Brilliant experience of teaching, learning and immersing yourself in another culture

I volunteered at the Excellence Center for one week in August 2019.
My host mom was a lovely Sudanese woman who went to great lengths to make me feel welcome. She even invited me along to the Mosque, where she normally worked and where the kids from the neighborhood had their classes, and afterwards to their barbeque later that evening.

As for my daily routine, every day I would walk to the center, the view of the Saale river on my right. When there, I would help preparing breakfast and then enjoy it with all the other volunteers, before our day started.
Normally, I would teach one class to early teenagers, or two at most. So, I had a lot of free time to prepare for my classes and I used to spend the day looking up materials and activities with my computer.
My students were generally from Syria or Egypt and had been living in Germany for a few years, so their command of German was much better than their English. Sometimes the challenge, especially with beginners, was that they were often tempted to switch to German or Arabic, but with gestures, pictures and a lot of drawing on the board we were always able to communicate and learn new vocabulary.

I also had a total of 3 hours of Arabic classes taught by native speakers. Afterwards, I was able to say common greetings, understand the numbers and the days of the week and to tell simple things about daily activities such as working, eating and sleeping. The nicest part about the Arabic class was that my teacher would go get any other native speakers who was hanging at the center, so I could practice more and make sure I would be understood.

At the center, there's always a team leader in charge of organising activities for the group and ensuring everyone is helping out with the daily chores. All volunteers are also asked to give a presentation about their country and everyone is welcome to attend. At the end of the working week, there's usually a special activity planned. During my stay, we went for a barbecue at Peißniz, a park closeby where volunteers, students and friends were all invited to have dinner together.
In conclusion, my stay in Halle was brilliant. I really enjoyed teaching English and I found friendly people from all over the world at the center. I really recommend everyone to come and spend some time here, but for at least two weeks if you can.