Our Talents - Our Future organises regular educational excursions and an annual summer camp for its pupils.
Joint Summer Camp in Zatoka by the Black Sea with tour of Odessa (July 2015).
The highlight of the excursions in 2015 was the 3-day joint summer camp that we organised for our groups from Kiev and Slovyansk in Zatoka near Odessa in July. For almost all of us, this was the first visit to this part of Ukraine. The weather was very sunny, the sea clean and warm enough – so no prizes for guessing what the most popular activity was among our pupils … Neither algae nor small, innocuous jelly fish could spoil the pleasure of bathing in the sea! After the first day at the beach, we held a quick vote on whether to organise a visit to the well-known castle a Belgorod-Dnestrovsky (about 30 km from where we were based), but we could not find anyone amongst us who wanted to exchange the beach for that excursion…
Bathing was not the only activity, however. The pupils had quickly formed mixed teams from the Slovyansk and Kyiv groups for some fast-action badminton and pioneer ball on a pitch at the edge of the beach. The pupils also organised various acting games with great success. One evening, we organised a picnic on the beach and on the last one, we all joined in singing Ukrainian songs. On that occasion, if not before, it became very clear, that we had more than scientific, mathematical and linguistic talent in our programme…!
It was a long journey for our Slovyansk group (up to 17 hours overnight in each direction, compared to only about 9 hours during daytime for the Kyiv group), but the memories of the sea, the sun, the joint activities and the newly made friendships made it worthwhile!
On our last day, the Kyiv group had the opportunity to take a very brief guided tour through Odessa, the city that is also known as the "capital of humour". We passed the Pryvoz market and then walked along Derybasovskaya street.
Day Excursions
In addiion to the summer camp, we made the following day excursions in 2015:
- Holosiivsky Park, Kiev
- New Botanic Garden, Kiev
- Feofania near Kiev
- Arsenal of Ideas exhibition, Kiev
Photos of these excursions can be viewed under the menu option "Gallery".