Living a self sufficient life in Southern Sweden! =)

Hein replied

Unfortunately, we were forced to send Auri and her partner away. In all the years we have been hosting, this has never happened to us before.

Both of them pointed out that their English is not that good and that they often use the translator to help them, but they stated that they have basic English or even intermediate English. That would not have been a problem for us, but unfortunately they cannot speak any English at all and could not understand even the simplest words and sentences.

This communication barrier led to difficulties even before they arrived when they sent us a message 2 days before the agreed date that they were on their way to us. However, we were not at home that weekend, so we tried to help and organize a place to stay for one night, and so we picked them up the next day as soon as we got home.

No two days are the same for us, the work varies and in the situation we are in right now it is simply impossible to do everything exclusively via translator. We are also renovating the house and because the construction site is being used with machines, we have to be able to give short instructions quickly and verbally and we have to be sure that they are understood.

In summer, the camper right by the lake is always the most popular accommodation of all. You have your own little private kingdom there even though the camper is in our garden and only 15 meters from the house.

I am sure that the two of them are very nice people and certainly good volunteers and I regret that we had no choice but to send them away. But this situation would never have arisen if they had been honest. If we had known that neither of them really understood a word of English, we would never have invited them to our place.