So now I finally dicided to finish and publish my fantastic experiences of work-exchange programmes in Germany. Please forgive me if I made some grammatical errors in this article, maybe I spoke too much German now so my English became worse...
The are many platforms available for people who wants to join the work-exchange programme worldwide. The one I choosen called "Workaway" (https://www.workaway.info/). In order to reach the host, you need to pay and became a member first. The way to find a host is quite simple, just go to the "host list" and select the country and region, then you could see the description of each host, as a member you could sent message directly to the host and ask if they are able to host you. I consider myself quite fortune cuz the hosts I'v met were really super nice, but I've heard some not so good rumours from other "workawayers" (the peope who participated in workaway) about their previous host. So to avoid some unpleasent experience, it is suggested to look up to the host's profile page carefully, and maybe have some chats with the host first to know each other better.
Following are my two great Workaway experiences in Germany:
1. Alex (profile: https://www.workaway.info/976715188191-de.html)
Alex was my first Workaway host. From his tremendous feedbcks, you can know he is quite popular and is beloved by the people who stayed with him before. He was an amazing guy, who always giving people warm smile and creating positive atmosphere in the house. He has a large house with graden, the house could live about 8 workawayers at the same time, so people get chances to know many other workaways around the world. Alex was very generous and willing to share all his stuff (food, drinks, he's thought and ideas...) with us. He treated us like friends, instead of some free labours (I heard the other workawayer said that some host ask him to work 7 hours a day and providing him worse meals and doesn't want to have much contact with the worawayers).
Everyday we ate breakfest together, then we work approximately 3.5 - 4 hours(depends) from Monday to Friday. Everyday there were two people resonable for making lunch for everyone. Dinner just depend on who wants to make (bty his kitchen is quite amazing, loved it), and we always seated around the big table and eat like a family.
What work to do depends on Alex. I've done collecting branches, apples, gardening, cooking, cleaning the house, etc. The workload was not heavy except collecting apples... cuz it was the end of December when was there, it was freezing cold outside, my feet felt numb, and we had to squat down for hours to harvest apples on the ground. However, since Alex was really into collecting apples and he was really nice to us, we felt that we should done our job well as a return.
We collected TＯＮS of Apples!!
After work the time is all yours. The living room is quite huge with cozy sofas, there's also guitar to play. Alex is interested in cooking, and had lots of recipe books, once we made curry powder with him (photo below), it was such a cool experience, cuz he got so many different species at home to make varius dishes.
I was lucky enough to stay with Alex during new year eve, it was probably one of the best new year eve I'v ever had. Alex was invited to celebrate at his neighbour's house so we all went there together. It was the first time I tried Raclette, I heard it is quite popular during christmas and new year eve in Germany. The neighbour were so nice o share their meat with us when they saw we only had vegatables >___<
After dinner, the hospitable neighbour tell us to dance next room, (they turn the garage into a disco..), then 10 minute before new year we all went up to the hell to have an fantastic view of the new year fireworks of the whole down.
(Above pictures: surrounding of Alex's place)
2. Katharina and Thomas (https://www.workaway.info/524637575531-de.html)
[German ver. please refer to my other article : Schöne Erfahrung mit Workaway_(deutsche Fassung) ]
The experience with Katharina and Thomas was also amazing, they were very friendly and caring and willing to embrace diverse cultures. When I visited them, they just satrted to use Workaway so they didn't have much feeback yet, but I could already felt their friendliness before the visit since Katharina always response to my variuos questions rapidly.
It was in mid-June when visited them, the daylight was quite long cuz they live in the northern Germany, so the workawayer could enjoy lots of summer activities like biking, kayaking, swimming in the fjord, playing with their cats and dog or just seating in the Gardne eating icecream and enjoy the sunlight during the free time.
The main reason why they start to use Workaways was to find helpers to repair the rooftop together. Since I am kind of fear of heights and not so good at wooden things, I'v done jobs like wedding, cooking, cleaning the house, cooking, garding. Katharina and Thomas were like Alex, treating us like friends, interested in other cultures. Katharina even done some research about my country seens I'm probably the first Taiwanese she met.
I tried to cook some Asian foods
The working hours were quite flexible, they just let the helpers to freely organize the time and work, so the time with them were very relexing and confortable. They also took us to a local bar where we can eat home made pizza with choosen toppings. The neighbours in the bar were also very friendly, I was surprised about their standard German, they all spoke like my German teacher which was very helpful for me to practice my German, and whenever I told my German friends who came from other regions, they all don't believe that the people there could speak perfect standard German.
Katharina and Thomas also own one dog and two cats (norwegian wild cat), they all knew I LOVE the cat called Maya, she's really sweet, so fluffy and soft and was not afraid of stranger and enjoys being tickled by others.
campfire (I took this picture at about 10 pm, you can see that it's still bright outside! and the temperature was droping fast at night, so people are wearing jackets in summer, which is quite unbelievable for the Taiwanese people)
In general, they were great host with lots of interested life stroy (Katharina and Thomas used to spent years riding around the world on a motorcycle), at their house, there are also variuos instruments and Katharina was good at playing them. The only thing Workawayers need to be aware of is only that they only eat vegaterian foods and nostly healthy foods at home. If you are fine living without meat, staying with Katharina and Thomas would be one of your great memory in life!
In general, I would said I am really lucky to met all those nice and warm hosts from Workaway, and I would definality recommend people to try out. Since I also heard some bad news about work exchange, remember to look up on the references on the host's profile and maybe chat more with them before you go there, it might help to reduce some uncertainty and avoid some inconvenience and make sure the thing what you want to do/ get there is similar to the host's wish, wish you have some great experience like I had !!
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