What to expect
Everything you need to know before we spend three weeks together in Warsaw.
You're in. Here's what that means.
This guide is the practical companion to the Pre-Fellowship Pack. The pack covers what to read and who's in your cohort; this guide tells you what to pack, how we'll live and work together, and what we expect from you and what you can expect from us.
This program is intense by design, and it's a pilot. Both of those facts shape everything below. Reading this guide properly might save you (and us) from some surprises in week one.
What to bring
- Comfortable clothes for long working days. Nobody will judge your hoodie.
- Something smart-casual for the CARE Conference week. The conference dress code is casual, but you may want a step up for networking and evening events.
- Sportswear and swimming clothes, we've planned some extra activities.
- Your laptop. You'll use it daily for project work.
Warsaw in September
Expect warm-ish days and noticeably cooler evenings: roughly 15–22°C during the day, dropping to 8–13°C after dark, cooling further toward the end of the program. Rain is never far away in a Polish September.
Pack layers: one warm jumper and an umbrella or raincoat.
Food
All meals during the Fellowship are plant-based, as is all food at the CARE Conference. Breakfast, lunch, and dinner are covered throughout the program.
You don't need to be vegan to be here, we care about your capacity to help animals, not your dietary history. But for these three weeks, the food provided will be plant-based.
Flag any allergies, intolerances, or dietary requirements in advance, if you haven't flagged them already on the onboarding form.
Living and working together
You'll be living and working in close proximity with your cohort for two weeks, followed by the conference week in Warsaw. Everyone has an individual room, but the spaces where you'll eat, prep presentations, and unwind are shared.
Where you'll stay
- Weeks 1–2 · Hotel AMW Rewita Rynia (ul. Wczasowa 59, 05-127 Białobrzegi). Check-in 31 August, check-out 15 September. This is home base: your room, our workshop spaces, and the extra activities are all here.
- CARE week · Hotel Gromada Warsaw Centre (Plac Powstańców Warszawy 2, 00-030 Warszawa). Check-in 15 September, check-out 21 September. We'll transfer to Warsaw together on the 15th. From Gromada Hotel, it's about a 15-minute walk to the CARE venue.
A few things that make this work:
- We haven't booked out the whole venue. Hotel AMW Rewita Rynia will have other guests during our stay, in the restaurant, corridors, and shared facilities. That's inevitable, so be mindful and respectful: to everyone else there, we're guests too.
- Respect quiet hours. People recharge differently, protect each other's sleep and downtime.
- Shared spaces are everyone's responsibility. Leave them the way you'd want to find them.
- This is intense by design, pace yourself. Two weeks of workshops, projects, feedback, and twelve interesting people is a lot. You do not need to be "on" every waking hour. An early night is a strategic decision, not a social failure.
A typical day
Exact timings will be shared shortly and may shift during the program.
Devices and focus
We won't confiscate your phone. You're an adult, and we intend to treat you like one.
But we do expect you to be present during sessions, not physically present while mentally scrolling. The program is short, the material is dense, and the people around you deserve your attention as much as you deserve theirs.
Simple rule: save the scrolling for evenings. If something urgent needs your attention during a session, step out, no explanation needed.
Feedback expectations
At Anima International, honest feedback is how we show care and respect, for people and for the mission. During the Fellowship, you will receive direct feedback and you will be expected to give it.
That means:
- Your project work will be critiqued openly, in front of others, by mentors and by your cohort.
- You'll be asked to critique others' work with the same directness, kindly, specifically, and without hedging the actual point.
- At the end of the program we'll give you a candid picture of where we see your strengths, growth areas, and potential fit at Anima, elsewhere in the movement, or on a different path.
Discomfort with feedback is normal and workable; we'll practise it together, and criticism of your work is never criticism of your worth.
It's a pilot
This is the first time we're running this program, and we'd rather tell you that plainly than pretend otherwise. Sessions may be adjusted. Timings may shift. Something we planned may turn out not to work, and we'll change it, possibly mid-week, possibly mid-day.
Two things we'll value enormously from you:
- Flexibility when things move around.
- Honest feedback about the program itself. Tell us what's working and what isn't, while it's happening. We treat failures as data, including our own. Your candour now shapes this program for every future cohort.
Free time
You'll have evenings and a full rest day, and where you spend them changes halfway through.
Weeks 1–2 · at the lake. Home base is a lakeside resort on the Zegrze Reservoir, surrounded by pine forest, sandy beach, marina with water-sports rental, sports pitches, outdoor gym, table tennis. Evenings here are for the lake, the cohort, and rest.
CARE week · in Warsaw. From 15 September you're in the city centre. Warsaw is a great city, and the CARE attendee guide has a whole section on what to do in Warsaw.
The one condition: show up rested and ready the next morning. Explore, enjoy, stay out late once or twice and own the consequences at 9:00.
Health and wellbeing
Three intense weeks, a new city, eleven new colleagues, and daily feedback: it's a lot, even for people who thrive on intensity. If at any point you're struggling, either physically, emotionally, or with the pace, talk to Laura Gough or Alice Trombetta.
We mean this. We'd rather know early than find out too late. Flagging that you're exhausted or overwhelmed is not a mark against you, and we treat it as an objective fact that needs addressing.
Emergency numbers in Poland
CARE Conference week
The Fellowship concludes with full participation in CARE 2026 (17–20 September, Browarna 8, Warsaw), one of Europe's key animal advocacy gatherings. You'll attend as a full participant: sessions, workshops, networking, afterparties.
By then you'll know the movement's landscape far better than you do today. Use the conference deliberately, book 1-on-1s, attend the sessions and be open to discussions.
Everything conference-related (venue, transport, restaurant discounts, the Swapcard app) is covered in the CARE in-person attendee guide.
Find your registration ticket HERE!
Before you arrive
- Read the Pre-Fellowship Pack materials we'll send you before the program
- Pack layers, some sportswear, your laptop and something smart-casual for CARE
- Download and set up the Swapcard app on your phone (iPhone or Android)
- Register on Swapcard for Anima International’s Fellowship
- Register for CARE Conference
- Arrive rested
Questions?
If anything in this guide is unclear, or your situation doesn't fit neatly into it, just ask. Asking early is always the right call.
We can't wait to meet you in Warsaw.
The Fellowship team