From the Black Sea to the Serbian Border

This week has seen a lot of me sitting on trains and trying to fenagal my way around strange places that are thronged with tourists to the point they are almost unmanagable.

On Sunday I was sitting somewhat bored in my apartment and decided to take a trip to the Black Sea for the first time. I didn't think I could handle Burgas yet, as it is a pretty big city and is absolutely packed to the gills with tourists right now. So in my Lonely Planet guide I read about this ancient port town a little north of Burgas called Nesebur. The guide siad it had a lot of tourists in the summer, but nothing, no words, could have prepared me for what I encountered when I stepped off the bus from Burgas.

There are two parts of town, "New Town," which is entirely made up of hotels and resorts, and "Old Town," which was founded thousands and thousands of years ago by the Thracians and is actually on a small island next to new town, only accessible by this rather narrow bridge.

When I crossed the bridge, I thought I was entering a refugee camp. Hundreds, literally hundreds, of people were swarming the bus as they walked over the bridge. They had huge beach bags, sun hats, bottles of sunscreen, innertubes, beach balls, and everything else you would take to the beach. When I got off the bus at the ancient gates to the town, I realized that almost everyone was speaking English. As I had not heard English in several days at that point, my ears went into shock and I almost didn't understand my native language.

The streets of the town are serval thousand years old and very narrow, but every crevace, every doorway in the place was absolutely packed with people. Everyone had to move in sync along the cobblestones lest they fall and be trampled. People were yelling at one another over the heads of strangers, little kids were getting separated from their folks, truly inconsiderate people stopped in the middle of the street to check maps or hold conversations and got knocked over by other inconsiderate people. It was a MADHOUSE (or as we say in Bulgaria, LUDNITSA). By noon, I had had enough and began the trek back home.

But the refugee-like adventure was not over yet, oh no. I took the bus back to Burgas, and by that point the sun was at its most intense. I managed to find a train that would stop in Straldja, and boarded. I did not, however, remember to buy a reserved seat. And, as would make sense on a Saturday at the end of July, the train was packed. I mean, for those who are familiar with London public transport, Central line of the tube at 6 p.m. on a Friday between Bank and Liverpool St. We were hanging out of windows for fresh air, circulating who got to stand on the sides and who had to stand in the middle of the mass not really holding onto anything except the mass itself.

But it was only 2 hours, and I ultimately survived (and kissed the door to my flat when I got home, if I remember correctly.)

My second trip started yesterday with a 7-hour train ride from Straldja to Sofia for a med check-up. I think I took the least efficient route here (all the way down through Plovidv and the area where I lived during training and then all the way back up the other side), and I will do a bit of research when I return to that side of the country. But I somehow made it, somehow managed to find the Peace Corps office on my own, which is a feat considering it is actually in a small village next to the capital, and had my appointment. In the evening I went to one of the Peace Corps recommended hostels to spend the night. Everyone there spoke English, so it was a pretty fun night. In one way I feel sorry for those travelers who have been in Eastern Europe for a month or so and only visit the major capitals of the countries in the area. THey really don't experience the place at all...Though I know it must be terribly difficult to travel around small towns here not speaking the local language. More and more I appreciate the way I am traveling...town by town with a home base to go back to. I understand the culture pretty well now, I speak enough Bulgarian to carry conversation with a "sympathetic listener" and I feel like I am actually betting to know the place, not just see it.

After the dust has settled

I have been a volunteer for a week and a half now, and I can already feel myself getting more adjusted to life in Straldja. My apartment is clean(er) and I have food in it...and things to cook with (though it still takes me about an hour to bring water to a weak boil...I'm waiting for my stove/oven to just give out completely so I can get a new one. For now, salad seems the way to go.)

The first week I was here I made two trips to Yambol, my nearest big town and the "capitol" of my region in Bulgaria. It is apparently one of the poorest "Oblasks" in the country, but you can't really tell that from the downtown area. There are shops (where the best 15 leva of my life were spent on a rotating fan imported from Germany for my apartment. They didn't have a box for it, so I had to sit with it fully assembled on the 20-minute bus ride after paying for an extra seat.) There is even a movie theater that shows one film a week.

I had to go to town two times because I am in the process of applying for my lichna karta (my Bulgarian ID) and I needed to get extra forms. It's one of the few remaining elements of a communist goverment, and even though it's a pain, I'm glad it's just one little aspect of living here. I could be much, much worse.

Over the weekend I headed back to the Rhodope Mountains to visit my "family." My host sister had her birthday on Sunday, but even though she wasn't there (she was at the beach with her uncle), they still wanted to have a party. I left for Plovidv on Friday morning by train. It's a 3 and 1/2 hour direct ride. I spent the day bumming around the city. I managed to find a replacement camera for the digital I lost (so be on the lookout for photos with these emails) and I saw War of the Worlds in the theater nears Ivan's apartment...don't ask me how I found it again, but I must be getting better with directions. In the evening I took a bus to Krichim, and Maegan and Andy were "home" too. Everyone was glad to see us, and they treated us like we had been gone forever (not just one week). On Saturday I bought the new Harry Potter book (since it is not yet translated into Bulgarian, I was the only one in the store) and hung out in Krichim. Villi, my host cousin, gave me a haircut and she says I look "Bulgarian" now...I doubt it, but several people have come up to me and started speaking Russian thinking I am Russian...

Anyway, I came back to Straljda on Sunday and finsished Harry Potter yesterday. Today I did the last of my paperwork in Yambol, and now I eagerly await Aug. 19 when I can pick up my ID card.

I am a volunteer

It's been a heck of a few weeks, which is why I have bene negligent in writing. During our last week in Krichim Ivan took us on a whirlwind of field trips and excursions (we suspect so that we'd give him really awesome final reviews.) He took us hiking to the Krichim pool and on the way home we found an awsome spot in the river to dip in. The next day he took us to Bretsigovo, a small town west of \krichim, to bum around and take our minds off of our final language tests the next day.

The day of our final LPI (Language Proficiency Interview) was one of the hottest in Bulgaria, ever. We were all really slow on the draw, but as it turned out, I was given a rating of Intermediate Mid -- the second-highest rating awarded after Pre-Service Training. Apparently only 4 people in the history of PC Bulgaria have gotten higher than that, so that's cool. After two months, I think my Bulgarian is actually better than my German, and I studied that for 4 years!

Anyway, this past week was eventful as well. On the 4th of July we were planning to have a party with our kids as a project, but the weather was really crappy so we had a 5th of July 4th of July Party. Lots of kids showed up, and we took them to the pool and played American games with them like sack races and stuff. They were really happy with it, and the gym teacher from our school came to learn some new stuff to do in class.

I must say that everone in town wished us a happy Independence Day, which I found suprising. THey all know our day, but no one outside Bulgaria knows theirs...That might also be because they have 3, but that's beside the point! (One to celebrate the beginning of kicking out the Turks, one to celebrate the final leaving of the TUrks and one to celebrate the leaving of the Soviets.)

Thursday was a pretty rough day. Our host families dropped us off in Pazardjik and we said our goodbyes, which were quite tearful. All day they made us do menial things to get ready for Friday, which was our big day. We heard the news about London in our afternoon (an hour of two after it happened) but our internet was down and we couldn't get much accurate news. Many of us have actually lived in London for periods of time, so we were all pretty upset.

THe next day, Friday, was the Swear-In day for the B-17s. They bused us to Sofia, took us to the Peace Corps compound, had the ceremony (which included reading out our names and hometowns, the American Ambassador of Bulgaria giving us the oath, and the Minister of Educatiuon in Bulgaria officially welcoming us to his employment.) Afterwards my five sitemates and Ivan bascially milled around together, not really wanting to go our separate ways. We decided that before school starts we will meet in the Rila Mountain town of Dupnitsa to hike to the Rila Monastary. Ned, one of my sitemates, will be living there, so it seemed like a good starting point. I will probably take a train to Plovdiv, meet up with Ivan and Ethan, and Ivan'll rent a car and drive us to "The Dup." I'm looking forward to it.

But after a few hours, everyone had left the compound and I was left waiting for my school director to come and pick me up. Once she came it was a 5-hour ride home to Straldja, and here I have been for the past two days, attempting to settle in.

I have some major cleaning and stuff to do in my apartment, but my town is so small there is not much shopping to be done here. TOmorrow I will travel to my nearest city, Sliven, about 45 minutes away, to get some supplies.

I know I'll be fine here. I have the language skills and the independence. Now it is simply a matter of settling in, meeting people, and getting into a routine.

I will also soon begin using either internet at my apartment or internet at the school, so my emails can be more poetic without time restrictions.