The Road is Life: updates!

It's getting colder here already. Last year it stayed pretty mild up until December, so I'm hoping this year is no different, but it quickly went from scorching hot to sweats and sweater weather in only a few weeks. So besides breaking out my sleeping bag, here are few random updates from the past few weeks.

*Me and my two students made it successfully to the school for the second round of testing, not without frustrations though. I had told some people that night that I needed a taxi for the next day or some way to get to Telavi by 10am, and said that the public marshrutka would not get us there in time. They promised we'd figure it out the next morning, but after being late still said we should take the marshrutka, because they knew a taxi would be expensive (and since it was Georgia they could be late for the test and it would be fine). After some insisting on my part, including that I didn't care how much it cost, I would pay, and that we did indeed need to be there on time, we finally got another teacher to spend his day driving us there if I paid for gas since it was too late to call a taxi. We got there 15 minutes late after zooming there at about 100mph, and they were allowed to take the test anyways, but it was a frustrating day for me, knowing that had I not been there to put my foot down, the combination of prohibitive costs and misperceptions from the adults in my community could have squandered away a great opportunity for these girls. We find out in November though if they made it to the next round.

*I'm slowly getting my English room together. When it's finally done I'll do a big post on what we did and plan to do with it, but for now its just a slow process now that school is in session and my counterparts schedules don't mesh well with mine

*My host sister knows that I am afraid of birds. She thinks its funny because she loves them (we have one that luckily my host grandmother forbids her to let out loose flying around for my sake). One afternoon I was reading in the living room, and look over to see a chicken next to me. I tell my host sister and hope that she will quickly shoo it out like a normal adult would, but I forget that she is 7 years old and not an adult. I realized my mistake when she suddenly squealed in delight at the prospect of the situation. I can completely picture her thinking "ooo, there is a bird next to Kelsey, she doesn't like birds, this might be fun!" so she hurried over and jumped down on the chicken to tackle it, resulting in it trying to fly away and a bunch of gobble cluck gobbles. I usually like to keep my cool, but a panicking chicken running away (and thus towards me) is not a good thing for me so I started yelling and jumping up onto higher furniture. She finally grabbed it, and flung it outside, but then squealed at the thought of telling others, so she ran off to tell the neighbors about my reaction. Yes, I did hear about it the next day at school, too.

*This Saturday I was all excited to do absolutely nothing. But then my director called and started off with the question "Kelsey, are you in the village?" I should know by now that the answer to this question is always "NO" because by saying yes you are basically agreeing to do whatever they are calling you to do. well, for some reason I said yes. "oh good, there is a wedding, we'll pick you up in half an hour" Damnit, there goes my day, but to save myself from a very long supra I said I had a phone interview with a university (yes...on a Saturday) which was a white lie because I really did have to call a friend that night. Anyways. The ceremony itself was interesting. We drove to a nearby town and the bride, groom, and one friend each stood in front of the church (parents and family generally didn't come, they are back home making food) and they do a lot of chanting, incense, and a few gestures, like wearing crowns. At one point the priest ties their hands together, and their attendants hold the crowns above their heads as they all walk around the podium together (and all four are holding candles too). I wish I had taken pictures because it looked a bit tricky, but you'll just have to take my word for it. Ceremony over, the caravan of cars drove at high speeds back to the village honking their horns, where almost 100 people had amassed for the supra. I didn't stay long cuz I had my "interview" and I was surprised that they actually got me home in time for it. Though whether they got me home in time sober for my "very important interview" is another story. Apparently they thought wine would make it go better for me.

* I spent the past week in Tbilisi, in for mid-service medical exams (yikes! ...I only have 8 months left!!!) and for some meetings with organizations to get next year's GLOW camp started. The meetings were all really encouraging, and hopefully we can make next year even better than last. It was a good week filled with tasty food and daily showers, plus some weekend excitement. Sarkozy was in town for a speech so on Friday the whole center was full of crowds. My friend and I had meant to go for a walk since it was such beautiful weather, but we ended up stuck in the crowds, and literally stuck on the metro squished in with hundreds of other people. Then Saturday was Tbilisoba, a yearly festival in honor of Tbilisi (just add -oba to the end of things....like my birthday could be Kelsey-oba). I met up with my director's daughter and we walked around, and found our inner 5 year olds and got our faces painted. A nice week overall!