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Archive file
Volunteers Information Pakrac
Volunteers accomodation office:
Prilaz Baruna Trenka 19
(former Partisanski Put) Strossmajerova 63
43550 Pakrac
Croatia
New Phone+Fax:
+385(0)46-83435
Email: PAKRAC.DA@ZAMIR-ZG.comlink.de
Situation in the Town
The 7th January was the orthodox Christmas which once again meant
that there was a lot of shooting "in the air". There was also a
lot of explosions in "No Mans Land". This went on for two days and
all was relatively quiet until 14th which was orthodox New Year
when they used the ammunition they had left over from Christmas.
Since then the situation has been very calm and quiet.
Life of the Volunteers
Life is becoming mader by the day (we don't want to go into
details at the moment). More and more people seem to be turning up
every day. We now have a dog named Unprofor who guards the house
for us but doesn't know who lives there and who doesn't. We had a
large donation of food from a friend which has meant that we have
been eating extremely well for the last few weeks. We play musical
beds every night, so don't know who is going to be where in the
morning! We got finally the phoneline in the office which has been
very busy from the moment we got it. A lot of people have been
phoning us from different countries wanting to know about Pakrac.
Last weekend the marvellous 9th group of volunteers arrived and we
had a great party at the Lipik disco on Saturday night. For the
first time we have volunteers from Denmark, Sweden, Ireland and
Czech Republic. There has been a lot of work this week with the
brigades. Waking up Friday morning we found a lot of snow outside
which caused a days break for some of the workers. The low
temperatures made people keep their shoes on and therefor bring
snow and dirt inside. This caused extra cleaning shifts. During
the week we had a series of hurt legs, one of these even brought a
volunteer to the MASH hospital in Zagreb.
Volunteers Activities
Reconstruction
Working Groups
This week the working brigades have been working in Pakrac,
Filipovac and Lipik. Some groups have been actually reconstructing
a house, while other groups have been cleaning bricks and clearing
rubble from houses. We are now working with three new working
brigades. As well as this a few of us have been visiting old
ladies in Pakrac and cleaning bricks and helping them drinking
their coffee.
Social Activities
English Lessons
Ben, American volunteer, broke all bureaucratic rules with the
blessing of the headmaster of the Secondary School and will now be
an English teacher in Pakrac. This may affored volunteers more
exciting opportunities in teaching outside of the Secondary School
as well. Jan's English lessons will go on as usual with
coordinating advanced English and international speakers.
Games with Children
Playing with children has resumed after our winter break. We
didn't manage to get space in the Primary School, on Friday played
with children in Papiga, in the meantime Idoia was collecting
children from the street and played with them in our house.
Radio Daruvar
This week the new volunteers went to the Radio to introduce
themselves and talked about sheep, beer and cows and played
peculiar music. Listeners were offered to call in and tell about
how and where they would like to spend Saturday evening, but
people were not exactly throwing themselves over the phone. In
fact nobody called. Response came the day after, when the
volunteers came to work. People from the brigades were excited to
have heard "their" volunteers on the radio. "But why didn't you
send a greeting to me?"
More Activities
We are going to have another party and we also had a party. A
volunteers team won a football match! Against another volunteers
team.
Some numbers
Concerning the number of volunteers from each country, the Germans
are leading with 15 followed by Great Britain and The Netherlands
both with 9, Italy 8, Belgium 8, Spain 7, USA 6, Switzerland 5,
Poland 4, Australia 2, Canada and Croatia 2 and Austria, Sweden,
Denmark and Ireland on the last place with 1. The youngest volun-
teer was 19, the oldest 47 years old, 31 female, 59 male.
Ideas and plans
Today the three Pols, Lynnette and Wam went to side to start the
work there! The UN containers for the volunteers to stay in have
arrived and. We plan a gallery showing childrens drawings, peoples
photos of the area and works from local artists.
Rumours and Gossips
Can you imagine - there has been a lot of talk about volunteers
being spies, taking drugs and giving food to Chetniks. Vanja has
eaten all the food we have been given and all the buttons have
come off her trousers. L.J. started to wake up early every morning
just to wake up the others, can you imagine.... But he can't wake
up Burkie, who couldn't make it up his ladder. Snez didn't manage
to make it home last night either. We also have a Polish volunteer
who doesn't remember Wembley '73 - can you imagine. One of the
volunteers fell in love with a person working at the MASH
hospital. Is his name Klinger? The lines outside the bathroom have
eventually turned into parties inside.
Guests
Two beauties from New York City have been staying with us and have
left taking Ralf with them, will we ever see him again?
Thank you
For the money from Carsten Fuhrman, thanks to Hendrik for bringing
gloves and materials for children and magazines.
Pakrac English for perspective volunteers
middle age school - secondary school
husband of chicken - rooster
eating backwards - puking
snow is smelling - snow is melting
Dutch - German
List of Needs
- sheets and pillows for the beds
- sleeping bag for Burkie
- tools (screwdrivers, spanners, saws, etc)
- snow shovels
- sweeping brush
- cleaning materials for house and office
- light bulbs
- light shades
- books, magazines and newspapers
- television and video recorder (VHS)
- radio and tape recorder (tapes)
- small electric heater for the bathroom
- still a new chain for the toilet
- a set of warm house-shoes for the volunteers (i.e. 30 pairs)
IMPORTANT
for the other side:
- materials for children, i.e. crayons, paper, paints, etc
- toys for kindergarten
- children's books in English
- comic books, i.e. batman, superman etc.
- bicycles
Make love, don't snore, the Pakrac Volunteers 26th 1994