Spend time with our cats in Zwickau, Germany

Infos

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  Description

  We are Sonia and Levent and we currently live in Zwickau, Germany. We moved from the UK to Italy in 2020 with an "open end approach", not knowing how long we might stay or where we might go next. After we got a bit stuck there with 10 + house cats (more about that project hereafter) we now managed to move countries with them all and are trying to settle in.
  
  When we first moved to South Italy there were a few dozens of malnourished strays fighting for survival by living off human trash and escaping the many uncaring at best, evil at worst humans (sadly a standard in many South European countries for those who aren't aware). We started feeding them daily and patiently gaining their trust and with the help of an elderly neighbour-friend who herself had done lots of volunteering in her life we managed to get them all sterilised and one by one adopted into for ever homes.
  
  Except of course the ones who simply became our family and will stay with us no matter what :)
  
  So, this is where Workaway came into the picture. We had been hosting people for years through Couchsurfing and one of our Couchsurfers mentioned the platform and that in fact she had been cat sitting in another Italian city. We thought this would be perfect for us in case we have to travel, which can come up quite spontaneously for us for work reasons. So having trustworthy people staying in the house for longer periods is perfect for this and it also gives us peace of mind while we're away. Apart from the cats we also have tortoises but they are not very complicated.
  
  During our last year in Italy we had numerous amazing workawayers staying with us and even though our location changed dramatically now, we'd like to still be open for hosting. Our cats are hard work and it's always great to have a helping hand.
  
  The way we've used workaway so far and most likely will covers two scenarios:
  
  1. We are away
  
  We never know when and for how long (in terms of days, not weeks) we might have to travel. Ideally we want to spend a few days with you to show you everything and to make sure you know the quirks of each cat and all the "security measures" to keep them and our belongings safe :D
  
  While we are away you simply take our role, you live in our house, take care of yourself and do all the cat duties. That means feeding, giving water, cleaning the litter boxes and loads of cuddling and playing. As for the tortoises, the only things that need to be done on a daily basis is turning on the UVB lamps in the morning, turning them off in the evening and making sure they always have food available. Apart from that you are free to do whatever you wish, stay in, go out, explore the town, etc..
  
  2. We are home
  
  When we are at home we simply share the house with you, we're happy if you help cleaning the litter boxes and keeping the house "tidy", in inverted commas because the cats have changed the definition of the word :D
  You don't need to worry about the feeding and also the tortoises won't be your responsibility. As for the cuddling and playing, our cats love all the attention they can get.
  
  
  Important things to know about the area and about us:
  
  Location & surroundings:
  
  We live super central, a few minutes walk from the typical shopping areas and in walking distance from supermarket, restaurants, the odd bar or café and a nice green area with a big pond. Zwickau is not huge, certainly not exciting, but actually a great location in itself, not far from Dresden, Leipzig, Northern Bavaria and also Prague in the Czeck Republic.
  
  
  Our house:
  
  We live in a very comfortable apartment on the third floor in a block of flats. The building is modern and very well insulated and quiet on the inside. We have a guest room with a double bed (1,40 x 2,00), where one person will sleep very comfortably, but it's also enough for a couple or close friends. Workawayers will have all the privacy they need and can retreat to their room any time.
  
  
  About us:
  
  We both lived in the UK for most of our lives but are both only half British. We got married in 2019 and moved to Italy one year later. We are vegan and really love cooking and trying out new things and experimenting in the kitchen. Our cooking styles are respectively fairly different from each other's so we certainly cover all types of dishes. Levent is an excellent chef, does amazing burgers, sandwiches and most importantly Turkish specialities. I (Sonia) claim to make better pasta dishes than any Italian, I love cooking Thai or Indian curries and huge vegetable stews and soups. I often cook something separate for myself because I'm hugely into strong spices, while at the same time being totally oil and mostly salt free for health reasons. We have no fixed times for eating and even among us two have our individual rhythms, we basically never eat at the same time, so please feel free to just listen to your own hunger drive and eat whenever you want.
  
  Overall we're trying to live as healthy as possible, though we know there's huge room for improvement, we do drink beer and wine and we could certainly incorporate more sports.
  We are also very conscious about environmental issues and especially in Italy it's been frustrating for us to see how careless people are in comparison to the UK and Germany. Like back in the UK we're aiming to live plastic free again, which had been impossible in Italy.
  
  Our daily life is rather unspectacular. We get up early and don't go to bed super late mostly and work (from home) and take care of the animals in between. We very rarely go out in the evening, even though we'd like to do it more often. On the weekends, provided the weather is nice, we usually go to the lake.
  As for the rest, we're fairly uncomplicated people, we take each day as it comes without expectations, we're calm but also love good conversations and love to hear about other people's life journeys and experiences.

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  Types d'aide et opportunités d'apprendre

  S’occuper des animaux

  Aide à la maison
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  Echange culturel et opportunités d'apprendre

  I think animals always teach so so much. When we're not away, we would personally also be around with the workawayer(s). We can teach you a lot about health and nutrition, about "life" in general the way we live it and see it.

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  Aide

  Quick summary of the things already explained in the introduction:
  
  - cat feeding
  - cleaning litter boxes
  - cat cuddling and playing
  - keeping the house tidy
  - feed tortoises in case we're away

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  Langues

  Langues parlées
  Allemand: Courant
  Anglais: Courant
  Italien: Courant
  Turc: Courant
  Espagnol: Intermédiaire
  Français: Intermédiaire
  Japonais: Débutant
  Hollandais: Débutant

  Cet hôte propose un échange linguistique
  Languages are one of the most fascinating things to dedicate your time to. The most present languages in our daily life are English, Turkish, German and Italian. We're actually sometimes speaking some hybrid language of them all but we can definitely teach anyone interested a bit of any of those languages. On our bookshelf there are actually many more study books for various languages of the world, but sometimes more for decoration 😁
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  Hébergement

  Another quick summary:
  
  - location in central Zwickau
  - spare private bed room for workawayers
  - easy access to other and bigger cities

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  Autres infos...

  We have heard some not so nice stories from workawayers concerning previous experiences. We do not use this platform to exploit people, make people work for hours on end while being lazy ourselves or anything like that. We think this platform is perfect for our cat vs. travel dilemma and are genuinely interested in the cultural exchange that comes with hosting.
  
  You'll have plenty of "time off", you can go to town or other near by cities any time and just feel free and at home. We will host you like old friends and hopefully when you leave you are a new friend :)

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  Informations complémentaires

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    Accès Internet

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    Accès Internet limité

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    Nous avons des animaux

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    Nous sommes fumeurs

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    Familles bienvenues

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  Possibilité d’accueillir les digital nomads

  Definitely.

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  Possibilité d'accueillir les animaux

  Depends on the pet I would say. Our cats are terrified of and/or super hostile towards dogs, most of them would hide under the sofa in fear of death, others might viciously attack the dog, so that wouldn't work. Another cat could work I guess, but it would probably just take a while for everyone to accept each other :) In the unlikely case you're doing workaway with any other animal, if they're small (tortoise, hamster, rat, spider,...), that would be actually super cool and we'd be up for it :D

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  Combien de volontaires pouvez-vous accueillir ?

  Deux

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  Nombre d'heures attendues

  no specific hours, super flexible

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