The Sun

The last four days have been beautiful. The temperature is around 52F with lots of sun. I didn't realize how much I missed the SUN. Yesterday I sat on the couch with the window wide open and the sun shinning on me. I could have sat there forever. With such great weather, I have been able to wash all of our clothes, sheets, and towels. For those who don't know, we do not have a dryer. In the spring, summer, and fall we hang our laundry out on our back terrace, but in the winter we use a small indoor drying rack. It works ok, but we can only wash one maybe two small loads a week. Hopfully spring will be here soon.

Recent Travels

I saw that Alana posted a blog entry, but didn’t include anything about our recent travels! Well, we have had a whole lot of traveling recently, but not many pictures to prove it. Our most interesting recent trip, however, was to Pernik. Once every two years there is a celebration in Pernik, which is close to Sofia, called the International Masquerade Festival, also know as “The Kukeri Festival.” The most interesting part of this event is its traditional and not-so-traditional costumes, which are which – I have no idea. Originally these costumes were worn to scare away evil spirits. Now, it’s to attract tourists. Check out our recent pictures on Flickr!

If you want to know more about this event, follow the link to this news article. http://www.bulgariatravel.org/etis/news.php?aID=593

Time goes too fast for change to go so slow

We have both survived our first terms. YEA!!!!! One down and three to go. Looking back on the past 5 months, I am not sure what all I have accomplished. Everyone says change is slow; I sometimes have to keep telling myself that. There are times when I feel that no one wants to change or cares. I have found that you have to say what you think or want at least 5 times just to be heard and then another 5 to get them to do anything. Cultural differences . . . what can you do. Starting a new term means changing schedules. John’s classes have switched from the mornings to the afternoons and my classes have changed times. I now start at 7:30am three days a week. During the winter we moved our mattresses from the bedroom to the living room because of heating issues. Due to this and my schedule change, I have to be really quiet when I get ready to leave for school. Ahh, life.

Two weeks ago when I started writing this post I felt discouraged. I was not sure what we were doing here. I think it was because I could not pin point one thing and say, ‘look I did that.’ I like to see a finished product, create things. I decided it was time to get in gear and not let everything slip by. Since then we have started a project in America called “Bats and Books for Bulgaria”, started working on a project with my school to build an art gallery, and we are talking with the municipality about writing a grant to build a baseball field. Five days ago, I began knitting to see more immediate results from what I am doing with my time. I am trying to make a scarf. The first two times I started, I made it way to wide, about 18inches . . . that’s a blanket! I was just so excited to be knitting! Finally on the third try, I got it right. I am about half way done. I like knitting. It gives me something productive to do with all my free time and I can see instant the results and improvements.

We have also uploaded some new pictures on to flickr. There is a link to the right to see the pics.

Bats and Books for Bulgaria: On-going project

Bats and Books for Bulgaria

We are Peace Corps Volunteers, stationed in Razgrad, Bulgaria. Razgrad is a town of 30,000 people. We are both English teachers at local schools, volunteers at the town’s orphanage, and facilitate a weekly English club for community members. All of our students are very excited about learning English and about American culture. We feel that one of the best ways to keep them interested and learning more is to give them the resources to keep learning after we leave.

Our town has a very limited supply of English books. We are first requesting used books and magazines. We work with babies to adults, so any type of book would be used. The adults that we are working with read at a 9^th/10^th grade level.

We have discovered that there is a strong desire to learn about baseball. We think that baseball is a great game to teach teamwork, cooperation, and American culture. We currently have no baseball/softball equipment. We are asking for anything; gloves, bats, balls, bases, safety equipment and bags.

You can send books using Economy M-bags. M-bags can be used only for books, magazines, and sheet music. US postal offices will place the books in a bag for shipping at a reduced cost. You will need to send a minimum of 11lbs to use this method of shipping. You can send a maximum of 66lbs. It cost $11.55 for the first 11lbs and $1.05 for each additional pound or fraction of a pound.

We are asking our friends and family visiting us to bring over the donated baseball/softball equipment, as shipping and customs fees would be very expensive. John’s parents and my mom, Carol Holdren, are planning on visiting us this summer. My sister, Sara Gallaugher, will be coming over at the end of March.