After I got back home from my first trip in Southeast Asia, I was asked to share my story for a local magazine “Panele”. Here is a short recap of why I left and what I was doing abroad. The article was published in 2016, a lot of things would not surprise me much now, but it’s quite interesting to read my early impressions and thoughts.

The original article is in Lithuanian by Viktorija Zapalskyte.

Adventure of my life

A couple of years ago Evelina Gasiūnaitė from Lithuania lived a normal life – graduated from the school, studied Management in a Business school, found a job and tried to work her way into the adult world. However, at the end of the employment contract, she realized that travel and adventure attracted her much more than a quiet life in Vilnius. She found a volunteering program, packed a bag and went to Malaysia where she was teaching the local children English. The girl just recently returned to Lithuania, I – the first to talk with Eveliną about her trip. What has changed in Vilnius, I ask. “Electronic bus tickets and Euros – girl laughs – nothing else”, but little we talked about Lithuania, all the rest of the time she shared stories about Southeast Asia, where Evelina had the greatest adventure of her life.

FreedoM to do what you want

“I didn’t have any commitments,” – the story of why he went to Malaysia began. She lived with her parents, the employment contract had just expired, no loans, nothing what was keeping her at home, just a big desire to grow, to learn, to improve English language and knowledge of the world. The plan sounded like this “a couple of months, well, perhaps half of the year abroad”, but actually, family and friends Evelina saw only after… two years. Why? The precautions. “I did not know where I was going, I did not want to scare parents and declare that they will not see me for a year or more, so it was better to mention a much shorter period of time. But after a couple of months in Malaysia volunteering turned into work. The organization SOLS 24/7, where I volunteered, offered me a contract, there was a condition that if I stay there for a year, I will receive a bonus. It motivated me, so I stayed”. A year of teaching in Malaysia was not the end, after she finished it, Evelina again packed her backpack. But this time, no work, only travelling alone: ​​she went to Singapore, then Sri Lanka, Indonesia, Cambodia, Laos and Thailand. Was travelling until she just got tired. Who knows, maybe she will be bored with black Lithuanian bread also?

Cockroach on the pillow – normal

The first challenge came up when she just started to dream about volunteering. After sending the application to the organization, she had to go through the selection process and 1,5hour long interview with representatives of the organization. The conversation turned the wrong direction, and Evelina just hoped “I began to wish that everything would end as soon as possible. I realized that I will not be accepted”- the girl shared her memories. However, courage, persistence and a great desire impressed the representatives. Later it was the second tough interview and then the girl already started packing her bags to Malaysia. “When I arrived in Kuala Lumpur, I had a month of training before actual work, during that time, putting on a side learned teaching methods, I also got used to cockroaches on a pillow and rats in a room. Once, a rat even got into my cupboard and destroy all the cosmetics and medication, as it somehow managed to make a hole in a cupboard. I had no problems with the food there, and that was quite strange. On the other hand, we were having three meals a day to eat rice: rice porridge in the morning, rice with chicken for lunch, dinner, rice with fish, after all, it’s hard to get poisoned with rice. But insects there are quite dangerous, that I experienced myself.”

Death in the eyes

After training in Kuala Lumpur, Evelina was sent to work in Borneo island, and there started the real adventure. Once an insect stung the girl, she suffered an allergic shock. She doesn’t know exactly what insect had bitten in the arm, but she guesses that it was a spider, and although she is allergic to bee stings, Evelina wasn’t panicking. “I noticed redness around the stung place, but felt no other symptoms, so I didn’t pay attention, but now I can say that it was a mistake. My head began to spin, was hard to breathe and I probably started thinking very illogically because I decided not to say anything to anyone and just lie down. Before that, I took some medication against allergy and hopped that all will be fine, but after a while, I started feeling a pain which was very hard to handle, I was shaking in bed and losing consciousness time to time. Now I think that if anyone would be recording all of it, the video could have been used for the film “The Exorcist” (laughs). Well, but after a few hours, I got much better. The next day I went to see a doctor and he said that I’m very lucky that I’m still alive”. With rats and insects, challenges are not over. In Malaysia the monsoon season lasts for six months, rains and floods for locals are completely normal. However, a foreigner from Lithuania had different thoughts, especially when the water lever reached the school’s electrical sockets, the dirty water with rats jumping and garbage floating was flooding the school classrooms. What students were doing during that time? Making paper boats, constructing rafts and were swimming around the school. However, in the long run, Evelina got used to the heavy rains. “Anyway, after all of these, I feel stronger, I stopped worrying about problems: began flooding. So what? You are not able to stop it, much better to fold a paper boat and have fun. “

PRAYERS for every RELIGION

“In short about the school. I was working with the students who are dropouts or never went to a school. Some couldn’t follow school’s requirements, were lazy to study, and some couldn’t study, cause the family couldn’t afford it or the kids had to work in the rice fields and help the family. The education was free, anyone could join, so we had a mix of students from all Sabah (area in Malaysia). It’s not an ordinary school, we were teaching just basics of the most important subjects. If the students couldn’t follow the normal school curriculum, so we wanted them to know the basics and feel good and confident. So just basic English for them to communicate and motivation classes to motivate them not to give up and study, be a good person and take from life the most they can. It’s a boarding school, so the teachers and students lived together in the school, not only during the classes but also during free time we all were together. All should get up at six a.m. Why so early? It’s a form of discipline. Before joining the school, the students could do what they want: watch TV, play with the phone, no control, so without discipline would have been very difficult to teach them something and make them listen to the teachers. After we get up in the morning, we start a school cleanup, all had their dedicated tasks or areas to clean, after it followed morning physical exercises, and the last before the classes – prayers. The organization itself is not focused on any religion, but the majority in Southeast Asia follows Christianity or Islam very strongly. If you meet a new person, he will ask you only three questions: what is your name, how old are you and what is your religion. Religion is very important and we were having prayers twice a day for fifteen minutes. During the prayers, we always were sitting in a circle and singing the prayers for all religions, even the “Our Father”. Then it’s time for the classes: until noon the students were having three English lessons, then followed a lunch break, after computer class and motivation lesson. We were finishing all at fourth p.m., one hour for relaxation, then evening prayers and dinner, and then have the evening entertainment: karaoke, dancing, movie night. The students go to sleep at ten p.m., so the teachers that time meet up for the meeting, to discuss the day and to plan another one. So the year of teaching passed really fast for me.”

We built a house!

Where Evelina lived and worked, together lived a hundred students and some teachers. Where they all fit? The girl started explaining, that from the beginning, they lived in a fairly spacious building, but it lasted not for long. At the end of the lease, the owner did not want to extend it and all the students with teachers had to move elsewhere. And where to go with a hundred children? Helping hand stretched out one NGO, they gave a plot of land, which was previously set up as a training centre. However, the property didn’t look good enough to fit all the students and teachers, so they started building a new school there by themselves. “So we were cutting bamboos from the jungle next to us, dry it, assemble walls from it, etc., well, and all we did just in a few weeks. My whole room was made only by my hands.” The impression, from Evelina’s description, that the house wasn’t very strong, no typical concrete walls, just a shed. “Walls had a lot of gaps, through them could get in anything, for a scorpion it was an easy task. I was taught to neutralize a scorpion. Just grab a broom, hold its head, cut tail and leave it, it can’t do anything bad after it. We faced other issues also, like the water system was not designed for so many people, so every morning each of us had to pour a bucket of water and use it for the whole day. If you want to take a shower or wash your head, had to save the water to manage all with only one bucket.”

Accepting any transport

Year of work in Malaysia was going to an end, during that time she has travelled a big part of Borneo. The students were from different villages, they often were inviting Evelina to visit their houses for the weekend. The students were very proud to bring a foreigner to their village, they could show-off in front of their friends and family that they can communicate in English, it means a lot for them. At the end of the project at the school, Evelina made a plan to visit a different country every month, packed her bag and left. “Sri Lanka vas the first to discover, later Indonesia, it is very big, I could spend there a year and would not be enough. Then followed Cambodia and Laos, these countries are quite similar and I was getting bored a bit, so I decided to reach Thailand from Cambodia by hitchhiking only, without using any public transport. I counted that I travelled with 25 vehicles: motorcycles, pickup trucks, cars, lorries… all of which stopped. Was it scary? Not really, I felt safer there than in Lithuania, I had a lot of fun to meet the locals, I wanted something interesting and different. Of course, at first I did a small research and knew that Laos is safe to hitchhike, and I was excited to start my journey. Most people travelled with pickup trucks, so was very easy to jump in it, then, I just had to follow GPS, when I noticed that the car is turning somewhere not where I want to go, I just had to knock the side of the car, get out and continue the journey with another vehicle.”

“It was a time full of adventure and new challenges. After I came back to Lithuania, I felt a gap between me and my friends who are living a “normal life”, family, good job, apartment, etc. And I came back as I left, but with a full bag of priceless experiences which I will never forget. Travel – the best school of life, try it. Because why not?”