Being an EVS volunteer gives me some rights – and yes, I really can have them :) One of those rights is to have a person – special person who is called MENTOR.

This person should help me during the first days of my staying on EVS. He or she should show me the city and give some useful tips, for example where to eat good and cheap. This person should also help me at the beginning in social live that I would not feel lonely. As far as I know from other EVS volunteers in Slovenia – sometimes they have great relationships with theirs mentors, but sometimes they even don’t see them :)

Fortunately, I know my mentor and I can spend some time with her, even if she is busy :) Of course, it depends on the personality – sometimes mentors can be annoying and not helpful at all, but on the other hand – we can also become good friends during EVS time. At the first look it seems like forcing someone for being friends… Actually, it is like that and if the mentor and volunteer don’t like each other – it would be problematic. But usually both sides are open for another people so there are no problems with that.

Mentor should also help in solving different kinds of problems. In my opinion this person should be objective as much as possible. For me, it means that mentor should not be connected too much with hosting organization (for example on family or love relationships level), because it leads to “not fair” situation inside of the office/hosting organization. But it’s also good that mentor is at least familiar with work of organization.

I think each EVS volunteer should have a person who will be on his/her side. Sometimes they are not able to fight for theirs rights and opportunities by themselves, because of organization politics or because their personality doesn’t allow them for that :) It always looks different in each situation, in each city and in each organization, but there is always one rule for that – having a mentor and being a mentor should give us fun :)

Written by Gosia, EVS volunteer in MC ZOS