Packed and Ready to Go, Again

Title kind of says it all, really.  My two heavy-beyond-all-sense suitcases are once again bursting at their seams, my backpack is full of survival gear, and my laptop bag is only waiting for this very laptop.

I meet my host family in little over an hour and a half.

It is a five-hour drive from Tbilisi to Poti.  My family will either have a car, or have hired a taxi or a minibus, which are called marshrutkas here.  I really, really do not want it to be a marshrutka.  These things are ancient, smelly, rattlely, and terribly uncomfortable.  Okay for a ten minute ride through the city, but five hours?  Torture.  I will also probably end up with the carsickness experience of my life.  Not the best way to make a first impression.

Yesterday was the last day or Orientation.  One last awful tedious morning in the Airless Windowless Room, and then my friend Julie and I went out for lunch.  We found a lovely little shop where a sweet stereotypical old woman was baking bread.  We bought kachapuri, bread with cheese baked in the middle.  Then we walked to another shop and bought sodas and ice cream, and ate in a park surrounded by Georgians doing the same thing.  Then we walked back to the hotel, met up with the rest of the group, and Lika and our Program Director Tamara took us around the city for a "Cultural Scavenger Hunt."

We divided up into groups and had to successfully take a taxi (and negotiate the fare), read some Georgian, ask people where stuff was, ask what time it was, and cross Tbilisi city streets without dying, which is a skill that needs particular honing.  It was awesome to get out into the city like I'd been dying to do all week, talk with Georgians and actually get to practice what we've learned.  Plus we got to see more of Tbilisi.  I love this city and am incredibly sad to be leaving it so soon.  Can't wait to come back.  Plus, my team won the scavenger hut!  Go Team Pirdapir!  (Pirdapir means "straight ahead."  We got that answer a lot when asking for directions.)

Black Sabbath!



Parlament



Winning Team!!!  #1!

And again.  We were very proud.

Post-win, everyone went to a Turkish cafe for snacks, pastries, and beer.  Back at the hotel, we had one last closeout meeting, then most of us went to the restaurant next door for dinner, dancing, and much merriment.  Much.  Tamara and Lika came as well which was supercool.  We ordered Georgian salads, which are cucumbers and tomatoes with some sort of yummy weird crushed nut sauce instead of dressing; cheese and bread, and lots of kinkhali, or dumplings.  Georgian kinkhali are just wonderful.  I could eat them every day, which is lucky because it is very probable that that is what I will be doing.

We danced our lil hearts out to traditional Georgian folk songs, Armenian Pop, Turkish something, Hava Nagila, and the Pulp Fiction soundtrack.  We made friends with a large group of very enthusiastic Georgian men.  "Ohh, you are from Washington!  I LOVE Washington!  George Washington my FRIEND!!!!!"  An older Georgian man approached our table with a 2-liter Fanta bottle.  He filled our glasses with a vaugely orange liquid that was most definitely not Fanta but homemade Georgian wine.  Then the group of younger Georgians corralled us into their alcove for shots of vodka.

Everyone was extremely nice but everything you hear about Georgians loving their drink and loving you to drink with them were all true last night.  When we finally left, the young Georgians literally followed us out to the parking lot with a vodka bottle for one more shot.  I abstained. :)

Kathrin, Julie, Tamara, Dani

Patrick with a Georgian girl.  Georgian girls love Patrick a LOT.

100% Awesome.

Me, Patrick, Lika

This was the third (and last) glass of wine I recieved.  I don't believe it would have been physically possible to put another drop of liquid into this glass.

So our last night was fairly epic to say the least.  This morning was packing, and I really need to be leaving to grab a kachapuri so there is something in my stomach before the long car ride.  Wish me luck everyone.  I'm going to need it.

Tbilisi Botanical Gardens and Tower

Argh, tired again.  Here are some of my favorite photos from our visit to the Tbilisi Botanical Gardens and mideval tower fortress.  Easily the best day I've had in Georgia so far.  Our language teacher, Lika, organized the field trip for us and we had class under a giant pine tree.  Awesome!

James and Johnny

Dani and Julie, with Patrick and our Program Director Tamara in the back

So, what did you do yesterday? :)

Dani and Kathrin

Lika, Dani being awesome, Kiyoshi

The group!  11 intrepid adventurers.

So wish I had been posted here!  I hope Poti is half as beautiful.

This was really high and up some very old and crumbling narrow stone stairs.  Handrails are for ruins in other countries.

Today, after our Intercultural Session, I took two of the group over to that same Georgian cafe accross the street and we had an amazing and tasty dinner outside, with no rain this time even!  And then a bunch of us piled into Lika's car and a taxi, because this fantastic woman had invited us to her house for coffee and tea.

It was really great to be invited into a Georgian home.  Lika's house is unbelievably warm and comforting.  She made chai and mint tea and Turkish coffee, and a ton of snacks came out in true Georgian fashion.  We laughed and chatted and even watched a few youtube videos before piling back into a taxi and heading home, or at least to our hotel.

Kathrin, Mark, Dani, Julie, Suzanne

Patrick and Kyoshi

The cab ride home was a bit of a funny story.  Patrick and I wanted to stop to pick up a few beers on the way home, which Lika had to communicate to the cabbie.  Turns out even Georgian shops are mostly closed at close to midnight, so we had to hit a couple before finding one that was still open.  This shop sold beer, cigarettes, and huge frozen whole fish of various remarkable natures, housed in giant glass-top coolers.

Then we reached our hotel and it dawned on us that the driver was going to drive right on past it.  Someone shouted "What's the word for "Stop!?" and none of us could remember.  Finally I burst out with gamichere! and the dude obligingly screeched to a halt.

Safe to say that so far I'm having fun communicating with Georgians!

Winding down for bed now.  Just talked to my father over skype.  It's always so reassuring to be able to actually see the faces of your family and friends when you're far away.  Sipping on the last of a Natakhtari, a Georgian beer that tastes a little like Yuengling.  Tomorrow is the last day of Orientation, and then on Saturday I will meet my host family and be transported to my new home -- in a small Georgian city on the shores of the Black Sea.  Life is strange.  But I'm still so grateful to be experiencing all this strangeness here.

Kaplah!

Okay, yeah, so that's Klingon and not Georgian, but it's the word that best encapsulates my achievement.

Sick beyond all patience of this truly awful hotel food, I announced my intention to eat lunch today outside of the cafe.  Originally I wanted to take a taxi (gulp) into the city proper, but a couple of things cut into my break time so I didn't think I'd be able to take that much of an adventure.  Instead I went across the street to a very local cafe.  I'd intended to go by myself but at the last minute my roommate Suzanne went with me, and it turned out to be just awesome.

We spoke in Georgian!  There was no menu, just four different choices of stew-type stuff simmering on a stove.  We chose something that sounded like "karakali," (I don't think I'm remembering right though).  I ordered erti ludi,  "one beer," and Suzanne got a coke.  Ramdeni is "how much," and I successfully communicated that I was only paying for my stew and beer.  We sat outside!  (And got ushered in when it began to pour, oh well.)

We ate and chatted and just had the best damn time, reveling in our international food-ordering capability and the fact that what we were eating was actually delicious rather than making me feel like I wanted to retch.  After lunch we wandered down the street a little and I was successful in purchasing a Snickers bar.  Which is funny because I would pretty much never buy or eat a Snickers bar in the States.  But that was one damn good dessert today.  For reals.

We have two hours of "Intercultural Training" this afternoon, which I am now three minutes late for.  Whatevs.  I kind of hate these sessions, in a monumental fashion.  I feel like I got so much more out of my 45 minutes out communicating with Georgians and eating their food and walking around their city than I do from hours upon hours in the reviled Airless Windowless Room.  My annoyance is not in the least bit calmed by the fact that I can't shake this feeling that these sessions are as much to keep us off the streets as they are to educate us.  Ugh.  Well, I'm off.  Hopefully photos of the gardens and tower tonight!

The Big Reveal

Well, I am so tired I actually want to go to bed before 1:00 AM, so this won't be the best written thing ever.  But today was a big day.

First, I found out where I will be posted.  Poti, in western Georgia on the coast of the Black Sea, about 45 minutes north of Batumi and five hours from Tbilisi.  It could be worse.  I was really hoping for the Capital, but there are definitely pros and cons to each.  Three other teachers from my group got posted in the same city, and that is really comforting.

I also met my Georgian co-teacher, and she seemed really excellent at first blush.  Very kind and down-to-earth.  I'll be teaching 7th, 9th, 10th, 11th, and 12th.  She was also able to tell me a lot about my host family, so there are many fewer unknowns than when I got up this morning, in a terrible mood because there was no water for a shower.

My host family is large, although probably not by Georgian standards.  Two girls, 8th grade and 5th.  Two parents, and two grandparents.  And me.  I was told the grandmother is an excellent cook.  They have a farm outside of town and grow much of their own produce and things.  I think they even have cows and chickens.  At least I'll know everything is fresh. :)

I have more to tell you -- about climbing the ancient tower and the Tbilisi Botanical Gardens, but my stamina is tapped.  More tomorrow, hopefully.

Local Color

So, it seems my company has decided to keep us out of trouble during orientation week by putting us up in a hotel well outside of the city center, and also keeping us trapped in an airless windowless room from 9:00 AM until 8:00 PM.  Yeah, there are breaks, but when you are hellagone from anything really neat, 30 minutes or even our 2-hour lunch break isn't good for much but unwinding.

Language in the morning, which luckily has a really great teacher because it goes all week and also is something we all actually really need.  Today in the afternoon we had Methodology, which unfortunately lasted four goddam hours and was taught by someone I didn't rather care for.  Also my stomach was really acting up because the hotel food gives a decidedly bad impression of Georgian cuisine.  So I wasn't in the best of moods this afternoon.  I skipped dinner (8:00 after we also met with both the bank representative and the insurance representative, having completed a full day of Windowless Classroom Overload).  But after my roommate Suzanne got back from dinner, a few of us went next door to the local watering hole, which is nothing short of wonderful.

Fellow teachers Julie, Dani, Mark

My roommate Suzanne, and BEER!

Georgian bar band.  They sounded wonderful!

This was hanging from the ceiling.  I have no idea.

Decor.  Puts Lamar Alexander's Congressional office to shame.

Um.  Great?

This was at 11:30 at night.  Perfect time and place for small child dancing lessons, yes?

Having skipped dinner, I successfully managed to order Georgian dumplings.  The hotel food is frankly barely palatable so I wasn't too enthusiastic about eating anything.  But these were delicious.  Fantastic.  And they cost less than 50 cents apiece.  Love.

An American and a Brit dancing in a Georgian bar.

Congrats?

Now it's just after 1:00 AM and we have another fun-filled day in the AWR tomorrow.  I've had amazing time hanging out with the actual Georgians, and only wish I could spend more of my time in Tbilisi actually experiencing the people and culture.

I think tomorrow night we all find out where we are posted.  And if we're lucky maybe actually get some kind of straight answer on our summer assignments.  Here's to a brand new day! :)

Arrival

I'm here!

Not the most eloquent or profound beginning, but I still have some considerable jet lag after my ~24-hour door-to-door trip that began at 7:30 PM Friday night in DC, and ended at 4:30 Sunday morning, Tbilisi time.

I suppose I shouldn't say anything and jinx it, but so far in my life I have had nothing but good luck with international flights.  The same held true here.  The 9.5 hours from Dulles to Istanbul actually seemed to pass pretty quickly (I have no idea how), and a nap followed by a couple cocktails filled up the 7.5 hours in the Istanbul airport.  I wish I'd had a day or three in Istanbul.  From the plane window the city looked beautiful -- all red roofs and mosques with their spires and minarets.

Landed in Georgia at 2:00 in the morning.  I met Dani on the plane, a wonderful girl from Londonwho is also teaching with my program.  Together we navigated customs, and baggage claim, and emerged out to be greeted by several representatives from the company.  Between that, meeting the rest of our incoming group, a couple local media interviews, currency exchange, a ride to the hotel, and checking in, it was after 4:30 AM when I finally opened the door to my very... basic... room.  Also, I found out I have a roommate.  Which is totally fine, but I was kind of expecting and looking forward to some privacy.  Ah well.  It's going to be a year of not having much control over my surroundings, so I better get the hell used to it.

Today my roommate and I slept late (natch!), and gradually met the rest of our arrival group over lunch.  11 people total, all pretty cool folks.  This afternoon we took a walking tour around the city, despite the chill and pouring rain.  Let's just say I love my North Face jacket a lot.

I love the rugged wildness of this city, and how the mountians seem to ride right up into town like a challenge.  Beautiful.  We also stopped into one of the Tbilisi bathouses.  I really hope I'm able to check one of those out before we leave at the end of the week.  Seems like it would be a lot of fun and a really unique experience.

So far, things have gone about how I'd expected, if I'd thought much about expecting anything.  About half an hour now before our first formal Group Meeting (even though we've already met), so I'm going to snuggle down in this very narrow bed and try to drive some of the walking tour's chill out of my bones.

After dinner I'm going to try and entice the more adventurous of my group over to the local bar next door... :)

Run and tell the angels that everything's all right...

So here we are.  I fly in just a few hours.  Months of planning, of prep, of wondering -- it all comes down to this.

Last night my father and I grilled steak.  I opened my 2004 Amarone that came back with me from Rome, and it was easily the very best wine I've ever tasted.  We lit a fire in the chiminea as it got dark.  I opened my full-size bottle of Fabbioli raspberry merlot, and played old school rock n' roll on my iPhone for about the next five hours.  Pink Floyd, Fleetwood Mac, CSNY, Dire Straits, Led Zeppelin.  Mom got home and joined us, and then we played Linda Ronstadt, David Cook, Judy Collins and ABBA.  We opened more wine.  I played them the song JC recorded for me from the party.  I may have cried a little, but less than I was expecting.  It was exactly how I would have wanted my last night to unfold, and I went to bed at 2:00 in the morning with Blondie's "Heart of Glass" playing in my head.

Departure for the airport is in less than seven very short hours, so I will leave you with this:  a very amusing video for a very cool song that has been my personal Theme Song ever since I first decided I was going to give this crazy idea a go.

I'm looking to the sky to save me
Looking for a sign of life
Looking for something to help me burn out bright
I'm looking for a complication
Looking 'cause I'm tired of lying
Make my way back home when I learn to fly.

Send-Off!

Two posts in one evening!  I don't mean to oversaturate y'all, but to me, both that last post and this one deserve their own headline.

Yesterday was my Going Away party.  My amazing folks worked their butts off and put out an amazing spread, and then my amazing friends and neighbors all came to celebrate my last Saturday in the States.

Because I am dumb and don't think of these things, I didn't take a single picture all damn night so have nothing visual to share with you.  But to everyone who made it -- Thank you, thank you for coming out!  A particular shout-out to those who made trips from out of town -- Meg and BJ, JC and Jenny, Christy, and surprise guest CC!  (If I've forgotten to mention any additional out-of-town names, please forgive me and know that it meant the world that you made the drive!)  And thank you also to JC for my song!

The weather cooperated which was such a complete bonus.  Folks got to be out on the deck and in my father's beautiful backyard garden.  We grilled out, lit a bunch of tiki torches, had a fire in the chiminea, and I made both my white and red sangria, which had a lot of people a lot of happy. :)  By request, here are the recipes.  Everything is really "to taste" so you can use whatever porportions of the liquor that suit your needs, and of course substitutions can be made for whatever fruit you'd like to feature.

Red Berry Sangria:
Cheap red wine
Fresh blueberries, blackberries, raspberries, strawberries
Cran-raspberry juice
Vodka
Black raspberry liqueur

White Peach Sangria:
Cheap white wine
Canned pears, peaches, mandarin oranges
Juice from said cans
Vodka
Peach Schnapps

I had an utterly wonderful time and it was just fantastic to be surrounded by so many incredible people who wanted to say Bon Voyage!  Yesterday was a piece of everything good that will be so hard to leave behind.  I wish I could go across the world and still be able to come home on weekends.  Lots of love to you all.

A Lot Can Change in 40 Days

To those of you that celebrate, a very Happy Easter to you.

This Easter has particular significance to me.  After all, it really wasn't that long ago that my life, my body, and my mind were one disapointing hot mess.  I'd come out the worse for wear from a short but passionate romance, I'd come to realize the gravity of my mistake in turning down a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, and the truly insane negative stress of my job had crossed over into the realm of nightmares.  The effects all this was wreaking on my body meant that I'd pretty much stopped eating for a little bit there.  Got lots of compliments on my too-big pants but aside from that silver lining, I was a wreck.  I spent a lot of time staring into space or bursting into tears without warning, which was embarrassing if that happened, say, in line at Starbucks. 

That opportunity I turned down?  This very one.  You see, I was originally supposed to leave for Georgia in early January.  By my own choice, that didn't happen.  And now, also due to my own actions, it was entirely possible that I wouldn't be able to join up with the Georgia program at all.  In fact, by the time Ash Wednesday rolled around, I'd pretty much given up on it.  And I had no freaking CLUE how to fix my life back into something resembling sanity, let alone happiness.

By a series of fated circumstances, come Ash Wednesday I found myself walking down the street and into a DC Catholic church.  This was a fairly stand-out event, as I was raised Catholic but am not exactly what you would call religious.  But I was getting well and truly desperate for some grace, and nothing else I'd tried recently had made even the slightest dent.

I enjoyed the service.  It actually felt pretty cool to check in with God about my state of affairs.  Georgia didn't really even come up in my mind; like I said, I'd more or less written that off at that point.  But when I got back to my desk later that day, that was when I got the email saying that all was good to go with my departure and that I would be leaving for Tbilisi with the April 30 group of teachers.

That was 40 days ago.  Today, in respect for the truly staggering list of things I have to be thankful for, I checked in with God again, attending Easter service with my Mom for the first time in decades.  I don't consider this to be a religious epiphany or myself to be a sheep returned to the fold or anything.  But when I look at what my life was like, waking up that Ash Wednesday morning, and what that life looks like now, I am floored.  Astounded.  Humbled, and grateful like I have never been so grateful for anything in my 31 interesting years.

If someone had told me my future 41 days ago, I would have called them a malicious liar.  It seems rediculous that so much could have happened, that it is really me who is on this brink of an incredible adventure.  That I Got Out.  That my prayers were answered.  I'm not gonna waste one second.

One Door Closes...

Yesterday was kind of incredible.

It was my last day at work.  And I survived!  The kind of day I had, I wouldn't wish on anyone, but even the longest closed-door meeting has to end eventually.  I shut down my computer, wiped the berry, turned off my desk lamp.  I was done.

My boss actually gave me a really sweet champagne reception at the end of the day.  And then several of my co-workers took me out for a truly impressive send-off at a couple of my favorite DC watering holes.  And my Caps pulled ahead in the quarterfinals, 3-1.

Today I woke up in a panic, thinking that I was late.  I laid there and thought about not having an office to drive to anymore.  No more waking up and reaching for my blackberry before I even get out of bed.  No more hour and a half commute.  Man, that commute really freaking blew.

It's hard to say how I feel.  I'd been with this job for almost five years.  That's longer by far than any relationship I've ever had.  Irrationally, now that I really think about it, it does feel kind of like that -- like ending a relationship.  There are quite a few people I said goodbye to that I will miss.  We had a lot of good times over the years, and made a lot of memories.

Fate is not without a sense of timing, because as I was wrapping up my last day in a DC office, I recieved the most important email since the one where I was told I'd been accepted into the program.

They've booked my flight.  I leave at 10:55 PM, April 29 out of Dulles.  Connecting in Istanbul, and finally touching down in Tbilisi. 

No turning back now. And I'll make my way back home when I learn to fly.