No Computer

Just wanted to let you all know that our computer is not working. We are in the process of filing a insurance claim, John dropped it, and should soon be buying a new one.

Cinnamon roll recipe

Link here for the cinnamon roll recipe, used to make the exploding roll blog

We are lucky

Ok, finally I can write a post. I guess I should tell why I have not been able. As some of you know, our computer stopped working on the 8th. It is never great when your computer brakes, but it is worse when it is your connection with so many things and a purple, red, and blue screen happens, what does that mean. We were lucky that our town has a good computer repair shop behind our apartment and VERY lucky that the main service tech speaks English. It took the store a week to find the problem and get the computer working again. Bad news was that it was a temporary fix and they didn't know how long it would last. I guess on the 3rd, the computer bag slipped off of John's shoulder and hit the concrete floor on the one place where it bag was not padded. OPPS!! A internal board was cracked and they had glued it together. Well, exactly one week after it was fixed the problem happened again. So, the bad news is that we need to get a new laptop. The good news is that right before we left we bought international property insurance and accidental damage is covered. YEA!! We have already started the process. Our adjuster seemed very easy to work with and we are only waiting for an embassy report to file all of the paperwork.

Other than our computer problems, not much has been happening. Personally, I was excited to find out that a member of our English club works for the orphanage in town. The orphanage houses 50 kids between the ages of 6 days to 3 years old. We are working on setting up a visit. As some of you know, I worked with children in this age group. I am defiantly looking forward interacting with children this age again. I have discovered, while being here, that I enjoy younger children much more than 12 and up.

Have a Great Thanksgiving!!

Winter came

Within the last 30 hours Razgrad has turned from cool Fall days to a Winter wonderland.

Last two weeks

The last two and half weeks have seemed to fly by. I am not sure why. My classes have been getting shorter and shorter. They are suppose it be 45 minutes long, but last week they were 35 minutes and then this week they were 25 minutes long. My school changed to schedule because it was SO COLD in the rooms. My school has central heating but for some reason it just turned on today. The building is slowly starting to warm up.

We have had our first snow flakes. On Halloween we had snow flakes in the air. Nothing stayed, everything melted when it touched to ground. Bulgarians are now saying that we are going to have a long and cold winter. Great, I can't wait!

Two weekends ago, John and I went to Sofia for our required flu shots. Since we are not in that part of the country much we decided to visit Rila Monastery. It was beautiful. The leaves were starting to change and it was sunny day. Hopefully we will be able to spend some more time there later and do some hiking

YEA!!!

We have HEAT!! Our central heating just kicked on. Maybe tomorrow we won't wake-up to a 50 degree room.

NEW PICS

HI everyone! Just wanted to let you all know that we have all of our Bulgaria pictures, incuding new photos, veiwable at flickr. Just go to www.flickr.com/photos/inbox

Free Breakfast and the 150 Leva Pair of Pants

Sorry I have not posted anything recently. Our internet has been acting up and would not load certain websites and Blogger was one of them.

Last weekend we decided that we had been bums long enough on weekends and planned a trip. We decided to go to Belchik, on the Black Sea. I had read a little bit about the area and it sounded interesting. We had to go through Varna to get there. John was excited that we were going through Varna because than he could eat McDonald’s. Anyway, we arrived in Belchik on a sunny Saturday afternoon. It was a great day to walk around and visit Queen Maria’s Summer House and Gardens. After the garden we decided to try to find a hotel room. The first place we went to was 60 leva a night and included breakfast but, it was more than we wanted to spend. The next place was 40 leva a night and newly remodeled so we decided to stay there. The next morning we wanted to pick up breakfast somewhere on our way to the bus station. We had plenty of time, 1 hour, before our bus left. We walked by a restaurant in the same building as the first hotel, the one that was too expensive, and decided to go in. The man serving the tables had us sit down and asked us if we wanted coffee or tea. After he brought us our drinks we started to question if we were suppose to be there. He soon brought us two plates of food. By that point we were sure that we were not supposed to be there. The server thought that we stayed at the hotel in the building, the one that was too expensive. John and I didn’t know what to do. We could tell him that we did not sleep there and explain that we would pay, but we need to catch a bus and explaining would take too much time. So, we asked our server if there was a bill. He answered, no. We quickly left the restaurant and walked to the bus station. WOO HOO free breakfast!

On our way home we went to Metro, it’s like a Sam’s Club/ Super Wal-Mart. John wanted to look for sweaters and pants and I like to look at their food. They have a large selection of items that you can’t find many places here. We bought many things but thought we had enough money. So, we checked out and the total came to 100 leva more then we had. I quickly went to the ATM and took out more money. When we were leaving the store, I looked at the receipt and saw an item for 125 leva, 150 leva with tax. We both had no idea what it could be and could not read the Bulgarian description . . . something about water. After talking to two people we finally got to the customer service desk. They checked all of our items against the receipt and found out that they had charged us for a 125 leva water pump instead of a 20 leva pair of pants. OOPS!! They quickly took care of the problem. I guess it was our payment for breakfast.

Check

Hi! I changed some settings and justed too see if list notifiyer works. Have a Great Day :)

Cinnamon Rolls

So, today I decided I wanted to bake something. I decided on Cinnamon Rolls, YUM!!

Well, guess I found out what happens when you pack the roll to close together BEFORE the RISE. They double and then STILL expand when they cook. OOPS! Maybe next time I will get it right. Even after all of the mistakes they still taste great, Gooey and Sticky.

Miscommunications

This week was a good week. We both survived our first full week of classes. I walked into the teacher’s room on Monday morning and was asked “Are you teaching your 3^rd grade SIP class today.” I stopped for a second and thought “I’m not supposed to teach that class till next week, right?” I guess I was misinformed. I was going to teach a class of 9 year olds for 40 minutes with no lesson plan, no idea of what they knew, and with not very much Bulgarian. Luckily, I can be creative and we all survived. After class, I went to my assistant director’s office to ask her a question. When I arrived, she looked at me and said “Done already. You are supposed to have them for two periods, 80 minutes. Never mind today just remember for tomorrow when you teach the other group of 3^rd graders.” Another miscommunication, I guess. I decided to tell her that I want to teach as much as I can, but two periods with 3^rd graders was going to be TOO LONG for them. It is hard for them to pay attention for 20 minutes, let alone 80! She said that she understood and would talk to the director about making them only one class a week. Luckily, that worked and now my SIP classes are only for 40 minutes a week. I think I would have gone crazy otherwise.

American Network Television in Bulgaria!?!

A few weeks ago, I discovered that I could download all of my favorite prime-time network TV shows that are aired in The States. Interestingly enough, I didn’t have any favorite American shows until I got to Bulgaria. Did it take me coming to Bulgaria to become addicted to American television? Since my discovery, we have become up to date with many popular prime-time shows, including: Alias, Lost, The OC, Prison Break, and The Sopranos. I watched the first couple episodes of Rome, but found them a little too risqué to continue that series. I guess I worked too many hours in the states to worry about TV. What’s great is that I can hook up the laptop to our TV and watch the episodes in near perfect quality! -- just like being at home . . kind of. Here, I have really become involved in each series. We can download each recent episode only hours after it airs in The States. Alias is our favorite and probably what fostered our addiction. Everyone probably knows, but it is about a covert ops team of spies called SD6. If you haven’t seen it and you are interested in spy flicks, be sure to check it out. There is talk that this will be the last season though. The season premieres on ABC next Thursday (8:00pm EST) and on my computer next Friday (Bulgarian Time)!

Gloomy Weather

Sorry, Sorry!! I do read your comments and have been thinking about writing an entry. I just have not felt up to it recently and I have been busy.

Our trip to our host families was successful. It was great to see them again and they were very excited to have us. There was a big festival in the square of Saedinenie for Unification Day. It seemed like everyone from the town and surrounding villages were there. During the day there were wrestling matches. A calf was the grand prize. At night, we went to a small fair. There we saw a military parade and fireworks with AK gunfire throughout. YES, on the way home from this trip we bought a new TV. The price was not bad, but we all know that John has to have the best.

Our next big event was the start of school. On September 15^th students arrive at school for a celebration and to meet their class teachers. It was raining that morning, so my school had a small celebration only with the students from 1^st to 4^th class. I thought it was interesting that here it is GOOD luck when it rains. After the celebration it is tradition to go to a restaurant with your colleagues and share lunch.

John and I both had class this past week. The children in my classes are all relatively well behaved. I started each class by going over the rules. I decided to speak only in English for my 5^th and 6^th classes. They understand me, but act like they don’t sometimes. I think it is because they are still unsure of their skills. I am positive that this will improve with time, because I won’t let them off the hook that easily. One thing is, I will have to teach them what pair/group work is, because they don’t do that in Bulgaria. On October 1^st four more classes will start. These are optional lessons for 3^rd and 4^th grades. We will see how those go later.

It has been cold and gloomy here for the past five days. One day it was high 70’s and sunny and the next it was 50’s and pouring down rain. As soon as the weather went downhill, John got a bad cold. And of course, married couples share everything so I got the cold two days later. We were planning on traveling this weekend, a four day weekend, but between us being sick and the ugly weather, we have camped out on our couch for the last two days. Maybe we will head somewhere tomorrow.

Oh, and “Ne Raboti” is something like “it doesn’t work” in English.

Oops!

Oops! A word of advice from what is now my experience . . . Always check what cords are plugged into the computer before you move it!

Yes, unfortunately I had to learn this lesson with harsh reality. Also, televisions don’t work to well after a 3 foot fall, face first onto a hardwood floor. The bad news is, the TV “Не Работи”. The good news is I haven’t bought a guitar yet, so we can afford to replace it. Anyway, the reason I’m telling you this is because some lessons are better to learn secondhand.

The Next Two Days

So, I have survived my first two days of school. As I logically knew, everything went well. I walked into a teachers meeting 30 minutes late. While, I was walking in my director said “Relax” and then went on introducing me. When he was done he told everyone to speak to me only in Bulgarian. GREAT! Luckily, that request did not last long. All of the English teachers told me that it is their job to better their English. HaHa. We have finally straightened the classes that I will be teaching. I will be teaching three groups of fifth graders for five hours a week each, a group of third graders and a group of fourth graders one hour a week, and American history/ geography class one hour a week. This schedule should keep me busy.

We have a long weekend. September 6^th, Tuesday, is unification day here. We are leaving tomorrow to visit Saedinenie, our training site. They have a big celebration every September 6^th. Saedinenie means United in Bulgarian. The town was the gathering point for revolutionaries who helped declare Unification of Eastern Rumelia, now Southern Bulgarian, with the Principality of Bulgaria. It should be fun to see friends and join in the festivities.

On a different note, the pictures and stories coming out of the south are surreal. CNN and the internet are our only sources of news. I just pray God helps calm the situation and order is restored.

Have a great Labor Day weekend!!!

Instead of sleep

I should be asleep right now, but I can’t make myself go to bed. Tomorrow, well I guess today now, is my first day at school, kind of. Here all teachers start going to work on the 1^st of September, but the students don’t show up until the 15^th. I know it is a little strange to me right now. My nerves must be getting to me. I am not sure why. I have met everyone at my school already. Our English course has been going well. Everyone wants to continue the course during the school year. My counterpart, coordinator, and director are all VERY nice and willing to help me anyway that they can, but I have to ask (most of the time). That is hard for me right now. I know I need to work on this skill to get me through the next couple of years. This morning I had to tell my school that I could not teach all of the levels of classes that I was scheduled to teach. My agreement says that I can teach up to four levels of classes, while I was scheduled to teach seven levels. I hated having to tell them something was wrong and needed changed. I feel that everyone has done so much for both John and I and I don’t want to offend them. Well, everything worked out well in the end, but I still didn’t like doing it. Sorry, that I have been rambling on. My excurses are that it is 12:25 am here and I am tried.

On a different note, last night we went out with a colleague of mine and her boyfriend. It was our first time going out at night with all Bulgarians. We were not sure of our language skills, my colleague doesn’t speak any English, but lucky her boyfriend spoke some. It was a lot of fun and I can see becoming friends with them. John and the boyfriend have lots in common, COMPUTERS. Enough said.

Well I need to try to sleep before work. Leka nosht!

FOOD

For some reason I have been thinking about a lot recently. I guess it’s because I have to cook twice a day and everything takes at least twice as long here. Maybe it’s because family and food are so closely related. Another reason maybe that I have already gotten into ruts of what I cook. Who knows? Bulgarian food seems to be a mix between Greek and Turkish with a little surprise here and there. They claim that a lot of foods that we think are Greek are Bulgarian, like feta cheese is really cirene, the Bulgarian word for cheese, and what we would call “Greek” yogurt is really Bulgarian and was invented here. What can you say? Bulgarians are very proud of their culture and heroes. As I said before I have gotten into a rut with my cooking, but I don’t cook any Bulgarian food, unless you consider making shopska salad as cooking. I try to cook foods that we ate at home; you know working the comfort thing. I make a lot of Mexican inspired dishes, so spices from that family are great to throw into packages. I usually make fajitas, stuffed peppers, rice dishes, that kind of stuff. I have also expanded my pasta repertoire. It now includes Cajun chicken pasta, a pretty close recreation of a dish we liked at Starliner Diner. One of the things that I like and don’t like is having to go shopping at least every other day. One way it is great I don’t have to plan out my meals that much, but I have to go shopping too much. There is a market in my town that is open everyday. I shop there 3 or 4 times a week. At first I was excited to market get fresh fruits and veggies, but it has turned into a search. Who has the best tomatoes, the freshest cucumbers, and the crispest peppers? I never know. Here is a picture of the produce that I bought at the market on Monday. It all cost about $2.50, but remember we get paid in Leva. We both feel lucky to be in a place where we are able to find great produce and frozen chicken breast.

Crazy Last Week

This past week has been kind of crazy. We had two guests helping with our English class over the past week. It was great spending time with other volunteers, but I am glad everyone has gone back to their sites.

Our first guest was Mike. He is originally from Twinsburg, OH, so he and John know some of the same places. We first decided to show him around town, off to the hotel we went. On the 16^th floor of the hotel there is a discotech. There we can go out onto a balcony and see the whole city in front of you. We had never been up there, it was a great site and we were happy that we went. We then decided to show our City Park and zoo. Our City Park is pretty big and has a nice playground, but our zoo leaves lot to be desired by American standards. While Mike was here we also went back to a village nearby that has a 9^th – 10^th Century site on a hillside. We walked around and looked for pieces of pottery, did not find much. The next day he went home and our second guest came.

Our second guest was Jeremy. He was at our training site with us and consequently a good friend. Unfortunately, I was not felling well the first couple of days he was here. So, he and John went to explore the city by themselves. On Monday, I was feeling better so off we went to Varna, the largest city on the sea and only two hours from us. We had never been to Varna or the Black Sea. It felt great walking along the beach and letting the water splash over my feet. Early on we decided not to go swimming that day, but somehow I still got soaked. All we wanted to do was get a good picture with the wave behind us, oh well. It was fun and we dried before we went home.

Sorry this blog Took SOOOOOOO LONG to get written. I well try to be better and faster at getting them up.

The Start

So, I finally thought it was time to jump off the bridge and join the Bloggers.

I guess I will start by telling everyone a little about what I am doing. My husband, John, and I are Peace Corps Volunteers, PCVs, in Bulgaria. We have been in country for almost four months now. Wow, time flies when everything is new. We both lived with host families for the first two and half months. It was a great experience. More to come about that later. Now we are living in Razgrad, a town of about 35,000 people. We like it here and are excited for school to start in September. I will be teaching mostly primary students at a general school while John will be teaching secondary students at the language school. We just started an English class for teachers at my school. The first day we had only four students, but it has been growing ever since. Last class we had twelve students. We started with the ABC’s and introductions last week and are moving on to simple verbs. We repeat everything a lot, but they seem to be catching on and learning. It is good to feel like I am finally doing some helpful. I have to start dinner, write more later.