Forty young people who left the country to study or work abroad spent last weekend covering walls with sticky notes, sketching ideas on laptops and swapping phone numbers in a bright community center in a large port city across the sea. The goal of the workshop, organized by a volunteer association of emigrants, was simple: no one should feel alone after moving away from home.
Participants, aged between 18 and 30, worked in small groups on problems they had faced themselves, from finding a flat and opening a bank account to coping with homesickness in the first winter.
From sticky notes to a network
By Sunday afternoon, the groups had produced a shared online guide for newcomers, a mentoring scheme that pairs new arrivals with people who have lived abroad for several years, and a monthly online evening of conversation in the mother tongue for children of emigrant families.
When I arrived, I spent three months not knowing who to ask about anything. If this had existed, I would have saved a lot of time and a lot of tears.
Ana Petrović, 24, nurse and workshop volunteer
The association estimates that several thousand young people from the country live in the city, many of them from the Valley Region and the Northern Region. Most left in the past decade for university places or jobs in health care, construction and technology.
Keeping ties with home
Organizers say the workshop is also about keeping a door open. Several participants said they would consider returning if they could find work that matched their qualifications.
“We do not tell anyone to come back or to stay away,” said coordinator Daniel Kovač. “We want them to know their options, and to know that there is a community around them wherever they are.”
The ministry responsible for citizens abroad contributed a small grant to cover the room and travel costs for students. A consular official attended the closing session and promised to help with document questions that came up during the weekend.
Next stop
The association plans to hold similar workshops in two more cities next year and to open the mentoring scheme to young people who are still only planning to move. Applications for mentors open this month.
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