Holidays

1) View of the Hagia Sophia from the top floor of my hostel.
2) Some guy weaving a rug on the main drag near my hostel.
3) Blue Mosque
4) Basilica Cistern
5) Sunrise over Istanbul on the bus in; Sarah and I were overly excited to finally have made it to Istanbul.

It has officially been forever since I updated this and I am very sorry to anyone who has been waiting for a post. I find it difficult to update this regularly, as I still have to go into town to get internet. The program I'm working with has made many promises that they have not kept. One of which being that I would have internet at either my school or my house. I learned early on, however, that promises are more like maybes.

It's been a pretty busy couple of months since I last updated, so remembering everything is pretty unlikely. October and November have simply flown by and now my birthday is now barely a day away. How that happened, I have no idea. Halloween was quite fun, despite being in a foreign country that doesn't really understand what it's all about. I am so happy I made good friends during training, because a couple of my friends in Zugdidi threw a massive Halloween party. As a joke between friends, I went as Sarah Palin (because I can literally see Russia from my backyard). I was pretty impressed by everyone's ability to dress up despite having limited resources here in Georgia for costumes. We rented a theatre, watched movies, danced and played beer pong. Well, I just watched people play beer pong, I didn't participate.

November was a very eventful month. Not only did I get more stamps on my passport, but I also have a 3 month visa to Turkey, now. And I almost got arrested at the border. Twice. (Once for taking pictures of the sunset while crossing and once for trying to get back through to get my bags.) My trip to Turkey was kind of spur of the moment. We didn't have any set plans and we just went without thinking. We were there for a week and stayed at a really nice hostel in Istanbul. Neither Sarah nor I wanted to leave after the first day. Everyone was incredibly friendly, the food was incredible and there was so much to do we had trouble fitting everything in one week. The first day we were there we ran into a couple who were teachers there and they told us about how amazing it was and how much they loved living there. Conclusion? I know where I'm going for my next teaching abroad experience. (I'll try to do an entire entry on my trip to Turkey when I get more time.)

My actual Thanksgiving day was uneventful. I woke up, went to school and went home. However, I did get to have a sort of Thanksgiving (which included homemade apple pie) in Zugdidi. It certainly wasn't the same as mashed potatoes and green bean casserole and cranberry sauce and all of the other foods that I seriously missed on Thanksgiving Day, but it was better than having no Thanksgiving at all.

Despite having my birthday in a foreign country (and being slightly worried that I won't have electricity or water), it seems like it's going to be a pretty good time. My friends here have decided it has to be incredible, because I'm the youngest and they're all excited that it's my 21st. They like to tell me stories about their 21st and how crazy it was and encourage me to be just as crazy. Luckily, my birthday is on a Wednesday so there's only so much they can force me to do. Unfortunately, I'm also having a party which will probably become crazy. We'll see how this goes.

Overall, the past few months have been good. I had a couple weeks of serious homesickness, but I usually just wrote or listened to music or sat at my window and watched the chickens and I was able to suck it up. Especially on clear days when the mountains are visible. I've probably brought the moutains up in every entry, but I was planning on moving to Montana almost specifically to live near mountains. I think my excitement is understandable when I can see two sets of snow-covered peaks from the top floor of my school.

It's still difficult living in a family that doesn't speak my language and it probably always will be. I've begun doing lessons outside of school with a woman in town, which keeps my afternoons filled. I've also begun doing lessons with my family and my teachers at school, which adds even more to my schedule. The key to keeping myself happy is to keep myself busy. Luckily, there's only three more weeks of school and then I have a break, which I desperately need. Turkey was a vacation, but it wasn't long enough. And I wanted to stay. So, I have things to look forward to and keep me busy and sooner or later I'm going to be home with everyone that I miss. I haven't kept in touch with some people as well as I'd hoped, but I guess that's only to be expected when everyone back home is busy with school. I miss everyone a lot and I also look forward to any e-mails I get. I'll try to keep this updated more often, and over Christmas break I should be able to since one of my friends who is leaving is going to be giving me her internet. Of course, without elecricity I won't be doing much, but I have my fingers crossed that there won't be any more week-long stretches sans power.