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That’s sad to say, but well, here my CAS journey comes to an end. I’m looking forward to my final exams and I’m sad, nostalgic and slightly terrified about finishing the program. What might be interesting is that I am planning to further pursue my voluntary work at the theatre, even with not having to go there because of the CAS requirements. It was fun to post here every once in a while. I’ll be missing it and was loving it, but I’m all open for the future! Here’s a silly happy picture from last week of me and my friend, CAS project companion, together on roller skates to be as active as the CAS would like us to be! Hope you never forget your best CAS rock star!

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CAS PROJECT:

My friend and I grouped as a two to create a yearbook album for our year. We decided to do it as we knew that every year one CAS project in our school is for the yearbook, and we thought it would be fun to make it together (this way we get to chose all the pictures and layouts and the social credit is there!! just joking). The designing it itself was fun and I enjoyed it, however, I learned that it is EXRTEMALLY HARD to get 60 people at least slightly organized. No matter whether it was filling out the questionnaire, taking the pictures or purchasing the books I had to send several messages and call people to finally make them collaborate with us. This really was no fun, there were individuals who were constantly ignoring us and waiting at least a few days past any deadline we had set which made the works much harder. Now that is finished, I am happy that we decided to make it, however I have to admit the experience was not the funniest. We already saw one physical album and I have to admit it looks very clear and pretty. I hope others will appreciate it too!! On the picture attached there are boxes of the books which already were delivered, but no spoilers!!

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March 2025

Creativity:

This month my brother and I decided to make the famous Dubai chocolate. I wanted to buy it (even though it’s expensive, the ingredients are pricy too) but my brother wanted really badly to make it at home so we agreed to have some fun. We got all the ingredients and did it from some TikTok recipe. The taste was good, but I think that it was too much chocolate itself in it. I think that when the chocolate is produced in a professional setup it is easier to make the chocolate layer much thinner which definitely makes the taste more pistachios as their taste is not covered by the dark chocolate. Though it was fun to try and to make it together.

Activity:

This month I decided to start exploring a new sport activity! Over a few days I started to watch some vlogs posted in YouTube by Claudia Sulewski (she shows her daily life, silly stuff, really) and I saw that she goes for wall climbing and this inspired me to start myself too. Since my uncle is very very much into climbing, mountains, landscapes etc I decided to ask him for some recommendations. He contacted me with his friend who owns a climbing company and is an instructor himself. I already attended 3 classes with him and I have to say that this is definitely something that I want to pursue. I have to admit it is much much harder than it looks on someone’s vlogs and requires a high level physical skills and abilities, but I think if I work hard I can become much better at this. As they say it is always the hardest to start.

Service:

This month I helped with the audience management on one show at the theater. The procedure was the same as always as I already experienced it before. What was different this time is that during the show I got to listen to audio description of the show as kind of a test, to later share my general reflections of it and thoughts on the quality of it. The experience was definitely interesting, but I have to admit that since the show was very colorful, loud and chaotic it was hard to me to follow the show with the reader in my ears all at once.

Secondly, I visited the theatre to attend performative reading event. It was a story about a polar shark which struggled because of unfriendly human behaviors. The main message of the show was to educate children about the climate and to emphasize the importance of taking care of it. Afterwards, there was a little talk to share our reflections about it too. I enjoyed the story and the performance itself, however, I believe that for children younger than 12 it would be extremely hard to follow the story, as the reading was quite chaotic. In performative reading the actors are reading the lines straight from the scripts and although they have their characters they have no additional costumes. In this story they were exchanging the lines very rapidly and since they had exactly the same suits I think for younger kids it would be very challenging to stay focused for the entire show.

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February 2025

Creativity:

Since the last time I described how we did have to say goodbye to our beloved oven, well the good news is that we got a new airfryer as a replacement. Now my brother’s and mine new hobby is to test new recipes in it. One of those were choc&chip cookies and I have to say they turned out very good (especially considering the fact that we took the recipe from TikTok). They slightly differ from the ones from the regular oven, as their texture is a bit different. I think that the best choc&chips are from oven but only if they are made in a perfect way. For a random recipe I think it might be easier to bake them in an airfryer if one wishes them to be crispy outside and soft inside.

Secondly, I made myself some grilled vegetables with couscous. I used to use rice all the time but lately I became a bit lazy in this matter and I started to hate the amount of time needed for the rice to get cooked. Therefore, I realized that I like couscous as well and it does not require cooking, but only to poor hot water onto it. I tried it and it was very tasty too, this will definitely become a part of my daily menu!

Activity:

As I mention a while ago I practiced some yoga at home and this month I decided to attend some classes in a real studio with yoga teachers to get some more precise instructions and tips than some YouTube guides could give me. I attended 3 classes, two of which at 7:00am before school, and even though it was hard to get up, the whole day felt much better after such practice in the morning. Additionally, I have to admit that the tutors gave me some pieces of advice haven’t known before.

This winter break my family and I went to the Austrian mountains to go skiing. We do it every day so about the skiing itself I don’t have much more reflections than what I wrote here a year ago. However, I enjoyed the time, it allowed me to get my thoughts out of the school and have some activity too. The only thing that sucked was that I got super ill right before the departure so I was deeply sick through half of the stay, but thankfully some medicines saved me!!

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January 2025

Creativity:

This month I baked a carrot cake, and this didn’t exactly ended as I expected to. I started the procedure with turning on the oven to heat up and then moved to start making the batter. As I was mixing it I started to sense a smell of some smoke or fire. I went straight to see what’s up with oven and when I opened it I figured it almost started to burn. There were no flames, however I could see it being orange hot because of its temperature and when I opened it the electricity went down in half of my kitchen. Since I couldn’t see any big flames I decided to wait a few seconds, the oven was making weird noises but I figured there will be no greater fire than this. I was home alone, therefore, I called my mom and she immediately came to help me out. In conclusion, the oven got broken, but the cake was great - I baked it at my neighbor’s.

Activity:

As the winter season has officially started my friend and I decided to go ice skating together. It was a nice Saturday morning and I was genuinely delighted as I finally could see my friend after a long time no see. I have to say the spot was quite crowded, however, it wasn’t too bad. Even the day was super sunny which in January isn’t too often of an event. It was fun!

Service:

With the Christmas and new year mess this month in the theatre we only had a few meetings for us, volunteers, but there were none bigger actions. To me, this was fun and valuable too as I believe spending time with my volunteer mates gives me a lot personally and allows to reflect on my interests, other environments than the one I encounter at school and it gives me a sense of purpose, that this is something I do for myself and not to pass academic requirement. On February there will be definitely something more!!

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December 2024:

Creativity:

1. Falafel - this year for the Christmas Eve dinner my mother and I prepared homemade falafels. The procedure of making the dough and cooking them in the deep oil is rather arduous but they tasted very good.

2. Cinnamon rolls - when I met with my best friend for a sleepover we have decided to make some homemade cinnamon rolls. As every time we make them we try to improve the recipe. This time we poured some cream onto it before baking to make them more moisturized and I have to admit it worked and they were really good.

Activity:

In December my mom, brother and I went to the mountains to ski for 3 days. Even though, I can ski since I remember the very first day of the season is always slightly challenging. Happily after a few runs I was all confident on the slope again and my family and I had so much fun. We had an amazing sunny weather for 3 days straight, the slope was perfectly prepared and it was not too crowded. Consequently, the skiing was very pleasant and I believe it helped me to relax and forget some of the school connected stress.

Service:

In December I attended two events as the Gulliver theatre volunteer. Firstly, I helped with the audience management during a Christmas show which was specifically organized for disabled children. I believe this event was enjoyable. Seeing how different families support and collaborate each other with the addition of smiles on faces of those children while receiving the presents made the event heartwarming. Secondly, in December Ochotnicy Warszawscy was organizing a gala to thank and celebrate all the voluntary works happening in the city. In the schedule there was an interesting interview with Małgorzata Szumowska, Agnieszka Kołodziejska, Katarzyna Dowbor and Michał Senk; Ruben’s concert, some food, cake, Photo Booth and other activities. The event was not a voluntary work itself, however, it was nice to share it with different people from all around the city who are all volunteers.

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November 2024

Creativity:

Gingerbreads - in November our class have decided to organize the Thanksgiving celebration with our previous homeroom teacher Mrs Ania. Therefore, I decided to bake my favorite gingerbread cookies which I know that my whole class and Mrs Ania really like (as I make them every year). Even though, I usually liked them to have different shapes and sizes, this time I made them all circles, and I have to say I saved me a lot of time. On top there was a sugar icing and sprinkles which were either red, blue or both to remind of the USA flag, as thanksgiving is their holiday.

Activity:

This month I did a lot of yoga routines from YouTube as due to the school workload I didn’t have much time to do something more adventurous. I have to say that those practices were very pleasant, comforting, relaxing, and helped me to feel less pain in my body. In addition, being regular introduced some routine to my daily life which I think brought me the feeling of control of it and peace.

Service:

This month I spent a lot of time doing service, as in the Gulliver theatre there were many events happening.

Firstly, one day we volunteers were invited to drive in an old tram around the Warsaw to share our work experience with other passengers. The tram was beautiful, and it all seemed to be perfect, however, unexpectedly it has broken down after only one out of the three planned runs. It has ended earlier than we wanted it to (which was initially slightly stressful), but we decided to go all to the coffee shop that was nearby. I have to admit that although it wasn’t what was planned I think that it made our voluntary team closer and allowed us to have a bit of integration.

Secondly, one day there was an event that was closing a project where three groups of children from different schools in Warsaw were creating their own shows under control of different theatre workers. I was supposed to help with the management of the audience, therefore, I was showing parents where they can leave their clothes, where the bathroom is and answer their questions. I think the whole event and the children were all cute and very emotional, however, it was quite chaotic and noisy so I came home pretty tired.

Thirdly, there was a show created by a group of elderly people were I had similar job as during the earlier described one + I could see a part of the final rehearsal of the show were I had a file folder to keep and eye on and during the performance I was supposed to look after the camera so no one don’t break it. The event was very pleasant and it was very heartwarming to see the close relationships the elderlies actors have with their coming families.

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October 2024:

Creativity:

Since it is the middle of the beautiful autumn season I decided to bake a carrot cake. Firstly, I spend some time looking for a great recipe as I had a precise vision of how I’d like my cake to be: not heavy, but also not entirely fluffy. Finally in order to reach that I used a recipe from Kwestia Smaku for batter, and added spices with accordance to my friend’s recipe. I have to admit it I reached what I wanted, and the cake was perfect.

Activity:

This month I spend a weekend hiking. My friend Hania, my mom and I went to Czerwone Wierchy and hiked through them almost the entire day. The trip was pleasant, however the beginning of the trail was very steep. In the morning the weather was gloomy and rainy, however, once we reached the 1st peak it became sunny and enjoyable. The little struggle we had was a very strong wind at the top which made hiking challenging, and the last 1,5h of the trail it was horribly raining. Nevertheless, the trip was very fun, we were prepared well so we didn’t have to worry a lot.

Additionally, this month I did twice a yoga session at home. I used to be very stretched when I was dancing regularly, however, since I stopped it is not so good anymore. Therefore, I decided to practice yoga regularly, and I like it by now.

Service:

This month I went to the theatre where I am volunteer in 3 times. Two of those were events just for the volunteers to get to know each other. The third one was a bit more special. On Saturday in the theatre there were two shows, one for deaf people, and one for blind people, and I was asked to come and help staff with the organization. This experience was very interesting to me as I saw even entire deaf families having conversations in the sign language. This made me want to get to know at least the most basic signs. An interesting way to communicate with the deaf people was that I was given a notebook to exchange the questions and answers with them.

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September 2024:

Creativity

This month I tested a recipe I wanted to try for a long time. It was an upside down cake with bananas on top. What makes this cake special is that first you put the caramel at the bottom, then pieces of sliced banana, and the batter at the end. After baking you have to flip the cake upside down. The first cake turned out to be good, however, I heated a caramel a bit too long, so it wasn’t the most tasty and got a bit dark. Therefore, in order to improve the recipe I tried to bake it once again a week later and it turned out to be better.

Activity

For activity, this month I went 3 times swimming. Last year in winter I dropped my swimming trainings that I have used to go for 10 years, and now I’m trying to still swim regularly but without any coach or scheduled trainings because this is what started to terrify me and what made me drop swimming last year. Now I’m my coach, I am still hard on myself, however, when I like the idea that this is me who tell me how much and with what speed to swim, and not someone else. I also tarted to go swimming in the morning when I start classes at 10:20am when there are fewer people, and it helps me to be less overstimulated after the training than I used to be when I was taking part in trainings with 18 other people.

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June 2024:

Creativity:

This month I baked a cake with all the seasonal fruit on top. This is a cake that I do every year so I didn’t struggle a lot, however, what I always challenge with is that the sides of the cake tend to flow down, which I couldn’t manage to avoid this time as well.

Another thing I baked were my own version of Polish cookies delicje. This year was our last with our best favorite homeroom teacher Ms Ania and I wanted to do something for her as a gift at the end. One fact I remembered about her was that her favorite delicje cookies were the blueberry ones with white chocolate, that are no longer available. Thus, I decided to use my skills and try to recreate them. This journey had so many steps and was quite challenging, and at some point also frustrating, as cutting perfect circles from jelly was super annoying. Nevertheless, the taste turned out to be awesome, and Ms Ania was very happy, which made me even happier.

Activity:

This month I went for swimming twice. I tried two, new for me, swimming pools in Warsaw, and even though the swimming by itself self was rather okay, I hated both of the spots. Both of the swimming pools were packed, therefore, swimming in a 25m long pool with 10 other people was not the most comfortable experience of my life.

Service:

This month for service I went to my voluntary work in the theatre and it was very fun. As the summer was close and there weren’t many other people our volunteering leader took one other girl and me to show us the changing rooms and how the stage looks from the back.

The other day I went to the Gulliver theater again, and me and other volunteers helped with an outdoor game which was organized in the area of the theater. Our role was to show kids coming how to play in three different games, and once they finish them giving them stamps so they can go to the next game point. This experience was fun as well, but I think that there were to many volunteers comparing to the number of players coming as there were abundant people who didn’t have to do anything.

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CAS May 2024

Creativity:

Since the Orthodox Easter which is the one that my grandmother celebrates is on May, this month I baked two cakes. The first one is a basic Easter cake, lemon taste with sugar icing. I did it several times so it wasn’t very challenging for me. However, I remember that last time I forgot to add baking powder, and this time I remembered about it. The second cake is a chocolate-caramel cake. It was a good, easy recipe that always work out so I didn’t have any problems with it and it tasted very good.

Activity:

In the previous years I used to swim a lot, however around the winter break I had decided that I don’t want to do this anymore. Surprisingly, this month I started to miss it, therefore I went back to training. The difference is that now I train on my own, and not with a coach. It is a difference for me, but I like this lack of pressure that I used to feel before.

Service:

For service this month I went again to the Gulliver theatre. This time we were creating a poster about diversity. Later on we had a little workshop with Amadeusz who showed us how the relativity of perceived photos. There was a group assignment of taking photos in the theatre environment that in our opinion look interesting. In the end we spend some time on preparing the theatre for the museum night. This was a very enjoyable time, and I really like the society we create there.

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April 2024

Creativity:

For creativity I baked my favorite peanut butter&white chocolate chip cookies. I made them a few times before, but making them is always a bit of surprise for me. As I bake a lot I usually don’t pay that close attention to the details of the amount of ingredients, and in those cookies those details play a huge role. However, they turned out to be very good, and i think that they’ve been the best one so far.

Activity:

This month, we went with my family to Dolny Śląsk. We went for a hike in Góry Stołowe to Szczeliniec and to Czaszka rock. It was very pretty, and the hike was enjoyable, I was extremely happy that it is finally warm and sunny.

Service:

This month I was invited from my voluntary work in the Gulliver theatre to go see „Pączek i Pompon” play. I was to review it, tell what I liked, what I didn’t, and whether I consider it appropriate for children. I am a great fan of theatre, and I hope to expand my stage management and technical theatre knowledge in the future, thus, it was very interesting experience for me. This was my first time to be in the theatre and actually had to think about the technicals of the show, and writing the review. This showed me that this voluntary work is beneficial for my self improvement and I really enjoy it.

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March 2024:

Creativity:

March was the Easter month this year so I obviously baked the Easter pie that I always bake. I did it around 5 times but this year I somehow wanted to change the recipe a bit. I added melted chocolate. The one thing I a bit did wrong is that I forgot about adding baking powder. I was scared that it won’t rise in the oven but happily everything went well.

Activity:

This month, we went for another Kółko Taternika trip and I honestly very much enjoyed it. We went for a 9h trip and hiked on a Grześ Peak through dolina Chochołowska. The hike was quite enjoyable as I really like all the people that came with us and I love mountains. However, the only thing that I didn’t like the most as the fact that it was raining for at least a half of the hike so everything was totally wet. Also the last bit of a trail, just before the trail turned out to be very challenging for me. I was even close to just give up, but finally I did it and was quite proud of it.

Two weeks later, I went with my family to mountains again. I always wanted to hike on Babia Góra so this time we finally went there. The whole hike was very enjoyable. The only danger we faced was an extremely strong wind.

Service:

This month I find a new voluntary work in the Gulliver theater. I spent there a few hours on one Saturday and it was really great. The group was made of children, their parents and some other adults/teenagers. We were playing in some kind of integrative games, including drawing, talking and other activities. I chose this place because I am a huge fan of theater and my dream was to see more of a background of it. I am happy that I managed to find a voluntary work in a place that interests me and going there definitely helps me to develop myself and new skills.

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CAS MARCH 2024:

Sport:

Since September I’ve had my new dance classes every Saturday. This month I also had them, but what is more exciting we had our first competition! In primary school I also used to dance a different type of dance and on a much higher level so I used to be very stressed during performances, because the winning part was very important. Now I am at the beginner level of a commercial dance and we had only show (without like a real competition) and I really enjoyed that without the pressure that I used to feel in primary school I wasn’t stressed at all and I had so much fun! On the one hand, the last trainings before the show were very tough and tiring, but on the other I think that it was worth it and I spend a great time.

Creativity:

Since I remember my family, friends and I have been going for skiing every year. Our favorite dish that we always order in the slope restaurant is a German/Austrian meal called Germknödel. It is a kind of a dumpling filled with plum jam and cover with vanilla sauce, icing sugar and poppy seeds. We very much like it so we decided to recreate it in Warsaw, as it is not available in any restaurant here. It turned out to be really great, however my friends and I changed the recipe a bit. We don’t like poppy seeds, and my friend is not a fan of plum jam so we didn’t use them. We didn’t use the poppy seeds and the plum jam we replaced with a raspberry one.

cupcakes:

after we came back from Austria, my brother brought a raspberry syrup to Poland. It reminded me of the cupcakes that I used to make with my mom when I was a little girl. Therefore, I baked regular vanilla cupcakes covered with icing mixed with raspberry syrup and with pearls sprinkles. They turned out to be very great and when I first tasted them I felt exactly the same way I felt 12 years ago. It was a lovely feeling.

Focaccia:

During my winter break I made my first tomato cream soup and I love to eat it with focaccia. Therefore, I started my journey with looking for a perfect focaccia recipe. My first to focaccias turned really great but this new recipe sadly didn’t work as I wanted it to. The focaccia was supposed to have many bubbles and be crispy. I had to knead the dough 4 times every 30 minutes, and then leave it overnight. Sadly the dough stopped rising and after baking it had no bubbles and was completely flat. Thus, now I will look for a new better recipe that will make my focaccia perfect.

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January 2024

Tomato cream soup:

Next to our school there is a great restaurant called „Heritage”. They sell an amazing tomato cream soup with focaccia. The only problem is that it’s hard to get it during lunch break (30 minutes) and I very much hate being late for classes. Therefore, I decided to make my own. The recipe I found included fresh tomatoes, but unfortunately we are far from the tomatoes season, so I used the can ones. Another challenge I have met was glazing the onion, it was noisy and during the process I felt quite not safe. Nevertheless, the soup tasted really great.

Cinnamon rolls

I am a huge fan of cinnamon rolls and I like to experiment with them, so this time I decided to make tiny little ones. They turned out really great. They were small so I could eat them for a longer time, as I had more of them. The only thing I would improve for the next time is adding more butter, as I didn’t predict that smaller rolls will be drier than the big ones that are baked combined with each other.

Pancakes:

I also made the same recipe for pancakes twice. I saw this on Pinterest, it looked extremely easy, fast, and healthy so I decided to try it. At first time I didn’t have the oat milk (which was used in the initial recipe) so I used the cow one and the taste was great. The second time I wanted to actually test the real recipe as it is so I used the oat one and I enjoyed the taste as well, but I in fact hate the taste of oats so the fact that I was able to sense the taste of it was not very satisfying (but it was quite good as well).

Activity:

Skiing:

During the winter break my parents, my and my parents friends and I went to Austrian mountains for skiing. We spent there a week and it was a very well spent time. The first 3 days were amazing, the weather was awesome. Sadly, we also had 2 days when the weather was horrible, it was extremely cold, windy and gloomy, and it was snowing so hard over nights. Therefore, at some point skiing became quite challenging as the blue and red slopes were covered with snowdrifts and the black ones were covered with ice. Nevertheless, the trip was still great.

** this month I didn’t do any service as I spent so much time on it last month

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December 2023:

Creativity: since December is Christmas season I had to make my favorite gingerbread cookies. Every year I make them in exactly the same way, but this year was a bit more challenging because there were so many places that I wanted/needed to bring (Christmas lesson on English, our class Christmas gathering, for my family, for my brothers class Christmas gathering, and for some of my parents friends) them so I just had to make so many of them.

Activity: this month, during Christmas break my family and I went to polish mountains for the first skiing this year. I’ve been skiing every year since I was 3 years old but the first day of the season is always challenging for me. We were there for 5 days, 3 days of skiing, and I can say that the first day was as every year a bit challenging for me, but with every next day it was only better and better.

Service: as service I helped on water polo swimming competition. I’ve been training swimming for 11 years and my current coach decided to organize a competition in water polo for kids this year. His aim was to make water polo more popular than it is now, but he couldn’t afford to employ profesional judges (other coaches from my club were judging) and other people who would help with the organization of the event. Therefore, he needed to find some volunteers. Hania and I were responsible for writing the records from each of the matches. At the beginning it was quite stressful because we had to find the name of each team on a long list, and than write down every goal. What was really hard that we had to write the number of the player who scored the goal which was quite a struggle because they were moving so fast in the water and the numbers they had on cups were so small. Later, when we knew more precisely what to do it was more fun, and finally I enjoyed the event.

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November 2023:

Creativity: this month I baked a banana bread. I baked it many times in my life, but actually this time I think that I added to much of baking powder, because it was much more fluffy and aerated than usually. Unfortunately, I like when the banana bread is heavier, so that’s definitely a thing to improve next time.

Activity: at the beginning of this month a group from my school and I went to Male Ciche for a weekend trip. On Saturday we went for a few hours hike to Rusinowa polana and Gęsia Szyja, then walked through Morskie Oko to the Schronisko w Dolinie Roztoki. I really enjoyed the hike, but unfortunately the weather wasn’t the best, and a half of our trip it was snowing. On the one hand the snow was so beautiful, but on the other it was really cold at some point.

Service: this month I visited the Koci Azyl in Konstancin. It was quite nice, I petted some cats and I was playing with them. The only problem was that I came only 1,5h before the azyl closes so there wasn’t many people, and it was quite stressful for me. It was so quiet there and except me, there were like 3 other people so I felt a bit watched (but actually I don’t know why and I think it was much more in my head than in reality). Next time I will try to be there earlier so there will be more people and I will feel more comfortable.