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We are almost at the end of our time in Colentum, so that’s why I want to tell you about both progresses and the beautiful times that we spent together here.
Argonauta supported volunteers to find the history on Gradina Hill for years. Theirs and their volunteers’ hard work started to take shape finally. So what did we do together? Sımply, 5 days of the week we were digingg somewhere, cleaning the bushes, carring the stones and soil and rebuilding the walls. And for sure, we protected both animals and the environment while we were working. These were the work sides of Colentum but on the other hand we were looking for remains, some historical pieces and maybe treasure :) Also, we spent time together, gained so many friends, sang and danced together. Of course, there were unforgettable excitements, for instance, when we were looking for the pieces that comes out from the soil even if they were just stone pieces :)
In the end, I just want to say that this
1 month was amazing, the workshops exactly in the middle of the
history, all volunteers, Argonauta and for sure Croatia with the
breathtaking nature.

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Aaaand BAM, we are here! Poland, Bulgaria, Italy, Spain and Turkey - we are the new team of SUPER volunteers. We are totally excited to face the Dry Stone Wall Extravaganza Project ! Maybe stones were not what we were dreaming about before coming here, but Murter and Argonauta is what we fell in love with! First and foremost, let me introduce you our amazing international family:
Natasha (lopata*) POLAND


Altuğ (he is not snoring) TURKEY

Giovanni (the Italian who wants to be Vegetarian) ITALY

Valentina (the ˝hidden lemon˝, the ˝still water˝, but all in brackets) ITALY

Dilek (BUT first! let us take a selfie) TURKEY

Dimitar (Dimitko) BULGARIA

Alex (you will always find her on the beach) BULGARIA

Iskra (always deserves a punishment) BULGARIA

Jose (Hose with *J ! ) SPAIN

Else (never wants to talk) SPAIN

Fulvio ( only seems crazy) ITALY

Magda ( the too-much-HARDworker ) POLAND

Xurxo SPAIN and Marchin POLAND enjoy .. jaja

In every process that you start (even in the smallest one) which aims to achieve something, to build something, is better if you have someone next to you that is going on the same direction and is willing to help you and share the efforts in the name of the final successful result. In other words, the game of thrones will be won by the army who had gathered the biggest number of partner-armies!
But enough for Game Of Thrones, Quint is going to be much more glorious than the Dragon Queen when all this story with the Management Plan achieves its happy end! Now about our goal: the idea for the Archaeological Research Center-a place, which will be a meeting point for science, education and tourism, needs for its realization not only good ideas but a food for these ideas-proffesionalists to work on the implementation of the project and of course, fundings. To receive these essential things Argonauta’s team tries to cooperate on many levels: they are applying constantly for EU funds, but also they are trying to establish a strong partnership with the local municipality and the Tourist Board of Murter-Kornati community. The two organisations, Argonauta and the Tourist Board, and the municipality of Murter work together and support each other in their projects and activities in the name of a bigger efficiency and better quality of education, sustainable development and cultural tourism on Murter Island.
We, the precious volunteers, also had the opportunity to meet the partners of our organisation, to ask them questions and to share opinions with them. Our first important meeting was with the mayor of Murter-Ivan Božikov. On first hand he explained us the current projects that the municipality is involved in: the building of a new kinder garden and the creating of a canalization system (Colentum has older canalization system than Murter, hohoho, archaeological joke). Then he shared his opinion about our project and the most important thing is that he considered the idea for recreating the ancient road of Colentum as a prioritet for the culture of Murter, so who knows, by the end of the summer we are going to have an old-new road on Gradina Hill. :)
Some time after we met the mayor, we had a presentation of the activities and a lecture from the director of the tourist board of Murter-Kornati community-Šime Ježina. Basically he pointed the main issues of the local tourism and explained about the efforts that have been made during the years for changing the current situation. In his opinion the main problem of the develepment of local tourism is the abscence of a sustainable strategy for the future plus the total neglection of the cultural tourism in the region. By all the activities connected with Colentum that Argonauta is doing actually local history and culture are getting more and more vivid and known by the local people and the tourists. Both Tourist Board and Argonauta meet same problem and needs according to their goals so they try to stick together in the name of the common good final results.
Even if you make the slowest and the smallest steps directed to your aim be sure that with a true friend you will reach it in the end. :)…and Argonauta is on the right direction :)

Some weeks ago we had the possibility to visit the Regional Museum of Sibenik. When you first see the outside appearance of the museum you are immediately fascinated by the authentic image of the building and this is not accidentaly: the museum nowadays occupies King’s Palace originally built in 13-14th century. But with your first step inside the museum you are again amazed but this time from the modern interior design. It is not only following the newest tendencies in museum interior design, but also is in a harmony with the local ethno-cultural traditions.
The exhibitions are mixture of archaeological and ethnographical artefacts and there is shown the history of the region from the prehistory times until the modern times. From Danilo culture to Faust Vrančić: you can examine neolithic zoomorphic figures (basically they look like sweet clay-made made animals without heads…or better: vases with legs) meanwhile you will hear the story of Mr. Faust Vrancic, who invented a new type of parachutte!



European Voluntary Service Program involves a huge diversity of topics and activities so basically there is something for everybody. From social work till taking care of baby bears and organising a work process in office-this is your choice. But there are also these projects that can combine very different activities and this is the thing that makes them a bit more special. Our project is exactly this mixture of actions-doing some scientific work on the archaeological site, create workshops, organising events, writing a management plan. It is not only about the cultural herritage’s socialization and preservation, but also about education and involving the local community into voluntary actions. A multilayer process. The best thing is that as long as we are five of us, very different personalities with even much more different interests, we are able, everyone of us, to find her or his own “layer” in this project. :)
You already know the story of Yordanka. Today is the time of Mathi and Alessandro. Mathi, a sweet blonde (very!) girl from North France, and Alessandro-sweet, but not blonde and all blue-eyed boy from North Italy are the new characters. Mathi has graduated recently from Communications, and I would say she has learned her lessons vey good-she has this unique sense of diplomacy and rationalism. So far she created a radio show program that is going to present our project and she, Alessandro and Anastasia (about this greek miracle: later on) wrote an article about us for the local newspaper-and beleive me, this girl knows how to do it, dude! When you hear the name of Alessandro you should think of nothing but gentleness. Similar to Mathi, he also has this diplomatical skills, but he developed them in a bit different way: graduated from International Relations, he made internships in Volgorod’s (Russia) as well as in Teheran’s Italian embacies’s. Phew, this guy has an experience, doesn’t he? :) From the beginning of our project untill now Mathi and Alessandro are working on the creating of the Management Plan of Colentum.
Management Plan maybe at first sounds a little bit scary, but actually it is the most important document, concerning Colentum Site. This document will allow our organisation Argonauta to apply for fundings from the European Union as well as from the Ministry of Culture and local municipality. Creating of the Management Plan requires a lot of discussing plus a quite hard and sometimes boring work in the office space in front of the computer. But the thing is that now maybe is a boring-office-work but tomorrow will be an Archaeological Research Centre on the Gradina Hill-the dream of Argonauta’s members. So as you can see in the end Mathi and Alessandro are appeared to be builders of this huge dream. Even by sitting in the office you can make a change, you should be just patient and a keeper-keeper of beleif that dreams and reality are one and the same thing, the only thing you need is action. :)
Bok!




Once upon a time there was a sweet, smiley, bulgarian girl named Yordanka. No, she was not a princess and she didn’t wear a diamond crown, but she had something much more precious-she brought all the colours in her heart. She was this little fairy that used to turn everything grey and sad into a shiny rainbow. I will tell you a little secret: sometimes even fairies are sad and bored and are losing there special powers, but not Yordanka! Once she finds in herself even a little piece of a grumpy mood a small unicorn rises out of her smile and turns everything into colours and smiles.
The End.
…into the Croatian culture, yes we do! Not only the Croatian language lessons are included in the “extra-knowledge-package” that is provided for us, the volunteers with capital “V” almost sounds like V. I. P., doesn’t it? :) Thanks to our friend Lovro we had the chance to hear a big variety of presentations aimed to introduce us to the depths of Croatian culture. Now we know that in Dalmatia for example we can have for lunch black risoto (my favourite) and in Slavonia the so called "Čobanac". Lovro showed us a huge diversity of music: one of the most impressive-TwoCellos-simply genious! We know some funny facts also-vallium was invented in Croatia, maybe that’s why some of the Croatians are so calm and relaxed, hmmm… (joke time!) :) Very impressive and inspirational is the tradition of the croatian people to produce their own food, drinks and home-made souvenirs. You can try in Croatia not only one of the best olive oils in the world, but also a pumpkin oil, which, I promise you, deserves tasting especially as a ingredient in a fresh salad combined with a glass of soft red home-made wine. :) Oh, and I was about to forget, the islands… Those islands! Lovro has graduated from Geography so now we know some secret places to explore. Don’t be jelous, be a volunteer and for sure whenever you come to Murter don’t hesitate-knock on the door of Argonauta and there always will be hidden at least one small beautiful story about Croatia behind the door. We are waiting for you!

…lupi dlanom ti o dlan! Kad si sretan i kad želiš s drugim dijelit sreću svu
Kad si sretan lupi dlanom ti o dlan!“ Tako, dobro!
Every EVS volunteer has the unique chance to recieve free language lessons in the language of the hosting country. This is one of the best aspects of the voluntary service-no matter if you are in Spain, Norwey, Croatia you as a volunteer always have a period in which you are taught in the language of the certain country for free. Can you imagine-you go abroad somewhere and you are not only practising already known foreign languages, but also after the end of the voluntary period you are enriched with some knowledge about a totally new language. :) There is another possible situation as well: if you can speak already this language you can help to the other volunteers to learn it. Actually, this is what happened with our friend Dominika: coming from Poland and graduated from Croatian philology plus being of a Croatian descent, she organized for us a language course and I would say, quite funny, jako dobro, mi smo vrlo sretani! As long as we are coming from countries belonging to different language groups: Greek, Roman and Slavic, for every one of us the difficulty of the lessons is different: some of us can hardly pronounce ”č", “ć” and “š”, others bought “Ottelo” in Croatian, but this is another stroy. So far the word “Bok!” has obsessed everyone’s daily life and with Otelo or without him we are everytime able to say: “Jedna Žuja!"

