Stay tuned for pictures everyday this week of how my camp is going :).
Monday, June 27, 2011
Qazax Summer Camp: Baseball Day
Day one of my summer camp was a success! Mason and Josh helped out in teaching some of my favorite students how to play baseball!
Stay tuned for pictures everyday this week of how my camp is going :).
Stay tuned for pictures everyday this week of how my camp is going :).
Monday, June 13, 2011
Marie and Jessi's 30 Hour Adventure
Friday June 10th
1pm: The Last day of Marie and Teresa's Agstafa summer camp! Things are going great, its hot, sunny and I'm finishing up helping the kids hit the pinata's they spent the week making when I get the call from the Peace Crops housing guy. He has just spent the last couple of hours on the phone with my landlords and it is now offical, 1pm June 10th, I am getting evicted.
3pm: Marie, who has plans to leave on a weekend trip the next day changes her plans to stay and help me. We begin the tedious packing process (why in the world do I have so much stuff-I'm a Peace Corps Volunteer!)
5pm: We start our quest for a new apartment. We make a few calls and are almost immediately out the door to look at our first "new" apartment option.
7pm: Marie and I come back and continue packing. As you can probably tell by my face and the pile of stuff behind me-we are exhausted! And this isn't even all the stuff, we have more packing to do. But by midnight its time for bed.
8:30am:The long, drawn out honk of the trash truck. Marie and I pop out of bed, get dressed without saying anything and starting taking the multiple loads of trash down to the truck-Saturday June 11th has begun.
9:30am: Quest number two begins-it is time to find me a new place to live-I'm almost homeless!
12:30pm: After many frantic Azeri phone calls and waiting around we walk through the door of the most perfect place to live! Sure the walls are falling off and the floor's covered in dirt-this is my new home!
1pm: Brunch, coffee and one last gaze out the window at the increddible view I'm about to leave. The view I had from this apartment was one of my favorite things about this country.
2pm: Marie and are start the cleaning process. We scrubbed this place from top to bottom! I've never met someone who can make a sink shine the way that Marie Novak can!
5pm: My friend Afgan and his brother come with a HUGE truck to take all of my stuff to the new apartment. And when I say stuff-I have my own fridge, oven, bedding (my old apartment didn't come very well furnished for living but thanks to my mom and dad's trip here last year it really became a home with all of this fancy stuff!) Of course while we spent an hour moving everything out of my fifth floor apartment (no elevators here!) it started to rain on the open bed truck holding all of my stuff.
6pm: We drive over to my new building in the rain and unloaded it into the stairwell. With in three minutes every kid who lives in this building was out helping us walk all of my stuff up to the fifth floor apartment here. On our way up every mom was hanging out of her door yelling "Welcome! How are you?!" This place is so much friendlier then my other apartment!
7pm: At last! everything is inside and Marie and I are EXHAUSTED!
We haven't stopped going since getting up for summer camp Friday morning. In these 30 hours we preformed not a move, but a life relocation for me.
I think its safe to say Marie and I can make any quest into a reality!
1pm: The Last day of Marie and Teresa's Agstafa summer camp! Things are going great, its hot, sunny and I'm finishing up helping the kids hit the pinata's they spent the week making when I get the call from the Peace Crops housing guy. He has just spent the last couple of hours on the phone with my landlords and it is now offical, 1pm June 10th, I am getting evicted. 
3pm: Marie, who has plans to leave on a weekend trip the next day changes her plans to stay and help me. We begin the tedious packing process (why in the world do I have so much stuff-I'm a Peace Corps Volunteer!)5pm: We start our quest for a new apartment. We make a few calls and are almost immediately out the door to look at our first "new" apartment option.
7pm: Marie and I come back and continue packing. As you can probably tell by my face and the pile of stuff behind me-we are exhausted! And this isn't even all the stuff, we have more packing to do. But by midnight its time for bed.
8:30am:The long, drawn out honk of the trash truck. Marie and I pop out of bed, get dressed without saying anything and starting taking the multiple loads of trash down to the truck-Saturday June 11th has begun.9:30am: Quest number two begins-it is time to find me a new place to live-I'm almost homeless!
12:30pm: After many frantic Azeri phone calls and waiting around we walk through the door of the most perfect place to live! Sure the walls are falling off and the floor's covered in dirt-this is my new home!
1pm: Brunch, coffee and one last gaze out the window at the increddible view I'm about to leave. The view I had from this apartment was one of my favorite things about this country.
2pm: Marie and are start the cleaning process. We scrubbed this place from top to bottom! I've never met someone who can make a sink shine the way that Marie Novak can!5pm: My friend Afgan and his brother come with a HUGE truck to take all of my stuff to the new apartment. And when I say stuff-I have my own fridge, oven, bedding (my old apartment didn't come very well furnished for living but thanks to my mom and dad's trip here last year it really became a home with all of this fancy stuff!) Of course while we spent an hour moving everything out of my fifth floor apartment (no elevators here!) it started to rain on the open bed truck holding all of my stuff.
6pm: We drive over to my new building in the rain and unloaded it into the stairwell. With in three minutes every kid who lives in this building was out helping us walk all of my stuff up to the fifth floor apartment here. On our way up every mom was hanging out of her door yelling "Welcome! How are you?!" This place is so much friendlier then my other apartment!
7pm: At last! everything is inside and Marie and I are EXHAUSTED!
We haven't stopped going since getting up for summer camp Friday morning. In these 30 hours we preformed not a move, but a life relocation for me. 
I think its safe to say Marie and I can make any quest into a reality!
Wednesday, June 1, 2011
Son Zang
May 31st was graduation or, "Son Zang," (Last Bell) at my school.
My school as I was walking in. The ceremony hadn't started yet so there weren't many people around, this whole yard was packed with people once graduation started.
During graduation the 11th graders (graduating classes) and the 1st graders exchange gifts. Then there is a ceremony of the 11th and 1st graders passing around a key and then parading the Azerbaijani flag around the crowd. This is one of the 11th grade boys holding one of the 1st grade boys after parading the flag.
This is the informatics teacher. Her and I have become friends over the last year and she brought me a bouquet of roses for graduation :). "Son Zang" involves a lot of fake and real flowers, as well as HUGE stuffed animals-these are typical gifts in Azerbaijan (you can see a a lot of flowers and balloons in this picture).
With this "Son Zang" comes a new chapter in my Peace Corps service. I just finished a full year of teaching at my school-a year and a half of teaching total. This summer is packed with summer camps and work of all kinds but it also brings with it the end. If this summer will be anything like the last it will go by in a sweaty flash and soon it will be fall-time to close up shop and say my good-byes here. It's hard to believe September 2009 was so long ago. Many things have changed since then; emotions have come and gone, I have both hated and loved life here. Tuesday was an emotional day for me though-it really seems the beginning of the end has come.
My school as I was walking in. The ceremony hadn't started yet so there weren't many people around, this whole yard was packed with people once graduation started.
During graduation the 11th graders (graduating classes) and the 1st graders exchange gifts. Then there is a ceremony of the 11th and 1st graders passing around a key and then parading the Azerbaijani flag around the crowd. This is one of the 11th grade boys holding one of the 1st grade boys after parading the flag.
This is the informatics teacher. Her and I have become friends over the last year and she brought me a bouquet of roses for graduation :). "Son Zang" involves a lot of fake and real flowers, as well as HUGE stuffed animals-these are typical gifts in Azerbaijan (you can see a a lot of flowers and balloons in this picture).With this "Son Zang" comes a new chapter in my Peace Corps service. I just finished a full year of teaching at my school-a year and a half of teaching total. This summer is packed with summer camps and work of all kinds but it also brings with it the end. If this summer will be anything like the last it will go by in a sweaty flash and soon it will be fall-time to close up shop and say my good-byes here. It's hard to believe September 2009 was so long ago. Many things have changed since then; emotions have come and gone, I have both hated and loved life here. Tuesday was an emotional day for me though-it really seems the beginning of the end has come.
Friday, May 20, 2011
Summer Camp Help
Hey there!
Spring is in full swing here, it is 80 degrees today! My garden is full of sprouting pumpkins and squash and as I sat out there today, enjoying the sun, I realized-my summer camp is only one month away! The last week of June (June 27-July 1) I will be holding a summer camp at my school for all of my students. I've tried to vary the schedule to make it fun for all types of students, but on Thursday, June 30, I am sneaking a health day in there to talk about dental care, nutrition and germs. Now I know this is a little late, as the mail can take about a month, and we'll that's all the time there is before my camp, but if anyone wants to help out 50 Azerbaijani students learn more about dental health I would sincerely appreciate around 50 toothbrushes and 50 of those little travel sized toothpastes. Also, and this has a longer deadline, if anyone (my teachers out there reading!) has any good tips, links, websites, games, word-searches etc. to making teaching dental care, nutrition and germs fun could you let me know, I need all the help I can get! Thank you all for thinking of me! I'll let you know how camp goes :)
Spring is in full swing here, it is 80 degrees today! My garden is full of sprouting pumpkins and squash and as I sat out there today, enjoying the sun, I realized-my summer camp is only one month away! The last week of June (June 27-July 1) I will be holding a summer camp at my school for all of my students. I've tried to vary the schedule to make it fun for all types of students, but on Thursday, June 30, I am sneaking a health day in there to talk about dental care, nutrition and germs. Now I know this is a little late, as the mail can take about a month, and we'll that's all the time there is before my camp, but if anyone wants to help out 50 Azerbaijani students learn more about dental health I would sincerely appreciate around 50 toothbrushes and 50 of those little travel sized toothpastes. Also, and this has a longer deadline, if anyone (my teachers out there reading!) has any good tips, links, websites, games, word-searches etc. to making teaching dental care, nutrition and germs fun could you let me know, I need all the help I can get! Thank you all for thinking of me! I'll let you know how camp goes :)
Sunday, May 15, 2011
Nick's 21!
Happy 21st Birthday Nick! I miss you and I wish I could be there for my little brother turning 21 but I'm thinking about you! LOVE YOU
Monday, May 9, 2011
Chay
I recently took this picture while having tea, or "chay," with Zeynab and the informatics teacher at my school and thought it was kind of cool. We all had a break from classes at the same time so we had a little chay and chat session.
Chay is a huge part of life in Azerbaijan. You can not have a conversation, a meal or even a thought without drinking tea. This isn't bad for me, I've always loved tea and find myself drinking it more and more at my own will. Even in the summer, when it is 100 degrees and humid, we all drink tea before we do anything important, its just the Azerbaijani way. Most of the tea they sell here is grown down in the south in Lankaran, near the Iranian border. When driving away from the main town and out into the villages you can see the many fields of tea growing along the side of the road. This is all black tea, which is the tea of choice here, but they do dry many kinds flowers and other plants to make special healing teas for when you have a cold. Azerbaijani's never drink tea by itself. In the mornings loose sugar is poured by the cup full into the breakfast tea. Anytime after breakfast a sugar cube in the mouth is OK, maybe chocolates, or my favorite, home made preserved fruit. The glass in this picture, an "armud stakan" (pear cup), is a very typical, very Azerbaijani cup to drink your tea out of. Tea drinking is an art here and tradition worth noting.
Chay is a huge part of life in Azerbaijan. You can not have a conversation, a meal or even a thought without drinking tea. This isn't bad for me, I've always loved tea and find myself drinking it more and more at my own will. Even in the summer, when it is 100 degrees and humid, we all drink tea before we do anything important, its just the Azerbaijani way. Most of the tea they sell here is grown down in the south in Lankaran, near the Iranian border. When driving away from the main town and out into the villages you can see the many fields of tea growing along the side of the road. This is all black tea, which is the tea of choice here, but they do dry many kinds flowers and other plants to make special healing teas for when you have a cold. Azerbaijani's never drink tea by itself. In the mornings loose sugar is poured by the cup full into the breakfast tea. Anytime after breakfast a sugar cube in the mouth is OK, maybe chocolates, or my favorite, home made preserved fruit. The glass in this picture, an "armud stakan" (pear cup), is a very typical, very Azerbaijani cup to drink your tea out of. Tea drinking is an art here and tradition worth noting.
Monday, May 2, 2011
May Day and Soviet Workers Day
Hanging out at Zeynab's house is a normal, everyday thing for me. She and her family have become my home away from home-my family away from family. Yesterday was a warm, humid, rainy day and was the day that used to be workers day during soviet times (and May day, I brought Zeynab flowers, but didn't ring the bell and run away). And, since so many family members just happened to be at Zeynab's house yesterday, we had a make-shift party outside while they made "lavash" (thin tortilla type bread).
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