Church/The Giraffe living in VT/ Peace

Ohh Sunday Morning! I always loved going to church on Sunday Morning. There is something about a Sunday that has always been an important day of worship for me. I feel rejuvenated alive! Awakened in my faith! Today I went to church for the first time in Bulgaria. Well actually not the first time but it was the first time I went to a church that wasn’t a Bulgaria Orthodox church. The church was something I found through a Peace Corps Bulgarian staff person who attends a Pentecostal Church in Sofia. Most Bulgarians claim to be Orthodox but they really don’t practice the religion or recognize God at all with the exception of holidays like “Poct” (fasting 40 days before Christmas), Christmas, Easter, and various other name days. People in Bulgaria are not very religious and in many cases they are almost atheist. It all has to do will Communism and religious practices being banned yada, yada, yada.

I truly felt the presence of God in that Church this morning. I could not understand the meaning of every word we sang but I knew that the words were powerful! I closed my eyes and sang my heart out. I had a huge sense of relief and peace. I felt at home! We sang another song in Bulgarian that I actually know in English called “Here I am to worship”. It was interesting singing this song in Bulgarian. I really needed to go to church this morning considering all the things I had been through in the last few days.

The past few days have been really difficult. This Friday I went to hang out with my director’s daughter for Student’s day at a café. On the way home we were followed by three or four teenagers that kept calling me “niggarka” (if you look at the word you will understand what it means). I am not sure if this is a derogatory term or not but I was offended. Bulgarians keep assuring me that its not derogatory but it sounds too much like the American word. After we left that situation not five minutes later another group of young people said “Tam e niggarka” (There is a niggarka).

I felt really exposed especially after the woman that touched me last week on my way to work (I talked about this in an earlier post. I decided to chalk it up to another day in life of a Peace Corps volunteer. However, yesterday on my way to the market the guys working construction yelled comments about me being black as well. Than on the way home from the Market (I decided to take a different route) some random man stopped me on the streets and asked me random questions. Needless to say, the conversation ended with a proposal of marriage.

I began to feel like a giraffe walking down the street that everyone stared at because I am so different. I didn’t think I would stand out so much in Veliko Turnovo because there are many tourist but apparently not African ones.

While I was in church one of the ladies that was sitting next to me asked me how I was doing in Bulgaria. I told her sometimes good other times bad. She gave me some words of encouragement After her comments I knew that everything was going to be OK.


Sitting in Church and trying not to be the giraffe in VT (or at least adjust to people staring),

Crystal

Cool Blog Thingys

I am at work now... its friday. I kinda dont want to work. I have had a extremely busy week planning for a fundraising event on 19th December. Two people left work early I should have left with them but I couldnt figure out what I would do at home before my language lesson at 5pm. So, I decided to stay and take random Myspace surveys online. heheheh its fun. The results are below. I just realized that this is my first weekend in Bulgaria where I havent been extremely busy!!!! YES, YES, YES, YES finally a break. Anyhow, back to the surveys.....

You Are Ruby Red

You are warm and inviting - yet a little wild and outrageous. Well aware that you have a dual personality, you work it as much as you can! You like for people to be comfortable around you, but not at the expense of you stealing the limelight. Popular and well known, you make friends easily. You have your big personality to thank for that.

What Color Red Are You?

You Are 58% Open

You are a fairly open person, but you also like to maintain your privacy. You definitely will tell all (okay, almost all) to your closest friends... But strangers and acquaintances only get a peek into your life.

How Open Are You?

You Are a Drama Princess (or Prince)

You're not over the top dramatic, but you have your moments. You know how to steal the spotlight... And how to act out to get your way. People around you know that you're good for a laugh. But at times, your drama gets a bit too much for everyone. Tone it down a tad, and you'll still be the center of attention.

Are You a Drama Queen (or King)?

Your Taste in Music:

90's R&B: Highest Influence Adult Alternative: High Influence Hip Hop: High Influence R&B: Medium Influence 80's Pop: Low Influence

How's Your Taste in Music?

You Are 16% Nerdy

You are definitely not nerdy - in fact, you probably don't know any nerds. You probably care a little too much about your image. No one will know if you secretly watch Star Trek reruns!

How Nerdy Are You?

You Should Learn Swedish

Fantastisk! You're laid back about learning a language - and about life in general. Peaceful, beautiful Sweden is ideal for you... And you won't even have to speak perfect Swedish to get around!

What Language Should You Learn?

You Are a Auditory Learner

You tend to remember what you hear, and you have a knack for speaking well. You excel at debating, foreign languages, and music. You would be an excellent diplomat - or rock star!

What's Your Learning Style?

this was really fun!

Of Course I know how to Catch a Train in Bulgaria!

Remember how I said I was going to go to some other volunteer’s house with my site mate? And how I cooked a ton of food because I just got a new stove? Well we did go to our friend’s town for Thanksgiving, but it took us a while to get there.

My site mate and I were really excited to celebrate Thanksgiving in Bulgaria with PCV friends. I didn’t realize how much Thanksgiving meant to me until I got to Bulgaria. It’s a time for the family and friends. Anyhow, my site mate and I left work early at about 4:30ish to go home to get the Thanksgiving food and catch the 5:20ish train to our friend’s house. Everything worked exactly as we planned it. I had all the food wrapped in proper containers safe and secure. Even the street dog that tried to sniff/eat my pride and glory couldn’t dampen my happiness. We paid the fair for the train secured our place on the train and waited patiently for it to take us to our destination.

We were both extremely tired and dozed in and out of sleep for the hour ride. I finally looked up and asked my friend “Do you know were we get off?”. Her answer was that, “Of course she didn’t because she had never been to the town before”. I started to get a little panicky because I had been to the town the weekend before but couldn’t remember exactly what the station looked like. If you know anything about trains in Bulgaria you will know that the names of the various stops are not always clearly displayed. There isn’t a loud obnoxious voice over the intercom, like in Chicago, announcing the stops. There isn’t even the little indicator thingy like in New York City or Philly, which shows you were you are on your trip. To top it off it was extremely dark outside and we couldn’t see anything but the shadows of the trees.

I looked at my watch and saw we had about 15 minutes left to travel to our destination. I wasn’t panicky anymore because I knew the trip was exactly an hour and we defiantly didn’t miss our stop. I set my alarm and we both went back to sleep. I woke up about five minutes before my alarm went off and SMSed my friends (the one we were going to visit) to say we would be their in about 10 minutes. At that very moment that train stopped to let people out. I asked a Bulgarian girl nearby us if this stop was the town I needed. She said “Da” (yes in Bulgarian) and we jumped out of our sets grabbed our bags of food and headed towards to doors.

My friend made it off the train a couple seconds before me, but as I started to get walk towards the doors, the train started to move!!!! She quickly grabbed the food (Yeah I know save the food let me die) and told me to jump. Being the superwoman that I am, I jumped without difficulty. As I landed on the ground I heard voices yelling from the train in Bulgarian. I had no idea what they were saying and decided to ignore them. Once I got my bearings, my friend and I turned and waved bye to the people on the train, but they continued to yell. We had no clue what they were talking about so we just ignored them and a couple seconds later the train was gone.

I turned around and noticed right away that something was wrong. The entire train station was dark and deserted and it did not look like the station from the weekend before. I said to my site mate, “uhmm, this isn’t our stop. I have no idea were we are”. We both started to laugh hysterically because we knew we were stranded. We walked to the small booth at the station, but no one was there, but we learned that the next train didn’t come pass that station until around 8:00pm. She suggested that we start walking in the direction the train. I didn’t think this was a good idea so when I saw a large group of random Roma (Gypsy) men I yelled for them to help us. My friend was a little threatened by the fact that they were Roma, but it didn’t bother me at all. I asked them how far we were from our destination and they said it was the next train stop. We asked about cab options and they told us the cab number and even called the cab for us. We waited for the cab for about 15 minutes and got to our destination where our friends were waiting for us. Ohh the wonderful world of the Peace Corps!!!

Thanksgiving was really nice this year in Bulgaria. The PCVs I spent my time with were awesome.

There are more pictures of Thanksgiving, if you click on the link on the sidebar you will see them.

Thinking about Cornbread,

Crystal

Am I a Freak Show (Get Ur Mind Out the Gutter)?

I am going to try to make this quick and painless.

This morning I left for work really early because I had a meeting with the program director from the Peace Corps. My program director was coming to see how things are going now that I have been in Veliko Turnovo for a month. I walked about half a block from my apartment and was fumbling with my MP3 player when I heard this woman gasp in surprise. My heart started to beat faster because I thought a car might be near me or that a street dog might be ready for attack.

Than, to my surprise she looked me straight in the eyes and said, “Can I touch, you?” in English. I answered immediately in Bulgarian “Zachto? (Why)”. From her reaction I thought a bird might be on my head or that a snake was on my shoulder and she needed to get off. She walked towards me with her hands outstretched and said, in Bulgarian, “Because I have never seen someone that looks like you before”. How weird is that?!!!!! Can you image someone coming up to you touching you because they have never seen someone that looks like you!!! This totally caught me off guard and almost made me cry. She touched my hand, gasped again, and walked away.

After her violation I felt like a freak show!!! On my walk to work I began to see what I had not totally noticed before this woman touched me. People are seriously staring at me. Every third person that I passed on the street was looking at me today. When I was in my small town Rila people stared, but after a while everyone got to know me so they didn’t stare as much. Veliko Turnovo is a rather large town, so I see different people everyday.

Urggh let me vent for a little please….

Who does this woman thinks she is that she can touch me! I mean I understand that people might not have had interaction with a black person before, but we are almost in the year 2007! Come on! They have MTV in Bulgaria. Bulgaria is about to join the EU for goodness sake. They get all the same music videos here that we get in America. They know that Condalesa Rice is the Secretary of State. I can not be that different or exotic!!! Furthermore, the world is becoming much smaller as people are traveling more to live and work in foreign countries. I mean, I have seen about four black people in Bulgaria since I got here four months ago. Ok, that’s not a lot considering the population of Bulgaria is about 8 million, but still it is very annoying. Peace Corps warns us about how people we stare and treat us as foreigners, but I didn’t expect to feel like an object.

My friends talked about being stared at in their small villages but I thought it was just because they lived in a small village. I didn’t think I stood out as much in Veliko Turnovo considering there are so many foreigners here. Now I am kind of paranoid about meeting new people here. Do they really want to be my friend or do they want to be seen with the “Black American”? On my way home from work, I decided to take the side streets because I couldn’t deal with people staring at me.

Feeling violated and like an object,

Crystal

Holidays in Bulgaria

Holidays in Bulgaria

Today is Thanksgiving!!! Bulgarians don’t celebrate this American Holiday, so volunteers are often left to find a way to celebrate themselves. Although I am away from the states I am not too far to celebrate with friends! Volunteers that live close to my town invited my site mate and I to dinner. I just got my stove two days ago so I decided to make my favorite holiday food (i.e. pumpkin pie, dressing with gravy, deviled eggs, and cornbread). This was a huge task to accomplish!!!

First I had to go to the store and find cornbread. I knew that had it in VT because the volunteer that was here before me left a half package full. I went to about two stores on Monday and did not find any. Yesterday, I decided to go to another store after my tutoring session. My language instructor kept asking me if I wanted her to go with me, which was a little annoying because I know how to buy things from the grocery store. Anytime I don’t know the name of an object I either write it down in Bulgarian before I leave my house or describe it to the clerk in Bulgarian words that I know. Anyhow, I found cornbread and everything else that I needed from the local market ALONE.

I started to cook the Pumpkin pie first. Peace Corps has a cookbook for volunteers, which has recipes and shows how to substitute items that are not in Bulgaria. I am so proud of myself. I made the entire Pumpkin pie from scratch! That includes the dough, and the Pumpkin Puree. Secondly I made the cornbread. Cornbread is not that difficult to make so it was a blast. My third task was to make deviled eggs while the cornbread cooked. As the eggs boiled I mixed the second batch of cornbread for the dressing. When the deviled-eggs were done and I put them in the refrigerator. The last item I made was gravy to go with the dressing. If you don’t know, dressing is very similar to bread filling except we use cornbread in the place of bread. This is everything I made for thanksgiving with my fellow Peace Corps Volunteers. I hope they like it!!!! The only problem is that now I have to get the food to my friend’s apartment by train. Its about noon here know, the party is at 6pm!!!! I will let you know how it went.

Thinking of a feasible way to transport food by train with limited Tupperware,

Crystal

P.S. I don’t now if I will be able to take pictures, because something is wrong with my camera! The stupid lens thingy will not go back in. I am so pissed because I have only had the camera for six months!!!! Urggh… Who told me to buy Nikon?!


HAPPY TURKEY DAY!!!!

Being in Bulgaria

I feel like a complete idiot. I live in one of the best cities in Bulgaria and I live in the best neighborhood in my town. My street has some of the oldest houses, apartments, and stores in the entire region. My town has a castle, theaters, cultural centers, clothing stores, supermarkets, and even a large mall.

When I got to site my apartment was not ready and I was very disappointed. I complained about the injustice of having to stay a week with a Baba (grandmother) because I was looking forward to having my own apartment. When I finally got my apartment I complained about how dirty the volunteer that lived there before me left it. When my host organization cleaned the apartment and painted, I complained that the paint job was horrible and repainted my bedroom myself (I am currently in the process of painting the other rooms). After they gave me furniture (bookshelf, wardrobe, and two couches) I complained that I would have to buy decorations to “make the place feel like home”.

I went to dinner with a Bulgarian friend and brought her home to see my horrible apartment to understand the injustices of life. As we walked to my apartment I noticed she was cold in her thin leather coat, so, I offered her my scarf. She accepted and proceeded to tell me how she needed a winter coat but she couldn’t afford it because it cost 160-206 leva (Bulgarian dollars). She just started a job that required her to dress professional. I could relate because I wouldn’t pay that amount for a coat. We walked on complaining about the cost of clothes and the quality of clothing until we started to reach my apartment. She seemed to get quiet as we got nearer to my door. I unlocked the downstairs door and ushered her in. As we walked up the stairs I could tell she was thinking. I unlocked my door and her immediate response was “you have a big apartment”. This is the response I always get from Bulgarians when I describe my apartment. To me it isn’t that large. I have a mini kitchen, a bathroom, a small living room, a closet, and a bedroom.

She walked from room to room in surprise. I could tell she didn’t understand way I was complaining. In fact I saw myself through her eyes. I became that American that has everything and complains about paint on the wall or things that don’t matter because I have nothing else to complain about. To her my apartment needed to be organized room by room but it wasn’t anything serious. She offered to help me paint and decorate until everything was they way I wanted it.

I felt like a complete idiot because as I looked the apartment over through her eyes I realized that I actually do have a wonderful apartment!!! It needs to be decorated because I just moved in, but the place is wonderful. I have never experienced being “the rich person” and I don’t know if I like it. IS THIS REALLY THE PEACE CORPS!?!!?

Yes I live in an apartment with running water, and electricity. Yes I have most of the modern conveniences found in the western part of the world, but life isn’t any easier. Bulgarian culture is very different from American culture. I think I will write about that next time though because as always this is too long.

Humbly,
Crystal

VT All the Way....

I have been in Bulgaria for about three months and I am still trying to integrate. There are many things about the culture that I still don’t understand. Being in the Peace Corps is all about taking things one at a time and learning as you go along.

I just moved to Veliko Turnovo Thursday. This town is absolutely wonderful! The people appear to be very proud of their town and of their accomplishments. For now I am spending a lot time in Cafes with my site-mate. She is pretty cool…

I have not moved into my apartment because it is not ready, which is a little annoying. But, hopefully everything will be ready by Friday this week. After I move in I am going to make it as homey as possible so that I will be comfortable.

Nothing else to write about!

Thinking of my apartment,

Crystal