Borja sta per concludere il suo progetto ESC di 6 mesi presso il centro diurno Auxilium. Ha raccontato qui le sue impressioni ed emozioni durante questo affascinante percorso!

Ciao! My name is Borja and I come from Galicia (north of Spain) 

I am 25 and I studied Social Work degree. For 6 months I have been volunteering in Altamura (Italy) thanks to Associazione Link APS, ESC and Fundación Paideia Galiza. The centre where I volunteered was the Auxilium day centre in Altamura (Italy), a therapeutic-rehabilitative centre associated with the network of services in the field of psychiatry of the ASL BA territory.  My experience was very good! My project consisted of carrying out all kinds of activities with the users of the centre. My favourite activities have been those related to sport, but thanks to other types of activities (tourist, educational, therapeutic...) I have managed to learn a lot of things about everything related to mental health. In the centre all the workers have welcomed me as one of them from the very first moment and I have felt at home. The users have treated me like a friend and have taught me to see life from a different point of view... and they have also taught me Italian! hahaha 

Thanks to this project I have fulfilled all the objectives I had before landing in Italy: to help make mental health more visible and train myself in this field, to live in another country and get to know its culture and language, and finally, to meet people from other cultures and learn to live with them. The adaptation to the city has been quite good, although it's true that it's too quiet... I've missed the Spanish life hahaha. This experience has also helped me to know myself better and to know what I want to do with my life in the future. Finally, I would like to thank all those who have made this project possible and I would like to leave a sentence about mental health as a farewell: Mental health is as important as physical health. Don't neglect it. Seek help when you need it. You deserve to feel good inside and out.