Charlotte

Royaume-Uni
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Information du profil

Information de voyage
Actuellement, je suis
à la maison
Description
Hi, I'm Charlotte and I'm excited to start my Work Away journey! I would describe myself as quiet and cheerful, and always willing to try something new (especially food!)

I'm particularly interested in volunteering opportunities.
Centres d’intérêt
Écriture
Dev. personnel
Dev. durable
Histoire
Jardinage
Culture
Cuisine et alimentation
Bénévolat
Livres
Animaux
Langues
Langues parlées
Anglais: Courant
Japonais: Débutant
Plus de détails sur les langues qui m'intéressent
I speak English with a Southern English accent and am happy to be a conversation partner, whatever main language you speak. :) Despite having studied Japanese at a university level, including a wonderful few semesters in Nagoya, my Japanese language skills are RUSTY. At some point in the future, I do want to get these back up to a standard. More generally though, I'm always interested to learn any basics or key phrases from your language, if you would be kind enough to teach me.
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Compétences et connaissances que j'aimerais partager ou apprendre
Ça m'intéresse :
Travail associatif
Éco-projets
J'ai des connaissances :
S’occuper des animaux
Jardinage
Accueil / tourisme
Je peux apprendre aux autres :
Préparer les repas / cuisiner pour la famille
Aider à la maison
Quelles sont vos compétences ?
Currently I work for my local library service, which is great fun. Every day is different, whether I'm chatting books with customers, hosting/assisting with various community sessions or working the computers. I particularly enjoy the community work, whether that's assisting with our monthly tea and chat events for autistic adults (one of my favourites, as a proud Aspie), helping to set out hot drinks and soup for those who might need it, such as our homeless community, fussing any of our wonderful visiting support dogs, or having my Lego creations critiqued by a five year old in our craft clubs.

This year I've also begun volunteering as a listener with Samaritans. I work the phones and have some experience with emails. The calls can last from ten minutes to some hours and are always a whole new experience. You never know who it's going to be on the other end of that phone, what they're going through or where life has taken them. It's a real honour to be let into someone's life like that, especially for the moments they are struggling to share with anyone else. I would say this is the most rewarding, and definitely challenging, volunteer role I've ever had.

I do also have some experience with various animals, having been lucky enough to grow up on a petting farm and so surrounded by wonderful dogs, guinea pigs, chickens, parrots, goats, donkeys and ponies, to name a few. As I say, I was very lucky and I think I learned a lot. This was also located in a seasonal tourist destination and I grew up working in the very busy café and gift shop, chatting with members of the public and pointing out all the local sights.
Âge
26
Autres infos...
I'm particularly interested in volunteering projects.

I love animals and am keen to learn more about working with different species. I also enjoy gardening and am always looking to learn more, especially about organic and edible gardening.

As well as this, I welcome opportunities involving disability and neurodivergence. As a neurodivergent person myself, I'm quite passionate about raising awareness surrounding disability and am always happy to talk about my experiences if anyone asks. If I can, I would love to be involved in projects which help neurodivergent people with extra support needs. Although I do not have specific support needs myself, I feel my own neurodivergence puts me in a good position to understand where people are coming from if there is an issue, and this is always a good place to start. As the saying goes, "Nothing about us without us."

I am also very interested in faith-based and interfaith opportunities.

Thanks for reading! :)
Informations complémentaires
- Fumeur
- Permis de conduire
- Allergies
- Régime alimentaire spécial

Sécurité du site

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17 mars 2025

Laissé par le workawayer () pour l'hôte (Join us at our non-profit ...)

I only stayed here for three weeks but what an amazing three weeks they were. Honestly, I'm not sure how I experienced so much in such a short time and so close to home. I went thinking I was going to meet some amazing cows (which of course I did) but there is so much more to this workaway than a farm stay, if that's what you want.

I think that's… read more probably the key here actually: you can join in with the temple as much or as little as you want, and certainly we had people who joined in tons or not at all. Either was fine and no-one was pushed to join anything they weren't feeling. People spoke passionately and with so much love about Krishna Consciousness and we were invited to everything, but this was always our choice. Everyone was just so nice and supportive and so that's probably how I ended up, after less than a week, at the head of the dancers in Soho, arm-in-arm with a lady I'd never met and chanting out loud. For context, I'm a very quiet person and I do. not. dance. Not since I was a child! But for whatever reason, I felt completely safe and not at all self-conscious here.

The dancing in Soho is called harinam and I recommend joining to any new volunteers. It is an incredibly fun, spiritual experience. The second time we went, one of the lovely monks, Marília, held a sari session for us ladies so that we could go to harinam dressed in saris. She helped us choose from boxes of the most beautiful dresses, taught us how to put them on and made us feel so confident wearing clothing none of us had ever worn before. Outside of harinam, she also answered so many of our questions and we had some really lovely chats walking around the grounds.

Back at the farm itself, the work was pretty varied and split fairly between the farm, the Goshala (with the cows) and the gardens. Hands down my favourite job was handing out bowls of kale to visitors in the Goshala. I had so many conversations with random people, from devotees to tourists, all here to meet the herd. People were so lovely and welcoming and funny and a few times even brought us surprise cakes. (Yep, definitely the best job.) The work on the farm and in cleaning the cows could be tough, manual work and I certainly had to pace myself with this. Again though, I never felt pushed and could go at my pace, which I'm thankful for.

For my last week I joined the 7 day "Be a Monk Challenge," which is free for volunteers. This was led by resident monk Samantha, who again is lovely and answered so many of our random questions. This time, only two of us joined from the volunteer gang, joining four other ladies at the temple guest house. This involved waking up at 4:00am to shower and join the early morning temple service and cutting out caffeine so it was pretty intense for a complete newbie like me. But again, everyone was so supportive and just lovely! We still have a very active WhatsApp group. We had philosophy classes, music classes, helped feed the homeless community as part of a weekly initiative, did yoga and meditation and just so much more. There was also something called "sacred sanga" on like the second day where each of us, basically strangers, talked about our lives, our journeys and there was crying and hugging and it felt good. No-one planned for us to have that response but that's what was right for us and we were immediately friends.

So in conclusion, I went to a farm and ended up having a highly spiritual experience I didn't quite expect. I thought I'd learn about the Hare Krishna movement and its beliefs, but maybe kind of more at a distance. Instead I did a lot of introspection and a lot of talking with other people about some pretty big things. I also learned that cows recognise their names, have favourite other cows and humans, and also have big wet noses like dogs. So now I'm vegetarian again after a good 7-8 years which is something that I really did not think would happen. At all.

So a massive thank you in particular to Ramai, who arranges all of this for the volunteers, Marília and Samantha at the ladies' ashram, and everyone else who helped pack six months worth of experiences into three tiny weeks. I made some amazing friends, ate some great food and learned so, so much. And I haven't even written half of it down. Thank you! :)

(Excellent )

4 oct. 2024

Laissé par l'hôte pour le workawayer ()

Charlotte spent just over a month with us helping us to take care of the birds and with someone of the other general maintenance and tidying jobs around the house and site. While the DIY side of things like hedge cutting or building in aviaries was, by her own admission, not her strongest attribute she more than made up for it with willingness,… read more

(Excellent )

4 oct. 2024

Laissé par le workawayer () pour l'hôte (Help at a conservation ...)

What an opportunity! I was with with Holly and Adam (plus Flax and Yellow the dogs) for just over a month, Sept 2024.

I came to this workaway with zero knowledge of vultures and knowing very little of bird conservation generally. I've left with a genuine love of these wonderful and unfortunately endangered creatures. Holly and Adam are clearly… read more

(Excellent )

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