Year in France for an Australian Volunteer

Posted on June 3, 2015 by La Giraudiere

Year in France for an Australian Volunteer

Year in France for an Australian Volunteer

Year in France for an Australian Volunteer by Margaret Gardner

This weekend we said goodbye to Margaret Gardner, our Australian volunteer who will be spending a year in France. Margaret choose La Giraudiere to be a part of her year long journey to learn new skills, meet new volunteers, and experience French culture.

While at La Giraudiere Margaret assisted with housekeeping duties, weekly food shopping, and used her extensive experience in accounting to manage the accounts at La Giraudiere.

Margaret enjoyed all aspects of French culture, from delays in public transport, yoga classes in the local village and French cuisine. She will continue to cultivate her knowledge of the French language while she continues her journey around France this year.

Thank you Margaret for joining our team. We hope you enjoy the rest of your time around France. It was a pleasure having you volunteer at La Giraudiere in the south west of France for the spring!

 

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Freiwilligenarbeit_in_Frankreich

Posted on June 3, 2015 by La Giraudiere

Freiwilligenarbeit in Frankreich

Julia Zander a 26 year old sales marketing exectutive choose La Giraudiere for her first volunteering experience in France. Julia arrived at La Giraudiere on 20 April and volunteered for 6 weeks to improve her French and to experience the fabulous region of south west France.

Thank you Julia for your hardwork, dedication and posititvity at La Giraudiere!

Julia's Freiwilligenarbeit in Frankreich

Freiwilligenarbeit in Frankreich by Julia Zander

 

During her stay at La Giraudiere, Julia managed the social media for the project at La Giraudiere, improved her French skills and created an introductry webpage about the project in her native language German, you can see the web page produced by Julia at Freiwilligenarbeit in Frankreich.

Julia’s previous French training, immersion into the French culture, and volunteering at La Giraudiere helped to improve her French tremendously. She regularly assisted a fellow volunteer while he was learning to speak English at La Giraudiere.

Thank you Julia for volunteering at La Giraudiere this spring. It was wonderful having you as a volunteer for 6 weeks. Good luck in the future. It was a pleasure working with you!

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Canadian Intern in France

Posted on May 26, 2015 by La Giraudiere

Canadian French Cultural Exchange

We are very happy to announce the arrival of our first intern for this season. Meghan from Toronto in Canada arrived last Saturday and had the opportunity to straight away immerse herself in French culture by visiting a “Brocante” (a flea market) in Bardenac on Sunday morning. In the afternoon Meghan and other volunteers went to see a local football match in Chalais.

Meghan has a degree in Sociology and Women Studies and has worked in Customer Services in a Transport company. She has got a passion for travelling and decided to temporarily leave her job to be able to come to France to improve her French language skills.

Volunteer from Canada in France at La Giraudiere

Meghan while going through the applications

The duration of her internship will be 4 weeks. During this time she will learn how to manage and run La Giraudière. This includes the whole application process of our interns and volunteers, the communication with local service providers, the management of our current volunteers and interns (who is taking over which jobs), accounting, social media and other administrative tasks. Today, on her first day of work, she started to have a look at the incoming applications for internships and volunteering programs and sent her first emails to applicants.

This internship will provide Meghan with necessary skills to enhance her job search when she is back in Canada. We are very happy to be able to welcome you to our international team and look forward to working with you!

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Volunteers Exploring France

Posted on May 26, 2015 by La Giraudiere

Excursion to Bourdeilles, Brantomes and Aubeterre

Last Wednesday was a very exciting day for our volunteers at La Giraudière. We booked a 9 seater mini bus for an excursion to explore beautiful France. We left at 7:30 in the morning to visit the “Chateau de Bordeilles” which is about 2 hours away from Brossac. The drive there was already worth it as it was a wonderful sunny morning which let the French countryside appear in a beautiful light.

Before visiting the “Chateau” we were having a delicious coffee and croissant in the sun. There were plenty of interesting rooms, chambers and a nice garden to explore at the castle which made us stay there for nearly 2 hours. Following this visit we headed for Brantome. We wandered around the charming city and had time to buy some very unique souvenirs to bring back home. With an authentic French lunch (entrée, plat et dessert) by the river we finished our visit of Brantome, went back to the car and started our trip to the train station to pick up our new volunteer from New Zealand – Carolyn. On our way we decided to go to Aubeterre straight away after we have picked her up –  she did not really have a choice 😉 However, Carolyn was very happy to have the possibility to see one of France’s nicest cities immediately after her arrival. We spent about 2 hours in Aubeterre enjoying the warm and sunny weather before we went back to La Giraudière where we had our second big and delicious meal of the day prepared by Tom.

France volunteers excursion international Brantome Bourdeilles Aubeterre

Our international group of volunteers after exploring beautiful France

 

 

 

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Volunteers from Australia in France

Posted on May 26, 2015 by La Giraudiere

English French language exchange

Unfortunately Sharyn and Janice – our Australian volunteers – left La Giraudière this weekend. This is to thank them very much for the excellent work they carried out during their 2 weeks stay.

Janice’s main task was the painting of our benches and tables for the garden and in the Old House. This job was perfectly designed for her as she has worked as an Interior Architect back in Australia. Sharyn has taken over the function as our main gardener and was very busy doing a lot weeding, cutting our hedges and planting new flowers. Both ladies have got an awesome hands-on mentality which enabled them to finish their projects efficiently.

On Thursday last week we were very lucky, because Janice and Sharyn decided to organise an authentic Australian barbecue for the whole group. They spent hours at the grill to ensure we all had a lovely evening. It was a great international night with lots of delicious food, amazing people and a good laugh.

Australian volunteer France La Giraudiere

Sharyn preparing the authentic Australian Barbecue

In addition both used their time at La Giraudière to improve their French language skills by interacting with the local community on a daily basis. They will still have the opportunity to use the French language as they will now spend a few days in Paris before they go back home to Australia.

Thank you very much Janice and Sharyn for everything you have done at La Giraudière. Working with you was a lot of fun which we all enjoyed very much. It was a pleasure to have you here!

 

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