Corn, cereal, princesses, sausages, the scottish and a friend.

Back again. I put some new pics up on that website http://picasaweb.google.com/Roryjnolan and you can view them. they are from earlier this month when we went to this city called Velikno Turnivo for a conference. It was a really pretty place and they even had their own awesome castle from a really long time ago. And the name of the castle is dangerously close to the word for "corn" in bulgarian, so when people kept asking me if i had gone there, i got really confused. its hard to go to corn. at least here in bulgaria it is, i guess in Illinois, Ohio, Upstate New York or wherever you people are reading this, going to corn doesnt sound so strange... Speaking of corn. i dreamt of corn flakes last night. and special K. it was a pretty disappointing dream because when i woke up, all i was craving was a bowl of cereal and some cold milk. but i dont have any. in fact, i havent had a bowl of cereal since i got here. they dont really eat that stuff. instead, my breakfasts usually consist of a slice of bread, with a pork paste spread on it, and put in the toaster oven for a few minutes. when the pork paste becomes "cooked" i put some kashkaval on it. kashkaval only translates to "yellow cheese" (on a side note, only 2 kinds of cheese here: Cirene and Kashkaval. One means White Cheese, the other is Yellow Cheese. - i know, pretty specific. it always makes for a fun conversation when people ask me if we have "Kashkaval" in the states. they dont really grasp the fact that there are like 10,000 kinds of cheese in the US) but anyways, back to breakfast. so i put this yellow cheese on there and maybe some spice that is green. i dont know what it is called, but its tasty. and then i toss it back in the toaster oven for a bit. This concoction is called a "princess" and i have no idea why. toast, pork paste and cheese. open faced. And it looks just like this.

So something funny just happened... someone from scotland just got dragged to my office with a woman and he needed help translating what he was saying. It was pretty funny. I got to translate! haha that was the first time ever. and the woman understood what i was saying! i feel proud. I guess this guy buys properties here for ridiculously cheap prices, like a house for $3000 with a 3000 sq ft garden... and then he rents them for 120 dollars a month to people from england. pretty good plan i guess. says he owns 12 houses in bulgaria and is making some good money.

Anyways, still not much to do here. i bought new clothes last weekend. I went with a girl from Moravitsa to go shopping. I basically just purchased everythign she said she liked. well, not everything. but damn near close. i didnt have any clothes for winter, so i needed some warmer stuff and some new jeans cause ive lost a bunch of weight here. so i ended up with seriously the tightest fitting clothes i have ever owned. i feel like a sausage. Bulgarians have no shame in big bellies with clothes that hardly fit - in fact, its fashionable. I honestly think its a game to see how tight you can get your clothes without ripping them. and another fun fact is that most clothes here have some sort of writing on them in english. no one really understands english, so it doenst matter if the words make sense in a sentence, or if they are spelled correctly or what. just as long as they look cool. For instance, there was a shirt i was going to buy that i thought looked neat. but when i read closer the sentence on it said "all the boys say this is the highest fashion" which to me sounded a little too much like i was interested in boys, if you know what i mean. especially since it was written in cursive and was all shiny silver. so i had to turn it down. i couldnt wear it knowing the words written on it. the girl i was with didnt understand why i put it down. it made for good times. Maybe there will be some pictures of me rocking the real fashion of bulgaria. All i need next is a chain necklace and new sporty shoes.

Actually, that scottish guy that came in told me i looked more bulgarian than most bulgarians... haha! yes!

Oh, and Tom Pattison from Ridgefield will be in Sofia all next weekend! I'm going to have a friend here! someone that has known me for longer than 4 months... funny to think, not one person within like 5000 miles has known me longer than 4 months... except Alex my cousin who is living in Europe. he doesnt count becuase then it wouldnt sound as cool... :) So yea, Tom is coming and I have no idea what to do with him. there isnt really much to do here other than sit at a cafe... maybe we could go for a walk. i dont have a car or anything to get around. we would have to take buses and trains. and that takes forever. so i dunno. stay posted, ill let you know what we did... or maybe i wont depending on what we do... :)

Well maybe that's enough for now. My thoughts are with my family and friends back home. i wish you all the best of health and happiness and successes. eat a bowl of cereal for me.

Rory

The beauty of a new language.

I feel like each time i post, i start by apologizing... It's once again been like a month since my last post... oops. You would think i was incredibly busy, but its just the opposite. I'm actually not really up to much. Although each day is a challenge and a learning experience, i spend most of my work days in an office with no work to do. I mostly sit from 8-5:30 with a 2 hour break for lunch in a quiet office surfing the web or trying to explore ideas on what projects to start here and what my limitations/abilities are. I also study the language a lot. It's not an easy one, but day by day i am getting more efficient in it and am at a point where i can understand a lot of what's going on around me and what is said to me when i am talked to. the hard part is forming coherent sentences, properly formed and pronounced and then peicing them together to make thoughts and paragraphs...

I think everyone should take a few months of their lives and jump head first into a society that doesnt speak a lick of their language. as americans, we are lucky because in america, if you travel 2 or 3 thousand miles across the country, you will end up in a state where they speak the exact same language as you. here, if i drove 50 miles north, or 150 miles west, i would be in either romania or serbia respectively and have to speak a different language completely. it's just an odd realization for us that come from a land where language is never a problem. And if someone in america doesnt speak english... good heavens! how dare they not speak our language in our country!

I remember a specific incident that happened right before i left for Bulgaria. I was at an mechanics place getting Rubi ready for her new family and was waiting for her to get done. There was a man that had his car worked on and it was completed. He appeared to be of Indian descent and hardly spoke english. The man was confused because he thought he had something fixed on his car that cost one thing, but the person behind the desk was charging him a significantly higher price. Well, i guess the individual that didn't really speak english had agreed to something he was unaware of or didnt understand before his car went in for service. So he probabaly ordered the full package after the mechanic asked if he wanted it. he probably just nodded, which is what i do all the time. well that cost him some cash. But the interaction between this man and the attendant was what was most interesting for me to watch. Instead of the attendant slowing his speech down, using smaller words, and remaining calm to explain the situation and understanding - he got more and more upset and simply repeated himself louder and faster as he got angry. the man that was to pay got defensive and just walked out because he didnt know why he was getting yelled at! luckly he was able to call someone that spoke english to explain - but i know that situation all too well. and i think we should all be humbled by putting ourselves in a situation where the simple act of communicating a thought vocally is stripped from us. and when we do try to communicate it, we feel embarrassed and always questioning whether the words we are saying make sense and if they understand what we want.

it is so easy in this language to screw up the meaning completely. for instance, if i say "obicham te" it means i love you. if i say, "obicham ti" it means you love me. get my point? Ti vs Te. do you know how easy that is to screw up?! ugh.

Here is another fun little struggle ive run into - just for giggles. two days in a row i took trains to and from sofia. 4 trains total. i got on the wrong train 2 of the 4 times. not really the biggest problem because the trains ended up going to the same place, it was more the time they left and the amount of stops they made along the way... but do you know how nerve racking it is to just step on a train and only be like 70% sure you are on the right train? and then how fun it is to explain to the conductor why you have a ticket for the wrong train? yea. good times. luckly one conductor just shrugged, said no problem and moved on. the other was not so friendly and drilled me with questions. luckly the individuals near me saw my struggle, explained to the conductor and i was saved.

day by day.

well school has started now and hopefully i will have something to do now. maybe they will give me direction in terms of work.

I shaved my beard. i am like a 17 year old now. the people here like it though. and i have gotten some nice comments from the women, which is always nice. i am not sure how much i like it though. but oh well.

I have been back to moravitsa a bunch. its a good place with good people and it makes me feel like home. its a little safe haven for me when i need it. i wonder how i will repay them for all they have done for me. but the thing is, repayment is an odd concept here. Here, if i helped someone and provided everything for them for a long time while they got on their feet, i would never expect anything in return. in the states, it just doesnt seem like that would happen. and i feel obligated almost for my own self to give them something. i am in serious emotional and financial debt to them! but i should chill out - i honestly believe that i have been adopted by Rosen's family as a member. and recieve the same treatment as a brother would treat a brother. It's amazing.

I have also been making friends here in Koynare which has helped a lot. there have been a few times where i will be walking home from work and get "kidnapped" by some people at a cafe i pass. and that's nice. they want to hang with me. and i can hold my own in conversation enough that it's not pure silence. mind you - when i say i hold my own, i mean i can spit out sentences, nod when i understand, and generally answer questions. But they want to hang with me, and i could use all the company and companionship i can get!

There is also a woman i work with that has been wonderful. she takes me to the nearby town where there are shops and helps me buy stuff for survival. she also takes me out to the cafe and has invited me to her house as a guest. she is cool, has a good sense of humor and enjoys hanging out with me as far as i can tell. She has 3 children which is a little uncommon here, usually its only 1 or 2. and her husband has worked in spain for, i think, 8 years. she has only been there once to visit and he has only come back a few times as well becuase it is expensive to travel. i cant imagine that life. they talk everynight on skype. this is life here. i cant imagine.

it reminds me of the stories i heard from the people that came to america from south america/mexico to work. they come alone and take money. they send most of it back to their families in their home country. but imagine how incredibly hard that is for them! they are kinda like me... but married with kids. cant imagine. thats a hard life.

anyways - lets end this on a positive note! I'm making friends and feeling better about my language ability and koynare is going to be a good place to be for the next few years... it better! :)

Hope everyone is well out there in the world! Keep in touch. send me emails if you like, i will get back to you or if you have questions or just want to hear more unedited, uncensored stories :)

Rory

I guess I'll post becuase there isn't much else to do today! I have been kind of a bum this weekend and not really gone out. On Friday night I met some fo the people i work with for drinks at a local place for a few hours. It was just the 5 of us and Pepi had to leave after a short period because he had stuff to do.

I had made myself a big old dinner called Gyuvche (or something like that). Its a bulgarian meal that is so easy to make and it is absolutely delicious. It is basically just tossing all the leftover veggies and meat you have laying around into a ceramic bowl and a lid with a small hole in it for hte steam to escape. Of course you add some cheeses too... after you cook it for a while, you take it out and crack an egg on top and toss it back in for 5-10 minutes more. It is so damn good...

Anyways - a little sidetrack there - after the drinks, Dani took me to go meet a friend of his in the town over. It wasn't far and I was under the impression that we were just going to a cafe or something to meet a buddy. Oh the joys of the language barrier... Instead we showed up to a house with a family of 4 and a full course meal prepared, salads, cheeses, rakia, kebabcheta, kyuftetas - the works. I was a little surprised and totally not looking for food! i was stuffed, but as any good guest does, i ate the food and drank the rakia. It was nice becuase this man had one son that is 18 years old and speaks phenominal english. So i was able to converse with him for a while. Dani and I didn't end up leaving until around 3-330am after arriving at around 10. I was absolutely exhausted.

Rosen had come - my language tutor :) - the night before for some studying. Of course we studied for 3 hours or so, but after that it was still early (at midnight) so we went to a cafe downstairs for some beers to unwind. But we didnt end up getting to sleep until around 4am. It was like a middle school sleep over! except the beer of course. So needless to say I was totally exhausted from both Thursday and Friday night. Therefore I slept in real late yesterday and just kind of cleaned up the apartment and watched some movies on my laptop. Today, I am just hanging at the house - kind of doing the same thing to be honest. I am currently cooking a vat of all the misc stuff i have laying around here. It better be good because it will be all i eat for the next week! haha... oh my life.

This is quite a different life. I am frequented by all sorts of bugs during the day and night. Some eat me, others pester and most eat the stuff in my garbage. I made a bet with Pepi earlier last week that I didnt have cockroaches here. He just laughed and told me that of course i did. I lived on the first floor of this apartment building... Well - we came and sprayed for them. and the next day there were a few laying around the floor nice and dead. So i have those nasty critters too. Good times. Asides from the bugs, tempermental water, and heat - life is good. I am getting some headway on projects and meeting new people daily.

This week, another volunteer is coming and we are putting on a movie for the kids. I figure its a good way to meet some. After that, i am headed for 2 days to his location to see him in action. So I have a busy week ahead of me!

Quick story - kind of funny. On Friday I was headed to a neighboring town, maybe 10 miles away, to make some purchases for the apt. Violina was driving and Pepi was with us. About 5 miles into the trip, the car turns off. We had run out of gas. It took about an hour, but someone we knew passed us, picked up Violina and took her to the nearest gas station. It was just a funny experience. Never ran out of gas before...

Hope everyone is doing well out there. Things are starting to pick up here. My social life is no where close to what it was in Moravitsa, but it will get better. I am just taking it slower here. Heck, i have 2 years!

Also - if you want to see some shots from Koynare - go to www.picasaweb.google.com/roryjnolan I have some posted.

Settling in.

Again, I regret not writing in this sooner as I am sure I have forgotten plenty. As you know, each day brings a new adventure with new experiences. Some more than others. And when I forget to write in this blog, I don't capture it all. But I doubt anybody wants to read everything going on in my life...

So I have been in Koynare now for the past few weeks, I guess since July 25th. On July 24th we had a big "Swearing In Ceremony". If you wern't aware, I wasn't really a PCV before July 24th, I was just a trainee. Now I am official. I said the oath that all Federal Government workers say about protecting the US and all it stands for basically.

That night, the 24th, I stayed in Moravitsa with Ashley and Scott. Sarah left to her new place. Since Moravitsa was the place to be, many other volunteers showed up and partied there that night to say goodbye to everyone. It was a blast. It was actually a really emotional night. I really truely love the people I was with when I started my experience here. You know, you get thrust into a totally terrifying and unfamiliar environment where you are completely helpless and if someone, or many people, reach out to you to make sure you are safe and comfort you - you will never forget them. That goes for all the people in the town, as well as the other volunteers I was with. It is pretty powerful stuff. When you first get put in a place like this, its like the military. You are stripped of your identity completely. You can't joke, laugh, share stories. You don't know how to cook, do laundry, use the shower or the toilet. Everything is new, everything is scary. And you aren't you. It gives you an opportunity to start fresh. The other volunteers I was with are really the only people that can truely understand. And for the Bulgarians in the town, we were the first Americans they had ever seen. The first outsiders they got to experience and know. They laughed at us and took care of us like family. And I know they will never forget us either. I think our group in Moravitsa, for such a short period of time, made a lasting impact there. Even if it was just by adding a goofy experience that residents can laugh about later down the road.

So Farewell Moravitsa. (even though I've already been back to visit)

And Hello Koynare!

So here I am. Arrived on the 25th of July. Rosen and his cousin drove me here since it's less than an hour away and Rosen wanted to make sure I was taken care of. So we came and I was pleasantly surprised by my living situation. Some of you may say its nasty and uncomfortable and primative, but I am happy with it. I am living in a Blok - which is like a concrete 6 floor soviet apartment style building. I have a bedroom, a kitchen, a bathroom (with a flushing toilet!), a shower (that is tempermental as to whether I have hot showers or not...), and another room that is like a bedroom, but not really and it needs some work. I don't really go in there. I will take pictures and post them later. I live above a fairly busy cafe that plays music into the night. I told Rosen about this and he had the best answer ever. He said "oh thats great! you can listen to music when you sleep!" and he was dead serious. I love that guy. But the nice thing about living there is that the cafe has free wireless... so I get internet at home without having to pay for it! kinda nice seeing as though I get 15 lev (12 dollars) a day to live off of... Also - I don't have a washing machine, so I do my laundry by hand and hang it outside to dry.

The town is nice, there are lots of shops and people. There are a good amount of young people, but I haven't really met a lot yet. I will soon. Right now I work in a cultural center in town and with the Mayor. I have some ideas for projects and I hope they work. When school starts again in Sept, I will be teaching English. The children learn basic English in the young classes, but they don't have a teacher for the middle school/high school age kids. That will be me. Kinda excited/nervous about it. But it will be fine.

Other than like, life is a lot more relaxed here for me. I loved Moravitsa, still do, but I was having too much fun there... Now I am in reality again and on my own. And it's nice for now - I need to make some friends, but that will come with time.

Oh, Rosen is my language tutor. So he comes here like once a week to study. It's freaking awesome. If you don't remember, Rosen is my brother from Bulgaria that I hadn't met till I came here.

I also have skype now. Send me an email if you have it with your info, or just look me up by my email.

That's it for now.

PST is OVER.

Wooowww Ho! it has been quite a while since my last post. or at least it seems for me. That was basically the last time i had internet for more than a few minutes. So i am sorry about the delay in posts for those that actually follow this thing. :)

So i came back from Koynare to Moravitsa and it felt like coming home. The people here are so warm and familiar for me.

I honestly regret not writing in this more because I am having a hard time remembering everything i have done since then! We celebrated the 4th of July with the townspeople and we made cheeseburgers, hotdogs and salad and sang the national anthem. It was a success. People liked the cheeseburgers, i have a lot of pictures but most are on facebook. We also held a camp for the kids of the town on a 100 degree day. It was a success as well, some photos on facebook, more to come later. I cant really upload right now. But i do have maybe... 4000 pictures from Bulgaria already. Ill get a few up there soon.

I have really been enjoying hanging with the people in town. I am starting to speak more and understand a fair amount of whats going on and what they are saying to me. That is empowering becuase finally i dont feel so freakin stupid.

Yesterday I went into the mountains with Rosen and a few other people from town. Scott and I went hiking with one Crazy Bulgarian Man who is the cousin of Rosen. No, he's not crazy for real. Hes a good man. He took Scott and I on a couple mile hike up and down some mountains around a river and such. i have pictures. they are sweet. Maybe youll get to see them one day. We then spent most the night there just laying under the stars by a fire. Pretty nice.

Oh, i went to a Bulgarian wedding too. It was pretty fun, it would have been more fun if i hadnt been throwing up the day before. I was a little nauseaus but like a good bulgarian, i drank some rakiya and the pain went away. did you know Rakiya is not only rocket fuel, nail polish remover, sanitizer, and straight up booze, but it is also medicine? Why dont we have this in the US?? And they all make their own. It only takes a couple weeks too...

So tomorrow i have my final language interview. Then wednesday i am going with the mayor of moravitsa to the mountains to some restaurant that is supposedly gorgeous. Not just me and him... its not a date. there are other people too... So after that, i have a meeting with peace corps on thursday and i swear in on Friday and become an official volunteer! not just a pledge... or trainee. Friday night i am staying in Moravitsa for one last party and then headed to Koynare for the next 2 years. I am seriously going to miss this place. I really do love this town. (isnt there a toby keith song about that? maybe its "i really love this bar" - either way, it works)

So fairwell. hopefully youll hear from me next week in Koynare. Miss you all.