SO, much to my mother's chagrin, and others I'm sure, I have been quite delinquent in keeping everyone up on all the happenings. So you may be wondering, Sarah what the heck have you been up to since March 22 :), well sometimes a whole lot, and other times a whole lot of nothing, to be honest.

After my last post in March I went in the beginning of April to Greece with one of my friends for about 5 days and then immediately following that trip I was medically evacuated to Washington DC to further check in on a medical condition. After 3 weeks of hanging out in our Nations Capital and getting to the point where it felt normal to be there, I was cleared with no major health issues to come back to Bulgaria. It was an interested experience, but the Peace Corps medical office there at headquarters was great and so pleasant to work with. I was also fortunate and happy to be able to spend some time hanging out there with my cousin Jeff, a family friend Pam and a friend and fellow volunteer from Bulgaria who had just recently finished with her 2 years and is now living in DC! :)

After I got back the beginning of May it was crunch time from then until the 2nd week of July! As soon as I was back it was project grant writing and preparations with my colleagues and then the implementation come June and July. It was another great summer of camps. We are growing each year on our planning and ideas and it's great to watch and be a part of. The kids really enjoy themselves and love meeting the group of volunteers that come to help and play with them!

In the two camps with the older kids, in addition to the games and crafts, we did two different informational sessions. My counterpart and another teacher did a session on communication and the next day I, with the help of the other pcv's (peace corps volunteers), lead a session on tolerance and diversity, as well as stereotypes. It was very interesting to watch the kids interact during the games and then to hear what they have to say on the topics. The term 'stereotype' and the negative implications they can have on a person and/or group of people is fairly a new concept here. Then some of the crafts we did were t-shirt designing, glass painting, and

bracelet making.

And somewhere in all of that in between two of the camps I was able to take one last out-of-country-trip before our time of "no international travel" before we close our PC service becomes effective. I went with my friend Grace and her pcv friend who is working in Africa and Grace's other friend who is just visiting from the states, to ISTANBUL again!! Man do I love

that city. Again, there is just this feeling and something about the atmosphere that is so great but indescribable...and I'm not the only person who has felt this.

This time we went in the Hague of Sofia and it was just AMAZING. We also ventured to the docks and took a boat ride out to the islands. We got off on the largest (i think it was the 5th island and last stop) and had lunch and walked around and caught the boat back. On the way back, however, we stopped and got off on the Asian side of iSTANBUL. We made a cafe stop and

walked around there as well, just taking in the sights and sounds. On that side it was more of the lived/worked-in feel rather than the side where the blue mosque is and the Hague of Sofia, which naturally is more of the glamorous part due to tourism. I love every bit of that city we have ever ventured into. This was the second time around for Grace and I was much more relaxed than our first trip, and we already knew so much about the city it made the trip much more enjoyable. While eating out one night, we got to see one of the Euro Cup games when Turkey was playing Spain or Russia, I believe, and it was so cool to be watching it there in Turkey.

It's been great in general to be in Europe during a Euro Cup championship. I actually was interested in the games unlike when I'm in America. We also ran into a guy who manages a bar who we had met last year when we were there and he remembered us and we remembered him and they kept the place open just for us after hours. I even have friends there now, haha.

I have a family that I am friends with here in Plovdiv in which the wife is Bulgarian and the husband is Turkish and this evening he is taking a bus to iSTANBUL to visit family and they said they are buying me a tea set and tea pot from turkey for me to bring home and I am so excited!

So it's now August 21st and I have been here exactly 2 years and 14 days -- crazy to think! this last week I had my last medical appointments and I found out I have two more cavities to be filled. I go 24 years of no cavities EVER to, 2 years of Peace Corps service developing 4 cavities, 2 per year by the age of 26. I'm not happy!

Greece was great too, backtracking a bit. My friend Taylor and I took a train down to Thessaloníki and hung out in that city. It is so nice and just a cool chill city with lots of young people and places to hang out. There are of course some very awesome ancient Roman ruins in the center of the city, not too far from the sea port. We then trained it down to Athens and hung out there for a night. Upon arrival we immediately went shopping, as the next day was designated for "sight seeing". In Athens we saw temples, palace gardens, changing of the guards, ruins galore and THE Olympic stadium, the old town of Athens where all the cool shops and

restaurants and food markets and jewelry stands are, it was just great! Unfortunately it was quite touristy, unlike Thessaloníki, but it had such a rich history vibe to it still...for sure in the old town. We went out that night, got cheap food from the street and went to a local music-drink

establishment if you will and met no Athenians or Grecians, haha. We met a Bulgarian, an Egyptian and a guy from France...that's besides the other tourists out and about, these guys lived and worked there. Apparently I look like a famous Greek singer. haha I'm finding out I have a face and look that must be able to morph into any look, just about. I have been mistaken for locals in Italy, Greece and Turkey as well as in Bulgaria.

Anyway, our plan was to spend one night in Athens, go to the near-by mountain town of Delphi for one night and our last night go back to Athens before our train to Bulgaria. Well, once we arrived in Delphi and we were in a hotel room, like Thess. and unlike Athens, in addition to it being just beautiful, we decided to stay both nights there. Only glitch with this awesome plan was we never saw the Acropolis in our "sight seeing" day in Athens! So we tried to work it out to cram it in before our train our last day and, well, it just didn't work so we just soaked up all the relaxing, fun time we had in Delphi. We made friends with some of the locals, a cafe and club owner, the bartender and the DJ and had a blast. The reason we picked this city was because of the amazing ruins that are there in Delphi just outside of it, near the highway. There we saw Apollo's temple, the arena where athletes would compete before the Olympics were established

(Pythian Games), an ancient amphitheater, the Tholos (a sanctuary of Athena), and ruins of a gymnasium. This was also the site of the Delphic oracle, one of the most important oracle in classical Greek history. This area was once considered to be the center of the universe. And some people think Greeks are "prideful" for no reason! :)

I've always ranked Italy as one of my favorite countries and it is for many reason, but I have to say that Greece almost tops it...Italy is a soft, romantic and rich place while i feel Greece is a rugged and rough romantic place with a history that is just as rich and ancient. I'd survive in

either country really, with the food, the music/dance and the good looking men, I think I'd be OK :)

This last weekend a group of us went go hike Musala, the highest peak of the Balkan Peninsula. We got up early, took a bus from Samokov (the town where I trained 2 years ago) to Borovets, then took a gondola up (for those interested in details) to the elevation of 2,369 meters then hiked the 556 meters left to the peak. Going up took about 3 hours and down was about 2...up and down to the gondola that is. It was great and beautiful, though unfortunately 'hiking season' and lots of people but it was still great to do! I and a couple others got a niiiice sunburn hiking up. My host family had said, you're going to be cold so take sleeves. Well I only wore my sleeves for 30 minutes while we sat at the peak -- otherwise I was sweating in a tank top.

It's about back-to-school time and I'll be here for the first week of school before my flight home. I could have left earlier to be honest since my work is dependent upon the school year and everything has been wrapped up essentially, but i wanted to be able to say my good-byes to the students and teachers and faculty since the end of the school year was crazy and I was unable to do that then. I have mixed feelings. I can't wait to be back and see my family and friends and have a plethora of food choices, toilet paper in every bathroom nationwide, and last, but not least, be able to drive! though I probably won't be able to afford to take it out of the driveway the way gasoline costs are going back home. On the other hand, I am truly going to miss the

people I have established relationships with, the kids and my Bulgarian family, as well as my family of other volunteers, and the different opportunities we have here. We have opportunities to go places, see things, meet so many different people! But "all good things must come to an end," I believe the saying goes :).

BUT before I can become completely reflective and all that good stuff, I still have work to do! and cleaning and packing AND most importantly just enjoying my time I have left like I normally would...can't force fun, you just have it! :)

So I'll be in touch again before leaving but in the meantime I will make a posting of just my most recent pictures. :)

MISS YOU ALL!!

I have tulips! I have 3 soft red, early budding tulips sitting in a glass on my table slash desk.

As I walked into the gate of my building yesterday my landlady, and fellow teacher at the H. School down the street, was in the garden sweeping up and cleaning the mess that the little stray dog they adopted off the street had made. She asked me if i wanted some tulips, i of course was like, no no they're your garden and she then cuts off one hands it to me and then says, hold on two more. Here unlike back home, even numbers are bad luck and odd are good, so three it was :)

She said that I could come down there and take some anytime I want and I may just take her up on that...i'll have to refrain from the very natural feeling and tendency for two to three maybe.

So they sit in a fruit decorated glass when they should be in a vase. One has a nice extreme bend in the neck but lays flat out so i could actually look in the bud and the other two are still standing with a slight bend in the neck...each with it's own different degree of bending and in different directions...I love it.

Tulips remind me of spring, Easter and my Grandmother. After planting tulips with her one year where I had fondly remembered her always have a bunch spring up every year, I realized how ridiculously difficult they can be, and all that back breaking work for one bloom or one season and then to be re-planted, ugh, but they're beautiful and smell that way too! :)

I also have an African Violet that I bought on a whim at the market while buying veggies one day...it was a beautiful early spring day and I wanted flowers dang it! Found out that the flowers i wanted would only bloom through may and that wasn't good enough so I picked up the violets and a bag of dirt. So far, they've held up and I like to think I have a good feeling they'll survive, but time will only tell...green thumbs in my family are small in numbers.

next, zucchini, yep that's right I'm going to try my hand at planting and growing zucchini! I heard it's rather simple AND I love zucchini and eat it almost everyday come summer. wish me luck!

Ok well, it's a rather overcast chilly saturday but I gotta get around and out to find me a new camera :( or I would be including pics of my budding promises.

Can't see the clock behind me but that's me in Gorna at midnight at the train station :)

host mom Katia

Well, since December when you last read my two bits of life in BG I have:

traveled to Romania over Christmas, spent New Years in the gothic style city Veliko Turnivo in BG, have taken up knitting while listening to any random podcast from National Geographic to NPR or 60 Minutes to brushing up/or learning Spanish :), crashing at multiple sitemates apartments for 5 days while my electricity was out, having lunch with Peace Corps Director from D.C. and beginning prep for our annual youth summer day camps! My how winter seemed like it would never end and now we have warped into flying-by time zone.

Backing it up a tad - Romania: So my good friend Mel and I seemed to be one of the very few volunteers (of our immediate group of friends or network) that wasn't going home for the holidays we had decided to go somewhere. Romania it was. I made the journey up north about 6 hours by train after work on a friday to Melanie's city where we hung out that night before setting off the next night for the "midnight train....from "Gorna". Yeah good ol' Gladys and her Pips were our theme for our infamous train due north. (note: Mel's town is Gorna Oryahovitsa, аnd is always shortened to Gorna)

We caught that last bus in the center that goes to the train station just 15 minutes away around 11:30 and jumped on that train. It was considerably colder up in Gorna than here in Plovdiv. So we hop on and nap all the way to Ruse, the Bulgarian border city. There the border check and train hookups took about an hour. As we sat at the checkpoint our first guard comes by, opens the door uses his flashlight since he knew we had been sleeping, takes our info. He goes into polite conversation with us; he asks if we know Romanian, we say no, he asks why we live in Bulgaria, we say we work here, he says, "you're problem", and we just had to laugh. I think it was more how he said it, that made me chuckle. But he was nice polite man who wished us a safe and happy trip and maybe we'd see each other again in life or another, lol. One check down, one to go. After a while, another suited and younger guard comesin, swings our door open, flips on the light, grunted the demand to see our tickets and passport, looked them over called it in to the office, very loudly unlike the Romanian guard, and left abruptly without a "thank you", "here you go", "ciao" nothing, and leaves the light, we didn't even have on in the first place, on and the door open. We look at each other and say, "yeah, that's more what we're used to".

Aaanyway, we make it into Bucharest early in the morning as Mel is still trying to sneak a peak and I'm up and getting my bag down since I am convinced we are approaching the station...she was adament that there was one more stop, lol. We hop off and head to the nearest bathroom to freshen up. Down the stairs a large and flamboyant woman sits among a random array of large plants and her radio playing the countries traditional folk music full blast, while taking our money and handing out tissues.

It was FREEZING but we walked around Bucharest between cafe stops, to see some of the sights. Pretty city and rather large. US embassy wasn't much to look at though. After a bite of lunch....pizza unfortunately, since our hours long search of a highly recommended tavern restaurant turned up fruitless....we headed to the train station again to go to Brasov the city where we would spend Christmas. We stayed there two nights. We had great food, great drinks, good service and a nice Christmas service at the famous Black Church (the largest Gothic church between Vienna and Istanbul, destroyed by Mongol invasions in 1242, given its new name after disaster struck again in 1689, when the 'Great Fire, set by Hapsburg invaders, leveled most of the town, heavily damaged the church, blackening its walls.) It's a Lutheran church so the service was in German. It was beautiful. Two large Christmas trees with real candles lit stood at the front, people piled in and there were candles resting along the sides on the seating benches. At the end the lights were turned off and the congregation sung Holy Night...really cool. We proceeded afterwards to one of the only places that we knew would be open, a Scottish pub. grabbed some food and some hot spiced wine, along with a Romanian beer, Ursus.

Next day we headed to Sinaia where the Peles Castle sits in the Carpathian mountains...the castle with Neo-Renaissance, Gothic, Saxon and Baroque architectural influences. Due to money and time we opted to sit at the cafe on the grounds and drink hot cocoa or coffee instead of paying the entrance fee. We hiked back down to Sinaia grabbed lunch and off to Bucharest we were. Had dinner in Bucharest, where our efforts to find that same raved about tavern was fruitless, and jumped on what has been our worse train experience yet. The train was atrociously dirty, smelled horrible, AND the heater was never turned on. After wiping down with disinfectant wipes Mel always carries with her, our seats we sat shivering for hours before our Bulgarian ticket takers came and when they came, a man and woman, the man had the audacity to say, you look cold, i said "YES, and why is that?! Why the hell aren't the heaters on?!" i asked. He said oh well the heaters up in our wagon work, laughing, you have to come up there. i said no the heaters need to be on. He of course was referring to first class. So there we sat, Mel trying ever so hard to sleep so she couldn't feel or think of how miserable she was and across from her there i was coat, gloves, hat, hood and scarf over my face, boiling inside and furious. Of course the area of where the two wagons we were closest to connect was extremely loud of metal scraping and banging around. Multiple times I would get up storm down the hall to shut all of the doors that people had left open allowing the cold and snow to come in AND the noise. We hadn't even crossed the border back into Bulgaria but we were back.

I hung out at Mel's until the after New Years. I was lucky enough to go with her to her work's Christmas banquet. She works at City Hall. So there we were hanging out with a ton of her Bulgarian co-workers and where I was "approached" by a city official, a much older man, ugh...i could have done without that part. I will give it to Bulgarians when they celebrate. They dance, and sing, and eat and drink for hours and it's a blast, all ages too! It's nothin for Grandma's and Grandpa's to be up until 2am with everyone else. They love to see us Americans, or foreigners in general, dance their traditional dances.

We then spent New Years Eve in Veliko Turnovo, the big city just outside of Gorna. It was great to watch the fireworks from a balcony over this city that is situated on a mountainside and very medieval styled.

Next day I was back to Plovdiv. I was home about a week or so before I had an electrical fiasco. I won't get into the details but I was without electricity for 5 nights. Needless to say this spurred my depression that hit me January into the beginning of February...oh how i was fed up with it all, as to be expected during a cold blistery winter. BUT things picked up come February and back out of the darkness I arose and to the grindstone. In the meantime I had picked up knitting from my friend Grace who learned from her village Baba's (grandma's) and visited her for her Birthday and had a bbq in Burgas with other volunteers to mark the beginning of bbq season.(the beer glass in the sunset:) It's March now and I have made myself two scarves and I have a third in the works but lack time now to work on it.

Amazing how spring always ushers out the bad and ushers in the good. Moods change abruptly as well as the increase of holidays. Except for the birds that come to town and nest in my overhang and my balcony...i hate it!!February and March take place the Kukeri festivals which is where they dress up in these oddly fascinating very old traditional costumes that were used to scare away the evil spirits of winter for the new spring planting/harvesting season. Then March 2nd is Baba Marta Day. Everyone buys these red and white twisted yarn like bracelts to give to everyone that day while wishing them, "life, health, luck or success and much love", or whatever you want to wish someone. :) The walking street in the center and pretty much every sidewalk in the city has tables of these Martinitsi to buy. I always love the beginning of March here.

Also, I and my counterpart have been working on applying for funding for our annual summer day camp for our students. The project proposal was sent out a week ago and is now up online for anyone to donate towards. Pretty exciting! So I have a lot going on right now with starting to prepare for camps, still tutoring an 11th grade girl Slavka, have taken on tutoring a boy outside of my work Vesil and starting to plan last out of country trips. Vesil and his family are really nice. His mother is a friend of a teacher at the H. School. This teacher approached me about Kamelia wanting Vesil to get some extra help in English and wahlah, here I am. So I go over to their apartment every Tues & Thurs and help him in English, chit chat with Kamelia and her father and then with Ismet her husband comes in from work, we all eat dinner. Then they drive me home. Sooo, we're talkin about 4 to 5 hours two times a week!! They're really nice, but 4 hours can be a lot sometimes.

So that's where I am now, thrilled that spring is here, busy with work, and can't believe that I'm only 6ish months away from my time here being done! My how time flies...I made it through the cold dreary winter caked with cold snowy/foggy weather, lack of work, motivation, health problems, electrical problems....things can only go up from here :)

I did manage to make it out to the slopes in January. I had a nice long weekend visit with my host family and skied with friends in Borovets.

Next excursion....GREECE, first week/weekend of April and I am pumped!!! :) After I make it to Macedonia for a quick long weekend trip at the end of April I will have been to every border country...well except for Serbia but that will have to wait unfortunately.

Be back soon with more pics and updates....Ciao za sega :)

*PS: Like I mentioned I am STOKED about my camps this year! My last year of camps and I am really excited and hopeful. We are going to try and do more things this year and change it up so I hope it all goes awesome and the kids have a great time AND gain valuable information/tools!

check it out at http://www.areteyouth.org/ "Roma Day Camp 2008 - Plovdiv".

Go check out the other two as well. The volunteers that are at those two organizations are also from my group and one of them is who I will be traveling to Greece with. Awesome girls and awesome camps!!

PSS: pics for those of you as interested and possibly anal about details as I am :)

top to bottom: Sofia, Jelly and I in sofia - am wearing scarf #2

self pic of scarf #1, Burgas sunset, Grace & I for her bday, Plovdiv walking street and all the martinitsi stands, Kukeri festival, Me in Samokov at the river or in Borovets with some peeps, my apartment building in Jan, when i ventured out for food and came back only with bread!, city hall dinner with Mel, New Years in VT and the next 5 are in Romania or on the way to, and the last two are in the village Bele Iksar where my host mom's parents live.

Ok, im out....

OK, well it's been more than a minute since I updated ya'll on all my happenin's, sooo, here goes...

Let's see...my last update was in September soo, what came after that was, MY TRIP HOME!

Most of you guys know that I took two weeks to go home. I really hadn't planned on coming home during my two year...two reasons: A) it's eeeexpensive, B) I kind of didn't want to have that "break" so to speak during the time, it's hard to explain. Just wanted to come here do my "time" and get back to everything. Going home has different affects on volunteers, and I didn't want it to risk it setting me back emotionally for a while. I will say that it was a great, and very busy, trip back.

I was actually excited and ready to get back to Bulgaria...where things are more "spoko", relaxed, haha, so to speak. Two weeks after I had gotten back felt like 2 months...just crazy how that happens! It was great to be back when I was, I made it for a best friends wedding, was able to go to Texas and see family and friends, and spend time back in Oklahoma to visit the rest of my family and some of my friends, and it was at the beginning of fall, a time I love.

Time flew and I was pressured for it constantly! I had hoped for at least one chance, ok honestly more than once, to veg out on the couch and watch all my TV shows im behind on and movies, and not do a single thing but eat popcorn or pizza and possibly not even talk...yeah didn't happen :). Oh well, it'll be all that more exciting next year when I move back home just in time for the holidays and I'll be done and i'll have months of nothing but crashing on multiple family couches! :) 'Till then, sitting at my little cozy table watching crazy, random, ridiculous movies they pick to show on the TV here will have to do, oh and popping my own popcorn on the stove top :)

But like I mentioned before I was really glad to get back and be able to be Jessica's Maid of Honor and see my family! Especially since I've been gone while so much has been happening in my family...I've missed my grandpa Porterfield's funeral, my Great Aunt Alda's funeral, a year of my grandpa Phillips chemo and my mom and step dad move into a new house...just across the street of my grandparents! :) I was blessed to be able to see my Aunt Alda though before her passing on my visit home...we took a trip out to McAlester one Sunday to see our family Phillips side! I was blessed to get to see her and everyone else and get to visit, especially since I wouldn't be there for her memorial service the following month. She was a great gal, and will truly be missed!! She doesn't have pain though now! ;)

Jessica's wedding was a blast! Us girls from OKC showed up everyone else and were the last ones on the dance floor....man it was great!

I didn't get to see so many people I had also hoped to see, so apologize now to all of you!! Two weeks really isn't as long as it sounds...especially when you have a crazy spread out family like mine! Going to the Ft. Sam Houston cemetery to see my papa's grave with my grandma and uncle in San Antonio was very special...I was able to have that moment that I missed experiencing with my family the few months before. It was interesting to read the other headstones of other military men and their spouses....serene, comes to mind. :)

I hadn't eaten like when I was home, well since I left! MAN it's amazing the quantity we eat in America, I mean I knew but, after not being around it everyday I forgot the feeling. I didn't have the "hungry" feeling until I got back to Bulgaria and a week or two had passed!! I treated myself as soon as my feet were on American soil. Once I made into the Dallas airport and found my next gate, I turned to my right the see my destiny....Chili's with their Top Shelf Margarita!!!

Yep, how perfect was that! Next thought...ATM, NOW! Finding the atm was not all that easy...no easy sign showing you where it was, and it wasn't an ordinary machine. I get my cash and settle up to the bar, no menu needed just one big top shelf with salt margarita. Not two seconds passes after I order and I realize, why the heck did I go get cash, I'm in the land of DEBIT CARDS! Completely forgot! Oh well. Ended up chattin up the man next to me, and I ordered some salsa and shared his chips with me. Turns out he was waiting for the OK flight as well. He's also been in the Eastern Europe area with the Army. Ended up getting into OKC almost 2 hours late...welcome party went home, all but my mom, dad and step mom...troopers.:)

That was just a sign to come of my flight home! My mom and I get to OKC airport 2 hours in advance like conscientious int'l traveler that I am, to realize that I grabbed the tickets that were useless in checking in! Fortunately bro David was home to meet my mom out on a highway exit to bring me my tickets I ridiculously left behind. Well, we wait in the long line (note there was no line when I originally got there), and proceeded to figure out my flight situation. Situation you ask, YEAH I had a situation. Flight into OKC was delayed and flights going TO Chicago (my destination) were delayed. SO, of course that altered my int'l connection in Chicago to Germany. Well, to get to the chase the man was very helpful, booked me on an optional later flight just in case and I proceeded to wait 6 hours, i believe it was, in the OKC airport!! Get to Chicago, I make my "just in case" flight and we are trafficking down the runway until we are at a dead stop in front of a building. Yeah, pilot comes on, says we'll all be sittin here for a possible 2 hours!! well turned into only an hour or so! My delays gave me 5 or so hours in Frankfurt to do NOTHING. I fortunately was familiar with the terminals I was departing from and knew exactly where the reclining "nap" chairs were...got myself a nice 3 hour nap! And off course, that flight was also delayed. SO, in the end I got into Sofia at 11pm friday when I was going to be getting in around 1pm and would have ample time to catch my choice of a bus or train, straight home and to crash!! NO, I had to get a cab and take it to the only hostel I could tell the cabby how to get to. I get there, NO ROOMS. So i walked about 10-15 minutes away around midnight to another hostel, bunked for the night and was on a 9am train home!!!

So, what's been going on since I got back in October...I'll break it down like this:

October: I got back just in time for classes to resume after our nation wide strike. Some other schools had already opened classes though still officially striking while mine on the other hand didn't hold classes. The schools who hadn't been having classes decided to resume "for the kids".

A group of volunteers had a Halloween costume party in the very cool, medieval town of Veliko Turnovo. I and my site mate Emily paired up as Thracian Goddesses :)

November: After 25 years of no cavities, I find out I have two! and one of them is rather large! SO I got that taken care of...wasn't as bad as I expected. The dentist Peace Corps uses is really cool and good. He also has some nice bling diamond in one of his teeth! haha Oh and he's also from Sweden. Also found out I have been exposed to TB...I DON'T HAVE TB but have LATENT TB...So I started the 9 month long med treatment...also no alcohol, not even red wine with dinner for 9 months! I do have my good friend Jelly who also tested positive to go through this with me! We got our chests x-rayed at a "lovely" communist/post communist (?when) hospital...that was an experience!

Like what I'm used to back home, I got to fest twice for Thanksgiving! My Plovdiv site mates and I had a mini Thanksgiving on the day of and that next day I and my homemade cornbread boarded a train with 5 other volunteers out to Burgas on the beach where 15 or so of us were going to have a fest on Saturday! It was a success!! It was great. We had a long day of just hangin out, a walk to the beach (in place of afternoon football), mimosa's and wine while we cooked all day! Even smelled like Thanksgiving. I was in charge of stuffing and dressing...yes they're different!! I think my Gram would be happy! :)

Work: Yeah been a tad slow! My counterpart and I have a new project but jeez, it's like pulling teeth to get her to sit down with me and go over everything at once! Also, classes with the high schoolers has been straining to start up this semester with the mess up after the strike. When we get back in Jan., things will start to smooth out as far as classes go.

December: Well immediately upon my return from the Burgas I decided to host dinner one night and also put up my Christmas tree. Andrew our site mate and a Jew, after all was said and done with the tree (takes like 10 minutes tops) said, wow you're tree isn't tacky! hahaha He just doesn't like xmas trees. lol On the 7th some of my good friends came into town to celebrate my birthday (the 6th). We went to the Arabic Restaurant, got our humus and hookah fix, and ate some of the awesome homemade cake Lina (my counterpart) made for me! It looked professionally done! The out of towners stayed until that sunday so we all got to just hang out and do whatever. We ended up laying low saturday night and just going to see a movie...Beowulf, wasn't bad. We got our first snow the night of the 13 and it snowed all weekend!!!! I decided to go visit my host family that weekend since I wouldn't be able over Christmas. That was a weekend of, food, drinks and name that meat. Yeah seemed like every meal there was some meat and my host dad would ask me, do you know what kind of meat this is....I delay as I was already unsure...the first mystery meat was goat, second tongue and the 3rd pork. The pork I had guesses but the goat I honestly thought was beef, roast beef...and the tongue, yeah I had no clue what it was when i decided to try a tiny bite before being informed.

SO, brings us to the present: My school is pretty much beginning break tomorrow though most schools finish through Friday. Since my school is 99.5% Roma and/or Turkish who happen to be Muslim and their 2nd biggest holiday (Eid al-Adha "Festival of Sacrifice"...Байрам, Bayram, in BG) starts tomorrow, we won't be having class. Why have class if they won't be there anyway. Went to the Christmas service tonight at the clubhouse, Segun from Nigeria and Craig from England have their work and ministry out of. Segun has a soccer team and they use the building for that and then twice a week they have services with the few Roma in the neighborhood who are Christian. Kate, a site mate, went with me. We walked literally 1 minute from my apt. where the building is which is directly across the street from my high school. It was really interesting to see and it was cute to see the kids singing and performing. Heard Christmas songs in all Bulgarian, Roma and Turkish. Saw some of my kids there too. I got a few pics, not good though...I'll attach what I can.

So, Friday I am leaving to go to my friend Melanie's town where Saturday at midnight we are catching the train from there to Bucharest, Romania. We're going to go see a little of Romania over Christmas. Mel is a type A planner so I'm just confirm whether or not I'm cool with the plans. :) We're going to go to some supposed to be really cool church on the eve of or the day of Christmas there in the city of Brasov...a cool little medieval place, supposedly. It'll be a nice 4 day getaway. We'll get back and then I'll just chill at her place until after New Years. So many of our friends ended up going home for Christmas so us and some others who are going to be around are going to get together and hang. Mel is our Italian cook, so we'll be well taken care of at her place!

Ok, it's late...sorry for the way-too-many-details and ramblings/babblings!! Those of you who know me best know I get wrapped up in all the details, so sorry for those of you who aren't and have the God given talent to be short, sweet, to the point and witty with no effort!

Everyone have a WONDERFUL CHRISTMAS & HAPPY NEW YEAR

Весела Коледа и Честит на Нова Година

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year

I miss and love you all!!!!

чао за сега ... bye for now

:)

Well Saturday was our first day of the school year....it was a trade off day for the previous week when businesses were closed on Friday from the national holiday on Thursday, but I don't get how that affected a school year that had yet to commence, yet there are A LOT of things here I don't get!

Anyway, I got up and at 9 walked down the street, just 2 houses down where the High School is, for all the celebration for the first day. All of the kids meet their new teachers and they give them all roses or some kind of flower, real or fake. Then, when I happened to show, they were all standing around respectively within their classes, and were all waiting for performances. So, I walked up through the gate entranced, found a nice spot on the side so I could see everything and everyone who walked by, students and teachers. It was good....i was a little nervous being around EVERYONE at one time since June/early July, but it was good, and it was great to see the kids again!! SO, follow up on my last bit, there is no strike apparently, or they already did what they decided to do, that being delaying the celebration on Saturday i think and wearing ribbons. I still don't know for sure what all they were up in arms about but pretty sure and would put money on it, that it was related to salaries and/or benefits.

Well towards the end after a group performed with their musical recorders and another group of boys did their usual break dance routine, a couple of the teachers from the elementary school ambushed me with their flowers. Since I didn't take them when they said I could have some, they decided to force them upon me! haha. Right about that time, Kate, the volunteer who works at the school for the deaf which is just 4 blocks away, showed up. She said that our school was like a real party/fiesta celebration compared to what went on at her school. She happened to get some pictures, those are the one I included. The pictures at the top are my school and the one at the bottom is a picture of some of the kids from her school. Like night and day, behavior wise.

So, come Monday I got up and went to the "small school" aka elementary school (we call it малко училище, small school) to see the teachers, see the kids and find out some of the teachers class schedules. I showed up and there weren't really any kids in the school yard like usual, and then when i walked up and said hi to one of the cleaning ladies, she said how she's not good, that she's tired b/c of all the cleaning work going on in the school and she told me how dirty everything is. HA she was right. i walked up stairs and there were some kids there and they were all helping the teachers clean desks, and bookshelves, etc. It was crazy. It's all from the remodeling that had started JUST right before school and is STILL finishing!!! SO, there have been no classes so far. The remodeling is great, b/c they are getting new windows and new heaters, which were both so desperately needed!!! So, my mindset of going and getting down to business was immediately HALTED and i had to take a step back mentally and just sit and socialize with the teachers basically. After I could only take so much of that, i then walked over to the "big school"(голямо училище) to make some ground there. That school is also in a disarray but not as bad! The whole 3rd floor apparently is not being used due to the construction of the new roof (much needed!). They also got new windows throughout the school, but work was started there first, so they're all holding classes, even without the 3rd floor being used. It's all just crazy. Anyway, that was my first day.

Today, was better. I went to the big school found the eng. teacher got her schedule, then headed to the small school. I chit chated with one teacher about work ideas and what not. I then went and found in the neighborhood this soccer coach who works at an NGO by the big school, to talk to him about some of his players we are trying to get back into school. After that I headed back to the big school to sit in a 5th grade eng class. That was great actually b/c the 5th graders are all 4th graders that I worked with at the 4th grade. It was great to see them and see how excited they were to be at the big school....except when they're in their eng class when the teacher does nothing engaging and makes them write a language they barely can pronounce much less write. It's really actually frustrating and difficult for me to sit in the class in regards to that aspect!

When i was leaving i ran into all my older 10, 11, and 12 graders! They all asked when we'd have class again and then a couple from my summer camp asked to go to cafe, i said of course, so that's the plan tomorrow, for me to go back and talk to them about times and days and to go and just hang out at a cafe. Now, that's work!! :) That's the part of being YD (Youth Development) that we get razed on from other programs, that just going to cafe's and hangin out with kids and playing sports and games is our work, haha :)

So, things are back to being more upbeat! I'm trying to do a lot of brainstorming and trying to make connections needed to do some things. Went to the pazar in the center today to see if I could buy some more okra this week and the lady didn't have any!! I happened across them last week, bought literally 7 pods and she gave them to me free (i wanted to feel it out first before i bought a ton) and they tasted great. Bought cornmeal this week instead of flour to cook them in and was all pumped and, ohhhh, let down! oh well, sauteed up a mix of veggies in soy sauce instead! mmm, mmm :)

pics: first 3 my school and the kids ... before and after the "celebration" performances and dances they had music playin and the kids afterwards were just hangin out dancin around, it was funny. They LOVE music and to dance! The pic of the kids standing around a roped off area was a shot of trying to get the break dancers...they're to the right wearing black and white. pretty sure their outfits were made by the girls who take the sewing classes. The last is one pic that kate got of her kids at her school before walking to ming.

Sorry if I ramble or get too caught up in details and makes too long, it's a habit of mine! ;)

WELL, x-rays prove it, they just confirm my fear of my sensitive tooth and the idea of it resulting from a cavity! BUT, we're talkin one HUGE cavity, the one I feared though had no idea it would be that big, and a small one just another tooth away!! :/

Well I made my scheduled trip to Sofia for my mid-service dental appointment, stayed the night Wednesday night and came back to Plovdiv Thursday evening. There happen to be a couple of other volunteers I know and am friends with in Sofia the same time so we had our "free" mediocre pasta dinner at the hostel and then headed out to get a drink or two on the town. They took me to a bar they knew of that I had never been to. They all call it the candle bar. This place was so cool....it is off the sidewalk down behind a building and there is no sign, no marking for the place, you don't happen across this kind of place, you find out about it by mouth from someone who knows about it. It's a small square one room spot and there are candles everywhere and a cement staircase to a upper wooden floor table area. What's cool about it, is it is supposedly the location of where the first Communist Bulgarian paper was printed!

Other news, apparently there is to be a teacher strike country wide. School officially starts this Saturday with the kids coming to school and there is some kind of celebration or activities with the teachers and kids. From what I read, Saturday will still happen but not all day and they are planning on holding classes all next week, the first official week of school and then after that, they are striking and not holding classes. NOW, this is what I read from Peace Corps but have yet to confirm what exactly might happen at my particular schools. I'll find out today when I can get in touch with my counterpart. Just crazy....it's amazing how worldwide it is, that teachers are always dumped on! If there is a strike where they don't plan to officially hold classes I'll still try and meet with the kids even if it's just to hang out at a cafe in the neighborhood!

The 26th I am going to go and be apart of a panel for the new trainees in Dupnitsa, the city my group had our hub trainings as well. Unfortunately getting there and back isn't a one day thing, due to the mountains it takes a day and a half...well and that has to do with timing and logistics of the panel discussion as well. Anyway, my point is if i don't have school officially it will make it easier for me to participate and be gone two nights for this Minority Panel. It's a panel with volunteers who specifically work with minorities. I was on the panel for the last training group and it went good, so we'll give it another try. This new training group are called the B22's since they are the 22nd group of pcv's to be in Bulgaria (I'm in the B20 group).

here's some pics for your viewing enjoyment....these are from when some of our friends came into Plovdiv for the September 6th holiday and some of them ran in the half marathon.

That would be Emily crossing the "finish" line and off in the distance cheering her on is Mike who had crossed right before her. Those are random youngins on the walking street here doing what the love. And yes, that would be me and my friend Jelly workin it, karaoking to Journey! right before I sang Tracy Chapman with Emily! haha, ahh great times!! :)

September has already started to fly by!

The weekend before last I and two other of my friends went back to my training site of Samokov for the annual Rock Festival, Rock in Rila (Rok v Rila) in the village of Beli Iskar just outside of Samokov. The three of us stayed saturday night with my host family. It was really great to be back "home" and to see my host family. It's weird the sense of comfort and home I feel when i go back there. I think part of it is that, that was really home for us and where we "grew up" in a sense here in Bulgaria, like it was our childhood. Anyway, saw the family out in the village, had lunch and then us girls walked up the street and hung out all afternoon and evening listening to rock, blues, classic rock, even a little "RESPECT" by some girls that could use some singing lessons. I always love going back there! Of course I was hounded more this time about how I need to visit my host brother who know lives in Colorado and how he has a car and whatnot....oh they're funny. I was there first girl volunteer out of 4 volunteers they have hosted, and i like to think that they broke the mold :)

That next week, one night all of us sitemates and Patty who lives in village Trud just outside of Plovdiv so we call her a sitemate, got together and tried our hands at making a peach pie from scratch. We made two pies and they were awesome for our first go at the art of pie making....though i guess there were 4 of us, soo....;)

I know my Gram and DD would be pleased to hear of me making and eating peach pie since every year when Gram makes her peach cobbler, I always refused because of not liking peaches...well times have a changed and I now love peaches, and bananas (esp. w/peanut butter), and I cook with vegetables that I never really cared for. Oh and the cherries, man, when cherries are in season here, which is the first of summer, WOW those are great! The tomatoes this season haven't been the best and I think that's from the really premature hot summer we got.

Anywho, enough rambling about food. This last weekend I went with my sitemates Emily and Kate to meet up with our friend Leslie in a town just north of here, about 4 hours by train, called Koprivshtitsa. I had been there before though in winter, because the man our school is named after was born and raised there so we visited his house where there is a monument of him out front. I knew in the winter that when that town was in full bloom it would be 10 times more beautiful. So, we met up and had stayed both nights, just takin it easy and having a relaxing weekend in the mountains. The two hotels we stayed at were beautiful and the people were great! Oh and I bought some homemade strawberry (яагоди - yagodi) jam....mmhmm, reminds me of the strawberries I would pick in my grandparents garden in Midwest City....those are definitely the best kind of strawberries...the small wild kind!

I returned sunday and turned right around monday and got on a bus to head an hour and a half south to the city of Haskovo to visit my friend Katie. She was one of my sitemates in Samokov during training and she and I went back to Samokov together last Christmas. I went down for this last minute visit because she had decided to go back to the states, for good! So, I went down yesterday morning to spend the last day and night she would spend in her city before she traveled with all of her stuff to Sofia today. I am really sad to see her go and will miss her a lot, though of course I'll be in touch with her, it's just that our training group is a group of people that know each other in a different way than some of our other friends we have here. You experience all of those first things in Bulgaria and language training together. But, I understand and respect her reasons for needing to go home, but will miss here being here. I did, however make out with some great stuff of hers from her apartment...my loot included: a Sheraton robe, Q-tips - actual q-tip brand!, a knife set, slippers, blank cd's, a huge pan, marker/highlighter/stickers for school, AND a printer!! maybe a few other little things, but you get the gist. The printer will be great for when I am teaching my own english classes and need something for the kids or myself. They are really tight and protective about printing/copying anything!

So, this week there is the huge national holiday, Unification Day on Sept. 6th which also happens to be Den na Plovdiv, Day of Plovdiv. Each city has they're own celebration day. There's going to be a half marathon in which some of my volunteer friends will be running in. That day should be fun yet exhausting.

Well, I'm down to 29 days till I am home I believe!!! So excited! School starts on the 17th so I'm just trying to think of last minute things I need to do before school starts up. It'll be great to see the kids again! Trying to meet with them over the summer didn't quit work out as easy as I had hoped. Though I am going to try and meet with some of them next week at a cafe or something and just catch up with them.

So, Thursday is the big day of celebration and then saturday or sunday I'll probably go with another Plovdiv volunteer to Trud where Patty lives to check out their village day celebration. Patty, though, will be visiting her boyfriend who is working in Egypt right now! After this coming weekend I may go back to Samokov if that is the time that they are going to be harvesting the potatoes (I forget when exactly they do that and I'd like to help out again this year) or go visit my friend Jelly in Blagoevgrad. Then the last weekend is hopefully going to be my second and last trip to the beach for the year and THEN it'll be time to pack up and head to Mid-Service Conference and then at 6am on the 4th, HOME!!!!!! :)

*sorry for the rambling and possibility of it not making sense ;)

(pics are rock festival (Grace, Katie and me), pie night, 3 pics from Koprivshtitsa and last pic I have of Katie and I this morning as we waited for her bus :(

Welcome to my humble, and COZY abode, 4th and top floor of my building, here in the city of Plovdiv in my wonderful neighborhood of Stolipinovo, infamously known for the main neighborhood of the "Turkish" Gypsies.

In the pics...the first is my apartment building from the street. My balcony is the one at the very top corner right...the inclosed balcony on the front side, that is my landlords apartment just below me. The big white round thing hanging is my boiler, the spot next to the main window where a low cabinet sits is where my stove usually is sitting on though is still on my balcony, probably for the next two weeks. You can see all the books, papers out as well as my suite cases, since I have little to no storage room. My bathroom is actually next to my main door though outside my apartment and next to. Not the greatest convenience but it's fine AND my bathroom has been noted to be the best bathroom...if that says anything...take my word for it, I won't include pics for you to see for yourself. I have tile floor and walls and a "normal" toilet. I also have been noted to have one of the best kitchen sinks. So, cozy as it may be, I lucked out overall! :)

It is 68 degrees and I am LOVING every second of it!!!! About 2am when I was getting ready to go to bed...yes i know 2am, sleep times haven't been the same after being up till 2 or 3am my time talking to family or friends around my grandpa's death....I thought I heard the sound I faintly remember being described as what is called "thunder"!! I thought no, there was only a little chance of rain and when I had gone to the window I heard a car racing down the major street near me and thought well maybe it was a car I heard. Well, NO, it was thundering....it continued from the west side of the city coming in over the mountains. I went to bed and of course laid there because I can't sleep and listened as the thundering got closer and closer from the mountains. I could see the reflections of the lightning on the houses or apartment blocks around me since I face east.

Right when I had started to doze off, the GIGANTIC burst of lightning struck simultaneous with the sharp and deep very loud cracking thundering that made me rise out if bed panicked! It was amazing!! And then the rain came!! WOOHOOOO RAIN!!!!! All morning I've heard off and on faint rumblings off somewhere but not sure if we'll get another dose today. (correction...it is an hour or so after i posted this and it IS RAINING!!!!! sorry i know, im maybe too excited! :) ... it's been a long time since ive been so excited and peaceful to watch a cold rain storm from a balcony...it's hard to explain!

We haven't had rain since the very beginning of June and we have really needed it! The whole country has been experiencing fires and the crops have been suffering as well! What a great way to start off the beginning of August! Which by the way is my exact year anniversary from when I left Ok and left the states! It is so hard to believe that it has already been a year! Many times it really feels like I was home just a few moths ago and other times it feels like we've been here forever. Tomorrow, August 2nd is when I flew out of OKC to go to Washington DC to spend a couple of days with my brother and our cousins before reporting in on the 4th in DC for our staging conference before flying out the 7th with my training group! Just surreal really!

With the weather the way it is today, I am getting soo excited about fall! Ya know, it's the little things in life...you have to be able to enjoy the little things! woohoo football season and volleyball season, can't wait!! :)

Lt. Col. Everett K. Porterfield passed on to be home with the Lord on July 17, 2007, in San Antonio, Texas. My Papa was 92 years of age and and just two months shy of his 93rd birthday. He was suffering from colon cancer and worsening Alzheimer's along with diabetes he had for most his life.

He was a great man who "honorably served in WWII in the Pacific Theatre and Korean War during his faithful 21 years as an officer in the US Army and Air Force. Everett was awarded the Bronze Star, Purple Heart and numerous commendation medals for his heroic efforts. He retired from the service in 1957 and went on to retire from the FAA of Oklahoma City, OK in 1971." Afterwards moved with my Granny, Annabel to San Antonio, Texas. "He married his beloved wife, Annabel Porterfield on May 10, 1941 and was married a blessed 66 years."

He was a sweet and stubborn man all at the same time and we loved all of that about him! He lived from his 40's on with one arm and didn't ever let it slow him down. He had his duties and chores around the house and "dog'gonit" he got them done one way or another. He had a routine for everything.

I'll never forget my fascination when I was a child of him driving with one arm and the little handle thing he had on the steering wheel, the picture of my sister when she was around 6yrs. looking into his shirt sleeve looking at his arm, what he had of an arm. Also, his smile and chuckle, him pointing at me squinting his eyes giving me some kind of advise for life or for our lottery scratch off my dad, myself and my granny would play, usually revolving around some kind of "you go get 'em", "you tell'em".

I want to thank all of my friends both here in Bulgaria and the few at home who knew...would have been much worse being this far away if it weren't for you!

And, of course I want to thank my family for being support and encouragement for me being here while my grandfather became worse and worse and when he passed and keeping me informed on everything. I really appreciate all you did!

For my family that was there, I hate that I wasn't there with you, I would have given anything to be there with you and to grieve with you all! BUT such is life, no one said it was going to be fair or easy! We have to keep on truckin, though never forgetting, just taking our memories and our loved ones along with us for the ride, on our journey's....b/c they are apart of you so they'll always be there!! Thanks to those who included him or our family in their prayers!!

Love, "Sugafoot" ;)

Lots goin on...and not all of it is good! Of all my years of playing multiple sports both indoors and outdoors, and in gyms with terrible or no air conditioning or ventilation, during every season and particularly summer in the typical hot scorching OK weather, I have NEVER gotten sick from the heat!! WELL, today marks that new milestone. Woke up this morning with the classic symptoms....dizziness, nausea, vomiting, weakness, headache. All of this at 8am, and i was supposed to meet with my counterpart at 10 to go over project ideas, I thought I might be able to meet her, especially since we were meeting just down the street from my apt. Yeah I was stupid to think that, but I met her anyway but I came home quickly after buying more water and slept and I took two electrolyte pills that the PC supplies us with in our Med kit!! How's that for self diagnosing and treating!

This heat is just terrible and with no kind of AC!!! Some pcv's have some kind of ac....климатик, we call them, but I obviously don't! Oh and my flowers are officially dead, but it's okay, it's b/c I was gone a week in Italy!! Yep, a week of fabulous food, fabulous weather, great sights, good times and laughs, authentic Italian experience!

So got back last Sunday night from being in Italy from the previous Sunday. We had a great time! Our first two nights were spent in Rome after "sleeping" in the Sofia airport for our 6am flight. We spent the early day out looking around seeing some of the sights...we took our time to see the city avoiding any kind of tight schedule of things to see places to go, we didn't make it to all the places some of us wanted to go, but this is the best way to do it! Monday was the Roman Forum (the old original center of Rome), the Colosseum, and everything in between. That night we headed out for dinner at a cafe with great pasta by the Spanish Steps but spent our evening hanging out at the Trevie Fountain....great people watching, kept us entertained for hours. Next day was the Pantheon, Vatican, best pannini sandwich in all of Rome for lunch and all the little stops in between....found the best little store in a random street with the coolest glass jewelry we all bought from! You don't find those kinds of places unless you take it easy and just go with the flow instead of sticking solely to a map and a watch! That night was our picnic night at the Spanish Steps. In efforts to save money but still have a night out on the town, we went to a store close to our hostel, stocked up on all Italian essentials...wine was replaced with cheap Italian beer, budgets may i remind you. We got on the Metro with our dinner and headed to find a spot to sit on the steps. Another great spot for people watching and again were entertained for hours. Unfortunately, a lot of the crowd around us was young traveling college students and/or HS students but some of them had guitars and played for the crowds so it equaled out, I guess :) (Roma accomplishments: found best panani shop and the best cafe by train station...what better place to start drinking coffee than Rome :)

Next day we caught a train to Florence! Florence was just an afternoon stopover on our way to Milan. We checked our bags and headed out for a 5 hour look at Florence. Florence consisted of: another great pasta lunch, stopping at multiple open air street bazaar/markets, saw the famous Duomo (the church in the center), walked over to see the David...a replica, since the original you have to pay to see, the oldest bridge in Florence with all it's shops that have been there for a very long time, of course a round of gellato (ice cream), then took our time walking through the city stopping whenever we wanted, and off to catch our next train to Milan.

Now this is where it gets better...see Melanie is Italian, and she still has family in Italy, so she has taken it serious to learning Italian...some of the deciding factors for me when I decided to hop on this trip, who doesn't want to get a taste of real Italian life from the locals! SO, we arrived in Milan where her cousin, Gianni (her grandma's cousin), a 70 something year old with the spunk and a heart of a 20 year old, musician picked us up and drove us to his apartment. He lives in a beautiful apartment just outside of the city. We arrived where we ate again pasta, killer Italian roast, potatoes and green beans...it was great. We're not used to eating foods with much flavor other than salt, so, we "mmmm'd" at everything the whole trip!! (don't get me wrong I do have Bulgarian favorite dishes!) His apartment is a wonderful blend of his global eclectic style....I saw that there is hope for my eclectic style one day when I have my own place, lol. It was very homey and comfortable and was great for resting after we spent either a day on the train or shopping downtown Milan. Next day we set out for a full day of shopping and sights of Milan. Gianni dropped us off at the Metro by his apartment and we headed into the center. We walked up from the metro to be right in front of the Duomo which is amazing and the largest Gothic church in the world. Along the sidewalk there were all of these posters of some of Versace's design sketches to commemorate the 10th anniversary of his death. So we all found one and posed by it. Then we headed off to the stores just in time for the doors to be open...the other girls were a little bit more into this than i was, though of course I found a few bargains :). It was the perfect time to be in Italy, it's sale season, so they can clear out and bring in the new fall lines. Ate lunch with some Italians Crystal had met in Estonia. Then we were off again to hit the rest of the sales in a hurry before we had to jump back on the Metro to meet Gianni at the Metro stop in his neighborhood in his Mercedes (sugar daddy #1). He then took us to grab a few aperitif's then it was home for dinner!! Melanie played some for us on the piano and then we were off to be treated to ice cream. He insisted. Next day we arose to the usual, "Pronto, ready" by Gianni in the morning, our cue that breakfast was ready. Then we off again to the metro where we said our goodbye's and thanks, hopped on and headed to the train station. Next stop, Ventimilgia, cousin #2 and sugar daddy #2, haha :)

Here we got picked up by Reddy, the younger brother of the cousin in Milan, also a musician and has his own big band music group! He and his wife and their daughter fed us a great lunch overlooking the valley and the sea in the background. After lunch we were driven out further into the valley to the village Pigna by another cousin, the youngest and the sister of the three boys. This village is where Melanie's grandma Nonna and the other cousins are from. There, the 4 of us stayed in the downstairs apartment of family friends. It was awesome and such a great place to stay. They were a very cute young family and the wife voluntarily fed us lunch both days we were there (of course we said, "oh no you don't have to do that" with big grins and of course we meant sure, wonderful). This village was pretty much built ON the mountain and the houses were just stacked on each other and along sides! The windy, twisty and cave-like, walkways in and between the whole place was just fascinating and beautiful....really took you back in time.

We spent one night watching a free open air concert of Glenn Miller music that Reddy's band put on. That is where we met the final sibling and the youngest of the three brothers, second to the youngest, youngest being the sister. He ALSO is a musician and is the bass guitarist in his this band. This is where Gracie tells an older gentleman sitting in front of us and who had turned to us rambling on about something, that "you don't speak Italian" thinking she was doing so well with the little she knew telling him that she did not speak Italian....he was a sport and laughed and of course continued to turn to us saying who knows what and smiling at us.

With our location, being around 40 minutes from the French border and of course off the coast, we decided to travel in for a few hours to Monaco which was 20 minutes by train. The location is very beautiful (the water and beaches!!), though in general, Monte Carlo seemed and looked too fake and made up for flashy appearances and for the tourists. When Mel and her Nonna made a trip back here a few years ago before she passed away Nonna was very disappointed how Monte Carlo had changed, a place where she had worked for many years making hats for the locals and even royalty.

We topped off our last night in Pigna with their village festival which included food and drinks from locals and a concert, and off we were the next day for our night train back to Rome (the night scene of the towns and villages off the coast was just beautiful!), caught a bus to the airport and off we were to Sofia....where it was stifling hot (we've made int'l news for our unusual heat this summer, ugh!!) We were spoiled in northern Italy!

Italy was everything I remembered and then some! It was a fabulous and relaxing trip with some of my girls!

*sorry the pics are scattered like they are, can't quite figure out all this programs upload shiznat for pics!

So, for the last week and a half it has been Ridiculously hot!! Supposedly we made CNN the other day about our record breaking heat here in Bulgaria. Apparently it is hotter here than it has been in 112 years. All I know is that I and my plants are dying(refer to picture)! (i think the marigolds might make it but I'm not counting on it) My little fan runs all day and all night and showers a day average 3! Last week when I had volunteers here for my second camp, we moved my stove out to my balcony so the heat stays outside, so I've been cooking out there IN the heat, nice huh. Oh and I've started using my distiller on my balcony as well, because it creates a ton of heat AND for four hours!!! Good thing I have electrical outlets out there!

I'm just really glad that this wasn't a week we had camp....last week, some of the days the kids (and a certain male volunteer) complained about the heat but I stayed out there and showed them up while they sat in the shade. :) I'm waiting to get pics from the other volunteers. I don't have a lot b/c I stay so involved with the kids or keeping things on track that I forget to take pictures usually. Camp went really well though, we had about 20-25 kids each day and they had a blast. They love Twister and our American Football "game" turned into football/soccer, haha! the pics above are from this second camp...

But after camp was over on Friday, I and another friend Karlan AKA Jelly, hopped on a train to head out to Burgas to go to the beach with two of our other friends. We got on the train and stopped in Stara Zagora, an hour an a half out of Plovdiv, where our friend Melanie joined us. From there we stood the whole time in the aisle holding the window open b/c it was way too hot to sit, and enjoyed some semi-cold "beverages" Mel picked up at the train station. We stayed like that for the next 2 1/2 hours or so. The whole way out to Burgas you see fields and fields of sunflowers, it's really beautiful. We got to Burgas where we met our 4th member of the group, Grace who lives just outside of Burgas. She met us at a restaurant outside of the train station where she had salads and french fries and a cold beer waiting for us! We then took a 40 min bus ride to her town for the night and took the same bus back into Burgas at 11 the next morning ready to go directly to the beach! We stayed out there for the afternoon, swimming, tanning, playing frisbee on the beach and eating pizza and taking in water like it was air, oh the crazy heat! The water was great and they had umbrellas out for you to use and only had to pay 1 Lev for them IF the money taker even made it to your umbrella....can't find that in America! That night we had awesome Chinese food for dinner. Next day, Jell and Mel and I headed for the train station and picking up lunch on the way, a "pancake" (crepe) filled with some chocolate cream, like nutella for those of you who know what that is, and banana's, oh it was heaven! Boarded the train and slept most of the time in the unbearable heat yet again. All i wanted after a weekend of non-stop heat was to walk into a cool, even semi-cool, I'm not picky, apartment and sleep comfortably for once....well that does NOT exist here, so i walked in dropped my bags and took a freezing cold shower and tried to sleep and not be miserable. But the beach was great overall, a nice cap to end a week of camp!

Well, after creating my account in March planning to update on my awesome trip to fabulous Istanbul, I have finally decided to jot a little something down for all my family and friends who have asked back home and maybe occasionally my bg pcv buddies of mine if they decide to take the time to mossy on over to my two cents to view and keep up on all the "excitement" that goes on over here. (bg=bulgaria, pcv= peace corps volunteer - this is the beginning of the constant and ever so "necessary" acronyms so try and keep up :)

Quick background...I've been placed in the big metropolitan city of Plovdiv, just under 400,000 peeps, in south central Bulgaria since Oct. '06. Though I am Youth Development I have been placed in a school so makes my assignment a little out of the norm in comparison to other YD's. I work with Roma (gypsies) youth. I live and work in the same neighborhood, which gets quite the remark from other Plovdiv Bulgarians when they find out where I live. This particular neighborhood predominantly consists of the two different types of Roma groups so is pretty much avoided by any Bulgarians that don't already live here. I live/work on the "Turkish" Roma side which is also mainly where the youth I work with live on as well. The other side is Roma. These two groups sometimes don't even like to interact or at least make it known that there is a definite difference between the two of them. The Turkish Roma, referred by Bulgarians as Gypsies, say they are Turkish and actually speak Turkish as their main language. Most of these kids don't learn Bulgarian until and if they go to school. Anyway, I really like working with these kids and am daily entertained by them somehow. By now most if not all of them know that I am either a "teacher" or that I am American or that I know English and when passing them I get "Здрасти Госпоза", "Hi Miss" or "ах Англиски, здрасти", "ah English, hi"....i know doesn't quite translate right, but they say this because they know I teach some English. So yeah, I'm at a school and am teaching some English to students who want to learn when they're not in their scheduled classes, so it's good, small, informal English groups. This won't be all my work though, next year I plan to do a classroom pen-pal with some of the younger English classes with a couple of classes from the states and I'm going to do a anti-drug campaign and get more info into the school and to the girls and boys even about prostitution, anti-trafficking and safe migration. So, that's a little bit of an overview for now. Some of you have asked and I'll have pics of my humble and definitely cozy abode soon....it's a mess right now.

Well, summer is here meaning school's completely finito in two weeks, bought my high class air conditioner (nice 40 leva osolating fan), I have a trip to Italy to look forward to in July and then frequent weekend trips to Burgas to hang on the Black Sea beach. Oh and of course I'll be working, not to worry, but it's gonna be quite споко (relaxing). I'll meet with some of my 7th and 9th grade girls to play volleyball during the summer...i want to teach those who don't know how and coach the one's who know. I hope to try and make a team of them during next school year but it would have to be a league team possibly since there are no girl teams at my school.

Last week was my first major project/event...I had a week long day camp for 3rd and 4th graders. Those kids are soo cute and soo easy to entertain. We had an awesome week of games, crafts, face painting, water balloon fights, ya know the works. I had some other volunteers offer to come to Plovdiv for the week and help me out with the kiddos and they did great, we got a lot of laughs, hugs and good times together with the kids! The picture I included is of me and two of the kids, my counterpart on the right and Patty who lives close to Plovdiv in the village Trud....give me some time to figure all this blog shiznat stuff out so I can include more pictures.

Well this week is being spent getting ready for our next week long day camp with the 5-8th graders, so far we have 24 kids signed up and should definitely be interesting and entertaining again!! I have a woman from an organization in Sofia coming to speak to some of the kids about trafficking and safe migration, though waiting to hear back from her on exactly which day, ugh i hate waiting till last minute to know some of these details, especially since it's my tail if it doesn't happen in the end.

Last night I walked into the center to go with Emily, one of my 3 site mates, to her museum she works at for a concert. Apparently, her museum has been doing this month long, every night concert series for 43 years. So we went, sat over to the side with some of the other staffers out in front of the museum and listened to classical music for an hour and a half in Old Town Plovdiv. Her museum, like just about all the others in Old Town, was once a home to some kind of Merchant or Trader. Beautiful homes!! Before it started some woman came up and asked "who are these pretty girls" and if we could present the bouquets to the musicians at the end. It was nice so we'll be going back a lot within the next month since it's free and there is different music every night. So, after it was finished I set out for my 40 min walk home again but this time in the nice cool nighttime. It's a win/win situation, save bus fare and get some exercise in!

Okay, that's long enough for now, I'll be back soon.....be sure and keep me filled in on all the happenins back home!!! (note: my short visit home is in t-minus 113 days!!!) BRING IT ON!!!

Don't forget to not forget about me and keep up to date!! :-)