Info Pack
Explore the World, Volunteer Yourself, Start the Journey
REUNION ISLAND - FRANCE
About the organizers
- consolidation of the French-Reunionnaise relationships in the cultural, social, educational, environmental and economic fields through bilateral projects ;
- encouragement of volunteerism during the activities of the projects and
meeting with other organizations ;
- enhancement of European cooperation in what regards the participation within international organizations, but also regarding bilateral or multilateral relations with certain countries (or regions) ;
- enhancement of the number of cultural exchange programs between the two countries ;
- achievement of projects of Erasmus+, youth exchange, TC, EVS, VET, Erasmus+ Sport, Creative Europe and their implementation.
About the project :
Type of the activity: Erasmus+ KA 1 - Youth Exchange Programme Countries
Venue: LES RESIDENCES DU LAGON (Kitoko Location) Bungalows - Saline les Bains, Reunion Island, France
Dates of effective implementation: 05 - 13 August 2019 (with 05 August being Arrival Day and 13 of August being Departure Day)
Working methods used: Non-formal education (getting to know each other, team building, team work, playing games, work in small groups and in big group, ICL games, etc)
Countries involved: Romania, France, Estonia, Poland
Participants: Each partner country will send 6 participants + 1 group leader. The participants age has to be between 18 and 30 years old and the group leaders have no upper age limit.
'Escales Latines' Association is organising this project with the grant received through the Erasmus+ Program from the European Union.
Explore the World, Volunteer Yourself, Start the Journey is a multilateral Erasmus+ Key Action 1, Youth Exchange project, that will gather 31 young people (including 6 leaders) from 4 countries (Estonia, Poland, Romania and of course France), during 05 - 13 August 2019, in LES RESIDENCES DU LAGON (Kitoko Location) Bungalows - Saline les Bains, Reunion Island, France.
Through the spirit of the active European Citizenship, "Explore the World, Volunteer Yourself, Start the Journey" aims to underline the importance of volunteer practices withing the organisations actvity, and to develop new practices and tools for working with volunteers.
About Reunion Island
Reunion Island is an oversea region of France (in french language: Région d'outre-mer) .
If you wish to spend more time on Reunion Island, on your own, and you want to find out everything that there is to know about it, before departure from your home, we recommend you to check the following links :
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R%C3%A9union
https://wikitravel.org/en/Reunion
https://www.lonelyplanet.com/reunion
Documents to enter in Reunion Island
Try to have with you everything that’s relevant for YOU to enter !
In general, the citizens of Italy, Poland, Romania and Spain, can enter in Reunion Island only with the ID Card (National Card) BUT it's the responsibility of each participant to check, recheck and double check its own travel condition(s) to Reunion Island, from the starting departure point all the way to the final arrival destination - Reunion Island !
Maximum careful when you'll be picking your flight(s) because if you will have to change the plane in some airports (depending on the country and on the airport) there might be required a Passport (even though it's just for transit) ! So please triple check.
Health Insurance
It should not be expensive and it takes just little time to make one.
Take into consideration that you will be in a foreign country, on an island, with strangers and in case something’s going to go wrong, you will need it !
Weather and clothes
Reunion Island benefits from a tropical climate softened by the breezes of the Indian Ocean. The sun shines down all year round, especially in the north, west and south of the island. The wide variety of microclimates in Reunion means that one can be soaking up the sunshine by the sea in the morning and be up taking in the cool mountain air in the afternoon, and all this without having to travel far to do so.
Here, on these links, please check the climate in Reunion : https://en.reunion.fr/practical/reunion-island/geography-and-climate/climate
&
https://www.climatestotravel.com/climate/reunion
Click on this link and check the weather again just BEFORE PACKING AND TRAVELLING TO REUNION: https://www.accuweather.com/en/re/cilaos/275407/weather-forecast/275407
VERY IMPORTANT - WHAT TO BRING
Bring good shoes and proper clothes for outdoors (comfortable hiking/trekking shoes) !
The Reunion mountains are really amazing, so we will organize hiking/trekking trip(s) with the entire group and it is mandatory to have proper hiking equipment if you wish to take part. More details about that will come in the weeks before the exchange.
FOR THE INDOOR ACCOMMODATION
Bring with you slippers for indoor and slippers for the shower !
Also, we will try as much as possible to do all the most important activities outside so it’s good to have light clothes and sport clothes for this .
FOR THE BEACH SIDE
We will have some days at the beach side as well so please bring with you all the relevant things for the beach side: sun cream, swimwear, towels, beach slippers, loose fitting clothing, light shirts and pants of natural fibres (cotton, linen), light sweatshirt for the evening, light raincoat or umbrella.
Travelling from the Airport to LES RESIDENCES DU LAGON (Kitoko Location)
You will most probably land on Sainte-Denis Roland Garros Airport: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roland_Garros_Airport
We will try to arrange local transport for the entire group, on 05 of August, from the Airport to the final destination - the accommodation. Also for the return on 13 of August.
But more info and details regarding this, will follow in the upcoming period.
IF we will not manage to arrange common transport for the entire group, every participant will have to arrive with the public transport on the island. We will provide you the information on how you will be able to reach the accommodation with the public transport, if it will come to that.
We will stay in touch on the Facebook Group of this project that we will create.
CURRENCY, atm's & Credit Cards
Sockets (Plug Ins)
Reimbursement of travel per participant per country
TRAVELLING TICKETS & REIMBURSEMENT DOCUMENTS NEEDED
VERY IMPORTANT :
Please use the cheapest ways of transportation possible - Second class ! If you will use as well, the train and/or the bus, please use the second class, this is very important !
You can travel 3-4 day(s) before the project starts and 3-4 day(s) after the project ends but not more than these days !
Please DO NOT lose your boarding passes, train tickets and/or bus tickets ! We will not be able to reimburse you anymore, if you lose them !
Mandatory, send us by email or bring with you:
-Booking confirmation/E-ticket
-Proof of payment/Invoice
-Extras account if you paid with your card
-Boarding Pass(es) if you travel by plane
We strongly encourage you to buy flights that have the possibility to do online check-in and in this way you will be able to give us the return boarding passes as well, without sending them to us by post when you return home !
If for your airline is not possible, you still need to send us the boarding passes by post after the project. It is very important to have all your travel and financial documents with you for each person, otherwise the reimbursement will not be possible !
Reimbursement will be done by bank transfer ONLY in the account of your sending organization, according to the rules of Erasmus+.
We will make an effort and we will try to do all the reimbursements for all the national groups within 3 months after the end of the project, BUT only if we will get on time all the necessary required documents from every participant, and the proof of dissemination activities.
We will NOT reimburse:
- the expenses of renewal of passport
- the expenses of insurance
- the charges of change of flight ticket
- the travelling expenses outside of itinerary form your country to Reunion Island
- the travelling expenses outside of project time
- the price difference between the granted amount and the real price of your trip
- taxi or private car transport costs !
INTERCULTURAL EVENINGS
During the international evening you will have the pleasure to promote traditional food, drinks, music, flags, games, dance in a creative way (please try to do it without using power points). It should not be expensive, but something specific to your country and which would allow you to give us an idea about your culture.
Of course, if you would like, there is the possibility for your national group to cook something traditional (from your country) for all the participants of this project (@lunch and/or @dinner) using the kitchen of the establishment in Cilaos (mountain area - in the first part of the project).
BUT anyway we recommend you to bring something that doesn't require long time preparation, that doesn't get spoiled quickly or never - like for example cans - and that can be easily presented on the spot, anywhere at any time, in any conditions.
Remember: You can bring typical costumes, ornaments, leaflets, posters, flyers, food, sweets, alcoholic and non-alcoholic drinks… and so on !
Also, you can show videos, photos, sing music, present national legends and dance traditional dances from your countries! We are counting on you to make the evening as interesting as possible and promise to help you in any way that we can!!!
Unfortunately we don’t have budget to reimburse you the expenses made for the things that you are bringing, but try to be creative and funny !
We hardly wait for your national delicious food and drinks…
Youthpass
Please don’t forget to tell us before coming here if you want to receive a YOUTHPASS Certificate.
More about the Youthpass Certificate you can find at: https://www.youthpass.eu/en/
Cooking
Because our budget is really small compared with the prices on Reunion Island, we will have to cook for ourselves. So we will create a Cooking system: we will form daily cooking teams (of 3-4-5 people) that will rotate and cook for all the rest of the participants.
We've done this before and it turned out really well so we are absolutely sure it will work nicely this time too.
We, the organizing team, will be buying the products from the supermarket and the daily cooking teams are going to use the kitchen and the facilities of the accommodation(s), to cook everyday.
At the accommodation at the beach side, the participants in each Bungalow will have to cook for their own Bungalow. Each Bungalow has some kind of a small kitchen that can be used.
We're hardly waiting to see your cooking skills in action... or not ! :-))
Working Language
Working language of this youth exchange is English.
Your English doesn’t need to be perfect, neither is ours ! Better a little English then no any language communication at all.
It’s important to respect and understand each other !
Internet Connection
The internet connection at the accommodation places will be really poor. We will do our best, until the start of the mobility, depending on the costs, on our available budget and as well depending on the understanding of the owners of the accommodations, to establish decent internet connection at the accommodation places.
But anyway please bare in mind there are chances for the internet not to work well. Expect and be prepared to be mostly offline during this project. Taking into consideration also the topic of this project, we consider it actually as a positive thing.
Your mobile phone internet: Please check with your phone operator what and how much internet traffic you have included in your phone subscription, that can be used in Reunion Island ! Normally, now, in the EU, there is no more roaming but please check with your phone operator about the internet traffic on the Reunion Island !
General Schedule
Facebook group
We will create a Facebook Group with all the participants and all the organisation team.
With the help of this Facebook Group we will be able to communicate faster and better with you, before coming to Reunion Island for our project. So this is why is very important for you to share with us your Facebook account so that we can add you on the Facebook Group.
We will let you know when the time is right about the name and address of this Facebook Group.
