A blog of spokoistvie

(A blog of relaxation)
Things are back to normal in Bulgaria...Well, as normal as they get here. The intense cold has loosened its grip, school is back in session, and I have again lost motivation to cook much beyond a boiled egg and PBJ sandwich. Oh wait, tonight I am making some noodles which I plan to shred some kashkaval over...Yummmm.

Anyway, eating aside, I spent my mini-vacation thusly (can that be an adverb?...): HIBERNATING. That's right, I stayed in my apartment from Monday afternoon to Thursday morning leaving only for a few hours Tuesday for my Bulgarian lesson. It was everything I thought it could be. I watched DVDs, glanced through Bulgarian work (which is not something I end up doing usually), played with the kitten, and generally enjoyed a more spokoino existance.

On Thursday, when the wind decided to stop gusting at 80 mph, I decided to end my hibernation with a trip to Yambol (which basically means eating pizza and existing in a more commercially-driven place.) My big purchase: a huge bag of kitty litter. Now that's exciting.

Friday morning I took the 3:45 a.m. bus to Sofia (yes, I am that crazy) and tried to keep warm all day by buying books (well, the bookSTORES were warm...) and stopping every hour or so for coffee or food. In the afternoon I headed up to the Peace Corps office to make sure it was still there and had a fun chat with my volunteer "sister" Vassi (the second volunteer to live with my host family). Ah, English. How I love thee.

Once the evening came around I took a cab to a residential part of Sofia to visit Monica Farling, a girl from Dover who is now working as a missionary in Sofia. Her apartment, in all honesty, is like a little America, complete with things like a CLOTHES DRYER, a DISHWASHER, the miracles of CENTRAL HOT WATER and CENTRAL HEATING, a BATHTUB with a SHOWER CURTAIN and even a guest bed that includes a MATTRESS and BOXSRPINGS and a HEADBOARD and DOWN PILLOWS. Ahhh.

We went out with Ivcho, a friend of my Aunt Kay's who spends his summers in the states. He took us to get some pizza then to see "Munich" in the biggest movie complex EVER. It put anything I've ever seen in the states to shame. We got home at 1:30 a.m., so you can imagine how exhausted I was (remember, I caught the 3:45 a.m. bus!)

Saturday I got to spend an hour and some change in a car! Ivcho drove me to Etropole, a town near Sofia which is the home to Lucia Chan -- a volunteer friend. We celebrated Chinese New Years with a few other volunteers, which basically included lots of food, lots of comedy DVDs, and the formation of a new kind of joke -- the "Dr. Robert Joke." (For those not-in-the-know, he is a Bulgarian doctor on the PC staff who is kind but somewhat straightlaced and we enjoy trying to confuse him with jokes or make him blush...)

Anywhoo...On Sunday I make the cross-country trek home way exhausted and way poorer...I feel a month on the poverty plan coming on. By now the weather has warmed up to close to 0 C, so life is back on track. I have this week in school, then next week I have yet ANOTHER week away at a PC conference/training thing in Stara Zagora. Sweeeet.