Summer Internship in Slovakia

Daniel Sandoz, a junior government major who transferred to Evangel in fall 2008, spent the summer in Slovakia in an internship for U.S. Army cadets. Through this program, 15 cadets participated in military training alongside Slovakian cadets. This program aims at developing culturally aware Army cadets.

Sandoz valued being part of this cross-cultural experience and was able to visit numerous World War II battlefields and castles of the region.

“I learned to appreciate things we take for granted here,” Sandoz said. He explained that many Americans earn better wages than Slovakian people, but their food and fuel costs are much higher.

Although he hadn’t started taking classes yet, Sandoz was surprised to learn that Evangel would give him course credit for participating in this program. When Sandoz graduates, he will be commissioned as a second lieutenant in the U.S. Army.

photos submitted by Daniel Sandoz

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Military training base near Lesk

Marksmanship training in Lesk

A competition in which cadets wear gas masks in a simulated chemical environment

Visiting a Roma village

In this impoverished community, the army has built schools and hired teachers.

Children of the Roma village gathered as cadets came to visit the school.

Home in the Roma village

Some Roma people live in government-built apartments. These apartments are primitive with no running water and no electricity; they are heated with wood stoves.

One cadet teaches a girl how her camera works.

Some homes are built on a collapsing coal mine.

The Slovak government built new homes for the people to get out of the dangerous, collapsing buildings, but many of these people are unwilling to leave.

Sandoz described this village as “crossing the line from Europe to a third-world country.”

Pentecostal missionaries have been working with people in this area, teaching them how to budget money and other skills.

Visiting a Russian/German battlefield at the Dukla Pass Memorial. Sandoz said it was interesting to see the history of World War II from an eastern front as it would be viewed from the former Soviet perspective.

Sandoz said that Devín Castle was a pivotal point in WWII for defending the Danube River on the Austrian/Hungarian borders.

Air Force Base at Zvolen. The cadets looked at Albatross and MiG-29 fighter jets and also had the opportunity to operate flight simulators.

View from the military academy

Sandoz climbed Mt. Krivá.

Mt. Krivá

Near a cave cadets visited

18th Century living history museum

Catholic church in Liptov Mikuláš

Spiš Castle

Catholic seminary

Russian Orthodox church near Polish border

Overlooking Dukla Pass battlefield

Historic site with reconstructed bunkers that the Russians built

At the Valley of Death, not a single tank from a Russian battalion made it through the battlefield. The disabled tanks shown have been in this location since World War II.

City square at Bardejov

Catholic church on the edge of the square

City walls around the old city of Bardejov

Orthodox church in Bardejov

Castle on the roadside

Sandoz said it seemed like they drove by a castle every 10 miles.

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