Back in Action

Fret not, my dear and loyal friends!

Contrary to popular belief, I have not fallen into a bottomless Bulgarian pit, thus disappearing from the blogging universe forevermore. Nay! Instead I have spent the past month taking a course in Sofia. Specifically, I was in the process of obtaining the Cambridge Certificate in English Language Teaching to Adults (CELTA) at AVO-3 in Sofia. As you will ascertain, due to this and other circumstances, there was not much time to be had for typing up self-indulgent (but delightful?) blog entries.

But now that I find myself once again with that elusive but much desired concept known as “free time”, I hereby present you with an informative update categorized with the aid of popular movie titles! (Exciting, yes?)

Back to School

If only I hadn’t left my camera in the back of a taxi, I’d be able to take pictures without having to borrow Ryan’s far less superior model.

Let’s evaluate this sentence, shall we? What tense is it? How about the form? Can you identify the subject, verb and object? What type of conditional clause would you say it is? And, most importantly, which camera would YOU say is better… the Canon PowerShot SD700 …. or the Casio Exilim EX Z60? Discuss, please.

Yeaaaahhh… So let me first make a confession. Up until recently I thought I knew how to speak, read and write English pretty well. Ryan teases me about being the grammar police, but the truth is I really do sometimes feel like I should have some sort of honorary badge or something because when people write things like “your funny” or “The dog ate it’s breakfast” I have to struggle not to launch into detailed descriptions of the proper use of contractions and possessives. I mean, I know I’m not, like, Hemingway or Shakespeare or Dr. Seuss or anything. I like big words, long sentences, too many commas and tend to overuse fragments to convey certain points. I’ve even been known to accidentally use “too” instead of “to” from time to time. But on the whole, I felt I had the English language pretty well under control.

To my eternal dismay, the CELTA class proved me wrong. I do not wish to bore you with the details, mostly because reliving the experience triggers my gag reflex, but I learned that those of us who use English as our native language really have no clue about all the nuances of our mother tongue. Considering I had previously thought we only had 3 tenses (past, present and future), discovering that with all of the forms we actually have closer to 12 or 15 came as a bit of a shock. It was quite humbling, actually. One of my roommates, Marina, is from Macedonia and fluently speaks a number of languages (including English). I would ask something like “So this future continuous, right?” And she would smile and gently tell me “No. That is present perfect.” As it turns out the individuals who learn English as a second language actually learn it better than those of us who learn it as a first language and much to our chagrin many of the students we taught knew grammar better than we did. This is probably not funny to you, but I assure you it is. Mostly because I envisioned myself completely at a loss, standing in front of a class saying “Um. This is a sentence. Here is the verb. And the object is here somewhere…. uhhh… okay, class dismissed! For homework write me an essay on the merits of, ummm… cheese! Yes! Tell me all about cheese!”

But I prefer not to dwell on that too much.

Anyway, we had class Monday – Friday from 9 AM – 6 PM, complete with detailed lessons on how to be an effective teacher. Additionally, we engaged in 6 hours of teaching practice and the subsequent oh-so-lovely feedback sessions where we got to hear what we did right… as well as just how badly we sucked. Because we also had to develop detailed lesson plans for the classes we taught, write thorough descriptions of 6 hours of observed lessons and come up with 4 papers on various assigned topics, there was limited time for anything but living, breathing and sleeping CELTA and gorging myself nightly on bread and picked vegetables because there had been no time to eat earlier in the day.

However, to my good fortune the people with whom I was taking the course were very supportive, enthusiastic and fun. (There was one notable exception, but I won’t go into that too much here. Let’s just say that if upon facing constructive criticism you feel the urge to disagree vehemently with the instructor, then spend the next month alternately pouting, complaining exclusively about how you're being singled out, accusing your fellow students of not supporting you and saying derogatory things about the size of the said instructor’s manhood, this class is probably not for you.)

So it was challenging… but it is also thankfully complete and the good news is we all passed and are now certified (if not entirely qualified) teachers of English!

The bad news is… I really did leave my camera (the completely awesome Canon PowerShot) in the back of a taxi and therefore, until my new one arrives, must battle Ryan for the use of his Casio. (Just kidding about the "far less superior" comment, baby! But I still maintain I am the better photographer!)

Nurse Betty

About a week or so after I got here, I came down with bronchitis. This is not unusual for me. For some reason my body tends to avoid most other illnesses such as the Bird Flu, Ebola and Sleeping Sickness pretty well… but seems to simply love bronchitis and embraces it wholeheartedly several times a year. To top it off, this time I also managed to catch the flu my first weekend in Sofia and spent two whole days in bed. Ryan was great and hung out around my apartment all Saturday and part of Sunday helping take care of me until I sent him off Sunday night to have dinner with friends and watch his beloved Bears play in (and sadly lose) the Super Bowl.

Anyway, as the flu tends to do, it went away very quickly, but the bronchitis kept getting worse and worse until I had to be forcibly urged to enter the mildly alarming world of Bulgarian Medical Care. Luckily the instructors at AVO-3 were fabulous and one of them went with me to serve as translator and, if necessary, hand-holder. Approximately 12 prescriptions, 7 doctors’ visits, 400 leva, 1 traumatic chest X-ray and a partridge in a pear tree later, I was told I had borderline pneumonia and needed to have a shunt installed in my arm so I could have daily injections of heavy antibiotics and cough suppressant administered directly into my vein.

Super!

This was not absolutely the most fabulous experience of my life, but luckily I paid for a nurse to come directly to the school so I didn’t have to spend a few hours a day at the doctor’s office, thus jeopardizing my standing in the class and forfeiting the money, time and energy I had put into the CELTA. And I tried to have fun with it! Even when the nurse had to move the shunt from one arm to the other because the first was really bruised and her (ungloved) hands were shaking so hard she couldn’t find my vein and wound up spilling my blood all over the table, I tried to view the experience with a bright spirit and a good natured sense of humor. (Ryan was there for this instance and he felt so bad for me it earned me a tasty meal at a local Chinese restaurant so dare I say it was worth it?).

At any rate, the shunt has since been removed from my arm, the drugs worked their magic and I am now feeling much better and moderately more confident in my ability to obtain quality medical care here. Huzzah!

A Clockwork Orange

You’ve heard about my driving, yes? Or perhaps you have ridden with me and are personally aware of my propensity towards speed, lots of cursing and heavy horn usage.

Have you also seen the movie A Clockwork Orange? This charming flick, brought to us by Stanley Kubrick, is about a seriously disturbed man who favors classical music, violence and rape. During a robbery (that also winds up being a murder) he is summarily caught and essentially forced into submitting to aversion therapy. He is drugged and his eyes are held open with clips while he is subjected to images of extreme and graphic violence set to Beethoven. Needless to say after this treatment he is unable to engage in any form of aggression (including self-defense) or, for that matter, acts with naked women. There is a lot more to the story, but that’s all you need to know for now.

Bulgaria’s roads are my Clockwork Orange. Every day. Cars speeding through red lights. People leaning heavily on their horns. Dogs, cats and pedestrians nearly getting run over. The sounds of gunning engines, the screech of brakes and, often, metal crunching against metal. I offer now to everyone who has ever ridden with me or come into contact with my driving in any way, shape or form a heartfelt apology because... boy do you deserve it!

You will be happy to learn that when I come home I fully suspect I will be virtually incapable of the following activities: speeding, using my horn, aggressively passing other vehicles, swearing at the driver in front of me, swearing at the driver behind me, swearing at the red light, swearing at animals that cause me to slam on my brakes, etc., etc., etc.

Aversion therapy worked for me.

Love Actually (or Planes, Trains and Automobiles)

Ryan wound up having business to take care of at the Peace Corps office the day after Valentine’s Day, so we were able to celebrate the holiday together. However, we vastly underestimated the all encompassing power of the Hallmark Corporation because evidently in recent years February 14 has become quite a popular day here in Bulgaria. When Ryan tried to get reservations a few days ahead of time, his coworker looked at him like “Uh, smoke crack much?” and advised him we were out of luck. Still, he persisted, but after a few phone calls it was revealed that the coworker was right. The entire population of Bulgaria (except us) would be dining out that evening.

Initially nonplussed, we solved the problem by getting take-away from the Taj Mahal, a fabulous Indian restaurant just up the road from my apartment in Sofia and cuddled on the couch watching movies. It was a most special Valentine’s Day after all.

We’ve also gotten to do a bit more traveling. Last Saturday the staff at AVO-3 arranged a field trip for the CELTA students to the Rila Monastery and Melnik as well as the St. Petka Church and Baba Vanga’s house in Rupite.

The Rila Monastery is located in none other than the Rila Mountains and is, as you’ll see, simply breathtaking. My fellow students, Ryan and I enjoyed wandering around the courtyards, taking pictures and dining on mekitsi (sort of a hot fried donut reminiscent of funnel cake).

Melnik, on the other hand, is the smallest town in Bulgaria boasting about 200 – 300 people, steep, winding roads, sandstone cliffs and lots and lots of wine. We had lunch in a typical Bulgarian Mehana, drank vino that was a little too grapey for our tastes, but on the whole not bad, and toured a really cool winery complete with barrels and caves (but not the bats I had been told we might see). We also got to hang our martenitsa on a blossoming tree in a courtyard overlooking the town. (Martenitsa are red and white yarn bracelets handed out on the 1st of March to celebrate the coming of spring. Ryan's blog offers a much better description here: www.ryaninbulgaria.wordpress.com)

As far as баба Ванга (Baba Vanga) is concerned, she was a woman apparently blessed with the ability to foretell the future, heal people using herbs and travel places around the world using only her mind. Whether or not they agree with the true nature of her alleged gifts, most people seem to revere her and although she died in 1996, Rupite is still a much visited place in Bulgaria featuring a church, Baba Vanga’s house and hot springs.

On Wednesday I also traveled to Plovdiv to meet up with Ryan. I really got a kick out of this city as you can find anything from Prada handbags to awesome pizza to ancient amphitheaters to roadside artists there. I loved it and I can’t wait to go back.

Despite all the fun we’re having, I’m not gonna lie; living 3 hours away from Ryan (as I did during the CELTA and probably will for the next year and a half) is not exactly easy. But it sure beats living 5,000 miles away! At the risk of sounding cheesy, I feel so lucky to be here with him. Challenges notwithstanding, we are really enjoying being here in Bulgaria together and are having fun living in the moment… as well as planning “what happens next” after Ryan finishes with the Peace Corps. Now, no firm decisions have been made, but the consensus seems to be that some time in the States is definitely in order! Our future home may be in Orlando, Florida… perhaps San Diego, California… or possibly Macomb, Illinois… who knows?

So friends and family please plan to come and visit us here before this limited time offer expires!

Employee of the Month

Wow, this is getting long and if I include details on my impending employment here in Bulgaria, I fear your eyes may begin to bleed from the tedium of reading so much in one afternoon. I will save this for later… but offer you a bit of a teaser.

I went to Thessaloniki, Greece on Monday and Tuesday to get started on my D-visa. While I will have to return one more time to pick up the necessary documents, I don’t have to leave Bulgaria long term and should soon be an upstanding (and employed) member of society. So tune in tomorrow (or maybe the next day) for more details!