Students Visti Report 2015

The students visit in January 2015 as part of the Cadfa project ‘twinning in action’ was an amazing experience for me.  I had the opportunity to improve different skills like English language, organization skills as a group leader, and learn a lot about how difficult it is to be a student in Palestine.

The visit was divided in two parts: The residential in the Yorkshire Dales and in London.

The first part of the visit during the residential was really intense. We were living together in a bunk house, sharing everything. Cadfa divided the days into different topics - a ‘British day’ and ‘Palestinian day’. During these two days we had some talks about the culture in both countries, universities, lifestyle, human rights and differences between England and Palestine. Also we saw some documentaries and we tasted typical food from these countries. We had some time to enjoy the snow outside the house, walk around the mountains, play games and discuss with our colleagues. 

The second part of the visit was running in London. The first day was for tourism, hopefully everybody enjoyed Big Ben and the London Eye, also Piccadilly Circus and Oxford Street. The second day in London was a ‘University day’ Cadfa divided the big group into small groups and the Palestinian students visited different  universities including  SOAS, UCL, Birkbeck, Goldsmith and King's College. They enjoyed it a lot and they could feel like an English students for one day.  The other days during the weekend we were in  Dragon Hall Community Centre doing a film about ‘Palestine and Human Rights’ and visiting different institutions; Amnesty International, a school in Hackney and a Mosque in East London.  Of course, they had time to enjoy the Tate and British Museum, shopping in Oxford Street and walking around the city.

Emilio Sanchez. 
London EVS Volunteer