These are some random pictures from my last week. The picture on the upper left is my 'cousin's' house where I went for dinner. Ekram is the dad and his wife is the sister of my father. As I've said before, family is very important, and we visit family all the time. If you didn't have a family you wouldn't know who you were and where you belonged, and family is traced back for at least 5 generations. Another volunteer lives with Ekram, and they are one of the more liberal and funny families - it's great fun visiting them with my family. The picture at directly above is Premtim, who is our Albanian language teacher. That's how he looks after trying to get us to pronounce Albanian words correctly - try saying gjthashtu quickly 5 times. The picture above that is the bazaar - every at least medium sized town has one. It's a combination farmer's market and flea market - you can get almost anything there and the prices are very low. I stock up on bananas there, as well as assorted other things. My 'father' bought a crate of the most gorgeous tomatoes you can imagine last week for 40 denari - about one dollar. There are sacks upon sacks of peppers, cabbages, tomatoes, grapes - everything that is coming in from the harvest. In addition, there are booths with clothes, umbrellas, eggs, baby wear - you think of it and it's there. Enver, my 'father' brought me down to buy a immersible hot water pot - takes about 3 minutes to heat a big pot of water. He knew where to go and what to say - we went to an Albanian vendor and they found me a new one they sold to me for about $7.50 and now we have hot water every day in our classroom for tea. We've reached the half way point in our training - hard to believe - and tomorrow we head to Skopje for 'field day', a day we get together with almost all of the other volunteers in country and play games, socialize, and buy stuff from the volunteers who are heading home soon. I'm looking forward to meeting more experienced volunteers and finding out about their experiences! Last weekend 6 of us trainees went to Tetova for the famous Apple Festival, but more about that later. I also want to take more pictures of my family here to share with you. I can't emphasize how friendly everyone is. Children in the village always want to practice their English, so wherever I go I'm greeted with "Hello. What is your name?" There are a number of young girls who run up for a hug whenever they see me, and there is nothing more energizing than a hug from one of them. There are challenges, too, but for the most part things have been wonderful. Enough for now - my love to you all!
These are some random pictures from my last week. The picture on the upper left is my 'cousin's' house where I went for dinner. Ekram is the dad and his wife is the sister of my father. As I've said before, family is very important, and we visit family all the time. If you didn't have a family you wouldn't know who you were and where you belonged, and family is traced back for at least 5 generations. Another volunteer lives with Ekram, and they are one of the more liberal and funny families - it's great fun visiting them with my family. The picture at directly above is Premtim, who is our Albanian language teacher. That's how he looks after trying to get us to pronounce Albanian words correctly - try saying gjthashtu quickly 5 times. The picture above that is the bazaar - every at least medium sized town has one. It's a combination farmer's market and flea market - you can get almost anything there and the prices are very low. I stock up on bananas there, as well as assorted other things. My 'father' bought a crate of the most gorgeous tomatoes you can imagine last week for 40 denari - about one dollar. There are sacks upon sacks of peppers, cabbages, tomatoes, grapes - everything that is coming in from the harvest. In addition, there are booths with clothes, umbrellas, eggs, baby wear - you think of it and it's there. Enver, my 'father' brought me down to buy a immersible hot water pot - takes about 3 minutes to heat a big pot of water. He knew where to go and what to say - we went to an Albanian vendor and they found me a new one they sold to me for about $7.50 and now we have hot water every day in our classroom for tea. We've reached the half way point in our training - hard to believe - and tomorrow we head to Skopje for 'field day', a day we get together with almost all of the other volunteers in country and play games, socialize, and buy stuff from the volunteers who are heading home soon. I'm looking forward to meeting more experienced volunteers and finding out about their experiences! Last weekend 6 of us trainees went to Tetova for the famous Apple Festival, but more about that later. I also want to take more pictures of my family here to share with you. I can't emphasize how friendly everyone is. Children in the village always want to practice their English, so wherever I go I'm greeted with "Hello. What is your name?" There are a number of young girls who run up for a hug whenever they see me, and there is nothing more energizing than a hug from one of them. There are challenges, too, but for the most part things have been wonderful. Enough for now - my love to you all!
I remember we always took one of those coils to make hot water when we travelled. My grandparents got one in England I think and they were so proud of it. I think Ihave one somewhere. Great interesting post Candy, Miss ya . b
ReplyDeleteThe language classes will undoubedly go much better now that you have hot tea!
ReplyDeleteA crate of fresh tomatoes! I can't stand it! Can't get those here at any price, and my patio tomatoes were just so-so after special care and daily watering. Got a few nice ones, but just picked the rest, still green and some of them are mildewing (or something). Too many tall trees around our property. Not enough sun. And I really like fresh tomatoes! Enjoy and think of your friends and fam back home who are faced with eating canned or imported Mexican or Canadian "tomatoes" that really don't have any tomato flavor; they just look like tomatoes.
Mom told me about your phone call to Everett. She was happy to hear you are having such a wonderful adventure! They are doing well.
Keep up the interesting notes.
Jan