And the Heat Goes On...

Today, the youth development volunteers went to Plovdiv for the day, to visit a Youth Center that teaches social skills to youngsters and the Bulgarian equivalent of an orphanage. It was really inspiring to see the programs that are happening, and at the same time, sad to think about the multitude of abandoned/homeless kids in Bulgaria that have no permanent place to call 'home'. One of the speakers at the Youth Center talked about the importance of working with small projects that have a deep impact rather than trying to work on everything all at once. When you affect the lives of even 2 or 3 kids, those kids can go on to affect the lives of 4 or 5 friends, who will influence their friends, and so on. It's part of the strategy of all grass roots movements, including Peace Corps, and, if you think about the influence PC has had in the lives of multitudes of people all over the world, it seems like (at least in some cases) it works pretty well! It's like 'chunking' in math...breaking down a problem into small steps to make it more workable.

It was also an incredibly hot day for September. It seems like heat is intensified in bigger cities...the pavement, the multitude of people, the cars, the sunshine...all of these things seem to contribute to the heat factor. Rhonda (my fellow youth development volunteer in Krichim) and I walked around after the visits and saw the historic amphitheater and visited the City Gallery of Fine Arts (partially because of the beautiful art and partially because it was air-conditioned ;P ) It was, overall, an inspiring, culturally filling day.

Last weekend, I visited family in Sofia. Grampa came to pick me up at the bus station, as he would not allow some taxi driver to abduct and rob me. Thank you, Grampa! Grandma invited the whole family herd and we talked and ate and looked at each other and had a wonderful time. I had brought some pipe cleaners and Aunt Anni and I made pipe cleaner angels. On Sunday, Aunt Mara took me to see the apartments that my dad had laboriously worked on over the past few years. It was so neat to see the fruits of his work, after hearing bits and pieces about floors, tiles, paint, etc. You've done an amazing job, dad! It was wonderful to talk to Aunt Mara more, as we didn't really know each other that well. Among other things, we talked about the power of positive thinking and the importance of medicine/doctors looking at the whole person, rather than isolated 'body parts'. It was just like being in Boulder again...positive thinking, holistic medicine :) A bonus of the trip was that my childhood friend, Daniela, was free on Saturday, and we got to catch up a little bit about what we'd missed in each other's lives over the past five years. Although we've led very different lives, it was really interesting to realize that we've come to be interested in similar things...she's really curious about psychology and meditation and yoga and, well, living in Boulder was very much about psychology, meditation, and yoga ;P We're hoping to meet up in Plovdiv sometime soon when she has a free weekend.

To come...we find out our permanent sites on Monday, so there's a nervous buzz going around our whole BG-18 community. It's a pretty big deal to find out where you'll be living, breathing, eating, sleeping, stepping (there's a lot of poop to step on in Krichim :) ), laughing, peeing, etc. for the next two years. Speaking of peeing... luckily no one has peed their pants yet, although i have to admit, a few people have come pretty close. Considering that this information is completely inappropriate for a blog, the author takes the initiative to censor herself and stop here.

Next blog, there'll be more about the wonderful characters in Krichim...