SCHOOL IS COOL

This week marked the start of school. I had not heard from anyone (my counterpart, my supervisor, or anyone else) about what in the world I was supposed to do for school. So, I just showed up on the first day half an hour early (too early actually) and learned about what the first day of school means in Georgia. Pretty much it means nothing. There were some balloons, we gave a bunch of speeches out in front, a priest blessed us, and we marched the flag around. They surprised me by handing me a microphone and telling me to say something in Georgian. I managed to get out: My name is Erica, I am from America, and I am going to be your English teacher for the next two years. But seriously, they could have given me like a few minutes to prepare. Anyway so none of the teachers even know what classes they are teaching. I have NO idea how students know where to go. But somehow people find a place to go and have about two hours of classes. I went to one class and introduced myself. All the teachers told me they were tired (I have no idea from what since we had only been there for two hours) and they said I must be tired too and I should go home. So I went home. Good times.

Later, we had this big teacher dinner where we ate massive amounts of delicious food and danced. They hired this really awesome electronic piano player who took requests. They kept requesting English favorites (probably for me) like “Hotel California,” and interestingly enough I learned that I have been singing the lyrics to that song incorrectly for years. Did you know that the song actually goes: Welcome to the Hotel California, wanna feel your face, running out of the place…. Living for love at the hotel California, it’s the wine that’s here, get it any time of year. And then there are a lot of English songs that aren’t actually composed with words, just lots of mumbling that is supposed to SOUND like English words. Like that old classic hit that goes: mush miv mee tum rock and roll music… mushikave tuu pipi pluset.

Anyway, it was probably some of the most fun I have had in Borjomi and it reminded me a bit about why I am here. I met another one of the English teachers and she is actually going to be teaching 2^nd, 3^rd, and 4^th grade English. They are just this year starting that low, they usually start English in the 5^th form. So I have the opportunity to teach the really little kids if I want. I basically get to just choose which classes I want. So for now I am observing them all. I love this other English teacher, as she has a great sense of humor, a real passion for teaching, and she is a vegetarian. Normally that wouldn’t immediately put you on my cool list. But it does here, since all the other volunteers who are vegetarians have had such a hard time explaining in this country that they don’t eat meat, and everyone thinks they are crazy Americans, but here was a Georgian taking crap for not eating meat from other Georgians. I don’t know why it seems like a good quality here, but it is. Of course, she kept telling me to try the meat because it tastes wonderful. But then she admitted she had never eaten meat in her life and had no idea what it tasted like. Anyway, point is, I hope I can work with her, but working with young kids might be really hard without much knowledge of Georgian.

My host sister went to a camp and is gone for ten days. My host brother went to Tbilisi for exams. So it is just me and the parents now. It will be good cause I will have to speak Georgian for a while.

On another note, I am totally allergic to this whole country. I don’t know what it is, but I can’t be anywhere without insane amounts of sneezing. I am only telling you all this cause I am wondering if anyone has any guesses as to what it could be. It is worse indoors (but not exclusively), it is also the worst when I wake up in the morning. I thought maybe doing a major cleaning of my room would help, but it hasn’t. Some days are worse than others. But seriously, I have not gone a single night in this country without massive amounts of snot clogging my nasal passages in the morning. Pretty huh?

Okay, well I suppose that when I have stooped so low as to tell you about my nasal excretions I am out of interesting things to tell you. If anyone is curious about anything specific here, please tell me and I can try and answer some questions.