Shkoj ne Plazh

This weekend was great. I went to the beach with my school direcotr for a day. It was a lot of fun. There is some debate here about the cleanliness of the Albanian beaches, but so far i seem to have survived. It is getting really hot here (around 96-100 degrees) and there are very few places that are cool and no public place (that I know of) in Kavaje that I can go to with an air conditioner. So the beach was great. The Adriatic doesn't really have many waves like the Atlantic, but it is much warmer so you don't freeze going in to the water. As far as I know there are no jelly fish or other stingy things. Also, they have coffee shops and restauraunts right up along the edge of the beach so if it gets to sunny you can go there to relax and have a coffee. Also, guys with donkeys come and sell fruit to you... Not making this up. It's great. If you want to come visit, let me know. I'd be happy to take you there.

Swearing In fun

This is me and the language crew swearing in... Check out the secret service agent man in the back!

Mire

So I now officially moved to my permanent site Kavaje. It is a welcome change. Although I met a lot of great people and had a lot of great experiences during Training, I was ready to be done with the training. I'm just getting settled here trying to unpack all of my bags. My stuff seems to have grown and grown. I can't explain it but my new host mom did ask me how I got all of this stuff on the plane. A lot of it is from the PC. I now have a huge water filter and a small library full of manuals. It's good to have it all, but it takes up a lot of space.

I swore in last Wednesday. It was a cool experience. There were a bunch of Albanian and American people there and it was a good ceremony. So now I'm a real volunteer not just a trainee. The swearing in came a few days after Bush's visit to Albania so it was quite a week for American/Albanian excitement.

Bush's visit was interesting. The entire day the news was devoted only to his whereabouts. They named a road in Tirane after him, there were commercials detailing his life, and everywhere you went people were talking about it (and I wasn't even in Tirane.) Also a few volunteers actually got to go and meet him which was a great experience for them. I think that it is good that he came here. It was interesting to see a visit from their perspective (a small country) being visited by the leader one of the largest countries. It was interesting.

Everyone seems to love the pictures so I will keep them coming.

Thune and Thall

this is me working on my community project. We made posters with the kids in kuqan. It was a great project. A lot of fun.
Here is the Kuqan school. Notice the cow. He was only there after their school let out. Us americans were still there. We named him the interrupting cow because everytime I tried to say anything he would Moo really loud.

This is my new host families house. Just kidding. It's an old abandoned military base we hike too sometimes.
This is my language crew in the library of the school. This is towards the end of language classes.
This is in Tirana. the capitol of Albania. They were really excited to have Bush come. i've heard that its been covered in American news. there was crazy coverage here!

Kavaje

So I'm at my site, Kavaje. It's a lot different than Kuqan. Kuqan was a tiny little town outside of a pretty big city. This is a small city. I've been slowly exploring the city. Because I have no sense of direction, I have this plan. I see things that I haven't been too before when I'm in the car and then I try to concentrate on the way there and then replicate it. So far, I've found a church, the stadium, and a hospital. So I think my method is a success. I'll be staying here for a week than heading back to Kuqan for a few weeks and then heading back here to stay for 2 years. I will be living 5 kilometers from the Adriatic Sea and it is really really nice. I live very close to the center of the city so I can walk to a park, the school, and a whole bunch of cafes from my house.
I have a new host family here and will be staying with her for a few months. I hope that it is as wonderful as my first host family experience. They were really wonderful people. The last couple of days were the counterpart conference. At the end of the conference, everyone in my language group got together and did a song and dance routine that one of our guys wrote. It was really funny. As most of you know, I can't sing or dance so it was a funny experience. I think that there are videos that exist, but I don't intend on ever watching it because I'm sure I'd be embarrassed.
I've been to the school to observe lessons and the students are really great. My counterpart and I are beginning to work on my plan for the summer. I will probably teach a few courses which will be nice practice for me and hopefully help some of the students who are in the middle of the pack. It's a lot different at my site because I'm the only volunteer. It's still a bit nerve wracking to walk into the Post Office and attempt to get something accomplished, but I've been lucky and have somehow been able to communicate. Although sometimes, I wished I had prepped myself by looking up a few key phrases. Like when I went to the post office and forgot how to say send. It's a simple word, but its important at the post office.