PCPP and other updates

Returned to site to some great news: 

PCPP project ‘Camp Forest Kingdom’ has been fully financed! 

Giant THANK YOU!!! to everyone who donated or thought good thoughts about donating! 

I’m also feeling good about my English and fitness classes. I'm still teaching beginner and advanced English groups for 90 minutes twice a week when I'm at site. Attendance is lower--summer is really nice here--but those coming are dedicated to learning. The beginner group asked for more homework and independent study to work on together between lessons. 

The fitness group, despite being relatively new, has some serious adherents. It quickly morphed from a pilates class to a more general fitness class, to include some cardio kickboxing and yoga as well. While I was on vacation, the ladies took turns leading the group with the notes and music I left behind. On Monday, they were ready for a new routine and psyched about their progress. They also told me we'd be meeting three days a week from here out! 

On a personal note, I was able to walk all over Italy with few ankle problems. The first two days in Rome I wore flip flops, this was not a good idea. But after I bought a pair of sneakers, everything was fine. Today, I went for my first run in six weeks. It was slow and short, but didn’t hurt. Success for Athens in November is still looking good. 

Божe, so much to do!

Returning to site feeling slightly overwhelmed with the amount of work that lay ahead. WiFi in Italy was never free and it was nice to have a break from the technology grip for a while. But my to do list now is pretty daunting. With Peace Corps mid-service conference next week, volunteer assistance at summer camps coming up, regular commitments at site, a tourism project, and the need for prep on grad school applications looming, it seems inevitable that the next few months will fly by in a flurry of sweaty train rides, laundry days, and desk time. 

Italia!

Spent the last week and a half on a whirlwind Italy tour with friends. More to come soon-ish. 


Summary: Sights were amazing, wine was excellent, people were beautiful, weather was perfect. 

Congrats to B27s!

The Peace Corps trainees took their official oath on June 10th, becoming to 27th group of Peace Corps Volunteers to serve in Bulgaria! 

Браво на тях!

Kiril and Emi with the three generations of PCVs they hosted.

Host families, current volunteers, and PC staff attended the swearing in ceremony for the 38 volunteers in the Vratsa Municipal building. It was much more enjoyable as an observer; at last year’s ceremony, the July heat, my nervousness towards going to site, and the goodbyes, made it seem like a sweaty, stressful blur.

Darik News Article

The night before the ceremony, I arrived in Kravoder (my host village) with Neysa and Charity. Volunteers from the group before me were also in the village, seeing their host families one last time before returning to the U.S. in a few weeks. This was the third year Kravoder served as a training village, and all three volunteers from my host family were present, as were host family friends and other volunteers. It was a great evening. Emi, my host mom, recently returned from abroad and it was the first time I’d seen her since Christmas. 

After the ceremony, I spent some time with other volunteers, purchased bomba fake raybans for about $7 USD, and had coffee with my host family aunt and uncle in Vratsa.

Pilates/Пилатес

Today I held my first pilates class for women and girls. I was super worried, of course, but it turned out wonderfully. I knew pretty much everyone that showed up and, although I'd practiced all the verbs ahead of time (I don't use "stretch, tighten, еtc. in their plural imperative forms real often...), I was also able to demonstrate and say "okay, like this." This is sooo much easier than explaining grammar or trying to come up with answers to questions like: how do you pronounce "the?" Does it rhyme with 'tea' or 'duh?'

Ever since I arrived at site, having a gym or fitness center for women has been brought up in conversations. Although this isn't quite the same as that, the school has a multi purpose room that is the perfect size for classes, and pilates, yoga, and kickboxing are pretty easy for me to teach. I've been wanting to have a women's fitness group for a while, but hadn't felt comfortable enough to start one until now. I'm glad I did, after class they asked about when we could meet again! We decided, from now on, Chiprovtsi will have a ladies fitness group every Monday and Thursday evening.

Mushroom Hunting

Hizha Yavor

This weekend I went with my friend to Hizha Yavor (Yavor means Sycamore in English). Her family is redoing the mountain ‘hut,’ which has been left unused for the last 10 or so years.  It was built in 1975 with a bar, two floors of sleeping rooms, eating area, bathrooms, kitchens, etc. And, Hizha Yavor has a great location—only a 15 minute walk from Gushovski Monastery, on the way to the Chiprovtsi Waterfall, accessible by two dirt roads, 6 km on foot from the Three Chuki (border peaks).

My friend, her husband, and her father worked all day- replacing glass, cleaning, hooking up water, etc. There is a lot left to do-someone has torn out all the wiring and the interior paint has some damage, but it’s very easy to imagine it functioning similar to the Hizha in Belasitsa. After they finished working for the day, J and I went in search of mushrooms. We spent a good 90 minutes wandering the forest, but only found one edible mushroom, a Manatarka (Boletus).

Comparing the boletus (in J.'s hand) with a non-edible mushroom.

We returned to the hizha, played some ping-pong, and hiked down to the car. On the way down, her husband briefly walked to the edge of the forest returning with a small bags worth of Boletus and Chanterelles. It’s unfortunate that I am such a bad mushroom hunter, but I am very happy to have friends that share. They tasted fantastic.

Boletus and Chanterelles

Kestini Magic

A few weeks ago I hurt my ankle while running. One of my friend’s mothers made this for me to spray on it and accelerate the healing. It’s made from the chestnut tree (kestini in Bulgarian), rakia, and I’m not sure what else. It smells good though and when I googled chestnuts/traditional medicine I found that they are used for a variety of things including increasing blood flow and decreasing swelling. They’re also used for enlarged prostates and hemorrhoids, but these aren’t relevant to me. 

Tourism Website

This is something I've been working on when I have extra time. It still needs more work and to be translated into Bulgarian. I have zero experience with webdesign and would love feedback/advice.

Visit Chiprovtsi