French volunteer’s first impression of Prilep

Bonjour à tous!

My name is Paul, I’m 20 years old, and I am a French volunteer, in Prilep. I will be involved in a 6 months EVS project, here in the Youth Information and Counseling Center Info Sega.

I always wanted to travel, to discover new people and cultures, and I decided to dedicate this “gap year” (2017-2018) to travel and experience new things.

I’ve started my “EVS experience” with a 40 days short term EVS in Romania.

It has been a wonderful experience, and I had wonderful moments there.

Back in France, I proceeded with the quest for another EVS, a long term this time! During this transition period in France, I’ve been to a youth exchange, during which I met many young people from different European countries.

I also met Macedonians, and I became very good friend with them.

I heard about this long term EVS vacancy in Macedonia during this exchange, at the end of November. It was a little bit late to submit my application, but I did it anyway. And here I am, I took the chance.

I arrived in Skopje the 3rd of January, and I took the bus to Prilep the next day.

So far so good! I have a very cool apartment, with a wonderful view (for me alone for now, waiting my future roommates). The city is really nice, bordered by mountains, people are very nice, and I feel like home already. There are many cultural cool things here in Prilep, and the town steel shows some remains of the civil war in 2001. There are also many bars, coffees, and restaurants that I really want to try! There are shops everywhere, and it’s difficult to get lost, the streets are linked.

Prilep already looks familiar to me, and I’m very optimist at the idea to stay here 6 month.