Baby Kerly and The Sound of Music

Well, summer time is officially over here. Yesterday was the first day of school. We had a ton more kiddies come. One in particular is a baby named Kerly about 8 or 9 months old. She is super adorable and when I passed by her for the first time, someone was holding her and she reached her little arms out for me to take her. "Awwww, how precious!" I thought. Well, let's just say she turned out to be a screamer. Hours upon hours of screaming. I think I saw the inside of her mouth more than anything else. It was her first day at the Guarderia and I was starting to suspect that she's used to being held. (Yes, all 8 or 9 months of her little life!). She cried and screamed most of the time, but if you put her down, OMG, I've never heard anything like it! I knew when she was getting hungry, because she kept tugging at my chest and was making a sucking sound. I just tried soothing her and told her ....."No tengo leche aqui" (I don't have milk here), to which the Tias (Aunties, as the women workers are called) roared with laughter. They just thought that was the funniest thing ever. So, all day they teased me about that.

The mothers of the infants come and breast feed their babies every few hours (as they work on the rose plantation which is on the premises). One of the mothers came to feed her baby and heard what a ruckus this little Kerly was making. The next thing I know, she takes her from me and starts to breast feed her! I was like..."Whoa! Is this even legal??!!" But nobody seemed to mind. It took me a whole hour to get over this! This was a big reminder that I am in another country. In the States, you just don't breast feed children that aren't yours! Anyway, she was fine for a little bit after this and then went back to her wailing. Poor thing. Her face was so red at the end of the day! I felt badly that there was really nothing I could do for her. Apparently, if I did have breast milk, I could have fed her. Actually, I think I'm still not over that incident!

Also, yesterday we received a new volunteer. She is from Austria. I didn't get a chance to talk too much with her yet. But as soon as she said she was from Austria....I just kept thinking of my dad and the Von Trapps. All of you Sound of Music fans out there will know what I'll talking about! My dad just loved that movie and was set on calling our family the Von Stotlers!

Ecuador

Well, it's been entirely too long since I've written a post. As most of you probably know, I am currently in Ecuador. I've been here for about 6 weeks now and have seen some pretty marvelous things. Like huge, lush, green mountains, snow capped volcanoes, and llamas to name a few. I've also met a number of people from all over the world. To date, 2 women from Taiwan, 2 girls from France, a girl from Honduras, a girl from the Czech Rep., 2 other American girls and a guy from Australia. These are the other volunteers who have either come and gone or are still here at the moment. I've been to a number of cities as well such as Otavalo (known to be the biggest indigenous market in Ecuador), Quito (the capital), Baños (city know for it's waterfalls and hot springs), Ibarra (known for a special type of hand made ice cream called Helado de Paila), Riobamba (known for the Devil's Nose train ride you can take-which was booked out when I went). I've visited a number of sites such as Lake Quilotoa (home of a crater lake formed inside of a volcano, Cotopaxi National Park (home of a gorgeous volcano) and the Middle of the World (a place that landmarks the equator). I've been white water rafting and horse back riding in the mountains. I must admit, I'm awfully blessed to be here experiencing all that Ecuador has to offer!

All of these adventures take place on the weekend as I volunteer during the week at a Nursery/Kindergarten. The place also has a school, a rose plantation and 2 volunteer houses on the premises. Many of the children's parents work at the plantation. The elevation is pretty high (not exactly sure how high) and it's super cold here. Who knew roses needed cold air to thrive? Any how, me being from Florida and not doing much research on the weather before I came, has left me wearing my blue, Victoria's Secret sweatshirt here daily. I figured 'It's South America, of course the weather will be warm!' Ha.That's funny!!

My daily routine at the Guarderia (as it's called) goes like this:

7:00- 7:15am -   Walk next door to the Guarderia and wait for all the children to arrive.

7:15- 8:15 -   Help the children to undress, shower, brush and style their hair (using intricate braiding techniques that I have yet to master for some of the girls. Every one can tell whose hair I did as it's always a single pony tail or sometimes pig tails which are often lop-sided and/or have cow-licks going on...the kids are so squirmy what can I say??).

8:15-9:00 - Breakfast (which includes helping to feed the tiny ones) and then brushing of teeth.

9:00-10:30 Indoor activity (which varies from simple indoor play with puzzles and games to coloring, singing and dancing, or doing some sort of art craft).

10:30-11:00 Snack time (usually fruit or yogurt).

11:00-12:15 Out door play on the playground (where I've learned you have to be super attentive as children easily fall off swings, slides, monkey bars and the like).

12:15-1:30 Lunch (Which always consists of soup and usually rice, lentils, some sort of meat, and sometimes salad or plantains) and then brushing of teeth and mandatory potty time for everyone before nap time.

1:30-2:30 Nap time (Haalleelujjah!!! :-) Free time for me. One whole hour of no biting, hair pulling or screaming!! :-)))))  I usually stay in the room with the kids and read silently or sometimes I fall asleep too!

2:30-3:00 Snack time (usually yogurt sometimes with crackers) and then gather belongings and leave for the day.

So, that sums up my time here up to date...I will certainly keep you posted as well as fill you in on some previous details of some of my funny/exciting times here!

Teresa, the Big Scaredy Cat

So, two night ago it was raining cats and dogs. I mean it was pouring! (The next day, I learned it was actually hailing). And we have a metal roof so you can imagine how loud it was. It was around 11:30 p.m. when the family decided to go bed and that's when the rain started and the power went out. No big concern there since it was time for bed anyway. I lay in bed for a good twenty minutes or so thinking to myself "Geez, this is some serious rain!" All the while, great bolts of lightning were illuminating my room and thunder could be heard in the distance. All of a sudden, I hear my bedroom door creak open and the light of a cell phone is peering at me from the doorway. It's my 14 year old host sister Keti. She says, "Tereza, don't be afraid. There is very big noisy weather outside."  To this I reply. "OK, thank you." And then she is gone.

I lay back down and smile to myself. Awww. She was concerned about me. Well, with just cause too as I have cowered into her room in the middle of the night on more than one occasion. All because of the strange noises of country life. I remember one night in particular I was deathly afraid after hearing some loud noises in the attic. I seriously thought someone was up there! As I ran out to the living room, certain that everyone else heard the noises too, I was greeted with snoring from every direction! Everyone was knocked out cold! I just couldn't go back to sleep after this. Especially, when my room has access to the attic. No way, Jose! Well, let's just say this was a scaredy cat moment and I ended up in my host sister's room. The next day, my host parents said it was a mouse. I guess because the walls are a little thin and I had abruptly awaken from a deep sleep it had sounded like something 10 times the size of a mouse. Anyway, as you can see, my host sister had ample right to be concerned about me....The Big Scaredy Cat!

A Quick Tip

A quick tip that I've been meaning to mention on my blog is that you can click on the photos to enlarge them. So, if you didn't know that, you should go back and click on some of the older posts with pictures of the gorgeous scenery and views in Georgia!

Always on the look out for Non-Georgian food

Well, after posting that last blog, I wanted to do a follow-up post on the non-Georgian food that Yadira and I are often on the prowl for. Don't get me wrong, we do like Georgian food, but lately we've had a hankering for other kinds of food.

That particular weekend went something like this:

Friday night- fried chicken at Texas Chicken

Saturday for lunch- Azteca Mexican Restaurant

A chicken quesadilla for me

And taquitos de tinga for Yadira

Extremely happy campers after a little Mexican food

Saturday for dinner- Ronny's Pizza. This place is owned by Americans, so no mayonnaise or any other Georgian toppings here!

Pepperoni and mushroom heaven

Followed by a photo shoot which was inspired by Natia the manager at Ronny's. She was a ball of fun and insisted that Yadira and I take some "fun and crazy" pictures at the pizzeria. So we did.

Things started off innocently enough

Then we tried to capture the art of "fish lips" with Natia leading the way

Then we hopped up on the bench to do who knows what

Uncle Sam wants YOU!

And one last photo with the staff

This was the best time I've ever had at any pizzeria. Take that Sal's!

Excursion Photos

These are the photos I promised to post of the excursion I went on last week with my 7th graders. We went to see a 3rd or 4th Century (one of the things that was lost in translation) castle. We took a bus part of the way and then we hiked for the rest of the journey. After we saw the castle, which actually is only rubble now, we had a picnic in an open field. One of the teachers and a few of the boys started a little fire to cook some meat and we also had pizza (Georgian style), salami, chicken, khachapuri (cheese bread), fruit, cake, cookies and a few other dishes I don't know the names of. All I know is we ate tons! On the way home from the trip, we stopped at an old soccer field and played a little "football." I really had a great time and I hope you enjoy the pics!

What's in a Name...

I went on an excursion with my 7th graders a couple of days ago. I promise to post pics of that soon but I wanted to mention that in this one class we have a Giorgi, two Lucas, a Nino, two Maris, and a Tamuna. So, there you know almost half of their names!

Giorgi, Dato, Irakli, Giga, and Luca seem to be quite popular among boys names here while Nino, Mari, Tamuna, Salome and Natia seem to be popular among the girls. I have taken a real liking to a few of these names so don’t be surprised if they come up again in the distant future as a possible name for one of my offspring. Mind you we’re talking “way distant future” here. Interesting though to note that calling someone “girl” or “boy” here may be just as common as calling someone by their given name. A brief lesson in Georgian:
-girl    - gogo
-boy    - bit’chi ( beet chi)- Use when you are talking about a boy
-boy    -bit' cho- Use when you are speaking directly to the boy
-come  - modi  (mow dee)
-good   - kargi  (you need to roll your “r”)

You’d be surprised how often you hear these four little words throughout the day. Things like “modi bit’cho” or “kargi gogo.” And speaking of kargi gogo, I think that is my actual name here. It doesn’t take much to provoke these words from a Georgian’s lips. When I first arrived at school I would say “Dila msvidobisa"  (Good morning) and I’d get showered with “Kargi gogo!” Now, on my travels throughout Georgia when I run into people who try to ask me questions and I have no inkling of what they are speaking about, which happens quite frequently as you can imagine, I simply say “Ar vitsi qartuli” (I don’t know Georgian) and this still seems to bring forth those golden words “Kargi gogo.” Followed up by a quick “Itsit Rusuli?” (Do you know Russian?) To this I reply “Ara, vitsi Inglisuri.” (No, I know English).  And that is the end of that conversation. We part ways smiling and nodding, which happens to mean the same thing in every language.

At the moment, I have been reading Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert. Yes, I did also go and see it in theaters (I know this is a fact you were just dying to know). And getting a little off the topic here but yes the movie, in my opinion, is just as good as the book (another fact you were just itching to know). Anyway, in the book, during her stay in Bali she says that the majority of people there give their children one of these names: Wayan, Made, Nyoman and Ketut. These names mean first, second, third and fourth. So, they name their child, whether girl or boy, one of these names according to the order of birth. And if they should have a fifth child, then they'd just start the cycle over again. I found that to be quite interesting. However, you can be certain that my future offspring will not have any of these names.