Project code: 2021-2-HU01-ESC51-VTJ-000044695

 Volunteers of 2022 in Nyim

November

November was really about slowing down, and preparing for the winter: we still did some harvesting, we stored our potato, and sweet potato for the winter. We found some monstress ones, one of them was bigger than 30 centimeter. We could see the result of long years of mulching: some years before the roots were much thinner. We could also see how the topsoil changed in the last few year: instead of compact yellow soil we have some spots where the compostation was successful: here on the top of the soil we have a thick black layer. 

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October

October was about slowly saying goodbye: first Adedayo left unfortunately a bit earlier than we expected, so we couldn’t involve him properly to the common goodbye event.

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September

In September we dedicated a serious amount of time to recover from the busy and exhausting hot August, so after the rest we organised smaller scale events and dedicated our time to finish our strawbale building. We held one longer event in cooperation with the Hungarian Strawbale Builders Association, when we were almost able to finish the wall of the house. Our architect, Gabi Révész led the course with her colleague, Tamás, whos father also joined to us with a special machine what he inwented to make the bales more compact.

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Gyüttment Festival

Last week I got to help out at the Gyüttment (Movers) festival in Magfalva. It’s a great festival, full of sweet enthusiastic people who are excited to learn and share knowledge about living sustainably and taking care of earth. As a non-Hungarian speaker, I might not be the best one to tell what the festival is about, but here is my idea of what it is about, coming from my experience and from what people told me. It’s a gathering for people who are interested in or are already living in the countryside in sustainable ways. The festival is full of workshop, from the morning to dinner time, on various topics that are somehow related to sustainability such as natural building, composting, community building, crafting etc. Unfortunately most of the workshops were in Hungarian, so I’m probably not the best person to tell about them.

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August

During August 3 volunteers from Etyek visited us, Paula from Spain, Paula from Germany, and at the end of the month Mathilde from France. They helped us in many programmes and tasks such as renovating our kitchen, building a yurt, and also hosting events.

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July

We begun July with a special event: “the walk for healthy born” yearly arranged pilgrim walk group visited us, as the community is connected to the topic of birth. One of our founders, Kati works with the topic of birth as a psychologist, she is one of the few specialists in Europe, who developed a method to help adults heal their birth trauma. Naturally she is deeply connected with many other specialists in Hungary related to this topic, so midwifes, doulas, neonatologyst nourses, psychologists and other experts visited her in her home, in Nyim. Our community hosted home births in the community house previously, so we shared our experience about it, and we showed our land and strawbale house to the visitors. They gave a wondernut tree to us as a present, which we will plant this winter.

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June

At the very beginning of June we went for an on arrival training to meet and build connections with other volunteers. When we arrived, Igor from Amsterdam, our third volunteer also landed, so we involved him to the daily activities: planting, weeding, and share the cooking tasks for the day.

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May

At the beginning of May, the biggest event was Sonja’s arrival to the village. She was the first international ESC volunteer in our community. Sonja from Malmö landed smoothly to the village, and immediately started to explore the surroundings. As a local, and a community member, I (Fanni) really enjoyed to introduce the places to her, she was wery open to everything. We walked around a lot in-, and around the village and also in the nearby town, Siófok.

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First weeks in the village

I have been here for almost two months now and we’ve been doing a lot of different things. We have done gardening in various gardens, including our own community garden. We have worked on the communal land of the community, taking care of little baby trees. I really enjoy watching the plants grow and the gardens change so much. We have also worked with renovating and organizing, and decorating, in the community house, where we are also living. We have also helped at different kinds of events, doing cooking, cleaning and organizing.  

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Hi! I’m Igor, 22 years old , from Amsterdam. I was fulltime working since I was 17 and did mostly restaurant work, and a lot of charity work. I got kind of tired of seeing the same city and being in the same routine, needed a change.

So that’s what I did, I took the chance to go to Hungary. I did not join the ESC programme straight away... I had a different path, I volunteered some time for an elderly woman who learned me some bits about permaculture... which made me really interested to learn more, I began to look for other possibilities, and found the best thing through wwwoofers in an eco-community in Nyim (where I’m currently volunteering) where they focused on the things I wanted to learn more about. Especially two things I really like: Being with and helping people, and permaculture , gardening and veggies, haha. Nyim could provide me an ESC program, so I joined, which makes it possible for me to meet more likewise people around the world, and to find even more similar possibilities.

Since I been here , I don’t feel isolation no more and I found great peace again. I have a great housemate and I can cook for fun again. I’m learning more about the things I want and I meeting many nice people .

One of the better choices I made this year!

Igor Miltenburg


Sonya Regardh

Hello, my name is Sonja, I’m currently volunteering at Nyim Eco-community. I’m 26 years old, from Finland. Before this I was living in Sweden working with kids and in a restaurant while doing my bachelor’s degree at university, where I was studying anthropology, human ecology and comics drawing.   

A lot of the things we did at university was very theoretical and it was a lot of reading, I felt like I was missing learning by doing, which is one of the reasons I applied to be a volunteer. I got many interests and things I want to learn about. I want to learn more about living in ways that is nice for all kinds of beings, so I want to learn more about ecological living, gardening and plants and community life. I also just want to get a feel what it’s like to live full time on the countryside, and get some inspiration for how I want to live. I also make art in different forms, and I want to make more art that is inspired or collaborated with nature. Otherwise I just want to be open to learn and experience whatever comes to me! 

I love being in nature and feel the best when I am outside, I love colleting herbs and edible plants from the wild. I believe that not only animals are living intelligent beings, but also plants, and maybe even rocks and places, and this is something I am interested in exploring and I want to spread this way of seeing the world so we can take care of each other better! 

I'm Fanni, 31 years old, visual artist, bookbinder and drawing teacher. 

As a local and a Hungarian, of course I participate in the group in a slightly different way. Since I have lived in Nyim for couple of years, I can be in our volunteer team the one who help the others to find their way around and connect with the local village community and the eco-community.

I take part in the renovation work of the community house, in the creation and care of the vegetable garden around the house, in the adobe works of the straw bale house under construction, we host events with an ecological theme, and we also participate in the events of the village. Personally, it is important for me to have space and time for artistic creative work, it is a lucky combination that all volunteers in the hosting organisation are very creative, so we make a lot of art together. I am especially happy that I have the opportunity to spend time with my ethical art concept, which explores the borders of everyday life, ecology, and art.

I really enjoy working together with the others, we learn a lot from each other, I taught the others how to paint the wall with lime and how to make lactofermentation, and for example I learned about the wider use of herbs and Korean cuisine from Sonja (who showed op firsthand with a kilo of dried porcini :), and the second day went to the forest to collect elderflowers).

Sall Fanni

Adedayo Okunade

My name is Adedayo, I currently study at the University of Warsaw, having my postgraduate studies in Sustainable
Development. My study track entails the core topics of sustainability (biodiversity, carbon emissions,
permaculture, urban agriculture etc.), and I hope to build on that through the practical engagements I would be involved in during this internship. After many theoretical studies, I feel it is time to take on more practical engagements, solve real-life
challenges, and have a real impact. In all, I would like to start my journey towards my professional goal. I
am committed to act upon sustainability issues and this will be a significant start.