According to the Lonely Planet "if you haven't seen Ohrid, you haven't seen Macedonia" and I understand why because Lake Ohrid is spectacular. Situated on the Albanian-Macedonian border, Lake Ohrid is one of Europe's oldest and deepest lakes and covers an area of 138 square miles.

Luckily our bus ride to Macedonia went much smoother than the one to Albania and we were in Ohrid by early afternoon. We got dropped off on the main road in town and as we stood there looking completely lost, backpacks strapped on and map out, trying to figure out how to get to our guesthouse a man approached us and asked if we needed accommodation. Of course this happens often traveling and people are trying to get you to stay with them so we politely said we had a place to stay and went back to our map. He asked where and when we told him we were staying at Antonio Guesthouse he pulled out his phone and called Antonio to come meet us. Once we made it to our guesthouse (the house was shared by Antonio and his parents and they used some of the rooms upstairs for renting to travelers) we decided to relax for a bit and then headed out for dinner and a walk down to the harbor and through 'old town' with its lovely narrow cobblestone streets.

Upper Gate of Old Town Ohrid

On our second day in Ohrid we did Lonely Planet’s walking tour of Ohrid’s ‘old town’. We began our tour at Sveta Bogorodica Perivlepta church, which is home to some amazing frescos depicting the life of Mary (not picture allowed though) and on to the old town’s Upper Gate and Classical Amphitheater. The amphitheater was originally built for theater, but later the Romans pulled out the first ten rows to accommodate the gladiator fights. At the church we were given a tour about the history of the church and an explanation of what the frescos depict. According to Robby our tour guide reminded him of the gypsy woman Esmeralda from the Disney movie 'The Hunchback of Notre Dame'. She had long wild curly hair pulled back in a large jeweled butterfly clip and wore a long hot pink sundress and wedge sandals. Her tour style was animated and she spoke loudly with a very passionate tone about the subject matter of the frescos. When our tour first began there were four of us, but as more visitors came inside the church she had to tell them about the ticket price (she was only person working there) and she would yell to them that they could join our tour and pay later. Invariably when she went back to the tour instead of starting off where she had been she would quickly begin the story again.

Classical Amphitheater of Ohrid

Next we went to Car Samoil’s Castle. Car Samoil from Bulgaria ruled Macedonia from 980 AD to 1014 AD, until Byzantine emperor Basil II defeated Samoil at the Battle of Belasica in 1014. The castle offered panoramic views of the lake and city.

From the castle we wandered down a forest path to the ruins of a 4th century church, which is currently being excavated. Next to the ruins is the 5th century church of Sveti Kliment i Pantelejmon that displays the architectural style of the various empires that ruled Ohrid.

Sveto Kliment i Pantelejmon church

Walking back up the hill we made it to Sveti Jovan at Kaneo, a 13th century church, sitting on a cliff above Lake Ohrid.

Sveti Jovan at Kaneo church

Chapel of Mala Bogorodica

Below Sveti Jovan tucked into the cliff base is the small chapel of Mala Bogorodica sitting next to Kaneo beach. We stopped for a fish lunch at a beach café before finishing up our tour. After lunch we walked back up the hill towards the center of the old town to Sveta Sofija, an 11th century church that was modeled after Constantinople’s St. Sophia. Some of the frescos have been exposed from beneath the wall plastering that preserved them during the Ottoman era.

Sveta Sofija church

On our last day in Ohrid before our overnight bus to Belgrade we took a quick trip to Sveti Naum 29km from Ohrid on the other end of the lake. The Church of Sveti Naum is a multi-domed, Byzantine-style church and was built in the 16th century. Peacocks roam the grounds around the church (apparently peacocks were an early Christian symbol of resurrection and immortality. The peacock is also featured on the 10 Macedonian denar bank note and coin.

Church of Sveti Naum

Next Stop: Belgrade, Serbia

When many of my friends found out I was traveling to Albania their first response was often "What's in Albania?" or "Why Albania?". Well I wanted to visit Albania because it is such an unknown to many people due to its decades of isolation under Enver Hoxha. My interest in post-communist states and Eastern European history also drew me to Tirana. Tirana is a city that reminds me of Yerevan in many ways, but also has the evidence of a stronger European influence than in Armenia. Albania is a country that was ruled over by many empires and ideologies all of which are evident in its architecture, cuisine, and people, which makes it a fascinating place worth visiting to me.

The cheapest way for us to travel from Athens to Tirana was to take the 11 hour overnight bus, which became a 16 hour journey because it took 5 hours to cross the border. Many tour companies run overnight buses to Tirana and that means that they all arrive at the Greek-Albanian border at the same time and each bus has to wait its turn to cross the border. We spent our first night in Tirana relaxing at our hostel and recovering from our bus ride. The next day we explored the streets of Tirana and this is what we saw.

The Pyramid was built in 1988 (can't you tell!) by Enver Hoxha's daughter and son-in-law to serve as the Enver Hoxha Museum. It is now home to cultural events and teenage graffiti artists. Hoxha founded the Albanian communist party in 1941 to fight back against the fascist occupation of Albania by the Italians. He was in power until his death in 1985. He kept the country extremely isolated breaking off relations with Yugoslavia in 1948. He maintained relations with the Soviet Union during Stalin's years, but after Khrushchev came to power and criticized the cult of personality surrounding Stalin, Hoxha broke with Soviet-style communism in 1960. After this Albania aligned with China and from 1966 to 1967 Albania underwent its own cultural revolution. Atheism was promoted and churches and mosques were destroyed and the collectivization of agriculture was completed. Hoxha built tens of thousands of igloo-shaped concrete bunkers that still dot the hills of the country. With Mao's death in 1976 Albania's unique relationship with China came to an end and the country became isolated with no allies.

The Bell of Peace was forged from bullet casings from the 1997 conflict in Albania.

Parliament Building: After Hoxha's death restrictions loosened a bit, but the whole system of government was falling apart. Throughout the 1990s thousands of Albanian fled to Western embassies in Tirana and to Italy in search of political asylum. The government finally agreed to allow opposition parties and the 1992 elections ended 47 years of communist rule in Albania. The transition from communism to free market led to increased corruption and smuggling. A severe economic crisis led to 70% of Albanian's losing their savings and rioting and looting in the streets. The situation has stabilized during the first decade of the 21st century, but it is estimated that around 25% of the population lives in poverty.

Communist-style Apartment Buildings fill the neighborhoods of Tirana. These buildings are a feature of all cities and towns throughout Eastern Europe, but unlike those of Armenia the one's in Tirana have been painted with bright colors and patterns. This really adds a sense of hope to the city and takes away from the grim nature of concrete block towers.

Italian Architecture: Albanian King Zog I cooperated extensively with the Italians in developing Albania during the 1930s. The Italians built grand boulevards and beautiful buildings from the Fascist school of architecture (that's right there is a Fascist style) and helped turn Tirana into a true capital city. However, this left Albania indebted to Italy and basically a de facto colony. In 1939 Mussolini ordered the invasion of Albania and King Zog fled to England. The Italians occupied Albania throughout World War II.

Skanderbeg: This statue of Albanian national hero Skanderbeg looks out over Skanderbeg Square, which is currently a giant construction site because the square is being renovated to be a pedestrian only area. Skanderbeg is a national hero because from 1443 to 1468 he led the Albanian resistance against takeover by the Ottoman Empire. He won all 25 battles he fought against the Turks and although the Ottoman's finally overwhelmed the Albanian resistance - it was only after 26 years of fighting.

Et'hem Bey Mosque was built in the 18th century and managed to survive destruction during Hoxha's 1960s atheism campaigns due to its beauty and its status as a cultural monument.

Mother Teresa Square: While Mother Teresa may be one of the most famous Albanians sadly the square meant to honor her is not much more than this statue and an empty concrete fountain.

Mother Albania sits atop a hill overlooking Tirana surrounded by Martyrs' Cemetery where 900 Albanian partisans who died in World War II are buried.

We took a day trip to Kruja, the site of Skanbderbeg's castle, during our time in Albania. Located about 45 minutes north of Tirana the ancient site is now surrounded by the modern city of Kruja. Skanderbeg was born in Kruja and Albanians still take pride in that fact that he and his forces defended Kruja until his death.

Next Stop: Ohrid, Macedonia

I spent about an hour our first afternoon in Athens trying to find out about how to take the bus directly from Athens to Tirana, Albania. According to many sources online there was a daily night bus, but I was not having any luck finding out where it left from or how to buy tickets. Like in Turkey, all the international buses in Greece are run by individual private tour companies. The front desk at the hostel sent us to a nearby travel agency, but I knew from their website that they didn’t offer bus services. We went on our second and last morning in Athens hopeful that they could point us in the right direction. Luckily they were able to because all of the tour companies that go to Albania are located near one particular metro stop. So off we went to the metro and the when we arose from underground directly across the street from the metro station was a line of tour agencies all with buses to Albania. Within five minutes we had our tickets for that evening at 8:30 and were back on the metro.

Triumphant we returned to our hostel to book a place to stay in Triana and then went out for some last-minute sightseeing and shopping. Located near the northern slope of the Acropolis is the ancient Roman Agora. Built in the 1st century BC by the Roman leaders of Greece you enter the sight through the well-preserved Gate of Athena Archegetis.

The Roman Agora is also the site of the Tower of the Winds, built by Syrian astronomer Andronicus. It functioned as a sundial, weather vane, water clock and compass. Each side of the octagonal monument represents a point of the compass. The reliefs around the top depict the eight winds. The tower was later used by the dervishes during the Turkic period.

Very close to the Roman Agora is the Library of Hadrian. Built in the 2nd century AD, the library is the largest structure built by the Roman emperor Hadrian. It was home to books, music halls, lecture rooms, and a theatre.

Next we made our way through the nearby shopping district and down the narrow lines of shops for a little window shopping (or in my case actual shopping). From there we headed for the Panathenaic Stadium, home to the first modern Olympic Games in 1986. The stadium was build from recovered Pentelic marble from the original Panathenaic Stadium built in the 4th century BC as a venue for the Panathenaic athletic contests.

To complete our loop of central Athens we walked along the edge of the National Gardens and past the Presidential Palace. The palace was being guarded by one of the Evzones, which are the Greek army's elite ceremonial unit, but as I like to call them they are the guys in the skirts with the pom-poms on their shoes. We made our way back to Syntagma Square and down the Plaka to our hostel. We spent the rest of the evening relaxing at the hostel until it was time to meet our overnight bus to Tirana, Albania.

Next Stop: Tirana, Albania

Hope you are armed with a cup of coffee and ready for a long on because this may be the longest blog post I've written thus far. What can I say it is ATHENS!! There is so much to see and so much to say about this amazing historical city as well as its modern self. We were only there for two nights, but we saw a lot. Also, instead of telling you that I went to this really old temple and that really old building I'm going to give you a bit of historical background of the sites we visited in Athens. So ready or not here we go...

In order to make it to Athens directly from Samos Island we had to take a twelve hour ferry during the day (disappointingly the overnight ferry is the one that comes from Athens to Samos). When we purchased our tickets our only choices were outside seating or inside seating for only about €10 more so we selected inside, but it turned out that we were in first class. Getting onto the boat was quite an exercise though as it arrived in the port at Karlovasi from Samos’ main port at Vathi and simply backed up to the port let down its walkway and driveway (for those transporting vehicles) and everyone began to try and get on at the same time. The boat was very comfortable with lots of leg room and comfortable seats which made the ride much more pleasant. However, one thing I learned from the large amount of children onboard is that they have the ability to run around and play all during the ride unlike on an airplane where they must sit still. There were kids playing catch and tag and babies crying and screaming for a large portion of the ride. Luckily as the owner of an iPod I was able to ignore most of it and try and get a bit of work done on my final grad school research paper.

The Nissos Mykonos (Our Ferry to Athens)

We made it into Athens and off the boat around 9pm and set out to find the metro station. Robby (who thankfully has a great sense of direction as I do not) had already figured out how to make it to our hostel in central Athens from the port via the metro. It took quite a bit of walking to get to station, but all in all it was simple journey. Although due to metro construction we were unaware off the train did not stop at our stop and continued on to the next. Not wanting to get too far out of the way we got off at the next stop and found a map to try and figure out how to get to our hostel. An older man on the stopped train called Robby over and told him that because of construction the train skipped our stop, but was now going back to it. After he told us this of course the train doors shut and it left the station to go where we wanted to be. We dragged ourselves down labyrinth of stairs to get to the other platform so that we could go back one stop. Fortunately our hostel was very close to the metro stop and after a minute walk we made it the hostel around 10pm. Exhausted we had one last hurdle before rest could come because our hostel room was on the fifth floor and there was no elevator! It was all worth it in the end because we had a breathtaking view of the Acropolis perched over the city and all lit up from our balcony.

Night view of the Acropolis

Monastiraki Square

The next day we tried to get an early start so that we could beat the heat and the crowds for our day if sightseeing in Athens. First we walked from our hostel in Monastiraki Square to the entrance on the northern slope of the Acropolis. We made it to the top of the Acropolis and to the main entrance at Propylaia. This section of the Acropolis is home to the Propylaia, the Beulé Gate, and the Temple of Athena Nike.

The Propylaia

The Propylaia formed the towering entrance to the Acropolis in ancient times. It was built between 437 BC and 432 BC by Mnesicles. It is made up of a central hall with two wings on either side. The stairs lead up the main section lined by columns to the beginning of the Panthenaic Way.

The Panthenaic Way

The Panathenaic Way cuts across the middle of the Acropolis and was the route taken by the Panathenaic procession. The Panathenaic procession was the climax of the Panathenaia festival which celebrated the birthday of Athena.

Temple of Athena Nike

The Temple of Athena Nike is a small square temple perched atop the southwest edge of the Acropolis, to the right of the Propylaia.

The Parthenon

After making our way up the stairs of the Propylaia we saw the grand jewel of the Acropolis – The Parthenon. History refresher courtesy of my trust Lonely Planet guidebook – the Parthenon was built on the highest part of the Acropolis to house the great statue of Athena by Pericles and to serve as the new treasury. It was designed by Ictinus and Callicrates, under the surveillance of Pheidias. It was built between 447 BC and 438 BC. While it appears simple in form the Parthenon’s perfect form was achieved through the use of optical illusions. In order for the foundation to appear perfectly level to the observer it is actually slightly concave. The columns are slightly convex to make them appear straight. Most of the damage to the Parthenon was caused by an explosion in 1687. You see during this time the Turks were storing gunpowder inside the Parthenon and when the Venetians attacked it caused an open fire on the Acropolis, causing an explosion in the Parthenon. More recently acid rain has been dissolving the marble.

Me & The Parthenon

Across the Panathenaic Way is the Erechtheion, built on the part of the Acropolis held most sacred. The spot is where myth tells us that Poseidon struck the ground with his trident and were Athena produced the olive tree. Wait you don’t know that story, well…

The Erechtheion

According to mythology, shortly after Kekrops founded a city on a huge rock near the sea the gods of Olympus proclaimed that the city should be named after the deity who could produce the most valuable legacy for mortals. Athena, the goddess of wisdom, produced an olive tree, symbol of peace and prosperity. Poseidon, the god of the sea, struck a rock with his trident and a horst sprang forth, symbolizing the qualities of strength and fortitude. The gods judged that Athena’s gift would better serve the citizens of Athens than the arts of war personified by Poseidon’s gift (again thank you Lonely Planet Greece).

Anyways back to the Erechtheion….it was named after Erichthonius, a mythical king of Athens. It is best known for its six large maiden columns that support its southern portico. These columns are known as the Caryatids because the models for them were women of Karyai who were known for the poise. The ones now at the Erechtheion are plaster casts of the originals. The five of the originals are housed in the new Acropolis Museum, while one was removed by Lord Elgin (a British architect who took many things from the Acropolis back to the museum in London). It was constructed between 421 BC and 406 BC.

The Caryatids

After descending part way down the southern slope of the Acropolis we came to the Theatre of Dionysos. The ruins are from the reconstructed theatre built between 342 BC and 326 BC, with a seating capacity of 17,000 spread over 64 tiers, of which about 20 remain.

Theatre of Dionysos

Next up was the Temple of Zeus, the largest temple in Greece. It was begun in the 6th century BC, but abandoned due to lack of money. It was left incomplete until Roman emperor Hadrian (who had a great fondness for Greek culture) completed it in AD 131. It was made up of 104 Corinthian columns (the ones that look like pineapples on top). There are 15 columns remaining today.

At the Temple of Zeus

Parliament Building in Syntagma Square

Following our visit to the Temple of Zeus we walked to Syntagma Square, home of the Parliament and the heart of modern Athens. From there we walked down the Plaka, the old Turkish quarter now full of shops. After stopping for a lunch of mousakka and a stop for frozen coffee at Starbucks we headed off to tour the Ancient Agora.

Walking Down the Plaka

The Ancient Agora was Athens’ central meeting place during ancient times. The Agora was the center of administrative, commercial, political and social activity in ancient Athens. Socrates spent a lot of time there expounding his philosophy and in AD 49 Saint Paul preached daily in the Agora attempting to win over converts to Christianity. The Temple of Hephaestus (449 BC) sits upon a hill overlooking the Ancient Agora. There is also a reconstruction of the now destroyed Stoa of Attalos, which housed expensive shops during ancient times and is now home to the Ancient Agora museum.

Temple of Hephaestus

Stoa of Attalos

After all that sightseeing we were starving so we stopped for a nice al fresco seafood dinner at a local restaurant. We enjoyed a salad with grilled Greek cheese and balsamic vinaigrette with pan-fried shrimp, mussels, calamari, and octopus. We took a post-dinner stroll up to the top of Filopappou Hill or the Hill of the Muses. The hill, which is located southwest of the Acropolis, is topped by the Monument of Filopappos, built to honor Julius Antiochus Filopappos a prominent Roman consul and administrator. The hill offers amazing sunset views and photo-ops of Athens, the Parthenon, and the Saronic Gulf.

Filopappou Hill from the Acropolis

Sunset over Athens from Filopappou Hill

Next Stop: Athens, part 2

We arrived on Samos Island via a ferry from Kuşadası around eleven in the morning. The boat brought us to Vathi port, the main port located in the northeastern part of the island, in the largest town on the island known as Samos Town. Samos Island is home to about 33,000 people and is 447 square kilometers in size. Tourists from Turkey often come to this island for a quick visit due to its proximity to Kuşadası. Hoping to explore more than just the island’s main port with its many visitors and crowded streets we decided to stay in the town of Karlovasi, located in the northwestern part of Samos Island. After getting directions at the port we made our way down the main road to the bus station to see about taking a bus to Karlovasi. It took us about one-and-a-half hours to reach Karlovasi by bus, which was a spectacular ride along a coastal road winding up and down hills overlooking the bright blue water of the Aegean Sea.

One of the many adorable churches in Karlovasi

Samos is known for it's lovely mansions

Once we arrived in Karlovasi we dropped of our bags at our hotel (that’s right we got to stay in an actual hotel instead of hostel because there are no hostels on the island) and went out for a lunch (I enjoyed a pork gyro pita and a coffee frappe). Following lunch we walked around the town a bit enjoying its narrow cobblestone streets and quaint red-tiled buildings. Apparently mid-afternoon on a Greek island is siesta time because most of the stores were closed and the streets were deserted. Worn out from the hills and the heat we walked back to our hotel and I spent the afternoon by the pool. Later that day we decided to go for another stroll around town and we ended up making it to the waterfront road just in time to watch the end of the sunset over the water. After a stop for some ice cream we headed back to the hotel for the evening.

Downtown Karlovasi

The next day we went our separate ways because Robby is not a fan of water or the beach so Robby head off on the bus to visit Pythagorio, home town of Pythagoras (as in the Pythagorean Theorem), in the southeastern part of the island. Meanwhile I decided to hit the nearest beach. Potami Beach is located about one mile from the center of Karlovasi and the walk there is all along the waterfront. I spent the rest of the afternoon relaxing in a lounge chair and swimming in the Aegean Sea. The water was the perfect temperature with a nice tide. Robby and I met up at the hotel after our adventures and went out for a dinner of traditional Greek food – delicious Karlovasi, Samos, Greece

At the beach

On our last day on Samos Island we walked to the port and purchased our ferry tickets to Athens and then I went back to the beach and Robby explored the hills surrounding the town. We met back up for dinner and when we returned to our hotel there was large party going on outside on the patio near the pool. We never figured out exactly what the party was for, but we spent the evening being serenaded by a small band playing traditional Greek music.

Next Stop: Athens, Greece

Traveling on the overnight bus from Istanbul to Selçuk we arrived at our hostel around 8:30 in the morning. We stayed at Atilla’s Getaway, a hostel recommended to us by Armenia PCVs, a bit outside of the town. It was perfect – quite, great views, a swimming pool, hammocks, and great food – for two days of relaxing. Exhausted from the trip since even when I manage to sleep on an overnight bus I never feel rested I spend the day reading, napping, and lounging by the pool. The hostel had a package deal where for like five dollars more a night you got breakfast (choice of 6 meals including french toast) and dinner. It was nice eating dinner together at picnic tables outside with all the fellow guests. We met a lot of travelers from Australia, where it seems to be a requirement to take 6 months to a year to travel, and an English teacher from Paris. I wish I had photos of the hostel to share with you, but I was having such a great time that I did not take any pictures.

On our second day in Selçuk we visited the historic site of Ephesus in the morning. First we took the hostel’s free transport to the bus station in town and then took a short minibus ride to the site. Ephesus was an ancient Greek city and later a Roman city. It was the second largest city of the Roman Empire for many years ranking behind Rome. It was home to the famed Temple of Artemis (completed around 550 BC) and one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. The temple was destroyed in 410 AD by a mob led by St. John Chrysostom, an important figure in the early Christian church. The Emperor Constantine I rebuilt much of the city. Ephesus was one of the seven churches of Asia cited in the Book of Revelations.

The Theatre

The Roman Library of Celsus

It is believed that the Gospel of John may have been written in Ephesus and the city was home to several 5th century ecclesiastical councils. The Church of Mary, an early 5th century AD church, is located at Ephesus although all that is left is the remnants of walls.

Ruins of the Church of Mary

On our walk back see the Church of Mary we were treated to a little Roman bit of the Roman times in Ephesus.

After two days in Selçuk we traveled by minibus to Kuşadası for one night to closer to the port. After checking into our hostel we walked around the market and stopped for a lunch of kebab. Later we toured to waterfront and enjoyed some stuffed clams and fried calamari at a waterfront restaurant by the port. This day happened to be my grandmother and great aunt's 75th birthday and my whole family and their friends (104 people to be exact) were at a birthday party. Luckily I was able to call them on Skype from the hostel and wish them both all the best and let them know how much I loved them on such a monumental birthday.

Kuşadası's Waterfront

Walking around town we stumbled upon an old castle that is now like a little public park.

Next Stop: Karlovasi - Samos Island, Greece

We arrived in Istanbul around 6 am local time and decided to take an airport shuttle to our hostel because we had flown into the airport on the Asian side of the city and our hostel was on the European side. The guide book said that the journey could take up to two hour, but I thought that had to be an overestimation. In the end it took a little over two hours before we got dropped off in the Sultanahmet section of the city. The views driving across the Bosporus Bridge, the main way across between the Asian and European sides of the city were amazing. We arrived at our hostel around 9:30am, but we couldn’t check into our room until 1:30pm so we walked around a bit and got some baklava and ice cream and then relaxed on the hostel’s rooftop patio. By the time we checked into our room I was so exhausted that I took a three hour nap. Later we went out for dinner at a nearby restaurant with an excellent view of the water.

The Bosporus Bridge

After dinner I enjoyed some drinks at the hostel bar with some of our roommates – a brother and sister from Toronto and a guy who is Foreign Service Officer. Around midnight while everyone was getting ready for bed a stray cat made it into our room and hid under the beds. We managed to get it out and next thing we know he is back inside. I had to take my scarf and use it to lure the cat out from under the bed and we shut the door and shut the front door to the hostel. All this time Robby is half asleep in bed wondering what is going on. Somehow the cat managed to sneak in a third time while people are milling in and out. As one of the guys is taking the cat out a third time the guy working at the hostel front desk says we are being too loud and we are like well if you would shut the door we would not be trying to get a stray cat out of our room at midnight!

The next morning after a Turkish breakfast on the hostel patio we went to the Blue Mosque and Aya Sofya. The location of our hostel was perfect – really close to all the major sites in Sultanahmet. The Blue Mosque was built between 1609 and 1619. Aya Sofya (Church of Holy Wisdom) was built by the Byzantine Emperor Justinian and was completed in 537 AD. It was the grandest church in Christendom until the Conquest of Constantinople in 1453. It was converted into a mosque and the Byzantine mosaics were covers (because Islam prohibits images) and the mosaics were not revealed until the 1930s, when Atatürk declared the site a museum.

The Blue Mosque

Inside The Blue Mosque

Aya Sofya

Inside Aya Sofya

Next we explored the Grand Bazaar, which was not like what I was expecting. In my mind it would be this large outdoor market full of stalls and in reality it was inside and more like a mall made up of tiny little shops.

Hot and exhausted we decided to get some lunch. I enjoyed some pide (Turkish pizza – an oblong crust filled with tomato sauce, peppers, and diced bits of lamb) and a restaurant near our hostel with big couches full of pillows on which to enjoy the shade and easy breeze. We sat at the restaurant for about two hours relaxing with some apple tea and Turkish coffee.

Later in the day we went to the Basilica Cistern, which is an underground water storage area built by Constantine and enlarged by Justinian. There are fish that still live inside the cistern. Then we went on a walk along the waterfront and back to the hostel where we spent the evening enjoying the cool evening breeze off the water. During the day it was hot and sunny with a nice breeze and in the evening it was really cool.

Fish swimming inside the cistern

Medusa head to protect the cistern

The next day we toured Topkapi Palace, which was begun by Mehmet the Conqueror in 1453 and where Ottoman sultans lived until the 19th century.

Part of Topkapi Palace

Tile inside one of the palace rooms

Next we walked to the Galata Bridge that connects Sultanahmet with the Golden Horn. There are restaurants on the bridge and we stopped there for lunch (yummy stuffed mussels!!) before our Bosporus cruise. The cruise up the Bosporus was amazing – sitting on the deck enjoying the breeze, watching the teal blue water. From the boat we saw Dolmabahçe Palace (built between 1843 and 1856 as home for some of the last Ottoman sultans and where Atatürk died in 1938) and Ortaköy Mosque (built between 1854 and 1856 by Ottoman sultan Abdülmecid). It took about an hour-and-a-half to get to the opening of the Bosporus to the Black Sea. Once there we had about an hour to walk around before the return boat left. We stopped for coffee and pastries at a little café. Once we returned from our cruise we had a relaxing dinner near our hostel and a quite night.

On the boat!

Dolmabahçe Palace

Ortaköy Mosque

We spent out last day in Istanbul doing a little window shopping, enjoying the views from the hostel’s terrace, and preparing for our night bus to Selçuk

Next Stop: Selçuk, Ephesus, and Kuşadasi

Two years…I can’t believe that it has been two years since I left for Peace Corps. I think most of that is because it is ending. It is like when you graduate from college and when you look back on the years you can’t believe how quickly it went by even though during you know there we times when it felt so slow. Leaving Aygepat for the last time did not fell as final as I thought it would be because my exit was so hurried and rushed, just trying to get all my things together and to Yerevan. Once I got to Yerevan I still had paperwork to do, packing to finish up, and goodbyes to say. There was not really time for long, sentimental goodbyes and it is only now really hitting me that I’m done and don’t know the next time I’ll be in Armenia. I spent my last night in Armenia in Vardablur at my friend Robby’s host family’s house. It was nice to spend it with an amazing Armenian family and enjoy a going away feast. The next morning we headed to Stepanavan for the marshootni to go to Tbilisi, Georgia. Tbilisi is so different from Yerevan – it has a more European feel to it and is full of beautiful 19th century architecture. During Soviet times Tbilisi was the cultural capital of the Caucasus, while Yerevan was a dusty cowtown.

This was Robby’s fourth time in Tbilisi so I followed his lead and we spent to day walking around the city. On our way back towards our hostel after stopping for coffee at a bookstore and café we ran into Danny and Mike, two other Peace Corps volunteers leaving Armenia. We all went to dinner, for a walk around the city, and out to a pub with a Georgia friend of Danny.

I am a bad blogger. I'm pretty sure one of the first rules of blogging is to update your blog often to keep your followers following and I haven't posted anything since Thanksgiving. So I'm going to use this post to catch everyone up on my life in Armenia (and a little bit in the U.S.) for the last four months. Everyone November we have a conference call the All-Volunteer conference in Yerevan. This conference is the only one where all the volunteers from both the old group and the new group get together at the same time. We have a Thanksgiving dinner with the Peace Corps staff, which is a great way to celebrate the holiday when we are all so far away from our friends and family in the U.S. A few days before the conference this year I received a phone call from Stepan, my program manager, letting me know that I was going to have to move out of my house because my landlady's little sister needed to move back to the village. I had about two weeks to find a new house and move, but this would all have to wait until after I returned from a week in Yerevan.

Because I live in a village there are a limited amount of empty houses available for rent. The first one I looked at was house that was previously unavailable the first time I moved last April. It was pretty nice - it even have an indoor shower with a hot water heater, but it turned out that the landlady, who lived in the village with her son used this house to escape to when she fought with her son and wanted to be able to have keys to the house once I moved. This is against Peace Corps policy and something I have to battle at my last house, where my landlady was overbearing and always just showing up at my house and calling me when I wasn't home saying she need to come over for some reason (to clean, to fix something, etc.) I loved my last house, but after dealing with that I wasn't excited about the prospect of another nosy landlady. Stepan called and tried to talk to the landlady, but it was a no go. At this point the only other house available was one that I looked at last April and had passed on. It's a nice house, but because no one has lived in it for many years it doesn't have a function hot water heater or wood stove or gas heater to heat the house. It was my only option so I moved in at the beginning of December, just time to get settled in before my trip to the U.S..

It has it's problems, one hour into being plugged in the refrigerator stopped working and while my landlord has tried multiple times to fix it - it is still broken. They have also been unable to fix the hot water heater. Peace Corps gives every volunteer money to fix up their house once they move out of their host family's house, but of course since I had moved out 8 months earlier that money was long gone. I making due though - I have become an expert bucket bather and since my kitchen is in a separate building from house during the winter the lack of a fridge wasn't a problem because it was the same temperature it was outside. Luckily I have an awesome site mate who lives in Artashat (the town nearest to my village) who has an amazing apartment with a hot shower and once a week we get together for what we call Dinner/Shower/Knitting/West Wing night. We get together and make tasty food, I get a hot shower, and then we relax and knit while watching the DVDs of The West Wing. Because Pat has a small agitator for washing clothes I know also bring my laundry over to wash every couple of weeks.

I was skyping with my parents last weekend and my dad mentioned that he had only seen the walls of my bedroom and wanted me to post pictures of my house. So without further ado here is my kinda new house...

Kitchen

Kitchen

Kitchen

Water Storage Bucket

Shower room with old, broken hot water heater

Outhouse

Kitchen is through the door on the left/Garage/The Door on the right is my house

Left Door is Shower Room/Right Door is Kitchen

Bookcase in my bedroom

Bed & Photos of home

Bedroom

Desk/Dining Room Table

Bedroom

I'm behind on my posting so today is going to be my catch up day on all the events of the last couple of weeks, which have been very busy. One of the questions I get most when I talk to my family and friends in the U.S. is what I do to celebrate American holidays here in Armenia. Luckily Armenia is a small country and it is fairly easy to travel around and visit other volunteers and because of this I've been fortunate enough to be able to celebrate among fellow volunteers. This Thanksgiving I celebrated at the apartment of my site mate Pat, who was kind enough to host a small dinner in Artashat. She even went so far as to go to the turkey farm and select our dinner! Together with Pat and fellow volunteers Beckey, Katrina, Katie, and David, I enjoyed a traditional Thanksgiving dinner complete with turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, gravy, and pecan pie. We even got to decorate a mini-Christmas tree after dinner!

Now I’m sure all my friends and family in America have this image in their minds of what exactly it is I’m doing here as a Peace Corps volunteer (saving the world one person at a time and all), but one thing I bet you don’t picture is the vast amount of free time the average PCV has in any given day. When Peace Corps is looking for our job placements the school/office must be able to provide 15-20 hours/week of meaningful work. I’m lucky and there is plenty for me to do at the mayor’s office, but coming from the U.S. where I was in class 12-15 hours/week, working 20 hours/week, and attempting to read about a 1,000 pages/week for grad school it is a huge difference. Many volunteers also find themselves with free time because of the differences in the work culture here compared with the hyper-efficient, always on the go nature of working in the U.S. Volunteers develop many interesting hobbies as a way of filling this new free time including reading, playing music, blogging, watching television and movies on our computers, hanging out with friends, and knitting.

A powerful cult of knitters has developed here in Peace Corps Armenia and volunteers are learning every day. Now I’m not sure if this happens in other Peace Corps countries in the Eastern Europe/Central Asia region, although I’m sure it does. I recently learned how to knit and I now must admit that “Hello my name is Sarah and I am a knitting addict.” I attempted to learn last year, but I only ever ended up with scarf fit for a mouse. My new site mate Pat is an avid knitter and when she moved to site she began teaching me again and I was hooked. This fall we would meet up at the outdoor cafe in Artashat (the town near my village, where Pat lives) and knit and drink a few beers. We were quite a scene! So far I have made six scarves, three pairs of arm warmers, and now I’m working on my first hat! Now in the evenings I sit in my house and either listen to music or watch a movie and knit. The contingent of knitters in Peace Corps is so strong that when we have our conferences and meetings you look down the conference table and there are probably ten people knitting while they listen.

So here are some pictures of my creations…

On Thursday, November 11th I celebrated the grand opening of the Aygepat Cultural House, the community development project I have been working on since the spring. We planned the completion of the project so that the grand opening coincided with the annual Բերքի Տոն Harvest Festival. This year the festival included a khoravats (Armenian barbecue) feast following the traditional singing, dancing, and a sampling of the local fruits and vegetables of the harvest, along with homemade wine and cognac.

The Marzpet of Ararat Marz (the regional governor) attended along with his entourage of regional officials, which judging from the reaction of all the villagers and everyone who works in the mayor’s office this was a big deal, because it is the village’s way to stand out to the regional government. Apparently all our work is paying off because during the ceremony the Marzpet told the village mayor that the cultural house would receive chairs from the Parliament.

The staff of the municipality with Mayor Petrosyan

The renovation of the Aygepat Cultural House is complete! Not only is it complete, but the project was finished on-time and on-budget. I'm so proud of everyone who worked on the project and now it's time to begin working on creating new community programs for the village. The first will the annual Berqi Ton Festival, celebrating the harvest. This year's festival will take place this coming Thursday - so more pictures to come!

The renovation of the cultural center in my village is a month under way and is going really great. I had a status meeting with Stepan - my Peace Corps program manager - and Seroyzha - the mayor of the village - and according to the mayor the project should be done on schedule at the end of this month! I cannot believe that the renovation will actually be finished on schedule. I had already prepared myself for it to be at least two weeks behind schedule, if not a month. The mayor and the whole village has done an amazing job and the room already looks incredible. So without any further ado...here are some photos of the renovation process over the last month.

So the title of today’s adventure is առնում ներկ Հայաստանում or for those of you who don't know Armenian ‘buying paint in Armenia.’ As you may know I am working with my counterpart organization to open a community cultural house in my village. We received funding for the project at the end of July, but I was very busy working some summer camps so we had to wait a bit to being the project. When I returned from working an environmental camp in Idjevan the first week in August I was ready to begin working on the project. One of the hardest things about working in Armenia is dealing with delays and working in an extremely different work culture. In the United States, we are very focused on being efficient and keeping to a project's schedule, but here it seems as if the timeline for every project or task must be padded because there will always be delays. It feels like everything here takes twice as long as it would in the States. For example, while I was under the impression that we would start cleaning out the project space the second week of August, it didn’t actually happen until the third week. So for an entire week I was waiting around and asking my counterpart when we would start and the only response I ever received was we will let you know.

The cleaning of the room was scheduled to be completed by the 13th, but it was actually completed on Friday, August 20th and when I came into the office that day meet with the mayor and my counterpart they told me that everything was ready and that now they were just waiting on me because the grant money is in my bank account. I made arrangements with the mayor to go to Artashat so we could go to the bank and purchase the renovation materials and supplies on the following Tuesday. However, when I arrived at the office on Tuesday to meet the mayor my counterpart told me that the mayor was in Yerevan! This is not the first time this has happened and I don’t know how to change it. The mayor is a middle-aged man and it is not like I’m all of a sudden going to get him to write down things and remember appointments. It is so ingrained in the culture here that it isn't disrespectful to be late or miss an appointment especially if you are an 'important person' in the community. My counterpart told me she would talk to the mayor and schedule a time for our little shopping excursion and let me know when it would be.

Again after waiting around for a few more days we met on Friday, August 27th to come up with a plan about how we would go about buying everything. Of course the mayor was an hour late for the meeting! So the shopping excursion finally happened on the following Monday. Of course the outing wasn’t exactly the picture of efficiency. My counterpart called me at 11:30am and told me the mayor was ready to go. I made it to the office by noon and the mayor was nowhere in sight. After waiting around for an hour-and-a-half the mayor finally showed up to the office and we were off.

Our merry little troupe included the mayor (Seroyzha), my counterpart (Ruzanna), and the renovation guy (Onik). First we went to the bank and because of the large sum of money I needed I had to go into the bank, rather than just using the ATM. If you think banks in the U.S. are a pain, just come to Armenia! After waiting around for 30 minutes for my turn I wasn’t even able to withdraw all the funds I needed because of the bank’s daily withdrawal limit. So with about half the necessary cash in hand we headed out to the hardware store. It was a chaotic experience – I was trying to follow what everyone was talking about and making sure that everything they were selecting was the same price as what we had put in our budget. It took us about 3 hours to get everything together including all the paperwork for the taxes (the tax system here is crazy!). We finally paid and got everything loaded into the delivery vans and were on our way back to the village. I definitely felt a sense of accomplishment watching the villagers unload the delivery vans, while the mayor proudly took pictures.

Because we were unable to buy everything the first day, my counterpart and I went back to Artashat the next day for another delightful trip to the bank and the hardware store. Now all we have left to buy is the windows and I’m curious to see exactly when that happens. After our shopping excursion last Tuesday they told me we would go in a few days, but again that must mean a ‘few days in Armenian time’ because here we are almost a week later and we still need to go to the store and I've heard no concrete plan. But that is generally the way working here goes and I've started to learn to be a little more flexible and adaptable.

You may have seen some random postings on Facebook and mentions of something called a ‘SPA project’ and in case you thought I was writing a project to get a jacuzzi put in my village or something, I wanted to clear the air of the lovely Peace Corps acronym alphabet soup (SPA, PCVs, CD, PMs, etc.) and let everyone know what I’ve been working on lately.

As you probably already know, I work for the mayor’s office which is located in a building called the գյուղապետարան (gyuhapetaran) or the village hall. In this building is a rundown auditorium that hasn’t been used since the Soviet times. It was full of old furniture and radiators, the window frames don’t have any glass in them meaning that birds are flying around inside the room, and the walls and floor need a good paint job. In April and May, I worked with my counterparts and the mayor to write a Peace Corps SPA grant (which means a Small Project Assistance grant – a program that gets money from USAID (the United States Agency for International Development) to make small grants to Peace Corps volunteers and their community partners). We found out we were approved for funding at the end of June and the grant money was transferred into my bank account at the end of July.

The project work actually got underway the third week of this month with the cleaning out of the room. After the room was clean, we began making plans to purchase all the materials and supplies needed for the renovation: spackle, primer, paint, window glass, paint brushes and rollers, cement, plaster, and cinder blocks. Now the materials have mostly been purchased and the renovation work will begin soon. The plan is to have the renovation complete by November and then we will have a great ‘grand opening’ celebration. We are also purchasing a projector, microphone, large speaker, and a dry erase board/flip chart easel that we can use for club meetings, trainings, and community celebrations.

More pictures to come as we make progress on the renovation!

As August approached I began to think about the fact that a year from now I will be finished with the adventure that has been my Peace Corps service and heading back to the U.S. and for the first time in my life I have no idea what is next for me. I’ve always had a plan so that when one phase on my life has finished I was prepared to move on to the next big thing. I know you would think that someone who joins the Peace Corps is a carefree hippie who just floats from one adventure to the next not worried about what tomorrow holds, but that is not exactly my style – I am a little too Type-A for that! So being my Type-A self I started researching possible next steps and how exactly one begins a career in the mystical field of international relations. Through this research I found two career guides on jobs in international affairs and development in hopes of finding some guidance. I was hoping to find maybe some advice on how to figure out what I want to do and so far both of them have said that the key is to find your “cause” or your “purpose.” They say that you should think about what tasks you want to do every day and their advice on how to figure out these very important keys is to do a little soul searching. So far these guides haven’t been overly helpful in this area. While they have nice lists of all the possible careers that expand the possible options as far as helping me figure out what in the world I want to do I’m not finding them all that helpful. Trust me I already know that if you want to have a meaningful career you should do something you love and are passionate about (I’ve heard all the cliches before), but when their only advice for figuring out these things out is soul searching I’m stuck. I’ve been soul searching and I still don’t know what my “cause” is or what kind of things I want to be doing. I feel like I’ve spent the last year soul searching and I am not getting very far. Now I feel like there are a million options and different cities and I don’t know where to start. So if anyone has any advice on how exactly one goes about finding their purpose I would love to hear it.

The last few months have been a whirlwind and I can hardly believe that half of the summer is already over. I haven’t posted since May even though I’ve been very busy with many exciting and interesting things because blogging isn’t exactly something that comes natural to me. You may or may not have been wondering what I’ve been up to these past two months…well I haven’t disappeared, I’ve just been avoiding sitting down and writing. I’ve never really enjoyed writing about myself. Writing essays about myself for college admissions and scholarships is akin to torture for me. I’ve always wanted to be one of those witty, self-aware people who keep detailed journals chronicling my life and thoughts and I have set many resolutions to write in my journal everyday or every week, but it invariably fails because I’m too self-critical and self-conscious about my writing. I spend half the writing process in my head wondering if what I’m writing is interesting and smart. Sadly for someone who spends half my day in my thoughts – day dreaming and analyzing – I’m not very introspective, at least not in a constructive way. I was discussing blogging with a friend of mine, whose blog happens to be hilarious, and he told me to stop waiting to only write about the big events and to write about my everyday life instead. He said consistently posting helps people connect to what you are writing about. The truth is that my average day as a Peace Corps volunteer in Armenia isn’t that exciting. On a productive day I wake up around 9 AM, exercise, eat breakfast, and get ready for work. I enjoy working at home so I often work at home unless I am teaching a class that day. Besides work I read, watch TV or movies on my computer, or do chores around my house. I also spend a lot of time thinking about what I’m going to do after Peace Corps.

Now that I’m beginning my second year I have projects to start and after how quickly the first year went I imagine that the second year is going to fly by in no time. I’m starting my SPA project now, which is to open a cultural house in my village and develop after-school activities for the youth. This will keep me very busy throughout the fall and then this winter I must start the research for my thesis to finish my masters degree. I’m also beginning to study for the Foreign Service Officers Test, which means brushing up on my U.S. Constitution and U.S. history. The last year has definitely been a roller coaster – at times I feel a little worse for the wear, but I know in the end I’m learning a lot about myself and what I want. I still have a lot to figure out and as cheesy as it might sound I really am focused on self-improvement over the next year and making the most of my second year in Armenia.

So after giving my blog a re-vamp I'm going to hopefully dive right in and actually keep a resolution for once.

I’m another year older…sometimes it is hard to believe that the last three years have gone by so quickly. There are times when it feels just like yesterday, but then I think about all the things that have happened in the last three years and then it seems like a lifetime ago. Three years ago on my birthday I was in San Marcos, TX finishing up college. I was preparing to live it up in my last summer there, studying abroad in Mexico, and trying to decide what I was going to do after I graduated. During this time I was applying to graduate school and thinking about joining the Peace Corps. Since that birthday three years ago I have graduated from college, moved to Denver, gone to graduate school, joined the Peace Corps, and moved to Armenia!

So here I am celebrating my 24th birthday in Armenia, miles from home and my friends and family, but with my many new friends. The last couple of months have been pretty frustrating and I’ve been struggling with work getting very busy and one year fatigue plaguing me, so it was a great relief to have such a great birthday. Some of the other volunteers came to my site to visit and we had a little party at my new house. I made strawberry mojitos, chicken enchiladas, Spanish rice, refried beans, chips and salsa, and a delicious cake. We feasted, listened to music, and played games. Even though I miss all my friends and family in the U.S. I couldn’t have asked for a better party or a better birthday!

I moved out of my host family’s house on April 1st and into my own place. The rules regarding how long a Peace Corps volunteer varies by country – all volunteers in Armenia are required to live with a host family for the first four months they are at site, but my friend in El Salvador only lived with the mayor of here community for a few days before moving into her own place. I decided to stay with my host family through the winter because they were already prepared and because I had been warned that the first winter is usually a hard time for volunteers here. I was really lucky because my host family is amazing, but in the end I was ready to move out and have a little more control over my daily routine and my own space. As much as I love my host family and I was at a point in my life before I left for Peace Corps when I was ready to live alone so living with a family of five could be overwhelming at times.

My Living Room

My Kitchen

Because I live in a village there aren’t any apartment buildings so my only option for finding my own place was to look for an empty house. The mayor helped me find a couple of places to look at and when I picked the one I liked best he helped with all the details before I moved in. He even helped me move my things in his car. The family who owns the house live in Belgium now and their relatives have been looking after the house and they are my landlords. My house has one really large main room that is the dining room and living room, two bed rooms, and a kitchen. It’s really big, but that because a normal Armenian family usually consists of 6-8 people not just one! I’m only using one of the bedrooms and the extra bedroom will be like my bunk house for when I have visitors. Off the kitchen I have a little balcony that over looks the backyard, which will be great to sit on in the summer and read. The backyard is a big garden full of trees and plants, which my landlords care for, but I get to eat from which is awesome. There’s a walnut tree, pear trees, cherry trees, and peach trees. Right now the only thing that’s ready is the green onions and greens.

My Bedroom

My Dining Room

I love that my house is big because that means I have plenty of room for visitors. In fact, I had my first visitors last Friday. Four other volunteers came to my site to help me finish moving in and to celebrate my new place. I made a great dinner and had a great time hanging out. One of the hardest things about living with a host family was that I couldn’t have friends come visit my site and if I wanted to see people I either had to go to Yerevan (which means spending a lot of money) and traveling to other people’s sites, so I’m excited to finally be able to have people come visit me.

My Extra Bedroom

The View of My Backyard from the Balcony

I’m starting a new project at work, well actually I started back in February after I went to a project development and management conference with my counterpart, but we haven’t made much progress in the last two months. The project is to renovate an unused auditorium in the village hall to create a cultural house for the community. To finance the renovation my counterpart and I are writing a Peace Corps Small Project Assistance (SPA) grant. The way the grant works is that 25% of the budget must come from a community contribution, which can be a financial contribution or a labor contribution. My village is going to provide the labor for the renovation as their community contribution. I have about a month and a half until I have to turn in the completed grant proposal so I’m really trying to kick start the process, which is quite difficult. The work culture here is very different and much more laid-back here than in the U.S. and I feel like I have to remind people of things multiple times before they actually happen. I mean if I was writing this project in the U.S. it would be done by now, but in the last two months all we have been able to accomplish is one community interest meeting and many discussions about what we need to do, but with little of it actually accomplished. If all goes according to plan and I get the grant money, work will start in July and hopefully the renovation will be complete by October so that it can coincide with the harvest and we can hold another harvest festival, but this time in the brand-new cultural house.

March 8th is International Women’s Day and it is also an Armenian holiday called Womanhood and Beauty Day. In my village I celebrated at the village hall at a celebration thrown by the mayor’s office.

Children from the school sang and read passages about how wonderful women are and everyone danced. There were champagne toasts (cheap Armenian champagne is really bad!) and we ate fruit and chocolates. I was trying to get out of dancing by taking pictures, but the mayor and the women who work at the mayor’s office got me and made me dance.

I know it has been a few months since my last posting, but there hasn’t been all that much to catch you up on. Things for me here really slowed down in the winter and it was definitely the period in which I felt the most isolated and lonely. After all the holiday parties were finished life in the village slowed to a crawl from its normal meandering pace. To be honest I live in a village of 700 people so it’s never going to be life in the fast lane here, but there were a few times when I had to really think to figure out the last time I had left my host family’s house. I mean other than going in the backyard to get to the shower room or the outhouse there were times when I didn’t actually leave my house for three days! Work really slowed down because I wasn’t holding club meetings while school was closed for the holidays and I worked from home a lot which was nice because I had the luxury of working in my pajamas, but eventually it got to the point where I needed to put on some real clothes and do something. It’s like I fell into this hibernation state and my world really didn’t extend beyond my room – I had my computer, magazines, books, snacks from America, movies. Now I should have known that this was going to be my biggest challenge with winter because succumbing to this sort hibernation isn’t exactly new to me. I mean during finals in grad school I only left my apartment to go to the grocery store and when I did I prayed I wouldn’t run into to anyone I knew because I looked a hot mess! I’m a nester – but after too long my nest gets messy, cluttered, and a little gross.

It’s a very good thing that spring time is beginning to emerge because it has given me the motivation to emerge from my winter cocoon and engage with the world around me again. The people in my village have also begun to emerge from their self-imposed winter hiatus – the children can be heard laughing loudly as they play outside at the school and everyone is beginning to go out into the fields and orchards to prepare for the spring planting season. I’ve started walking back from town to my village after my class instead of taking the bus to spend some time in the fresh air and sunshine.

With the changing of the seasons my work has also begun to pick up. At the beginning of February I attended a Peace Corps conference on project development and management with my new counterpart, Ruzanna. This was the first thing for us to work on together and it was a great experience. It allowed us to discuss what we wanted out my service and what the community’s needs and desires were. She works in the mayor’s office and has lots of useful connections and experience working in the village. She is a middle-aged widow with two teenage children. She works very hard to support her family and even though she already has so much work to do she has graciously volunteered to work with me. She had already become an invaluable resource to me, helping me further integrate into my community.

In Armenia, Christmas (or surb tsnund, Սբ. Ծնունդ) is celebrated on January 6th and it is mainly a religious holiday that marks the kind of unofficial end of Noor Tari and coincides with the Epiphany. Traditionally on Christmas Armenians refrain from eating meat and the traditional Christmas meal consists of fish and Christmas pilaf (rice with raisins).

Now you may asking yourslef then what is this mysterious holiday called Noor Tari you speak of if it isn't Christmas? Well it is actually a holiday that is many days long and begins on December 31st. In Armenian Noor Tari literally means ‘New Year’ and it is best described to a foreigner as the secular parts of Christmas in the States plus New Year’s Eve with a twist. The weekend before my host family decorated the house with lights and a little Christmas tree. In the days before the 31st my family prepared a food for our Noor Tari table. The tradition is that every family prepares a table at their house with all kinds of food, including a turkey, pork, dolma, blinchik, kufta, fruit, mixed nuts, dried fruit, assorted cakes and candies, wine, vodka, cognac, juices and sodas. On December 31st everyone sits at home at waits for midnight. My family got the table ready and watched a special on TV. Then Dzmer Papik (literally Winter Grandpa but his like our Santa Claus) came to our house to see my little brother. We shared a toast with Dzmer Papik and when it was midnight my brothers went outside and shot off fireworks. The tradition is to go around to your neighbors’ houses after midnight to eat, drink, and say many many toasts.

I was really supposed to wait and give my host family their presents the next morning when they opened their gifts from Dzmer Papik, but I could not wait so I played Santa Sarah. My parents sent gifts for my host family from the States and even though they weren’t expected to arrive until January the post office gods smiled on me and they arrived on Christmas Eve.

I was not feeling that great on New Year’s Eve and my host mother has been sick so we stayed home. A few neighbors came over while I was still awake, but I went to be around 1am and apparently the mayor and his family came over and were sad I only made it to 1am. On New Year’s Day my host sister and I went to the mayor’s house and her aunt’s house to sit, toast, and eat. That is pretty much what Noor Tari is – going to people’s houses sitting eating, toasting, and talking. However, when you are an outsider it is mostly being told to eat a bunch of food even though you are full from eating exact same things at the previous houses and questions about how you celebrate in the U.S. and if you like Armenia. People continue to go visit their friends and relatives as well as have people visit their homes over the next week or so. I didn’t go visit a bunch of houses, but every time someone new came over to my house I got paraded around and introduced to everyone as “Our Sarah”. I'm glad I got to experience such a big holiday with my host family and they were glad that I was there. However, next New Year's I hope to be visiting the States!

Because this was the first Christmas many of us had been away from our families we decided to have our very own Christmas in Kapan. Kapan is only about 200 miles from Yerevan, but to get there you must drive through a ton of mountains passes so in takes about 6-7 hours in good weather to get there. Therefore, the volunteers who live there don’t make it to Yerevan often and they don’t get a lot of visitors outside their marz so it's become a little tradition to have Christmas in Kapan.

There were quite a few of us traveling from Yerevan so some of us took shared taxis and others (i.e. my group) had to take the marshootni. Now the marshootni takes about an extra hour and the three volunteers I was traveling with and I got the last four sets in the back which meant our knees were pressed into the seatbacks in front of us and we got to sit on hard marshootni seats for seven hours. But it was worth it because once we arrived in Kapan everyone met up at one the PCVs, Barbara’s apartment for some Christmas Eve chili. There were 22 of us there and it was so much fun! We had chili and cornbread, played charades, listened to Christmas music, and just had an awesome time.

I stayed at Shannon’s apartment with Danya, Rani, Amanda, and Bryan and Christmas day we sat around her cozy apartment drinking coffee and eating gingerbread cookies while we all knitted and listened to Christmas music. I got to talk to my family on my Christmas morning (their Christmas Eve) while they were snowed in at my grandma’s house. Of course my first Christmas away from Wichita Falls and there is a blizzard and no snow here for a white Christmas! Later on Christmas Day we all head out to Sue’s village Vachakan. We had a Christmas feast, exchanged Secret Santa gifts, and watched ‘A Charlie Brown Christmas’. Even though I was far from home it was an amazing Christmas spent with tons of new friends.

Amanda and I were Christmas!

Watching 'A Charlie Brown Christmas'

Opening Secret Santa Gifts

At the beginning of December I attended my first Armenian wedding or as the Armenians say a Haykakan Harsanek. It was the wedding of my host cousin Miriam and it was definitely an interesting experience. I left my house at noon and returned home at 1 a.m. Armenian wedding and American wedding traditions are very different.

First my host sister, host mom, and I went to the neighboring village Aygezard to the family of the bride's house to sit and chat with all her female relatives before the ceremony. My sister and I sat with the bride and her friends while we waited for the groom’s family to come over. After about an hour we could hear music coming from outside and we all went down stairs where the groom’s family was coming marching down the street with a four-piece traditional Armenian band and gifts for the bride.

The women from the bride’s family came out of the house and took the gifts from the groom’s family and everyone danced in the street. Then all the women from both families went inside to give the gifts to the bride. The gifts were baskets of fruit and candies. One basket had the bride’s veil, wrap, bouquet and one of her shoes in it. Now you may be wondering why in the world the groom’s family had one of the bride’s shoes…well many of the Armenian wedding traditions involve the giving of money for various things, including one of the bride’s shoes which the groom’s family stole earlier. The women then began to sing and prepare the bride – putting on her shoes, her veil, and her wrap. Then they threw some of the candy from the basket at all of the women and girls watching. My host mom handed me a piece and told me to put it under my pillow that night while I slept and I would have a dream about my future husband. After the bride was ready the groom came up stairs and presented her was a basket of flowers. The bride and groom went downstairs and outside and we all followed. Once we were all outside there was more dancing, this time around the happy couple.

The next stop was the church – they ceremony was at Khor Virap, a beautiful church about twenty minutes from my village. Khor Virap is a 7th century monastery and it is where Saint Gregory the Illuminator (the patron-saint of Armenia) was imprisoned in a dungeon for 13 years. According to legend the King became very ill and began to go mad and his daughter convinced him to release Gregory who then healed the King and converted him to Christianity.

The ceremony was quite short compared to the rest of the festivities and after the priest finished the ceremony the groom’s parents stood at the front of the church with the couple and the wedding party for the receiving line. All the guests went through the line giving their congratulations to the couple. Everyone lined up for pictures outside the church after the ceremony and then doves were released.

After the ceremony everyone headed to the groom’s house for celebratory toasts and dancing. In Armenia it is tradition that when a couple is married the bride moves into the groom’s house with his parents. So when everyone was at the groom’s house the bride and groom arrived with a suitcase symbolizing the exchange of the bride to her new family. After some more dancing the party head to the reception, which was at a restaurant on the highway between Artashat and Yerevan, for more dancing, toasts, food, and drinks. At the restaurant there were large family-style tables full of olives, cheese, bread, fruits, and bottles of wine, vodka, and cognac. There was a three-course dinner 1) pork khoravats (Armenian barbecue); 2) kufta (this weird meat trine); 3) fish. The reception had a MC, tons of dancing, and many long toasts. The bride and groom went around the room and toasted every person at the reception. The bride and groom were presented with gifts from their families, mostly gold jewelry. They cut the cake around 11pm and then did the garter and bouquet toss. The bride and groom went around the room and handed out little plaster statues of hearts and flowers to all the single people in the crowd. Later the bride danced for all the guests and people came up and gave her money. The reception wound-down around midnight, but by the time we got home it was past 1am.

It was interesting to experience a wedding a culture that is very different for the United States. All in all I can say that an Armenian wedding is an exciting fun time, but it is not for the faint of heart because it is a marathon of toasts, eating, drinking, and dancing.

An Armenian Thanksgiving with PCVs

On November 20th I headed to Yerevan for our All-Volunteer Conference. The first day of the conference was for my group of volunteers (the A-17s) to discuss any issues we had encountered in our first three months of service. We discussed things we encounter in Armenia that cause us stress and ways to help relieve any stress were are felling at work and in our host families. That night I went to a Mexican feast my Country Director’s with a group of volunteers. The food was amazing! She had a full spread of enchiladas, tacos, beans, chips, salsa, and queso all topped off with brownies and ice cream. Believe me this type of food is not easy to come by in my everyday villiage life here. The second day of the conference was a language camp with sessions on useful topics, such as dealing with landlords, shopping and bargaining, and sector-related language. The third day of the conference was the first time all the Peace Corps Armenia volunteers had been together and it will be the last time. The last day of the conference there was a development fair with many difference organizations working in the development field in Armenia handing out information and anwsering questions. There was also a development panel and career panel with people from USAID, Millennium Challenge Corporation, and European Council. All through out the conference at night after our meetings were done I had a bunch of great meals and went dancing with friends. The last night of the conference we all celebrated Thanksgiving together. A group of volunteers prepared a Thanksgiving feast at the hotel where the conference was held and it was AMAZING!!! We had all the fixings from turkey, stuffing, green bean casserole, mashed potatoes and gravy, cranberry sauce, and pie. There were also great decorations including a papier-mâché turkey whose feathers were hand turkeys every volunteer made with what we are thankful written on them. We had coloring book placemats,funny turkey hats, and Thanksgiving tradition. It is funny how being away from home for the holidays brings out the kid in everyone and the desire to celebrate the way you did back grade school. Everyone put on their silly hats and we ran around taking pictures like a bunch of little kids. After dinner we had a variety show with amazing performers like Danny and Ben playing guitar and singing “Hit Me Baby One More Time” and Janet telling pirate jokes. Even though I missed seeing my family back in the States for Thanksgiving I had a fantastic time with all my new friends!

Work

Work has been a little slow lately because I missed a week for my conference and with winter setting in life in the village is quite. School has been closed all throughout Armenia for that last two weeks because of the flu and this has led to lower attendance at my English club in my village. At the moment I’m just teaching my two clubs, but I’m doing a lot of research for future projects and I’m hoping once spring is here I will be able to being planning some larger projects. In the beginning of February my counterpart and I are attending a Peace Corps conference on project planning and management so that should help us come up with a more concrete plan for what my role is here.

Last Saturday, I went to a wedding so you will soon hear all about the traditions of an Armenian wedding. Until then...

Love, Sarah

Last weekend I traveled up north to Tavush Marz to celebrate the Halloween weekend Armenia-style. After meeting some friends in Yerevan we met our taxi driver to begin our supposedly four hour journey. We left Yerevan around 5pm in the cold and rain - until that week the weather in Yerevan had been amazing (the perfect blend of Indian summer and early fall) but of course that has now come to an end. It was especially nice because Yerevan is a walking city full of outdoor cafes and fall is the perfect time to enjoy it.

About halfway through the trip once we started climbing in elevation the drive started getting a little spooky. The mountains were full of low hanging fog and between that and the dark and the Armenian mountain passes it was poetic that we were heading to a Halloween party. We were already running late because we stopped for gas for like half-an-hour and we couldn’t go too quickly because of the weather. We arrived in Berd, the city nearest to the village where we were headed, and our taxi driver stopped driving. We were all confused about what was going on because we were only 30-40 minutes from the village. It was about 9:30 at this point and he just kept telling us that the road was bad and he called the taxi company where someone spoke English to explain that he was going to find us a local taxi to take us the rest of the way. We were all rightfully annoyed because we had hired him to drive us the whole way but know he was saying he didn’t know the way and he couldn’t take us. Finding a local taxi driver of course took time so it was 10 before we hit the road again.

The last stretch of our journey involved dirt roads, mountain passes, fog, and darkness. We just all closed our eyes and talked about how we were so set up to be in a bad horror movie...four Americans in a foreign land driving to a remote mountain village...then it got even better because we got a flat tire! So we got out of the taxi and tried to help our driver change the tire. It was cold and dark and our driver was huffing and puffing while smoking a cigarette trying to change the tire. Then we see headlights coming around the bend, but it seems like forever before we can actually see the car. Two friendly Armenian gentlemen, who our taxi driver knew, pulled over to help and then we were on our way again. We finally arrived at our destination – the village of Artsvaberd – at 10:30pm! Luckily we got to relax with good friends, cook chicken fajitas, and tell the harrowing tale of our journey.

Saturday we hung around playing with Heather’s (the volunteer whose house we were staying at) new kittens, making more fajitas, and trying to stay warm. We carved pumpkins, made kleenex ghosts, ate Halloween candy, and Heater made a cherry pie...all in all it was the perfect fall day. Later that day some more volunteers made it into Artsvaberd in time for a Halloween party!

Sunday it was time for everyone to head home so we all loaded into a marshootni to Yerevan. Before we could even leave the parking lot the marshootni broke down. Once we finally got on the road we were cruising along, but every time we had to go up a hill, which was often because we driving in the mountains, things got shaky. Then on our way up one hill we stopped to pick someone up (smart I know!) and couldn’t get going again. All the guys got out and tried to push but then we started to roll backwards. After 5 or 10 minutes of this another marshootni came up the road and pulled over to help pull us up the hill. That meant we all had to get out of the marshootni and walk up the hill and stand in the cold on the side of the road. The best part was that there were 12 Americans on the marshootni so we just stood on the side of the road huddled up while the Armenians stared at us. Luckily where we broke down was very pretty, which made it better. It took a good 45 minutes before we were up and running again. There were a couple more close calls along the way but we eventually made it to Yerevan. Like all my trips around Armenia so far it was eventful, exciting, fun, and tiring.

The Beautiful View of Tavush Marz

Our Marshootni Being Pulled Up Hill

Two Saturdays ago I had the opportunity to go to Yerevan and have dinner at the Peace Corp Armenia Country Director Lee’s house. This all came about during pre-service training (PST) – through the course of PST all the trainees earned “Lee Bucks” for completing different tasks during training sessions, our language classes, by answering questions, etc. At the end of PST there was an auction where we could use the “money” to bid on everything from spices, movies, hiking trips with various staff members, and a dinner at Lee’s house along with members of the development community in Armenia. My friends Brent and Shannon and I pooled our Lee Bucks together and won the development dinner.

So I polished myself up and made my way to Yerevan. Lee’s house in Yerevan is very nice and the weather that weekend in Yerevan and the surrounding areas (i.e., my village) was amazing – in the 70s during the day and just cool enough in the evening for it to be fall. Lee is also an amazing cook and she made a feast of enchiladas and tacos. I’ve missed Mexican food so much and it was so good. We ate our dinner on the patio and drank wine and talked to some really amazing people. The guests from the development community included people from USAID, OSCE, USDA, and independent development contractors. They all had so many fascinating stories about the places they had been and amazing things they had seen all over the world. We talked about what we had done before Peace Corps, our work here, what we hoped to do after Peace Corps. I got some really great career and life advice from this amazing woman Gina, who has worked in development all over the former Soviet Union. Her husband is Swedish and works for OSCE on issues of gender and women’s rights in Armenia. It was a nice, relaxed atmosphere and it will definitely be a night I remember for a long time.

After the dinner some of us met up with other volunteers who were in Yerevan to go dancing. We went to this little bar called Cocoon which sometimes becomes a dance club even though it’s the size of a closet. We met a diplomat from Argentina and two Armenian girls from California and a bunch of cool Armenians. Usually they just play typical Yerevan club music but they started out with that and switched it over to some latin music and then some old school American classics like the YMCA and the twist, which got all the Americans up and on the floor.

So after a pretty standard week at site teaching my two clubs and working on some lesson plans I made the journey up north to Artsvaberd for Halloween weekend. More to come on that later.

So after many date changes and frustrations the Aygepat Harvest Festival & Halloween Celebration finally happened on Wednesday and it was a huge success! All the frustrations were worth it and it was probably a good thing that they happened because they gave me a taste of what it can be like to work in Armenia and I proved to myself that I can in fact do it. I need to work on developing more patience – I always thought I was a patient person but there is definitely a difference between being patient in the States vs. being patient in Armenia. The whole experience helped me learn more about the Armenian work culture and how I can best work with my co-workers and bosses to get projects done. I learned that I need to calm down and learn to take a breath when I get frustrated because trying to explain in the moment what is frustrating me only makes it worse. I also need to have a little more faith that things will work out even without my direct supervision.

The many date changes were due to the fact that my village mayor had invited the marz petaron (the regional mayor) to come to the festival and we were operating around his schedule. Apparently it was quite a big deal that he came to the festival – there was news crew there from the regional TV station covering the festival and last night my whole family went over to our neighbor’s house to watch it. When the marz petaron arrived everyone lined up to great him and the mayor greeted him along with a girl in traditional dress. There is a ceremony here where there is a loaf of traditional braided bread that a girl in traditional dress holds and a small pile of salt is placed on the bread and you rip off a piece of the bread and dip it in the salt and eat it. All the new volunteers participated in this ceremony when we met our training host families. The bread represents the wheat that Armenians believe is the life source of their people and the salt represents…well I don’t remember exactly what that represents maybe the salt of the earth or something. Anyway the marz petaron participated in that ceremony with the mayor and then my village mayor released doves. All of that was a surprise to me because the majority of the traditional Armenian parts of the festival were planned by the mayor, his assistants, and my counterpart. Next there was a series of traditional Armenian dances performed by a group of the local children and songs performed by a local singer. Then my counterpart, Vika and some of her students performed a small play about fall. The marz petaron and the village mayor made speeches. Then the school director made a small presentation of certificates and gifts to the local students who had been accepted to university, which included a couple of my English students.

Later Vika read a small thing we translated about Halloween and introduced me to everyone. Hopefully now that I have been formally introduced to more people in the village they will no longer think that I’m some random Russian girl who has moved into the village. After the bit on what Halloween is Vika invited people over to my table to sample some Halloween treats (candy apples, caramel corn, candy corn, mellow crème pumpkins, and cookies) and then I was mobbed by all the village children, but with the help of my host mom and neighbor we regulated the kids and they all loved the treats. The deputy regional mayor really liked the candy corn.

The whole village was really involved. In a traditional Armenian harvest celebration different groups or villages create decorative tables displaying fancy craved fruits and vegetables and bountiful baskets of the harvest along with homemade wine, bread, and pastries. The post office, the policlinic, the 10th form class from the school, my counterpart’s family’s store, and the mayor’s office all had tables. At the end of the festival everyone goes around sampling the harvest and treats. There were probably 75 to 100 people there and everyone seemed to have a really great time. Everyone at the mayor’s office worked so hard to make it happen and it was a great display of the amazing community spirit of my village. After all the uncertainty we achieved what I hoped to all along – a successful first big project to help me learn how to plan and execute projects successfully in Armenia.

Initiatives

A couple of weekends ago I went to Yerevan for the Peace Corps Initiatives Meeting. Peace Corps has five different initiatives: IT, PR, HIV/AIDS, Environmental Action, and Gender & Development. The purpose of these initiatives is to allow volunteers the opportunity for cross-sector work. Saturday was a meeting for all the new volunteers to find out more about these initiatives so we can decide which ones we would like to participate in. It was also the first time most of the volunteers had a chance to hang out since we finished training and moved to our sites. Despite my broken foot I hobbled my way around Yerevan with my friends and had an amazing time. On Friday we went out for Indian food then to the Irish Pub for drinks and dancing at Aftershock. We all stayed at the hostel, which is really nice and in a great location. Saturday we went to breakfast at Artbridge Bookstore Cafe where they have french toast, bacon, and lattes!!! It was amazing! Then it was off to the Peace Corps office for the meeting. After the meeting we had shwarma and hung at a cafe (a favorite past time of everyone in Yerevan) then another great night of dancing. Sunday we went back to Artbridge for more bacon and good coffee before heading back to site(where sadly there is no bacon or lattes...)

Armenia vs. Spain Game

Last weekend I went to Yerevan to see the Armenia vs. Spain soccer game with a bunch of other volunteers. Armenia was expected to lose like 4-0, so in the end the fact that they only lost 2-1 was kind of a miracle. After the game we all went out to the Irish Pub in Yerevan. Of course by Irish Pub I mean a normal bar decorated like a Bennigian’s Restaurant and playing U2 music videos. But I did get more bacon, french toast, and lattes. Yerevan is nice but it's way too easy to spend money there so I need to stay away for awhile.Yerevan can feel like a completely different country than the rest of Armenia. Armenia receives a ton of international aid money especially from the United States, but the majority of it stays in Yerevan. The disparity in development is really striking, but I guess that happens in a lot of countries. But the amount of U.S. money flowing into Armenia is crazy, but that’s what happens when your country has a powerful diaspora working for you.

Work

Work is a little frustrating at the moment. Originally my festival was supposed to be on the 20th, but all the people helping me kept saying it was too late and that the harvest would be over so we moved the date to the 16th. Over the next two weeks I kept asking my counterpart and boss what we needed to do, how we should invite people, and when we were going to buy supplies. We would make lists and I would keep asking the same questions without ever getting a clear answer. Then yesterday I show up to work (I’ve been making masks and decorations with the kids) and my co-worker comes in freaking out saying that we don’t have enough time and that the 16th is too early and we need more time. After a minor freak out on my part because I was trying to explain why I was frustrated that we weren’t ready, but no one understood me we changed the date. In the end I decided that I would just agree to change the date back to the 20th if it meant that the festival would be better. Intellectually I know that frustrations like this are part of the game and part of why you do this because eventually you hope you’ll learn to adapt and work in a new environment, but that doesn't always help in the moment. I mean these are the skills that are supposed to come with this whole crazy mess and make it all worth it.

In other news…my life includes lots of time spent watching old episodes of ‘The Office on my computer, reading, and listening to music. Although my new obsession is ‘The Wire’! And my little brother now likes to run around the house trying to rap like Jay-Z!

Site Move Day

Teghenik Host Family

Teghenik Kids

Teghenik Youth Club

My Counterpart Vika

Old Chapel in Teghenik

My First Picture in Armenia

My Host Mom

Me, Zoe, Amanda

Official A17 Swearing-In Photo

A couple of weekends ago I went to Lake Sevan with a bunch of other A17s to celebrate begin at site for a month. Lake Sevan is one of the largest alpine lakes in the world and a popular vacation spot in Armenia. A bunch of us met up in Yerevan to catch the marshootni to Sevan which is always entertaining to have a group of Americans on a marshootni especially when you have luggage. We were all so excited to see each other that we piled in the back of the marshootni with all our bags on our laps and laughed the whole way while the Armenians facing us stared.

Once we arrived in Sevan we met up with Hayley – the volunteer who is assigned to Sevan to get supplies for the weekend. As with anywhere we going walking into a store with more than one American is always a show. Hayley’s host dad was with us and once we finally got all our stuff and were almost done checking out the store manager came over to the register and made the cashier unpack everything and recalculate it. By this time all the customers were standing around the register watching us. After all was said in done they said we short 4 dram (which doesn’t actually exist because 10 dram is the smallest unit here)!

When we finally made it to the peninsula we got settled in our dolmiks (metal storage containers that have been turned into cabins). We all got so excited hanging out and talking that by the time we decided to start making dinner it was dark and we had to go collect firewood. It had been raining a lot in Sevan so all the wood was wet. Earlier when we were at the store we kept asking Hayley’s dad that we needed to get firewood and he kept saying spasi or heto which means wait or later, which seems to happen a lot when we ask for things here. After we couldn’t get the fire started because the wood was wet we called Hayley’s dad and he brought us some dry wood. By this time it was 9:30 and we started making our dinner. It was so good we made quesadilla-tacos! We melted cheddar cheese we bought in Yerevan between lavash (Armenian flat bread) and used it as the shell for taco meat and fixings! They were amazing mostly because I’ve had nothing but salty Armenian cheese that doesn’t melt so having cheddar like heaven. Is it sad that having cheddar for the first time in four months is one of the best things that has happened in a while!

Saturday the rest of our group came into Sevan and the party could truly begin! We walked up to this old church on a hill overlooking the lake and took some amazing band photos. Rani loves taking band photos which are fun pictures that you would but in the cover of an album – the pictures are on Facebook and they are amazing! That night Hayley’s dad came and helped us prepare a horavats (Armenian barbecue) and then had an awesome dance party! Sunday we were all moving a little slow so we just hung out and played cards.

Later that day I was walking out of one of the cabin and as I turned out of the door to shut it I stepped off the stairs leading into the cabin and landed on the side of left foot. At first I thought it was nothing because I walked back to the other cabin where everyone was, but later when I tried to get up I couldn’t put any weight on my foot. I had a large bump on the side of my foot and it was starting to swell. A couple of the boys carried me out of the cabin and we wrapped it and did the whole RICE thing. The rest of the time I couldn’t put any weight on it so I hopped around on one foot or sat watch in my chair while we made spaghetti for dinner. The next day with the help of my lovely friends I made it back to Yerevan where I went to see the Peace Corps doctor. I wasn’t alone because Amanda had to see the doctor to so we braved a night at the PCMO because Monday was Armenian Independence Day and apparently you can’t get an x-ray on a holiday in Armenia! Tuesday we went to the hospital to get an x-ray and it turned out that I had an evulsion i.e. I chipped on the outside of left foot. So they had to give me a cast that I have to wear for a month. The hardest part about the hospital was that everyone was talking and I couldn’t understand what was going on and the Peace Corps doctor wasn’t translating anything. I knew that it wasn’t a big deal but I wouldn’t want to go there if something really scary was happening just because when you are at the hospital and you have no idea what is going on it’s just awkward and confusing. According to the Peace Corps doctor I got the most expensive fancy cast, it’s made out of fiberglass and it is removable. I can walk on my cast but not too much because otherwise the corners rub on my ankle and I’m starting to get sores. I have to wear my cast for a month, which isn’t too bad but is still no fun!

I thought it would be nice to devote an entry to what exactly it is that I'm doing here in Armenia and what my life as a Peace Corps volunteer is like. So this entry is all about my work and my co-workers. I hope it helps explain what in the world I'm doing over here...

Every Peace Corps volunteer is assigned a counterpart with their organization or school. Our counterparts are supposed help us not only navigate our job assignments, but also integrate into our new communities. At my job I have a counterpart Vika - she is 22 years old and recently graduated from college. She wants to be a teacher, but it is really hard to find jobs here so she works in her families store and tutors children on the side. I work for the mayor’s office in my village so I can do lots of different things…pretty much anything that involves community development. Specifically I am working on an initiative in the village called YCAP. My other co-worker is Ovsanna - she works for YCAP and the community center. YCAP operates all over the country and it has been in my village for about a year-and-a-half. My YCAP boss is Laura – she is in charge of all the YCAP groups in Ararat Marz where I live. All the regions in Armenia are called Marzs – there are 10 marzs in Armenia plus the Yerevan district.

Right now I’m conducting an English club in my village for some of the students because there isn’t an English teacher at the school. I’m not really supposed to be teaching English, but I feel like it is a good way to meet the kids and hopefully once my Armenian has improved I can move on to not just having an English club but also a youth club that is focused on community development and youth issues, which is more in the realm of my sector.

All volunteers are assigned to a site (a village, town or city) and the volunteers in villages have an extended community which includes the nearest town for shopping and banking. Artashat is the capital of my marz and my extended community. Laura’s office is in Artashat so I go there quite often for meetings. Artashat had a Peace Corps volunteer five years ago and there is a lot of work there for secondary projects. Laura set up an English conversation club for me at the Artashat Cultural House. We have only met once two weeks ago because we couldn’t meet last week because I was on bed rest for my broken foot. Our first meeting went well I had about 25-30 young adults come although only 15 stayed for the whole meeting. I assume that once Laura explained that the club wouldn’t be an English class but rather a conversation club where people can come to practice their language skills while we discuss a range of topics that involve youth issues in Armenia. All of the participants are in their early to mid 20s and either attending university or graduates of university.

At our first meeting we had a short discussion of some of the differences between Armenian and American youth. The main difference I came up with was the amount of freedom given to American youth compared to Armenia. Most Armenian teenagers especially in the villages spend most of their time at home with their families. They don’t work especially Armenian girls because a lot of times it is considered shameful for an Armenian girl to work because it means that their families can’t support them. One of the girls made a really good point that in Armenia youth are expected to attend school and work hard to get into university and then while in university they are supposed to study but not work so that when they graduate from university they have not practical experience. She works for SMENDC (Small and Medium Enterprise National Development Center) which is an NGO that acts a consultant for local businesses. I am hoping to work with them in the future when I being to look for secondary projects.

My big project right now is planning a Harvest Festival/Halloween Party for my village. The students in my English club told me how much they love Halloween and wished that more people here celebrated it and asked if we could celebrate it. I was originally planning on just having a Halloween themed club meeting but when my Project Manager Stepan came to visit my site we had a meeting with Vika, Ovsanna, and Laura and they all loved the Stepan’s suggestion that we make the event cross-cultural to attract more people in the village because a lot of Armenians think Halloween is all about devil worship, etc. My small Halloween party soon transformed into a village wide festival so now I must begin planning because the festival is going to be on October 20th because Halloween is too late for the harvest. It is going to be cross cultural because there is a tradition of having a fall harvest festival where all the families in the village make a table displaying their harvest - they carve the fruits and vegetables in decorative ways. I’m going to have an American corner where I will have American Halloween decorations, treats, and some of the posters explaining some American Halloween traditions written in Armenian. My students and I are going to work together to make decorations and masks for the festival.

It definitely takes time to learn about a new work culture and the best way to get things done here so I have a long way to go. I really just hope that my first big project is a success because I think I need that confirmation that I do indeed know what I'm doing or that I'm at least not completely hopeless. I also think it would help the village gain confidence in my ability to get things done. I'll keep you updated as the festival approaches and after I have a few more club meetings under my belt.

So most of this info is from a month ago but the internet in Armenia, like life is unpredictable!

I’m no longer a lowly Peace Corps trainee but an actual sworn-in volunteer! They last couple of weeks of training were hard because we were all exhausted and excited about swearing-in. Our swearing-in ceremony was great! All our training host families came to watch us and the US Ambassador to Armenia was there to administer our oath. Best of all is we got our Peace Corps Armenia pin, which is the Peace Corps logo and the American and Armenian flags. After the ceremony we had a great party with the A-16 volunteers who came for the ceremony.

I was ready to move to site but I was definitely nervous because I am the first volunteer in my site and I’m not really close to any other volunteers. I got comfortable at my training site so it was kind of like starting all over again. There have definitely been some challenging moments, but all and all things are going good. I’m still in the transition period and work is slow so I have a lot of free time which can be overwhelming because you feel like you should be doing something! I’m working on my Armenian still but I should step it up if I want to start getting any real work done because there are no English speakers in my village so I’m going to have to communicate fully in Armenian. Currently I work a couple hours a day and I’m trying to brainstorm project ideas with my counterpart. Really I spend a lot of time wondering what is going on and what I’m doing. I’m trying to just stop worrying about and roll with it but that is hard because I’m not used to not knowing what is happening in my own life. I’m definitely learning to have more patience.

I moved to my site on August 14th and although I had come to visit before in July the first couple of days were a little awkward. Just imagine that you move in with a family you barely know and can’t really communicate with. It took the first week or so to stop feeling like a house guest and like I actually live there. My host family is really great though they have been nothing but welcoming and gracious which makes being here a lot easier. My host sister Ani has made the transition really smooth. When I first got to site she would go everywhere with me and introduce me to people which is really helpful since my assignment is to work with the community youth club so she brings all her friends to my meetings. She helped me figure out how to get to town and where the bank, stores, and cafes are. Even though we don’t always understand each other we can joke around and laugh together. My oldest host brother Garenik is the most reserved of the three kids and we haven't talked too much. My youngest brother Davit is cute and hilarious but he is also a handful with nonstop energy—he is the classic baby of the family, dramatic and a show off.

Work has been the most challenging part so far. Learning a new work style and culture takes time and I’m so used to the go-go attitude in the States which is definitely not how things operate here especially in the village. I’m in a new Peace Corps village so they have never had a volunteer before and in a lot of cases I am the first American a lot of people in my village have ever met. All the volunteers who have been here for a year told me that it is best that I am the first because they won’t constantly be comparing me to their previous volunteers, which I guess is true but there is also a lot of uncertainty on my co-workers part of what I should be doing. My counterpart just graduated from college so she is really anxious about this being here first job and doing a good job. For the first two weeks of work I just went to the office and either studied Armenian or taught my coworkers English. I just finished my third week in site and it was much more productive at work. Now I have a weekly English Conversation Club/Business Class/Youth Club in town scheduled at the Culture House and a weekly youth club in my village. My first meeting in town is on the 16th and I’m really nervous about what I am going to talk about – I’m stepping into unknown territory.

Definitely the hardest part is that everything is unknown territory…everything is new and different. Parts of it are super exciting like traveling but it can be overwhelming when everything is unknown and changing. Every single thing in my life is different than it was three months ago and its new and exciting but from time to time it is just too much.

The first day of school in Armenia is September 1st and it is a really big deal. My family all went to town to get new outfits for school and then they came home and modeled them or me. On the first day of the school all the students and parents stood outside the school and the kids lined up by class. There were lots of little speeches and awards (which I didn’t really understand). Then all the new first graders were given new bags for the beginning of school. The boys got little black briefcases and the girls got bright pink and purple backpacks. All the students brought flowers for their teachers. Since it was my youngest brothers first day of school my host mom and I went to his class and all the parents stood in the classroom taking pictures and they were all presented with their books.

Funny Moments

•One of the women at the mayor’s office told me I am pretty but very plain (i.e. I don’t look like I’m ready to go clubbing at 11am at work like most Armenian women)

•I walk way too fast for Armenia...I don’t have my casual Armenian stroll down quite yet.

•Chocolate Butter...not as good as it sounds

•My little brother Davit asks every afternoon if I want ice cream because he knows if I say yes he will get ice cream too.

•Everyone I meet thinks I’m Russian or German never American and they can’t believe that I’m going to live in a village in Armenia for two years.

•Potatoes, Potatoes, Potatoes! If you don’t like to eat potatoes I wouldn’t recommend living in Armenia

it has been awhile but I promise there will be many new posts soon because I know have access to the interent at school in my village. rather than trying to write the off the cuff now (which makes for rather scattered and not all that exciting posts) I am going to write them at home and then post! Miss you all!

Well, I'm currently trying yet again to post photos on Facebook but it is not going very well. I've been waiting 15 minutes for six photos to load! I'm in Charentsavan today working on my practica. Rian and I set up a meeting on Thursday with CARD (The Center for Agribusiness and Rural Development) to try and connect the organization with the mayor of the village we are working with. I'm excited about meeting with them and having another chance to go to Yerevan. We all went to Yerevan on Sunday and went to the National Armenian History Museum. We didn't really have enough time to see everything, but afterward a group of us found a Thai food restaurant and I had some good pad thai which help soothe some of my food cravings.

Hi All! So we officially have three weeks of PST (pre-service training) left before we are sworn in as official Peace Corps Volunteers! My days recently have been full of meetings because I am working on my business practica. I am working with another trainee, Rian, and we are helping facilitate a meeting between a village mayor and a NGO in Yerevan because the mayor wants to start a farmer's cooperative for the dairy farmers. Tomorrow I'm going to Yerevan to the National History Museum and the Armenian Genocide Museum. Then Sunday I am going to Lake Sevan to look at birds. The address that I have posted on my blog is no longer good to send mail to so once I find out my address at my site I will post it. I swear in on August 13th and I move to site on the 14th. I will be sad not to see all my fellow Americans as often but I am super excited to be officially a volunteer and be done with days full of meetings. My American food cravings are getting pretty strong but I got a package yesterday that will help me stave them off a bit longer. I hope everything in the States is going great. Don't forget to keep in touch - I check Facebook everyday on my phone!

Love, Sarah

A lot has happened in the last month, fortunately I have not had the opportunity to get on a computer with internet to update my blog or add more photos to Facebook until today.

My average day in Armenia consists of language class from 9am-Noon then I go home for lunch and then in the afternoon we generally have a meeting or business technical training. My Armenian is coming very slowly, which is a bit frustrating. The everyday words I need I have a handle on but understanding to an actual Armenian when they speak to me is very difficult because of the speed in which they speak. We had a practice oral language exam a few weeks ago and they told me I need to work on speaking in more complex and complete sentences which is can be difficult. I have to study a lot in the next month though because I must take another oral exam in August before I am sworn in as a volunteer and my work counterpart doesn’t speak much English (about as much as I speak Armenian).

I found out about two weeks ago where my permanent site would be (i.e. where I will live and work for two years beginning on August 15th). I just spent five days at my site and with my new host family, kind of like a sneak peak at the next two years. I will be living in a village called Aygepat, which has about 1,500 people who live there. It is not on many maps I’ve seen, but it is 6km from Artashat, which is the capital of my marz (region) Ararat. Artashat has a population of about 35,000 people so that is where I will do a lot of my shopping and can use the internet. My village is in the Ararat Valley of Armenia, which is known for its fruits and vegetables. We have apricot, peach, apple, pear, plum and walnut trees, as well as grapes, corn, tomatoes, cucumbers, squash, watermelon, and many types of herbs.

My new host family is made up of my host mother, Anahit, who is a 40 year old housewife and is recently widowed, her three children, and her 87 year old mother-in-law Lusik. The children are a girl, Ani, who is 15 years old and two boys – Garnik, 10, and Davit, 5. They don’t speak any English because the school in m village teaches German as its foreign language.

My work assignment is to work with the Aygepat municipality and YCAP. YCAP stands for Youth Community Action Plan and is a nation-wide initiative that is sponsored by AED (Academy for Educational Development) and USAID to increase volunteerism and community development efforts by the youth of the villages and towns in Armenia. My village’s mayor signed up to be a participant a year ago and my role is to help organize events, contribute new ideas and skills, and help with the management of the organization. All Peace Corps volunteers are assigned to a counterpart at their partner organizations to work with and my counterparts name is Vika. She is 22 years old and recently graduated from college in Yerevan. She is a member of the youth group. If anyone is interested you can check out http://aed.am

The marz-wide director told me they are working on getting internet on the computer in the office so hopefully soon I will have much better access to the internet, but until then I will be able to take the bus to Artashat to use the internet. My office is in the village center, down the hall from the mayor’s office and next door to the post office. As soon as I know my new address I will post it. The address currently posted is good for mail sent before the end of July because of the lag time in it arriving in Armenia.

I really love my host family and everyone from work I met. It was extremely hot while I was visiting but I was told it should be better when I return. Luckily because of the hot summers the winters are not as harsh as other parts of the country. In some sites winter begins at the end of October and can last until April or May, but in Aygepat winter starts in December and is over by March.

While I was visiting my site my host family took me to a historic site called Khor Virap which is an ancient church where St. Gregory was held captive for 14 years by the King because of his faith. It was really beautiful and behind the church you could see Mt. Ararat. I will have to go back because I did not have my camera to take any photos. My family and I had a miscommunication – they told me on Saturday that tomorrow we would all go to church together so the next morning when we were getting ready to leave they asked if I wanted to bring my camera, but since I thought we were going to an actual service I said no, but come to find out we were going to a tourist attraction! It is not far from my village so I plan on visit again when other volunteers come to visit me.

I could tell plenty more stories but I will save those for another time because I can’t write anymore at the moment (I just got done with a day of school, which leaves me brain dead!). Keep your fingers crossed that I have internet in my office and I can post every day.

I tried to post photos on Facebook but the internet wasn't cooperating!

Սեր Հետ (With Love),

Սառա (Sarah)

So I've officially been in Armenia for 19 days and this is my first time with the ability to use the internet other than on my phone. As of know I can check my email and facebook from my cell phone, but because it is a pain to type on the phone the blog posts will not be coming as often. I'm hoping to set up a system where I write my entries prior to coming to town so they are not so freeform but that didn't happen last night because I went to bed at 7:30pm intending to take a nap and staying asleep all night! I'm recovering from a virus that is being passed around among all the peace corps trainees. More detailed stories about adventures involving crazy chickens, the strange moments involved with living with a host family that you can't talk to beyond the capacity of a 3 year old. I live in a small village of about 300 people called Teghenik with seven other Peace Corps trainees. The nearest city on a map is Charentsevan. My host family is great and we are slowly breaking down the language barrier and the strangeness of living in another family's house. I have a host dad named Arto and mom named Marené and a 20 year old host sister name Rosan. We have two cows, chickens, and my mom makes yougert and cheese. Don't forget to write letters because they announce at our Central Days who got mail and it is like being in camp and everyone gets super excited! I promise to post tales from Armenia next time I come to town and get a chance to use the internet...they are keeping us pretty busy with training. I love it here but I do miss everyone back home and I hope that all is well back in the U.S.

P.S. Check out photos on Facebook of Philly, Vienna, and Armenia!

So I only have one day left at home before I leave for Philly and the beginning of my Peace Corps adventure! For all who are curious my mailing address from June 1 to August 1, 2009 will be:

Sarah Kuehler

3 Rustov Street

8 district, School #6

2501, Charentsavan, Armenia

Not 100% sure on the formatting of that but that's the correct order.

At least in the beginning I will be in a town that has access to the internet so I should be able to update and chat via facebook, email, etc. My email address is sarah.kuehler@yahoo.com.

Tonight was my going away party but some how it still has not completely sunk in and I don't think it will until I am on the plane to Philly.

So I'm two weeks from leaving for Philadelphia for my Peace Corps staging and I really should be packing, but I wanted to make sure and get this blog set up so I can stay in touch with everyone while I'm gone. I can't believe I'm leaving so soon!