One Year Come and Gone!

April 23 celebrated the year mark for me here in Georgia. I can't believe a year has already gone by so quickly. It really hit me when I went to the airport with my friends last weekend to welcome the new arriving G14s. I remember being super jet lagged, scared and very confused as I made my way to the front entrance of the airport with my fellow volunteers. The U.S. Ambassador and our Country Director greeted us, while a flock of media folks took our picture. I also remember straining to listen to our next instructions being shouted to us from across the vast foyer as the announcements for flight arrivals and departures echoed around us.  I also remember seeing a group of scraggly yet happy volunteers yelling greetings and waving at us. I think this was the moment that I started to feel at ease, to know that it is possible to make it to the other side of service. It was a relief to see friendly, happy, volunteers who had survived the first part of their service and still seemed to be in the best of spirits possible.

Like I said all of these thoughts flooded my head as I, a year later, got to be a part of the welcome committee for the next group of volunteers. Within my year here I have had my super highs and my super lows. Some days I feel like I've got things figured out and then other days I get frustrated and confused.  I have definitely grown to be a stronger person because of it. I have also had time to do many other things here as well. Since I've been here I've taught myself how to knit, applied and was awarded my first grant, read over 35 books (most of them being the classics that I didn't get to in college), taken three online courses, planned and implemented  summer camps, learned how to milk a cow, have grown somewhat comfortable enough to teach a class full of students, traveled to three new countries, implemented gender equality trainings, made lifetime friends, witnessed animal sacrifices, attended more supras than I can count, learned a whole new alphabet and language (always a work in progress but I'm still proud), turned 25, and have become super close with my host families here in Georgia. It's been one hell of a ride and I can't wait to see what the future holds for me for my remaining 15 months!

The "new" scraggly looking elder volunteers. Way to go G13s, may our next year be even better!

First Days in Georgia!

Well it has been a whirl wind of travel and such since I last got on here. Let me catch you up. Started my travels early in the morning this past Sunday by driving with my family to the Knoxville airport for my 6 am flight. After a connecting flight in the Washington/Dulles airport i arrived in Philadelphia. After I arrived at the hotel I took an hour nap since all I slept the night before was 30 mins. Then I finally got to meet my fellow volunteers downstairs while we waited for our information session to start. There are 32 of us in total and we are from all over ranging from different ages too with 23 years old being the youngest and mid 60s being the oldest. We all seemed to bond instantly which is good since we will be each other's support group in country for the next two year. To celebrate our last night in the states, we went to a fancy sushi restaurant close to our hotel. 

The next day we left the hotel around ten and took a 3 hour bus ride to JFK airport where we waited another two additional hours to check into our overnight flight. Turkish Airlines we found out is really swanky with nice house slippers to wear during your overnight flight as well as gourmet food too. I didn't get much sleep on our ten hour flight but that was kind of expected. After our flight to Istanbul we had another two hour flight that would take us to the Tbilisi airport. 

Finally Made It! We were met with cheers and clapping in the airport from the older volunteers there in Georgia that came to witness our arrival. Then we had a press conference where we met Richard Norland the U.S. Ambassador for Georgia. After that we traveled to a restaurant to have our first supra complete with bread, cheese, eggplant and other thing. Still with me?....When we finished dinner we boarded our bus and were issued our official Peace Corps phones...actually kind of an upgrade from my phone in the States.. at least this phone has snake. We stopped at a store to pick up some snacks and supplies that we would need for the next three days. We arrived at our orientation camp and basically passed out from exhaustion from traveling. These past few days we have been in and out of language classes, diversity classes, Peace Corps policy classes and culture classes. Since our camp is out in the middle of the Georgian countryside and we aren't really allowed to leave the sight, I haven't seen much of urban part of Georgia...just what we drove through in Tbilisi the night we arrived. Tomorrow we leave the "compound," as we like to call it and go to Khashuri where we will meet our new host families that we will be living with for the next 3 months. It's really kind of scary because we only know maybe ten Georgian phrases  and vice verse with our host families and their English skills. Oh well lots of hand gestures and laughing I guess.

More countryside

ხაჭაპური Khachapuri, the cheesy bread stuff in the center

First Supra

Yay food

Weird window display in front of the restaurant (kind of reminds me of the Beatles ... with Yoko to the right)

Abandoned house next to our camp

Cool building in Tbilisi 

Georgian countryside....looks a lot like East TN