After being a volunteer for almost a year at Association For You, French volunteer Oriane presented her personal project. She has been working in the communication team since March 2021. As a volunteer under the European Solidarity Corps, she had the chance to create her own personal project. With the help of For You and her colleagues, her project became real!

What is Starting Point Varna?

Starting Point Varna is a guide that aims to help foreigners and new volunteers to understand transportation in Varna and how to leave from Varna to different cities. Oriane explains to us how she got this idea: “ When I arrived in Varna, I really wanted to take this opportunity to travel and discover Bulgaria. But I found myself struggling to understand how Varna Traffic works and also how to visit the cities around Varna. I thought that I would have loved to have a guide to help me. And that’s what I did for the next volunteers. I hope this guide will help them a lot and that they will have the chance to discover a lot in this beautiful country!”

In this guide, Oriane proposes you discover different sights around Varna as the Aldzha Monastery, cities close to Varna as Devnya, and even cities further away as Sofia. All those destinations are places Oriane has been to – “ In total, I have been to more than 40 places in Bulgaria”. All the pictures were taken by her. Oriane also left some useful tips to help you make the best decision during your traveling time.

YOU CAN CHECK OUT ORIANE’S GUIDE HERE!

The event

To present her project, Oriane in collaboration with For You and Hale 3, organized an event. Firstly, the media was invited to see the presentation. After an interview on TV, Oriane also answered questions for the radio and some online media. The media was really interested in this experience coming from a foreigner who has been discovering the country for a year.
After making those interviews, a second presentation was made for the people who were interested in the project.

Her experience

We asked Oriane what will she keep from this experience – “ A lot of things! I discovered a country that I didn’t know anything about and I was really amazed by its richness! This country is full of history, of beautiful landscapes,… I was really not expecting this before coming. And to be honest I think it’s really too bad that the Bulgarian government doesn’t put stress on the tourism opportunities of this country. Which sometimes makes it difficult to have access to some landscapes. Sometimes you can only access them by car. If the tourism field was more developed it would be way easier! There is so much to discover here and people don’t know about it. To anyone who wants to come to Bulgaria, I think you should come without thinking twice! You will discover more than you think!” You can see videos from her stay HERE!

We wish her success and hope that we will meet her again in Bulgaria!

 

The European Commission’s support for the production of this publication does not constitute an endorsement of the contents which reflect the views only of the authors, and the Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein.