An introduction

My name is Vicky, and I am studying BA Russian Studies. This year is my third year, and therefore is my compulsory year abroad. I will be spending six months in Russia.

For the first half of the six months, I will be volunteering for three months in a village called Orion, which is about an hour and a half’s drive away from Moscow. I will be teaching English, milking goats, and making myself useful, with my friend Lois who is also studying Russian.

I had never heard of Orion, or its sister village Kitezh, until Lois mentioned it to me, and, as I wanted to do some volunteering on my year abroad, and because she was so enthusiastic about it, I decided that this was the place for me. Both of these villages take orphans from awful backgrounds and give them a new life, with foster families, good education, and therapy. Although I know that this will be a challenge, having worked with AIDS orphans three years ago in Namibia (near Windhoek), I am looking forward to it, although this will be the longest time I have ever been outside of the UK!

I was studying Russian and Chinese Studies Joint Honours at the start of this year, but have since dropped Chinese. I was supposed to be going to study Mandarin at my university’s campus in China, but now I am looking for somewhere in Russia to spend three months.

One of my life goals is to visit every continent, and so far I have visited just Europe and Africa. As I thought I would be studying in China, I thought I could tick off Asia, but this is not possible at the moment so I’ll just have to wait and see what happens…!

Thanks for reading.