And my new site is......

So much has happened in the past week that I don’t even know where to begin!  Last week I found out that my placement is in the Tavush Region and my village is in the north by Georgia and Azerbaijan.  At first I was a bit bummed to be sooo far north, by after meeting my supervisor and visiting my town and I excited to move to my permanent site.  My supervisor is my new school’s principal.  He seems pretty chill and drove me and another volunteer to our new sites.  It took about 3 hours by car or taxi to get to my site, but it will take longer when I have to use a marshrutni.   We went straight to the school, which will be my workplace for the next two years.  It is an old, 3 story building in dire need of repairs.  Surprising it has a computer lab so hopefully I will be able to integrate technology into my lessons.  I also met my counterpart, a 60 year old women who has been teaching English at the school for over 30 years.  I’m intimidated, but hopefully she is excited to have me in the school.  I will be team teaching with the 4 English teachers in the school.  I hope to form several after school English clubs and tutor at a nearby art school.  My village hasn’t had a volunteer in 10 years so I am excited about the potential projects I can do!

My new host family is very nice.  My mother is a nurse, my father is an engineer and my brother just returned from the military.  They have a big house with a wraparound balcony that overlooks the entire village.  It would be perfect except for the bathroom and shower situation.  In the backyard I have an outhouse which is basically a very, very small hole in the ground.  The washroom is separate from the house and is the only room to get running water (even the kitchen doesn’t have running water…) My family pays for water to come to the house at 5 pm every day.  To shower you have to heat the water in a medieval looking wood stove and then use a bucket as a shower head.  I was never home at 5 pm and when I got home it was pitch black outside so I went without a shower for the past 4 days.  Good to know that during winter I can survive for quite a few days without a shower, but oh goodness how my hygiene standards have already decreased.  My new bedroom is similar to my current bedroom: 1 twin bed that is too short for me, 1 desk, 1 chair and 1 dresser.  We have fruit trees in our backyard that should be ripe when I come back in August.

The battery on my camera was dead so I don’t have any pictures of Tavush.  No worries though, I will have the next two years to post as many pictures as you want J My counterpart took me to a khorovats in the forest for her grandson’s birthday.  We were there for 10 hours and I actually had a great time doing absolutely nothing.  That night it was host brother’s birthday and 20 relatives had dinner at our house.  Highlight of the evening: My host brother never even showed up to his own birthday dinner! I was forced to sing happy birthday in English while my host brother turned 21 at a café (and turning 21 is not a big deal here in Armenia).  I’m excited to live with them for two months while I get to know my village, but in October I know I will be ready to move out into my own house.  The next day a few current volunteers who live in a town close by came to visit my site.  They are all so nice and I am thankful to have other volunteers who live a short taxi ride away from my village.

By the way did I mention how I haven’t had a door to my current bedroom for the past 2 weeks?  One day my host father asked to take down my door to paint it.  They said it would only take one day so I said yes.  Little did I know that they took off every door in the house and sent them to another city to have the design on the window glass replaced.  I’ve had a clear curtain hanging from my door frame for the past week.  I came back from my site visiting expecting a new door, but unfortunately even my curtain was missing.  They say I will have my door back tomorrow so we shall see.  On the upside, while I was gone they put a screen in my window! Window screens are rare in Armenia and I am so thankful they surprised me with a brand new screen.  This way when it is 90 degrees at night I can leave my window open without a thousand flies buzzing around. 

Sorry for such a long post, I will try to post more often instead!