !! )
I must say that I was pretty disappointed by the response of the students during my session. Later, when I gave them flip-charts and they came up with ideas, it left me wondering what was wrong during the session. Why was no body participating in the discussion.
I realized, it was not because they were not interested or were not active, it was because as an Asian, when I spoke, it was difficult for them to understand my accent.
The expirience has been amazing. A new thing to learn. It has left me completly into a new space. I must further design my session now…a session that can be delivered overcoming these diffrences in accent…a session that is more successful in transferring the ideas without any boundaries…a session that is able to motivate pupils towards their roles and responsibilities for this planet…
I have quiet few ideas in mind. I will work on Powerpoint. For the time being I am just using two slides, but now I think, I will put more information on slide. It is easy to read a language than to listen it. This will promt them into discussion, even without the accent barrier. They more they will idscuss the more they will be motivated towards their roles and responsibilities.
This school has left me with new challenge. I love challenges I hope to rock again tomorrow with my newly designed session. YeeeHaawww !!
Alina Rusu: the day started great- sunny and warm and we knew that there’s a nice experience ahead. And so it was! The pupils of Raina Daugavpils 6.vidusskola are the first to applaud after we show the AIESEC movie- it was very nice. The first minutes were a bit difficult, but once we got the disussion going, everyone started to get involved and by the end of the first session the pupils were really into the work and coming up with solutions. The second session was challenging and interesting. I think it went well, we had some cute short movies and some laughs over some of the presentations, ’cause the pupils here are really friendly. No logistics problems, which for me is something that can make my day!
After the sessions I had a really nice discussion with the principle, we talked about Moldova, about youth in my country, about universities and many other cultural things, that I proudly presented to her. I think everyone should go abroad for a short period of time, because only there you realize how much you love your country and how proud you are to talk about it.
Today was a nice day and I can’t wait to see how tomorrow will turn out to be. Hopefully it will be sunny outside and inside as well
Genevieve: I have just enjoyed the best weekend in Latvia. It is so interesting that I got to try the banja (a type of sauna) and the pottery lessons that I have always wanted to try in Singapore but never quite got down to it. And it’s even better because we had Lasma’s mother who has decades of experience to teach us the Latvian folkart. =) The memories at the banja house with us sitting there in a small hut built by JLo’s father and eating some homey food in the cold weather will be forever etched in my head.
So today was back to lessons in our 4th school in Daugavpils and it is an experience that made me understand that I should try to hear more and talk less sometimes. I realized that most students couldn’t understand us even as we tried to speak slowly. So I was glad that prior to our lessons Alina came up with the idea to play movie clips during the presentations. We didn’t know that we will face these difficulties but the idea came at the right time! Those cartoons were the key in speaking to the students more effectively than our words that we had to say. I learned the significance of improvising according to whatever situation that you are in and I look forward to more lessons like these! 
Ana Marija: Finally sun shown its face in Daugavpils, I was afraid it would never happen… When you are deprived of something only then you realize how much you missed it.
We passed our first half, 6 more schools in front of us, yet 6 more surprises .. I’m curious and I wonder how it’s gonna look like, because all have so far been different from one another. But for all schools one common thing was they were all very welcoming. For today’s school I’m especially thankful for the medical care! About sessions- good that Alina came up with the idea of putting more movies in today’s second session, just when we needed inspiration the most. Her innovative idea was to play few short movies to make the presentation more dynamic and to motivate the audience and leave them material for later educcation and discussion..
Looking forward to going to Liepaja and discovering the beauty and nature of Liepaja, especially the sea and nice weather- something to remind me of my homeland. However I believe that we will certainly miss the breakfast and dinner at Vestma, due to the great company, ambient, food and sevice…
There is no such thing called perfect team, unless you have been through all this. I am seriously proud of my team. 
