Long time, no see...

I know it's been a while since I've written in my blog. And since then a lot of things has happened. Most I don't remember. Some I shouldn't write as it might be scandalous to do so. But I'll share some highlights of the month of August in Georgia.

August in Georgia is the hottest month of the year. It is also when nearly everyone has vacation and that goes for 90% of the PC volunteers as well. Unfortunately, or fortunately (depends on how you see things), I'm in the 10% that still have work. In fact, August is probably our busiest month, since that's when all the vacationers come to Borjomi and to hike in the park. Most Georgians don't actually go hiking in the National Park, but rather spend time in the city park which is where most of the Georgians congregate at night. Most are from Tbilisi. The real hikers and the campers are from Europe (mostly Israel and eastern Europe--Poland, Czech, Germany), and strangely enough, I have yet to meet a single American. I've met a few Canadians, but no Americans. Just a few days ago, we started construction in our office and so now its very load and dirty here, and I'm finding myself working from home more often. I'm already pretty unproductive, working from home just makes me more so.

I did some traveling in August as well. In early August I went with a few friends to Tbilisi to buy a guitar (which I successfully did, but have trouble really learning it since there are few videos online to learn the classical guitar, which is what I bought). I also went to do some sightseeing, and saw a lot of churches. In fact, Georgia is one of the few countries which religion has really blossomed and expanded in the past decade, as opposed to America and Europe. There was a huge church building boom, and I got to visit a lot of them. I stayed at this small hostel in the middle of the city where I met a lot of cool people. One of them was a Spanish guy that had an irish-english accent and an American who was a PC volunteer in Ukraine but now goes to law school in San Francisco. We partied the entire weekend, and as I recall, I did shots of Beer + cha cha in what I would best describe as sake bombs. What they consist of is a full cup of Beer, a napkin over the top of the cup, a shot of chacha poured through the napkin, then a quick chug of the cup. I had three. Another highlight of the night was me grabbing a bottle of water chugging it then spitting it up after realizing it was vodka. Well, that was what someone told me I did.... I can't recollect.

Later in the month, I also had the chance to visit Batumi. It's a very nice resort city on the coast of the Black Sea a few miles from the Turkish border. Lots of fun in the sun, lots of swimming and diving, and drinking and partying. Also went to a nice club that was the scene of a wild night. Lots of drinking and dancing for sure, but also an American pop-group on stage (ala pussy cat dolls) and a stripper on stage (strange for Georgia). Best part of the night though was dancing to American music for once and jumping up and down like and idiot, and of course fist pumping ala Jersey Shore. For those who live in the region (which is the majority of the G10's) I'm not sure how they ever afford anything else, since I would be so tempted to go out every weekend in Batumi if I lived that close. For me, it is a 5 hour trip and cost 17 lari to get there, not very comfortable and not very affordable makes that trip a rarity for me. Luckily Tbilisi is only 2 hours away. But I don't necessarily like the fact that I am in the center of the country whereas everyone else is in the East, or in the West. I'm not close to many people, so I only see people who come in who want to hike in the park. It's like living in America, and living halfway between work and play. Would you prefer to be a few minutes to work and avoid all that commuting 5 days a week, or would you prefer to be a hop skip and cab-ride away from many bars and clubs? I always preferred the latter since I don't support drinking and driving.

The last two weeks I've finally succumbed to some food poisioning and digestional problems. I know a lot of people have already done so, but 4 months in, I guess it was just my time. Fortunately I have cable internet in my apartment which allows me to download a lot, add the fact that I brought a bunch of media from home and have a guitar now, I'm seldom bored or have little to do even if I'm stuck at home. Very excited by the new Mad Men season, and of course looking forward to the Football Season. I suppose I can stream NFL games since I'm only 8 hours ahead of the east coast.

Borjomi in August was fun. The entire population seems to swell three-fold as tourist from Tbilisi comes. It seemed like I went out every night to go drinking and dancing with friends. Now, it's cooling down a bit and it seems people will be moving back to Tbilisi to resume their normally scheduled programs.

Diving in the black sea. It was a little frightening since I'm not a very strong swimmer and I barely made it back to shore. Fun times...

Sunset on Batumi.

The largest and newest church in Tbilisi.

Lots of weddings in the Church, especially on Saturdays. Apparently that's a prime wedding day.

Borjomi. Lights on and all.

More Random Observations...

So this is a random observation I could've made the first week I was here. It could've been made definitely after the first month. And it still holds true today. I just wanted to see how time passing changes this observation. I can safely say that some, if not at least half of all Georgians are racist. No one is really forwardly racist anymore to me. But there are every day comments of racism I hear around me as I pass groups of people. I could be talking in Georgian to another Georgian and I can still hear racist remarks. I could even be talking in English to other Americans and I could still hear subtle racist remarks. Now unfortunately I haven't learned Georgian enough to discerned what exactly they are saying, but by tone and a few sparse words, I gotta say, it 'aint nice. Its sometimes conflicting for me to work and toil trying to do my part to improve and help a country that doesn't like me or my kind very much.

I used to complain about the racism in the country a lot. But now I just ignore it mainly. But it still gets to me sometimes. I mean, I live in the community now so I would have hoped I would have fit in more with the community and I wouldn't be targeted as much. But I guess being chinese-looking isn't a good thing here in Georgia. But I guess it could be worst. I heard Asians are treated terribly in the Middle East.

I also gotta note that Peace Corps is probably the least diverse American governmental organization I have seen. Probably one of the least diverse big organizations in America. Although I understand why. Imagine who would come to a program where you need a college degree and are willing to go 2 years without pay for adventure and altruism. Although I've experienced being the only asian before. I was once the only asian kid in a school of 500 near the Mexican border, and I think I had a good time.

So there are also new volunteers in my office. Theres a EU program where they send volunteers to random places for 3 months at a time. These two girls are from Latvia and Germany. Hopefully this should be exciting.

My adorable host sister making faces (many many poses) with my glasses.

This small black kitten follows me around when I get back to my house. It literally fits in the palm of my hands.

Random Observations...

Sometimes I feel my time in Borjomi is like being in a gay bar where no one is really gay (or so I suppose). Going out to a disco here where men are dancing with you is really weird and awkward.

I feel there are mainly 2 types of Georgians. 1) Those who know me and really like me and think I'm cool. and 2) Those who don't know me and have a strong dislike of me mainly because I'm Chinese looking. Its a weird and interesting dictomy. Very little in between.

Now for some obligatory pics of clouds...

Picture during my hike...

Picture taken from my iphone in Kvibisi right before a thunderstorm.

More Pics...

And this was one of the better bridges in the park. The rest were... iffy, and this one was too.

The rain forest. I was tempted to try a mushroom, but as our PST training taught us, that would probably be a bad idea.

I wish I were on horse at times...

Hiking through the national park.

A Georgian picnic. We unwrapped an entire chicken then proceed to eat it even as it fell on the grown and got dirt all over it.

Theres a catapiller in my pants!

No really, there was literally a catapiller in my pants. It wasn’t a subtle self deprecating title, its about my fun time with bugs here in Georgia. I was in class one day, and I felt something near my knee cap, I quickly reacted and grab at my jeans and cupped whatever was there, and in my mind I’m thinking the worst, even though its probably a piece of lint or something that tickled me. But as the title tells, it was in fact a catapiller in my pants! I rolled up my jeans and out popped a scrimy catapiller.

In other bug related news, as I was typing this blog, something startled me. Now usually things don’t startle me any more here, since lots of strange things happen all the time. But seeing a quarter-size giant spider roll down from the ceiling on her silk line straight to your keyboard was pretty freaky. Bugs here are not afraid of humans too. If you pretend to swat them away, they’re left unfazed. I’m not so lucky.

So I started working this week as well. On my first week here, I was tasked to join an expedition of sorts to improve the trail markings of one of the more popular trails in the national park. It's a 3 day trail and it was quite challenging and diverse. It was made more challenging by the fact that after the first day's hike, we celebrated with shots of cha-cha which definitely didn't help my stamina the next day. The first day was a good hike, I felt fresh, there was definitely a lot of uphill and we climbed probably 2 kilometers up. It was like walking through what you would expect a national park would look like. The 2nd day very different. We started by walking through high mountain terrains right at the cloud line, so it was very misty. There were also quite a bit of horses running around. It was pretty cool, and cold, unlike the first day, which was quite hot. The whole terrain looked like a painting of sorts, with very beautiful wildflowers all around. After the flowerly mountains, we went downhill through what could be best described as a rain forest. It was muddy (2 feet of mud at parts) and damp. It was also very green and dark. It was sorta fun running downhill through lots of mud, but when your shoes get stuck in the mud and when your shoes and pants get all muddy and wet, it isn't so much fun. Overall it was pretty cool, very adventurous, especially with a hangover. The last day was more of a routine hike, but with lots of bugs and mosquitoes and even leeches! It was more of a day where I had to cross log bridges, swat bugs away, and ignore the pain of my blisters on my feet.

In other non-nature related news, the volunteers here were able to visit Hilliary Clinton. It was brief, but a cool experience. We also swore in as real volunteers finally, and moved into our new host family houses. My move was quite brief, as I just moved one village down, to Borjomi, a resort town. My new digs are in a smallish apartment building. I don't have a lock yet, and I have a balcony which everyone uses so they go through my room. But it's comfortable and I leave the balcony door open at night which allows me to sleep in a cool-ish temperature. Last week, the Borjomi volunteers (me and Ruta) had American visitors from previous peace corp groups (G7's and G6's). We visited Vardzia which is a city carved into a cave walls. It was a fun hike going through short and cramped stairs, something out of those 3-d maze books we had as kids. I know a lot happened since I last posted, so I'm trying to include everything, but my most important observation happens to be about Lebron James going to the Heat. I mean, WTF? I'll leave it at that.

Running down a misty rain forest with extremely deep muddy tracks was very fun and challenging.

Wild horses spooking us in the mist. After the clouds past it was very beautiful.

My crew walking up in the clouds. We were there to put up new signs and repaint old ones.

The city of Vardzia. Its a spectacular cave city with crazy maze-like stairs.

We waited several hours for a few minutes of Hilliary. The McDonalds afterwards was well worth it. I can't believe I would ever crave McDonalds... but in Georgia...

Changes, Changes, and no Change...

I've been to Tbilisi, Georgia's Capital City 4 weeks in a row. Now some might call that lucky, I call that tiresome. Especially since 2 of those days were one day trips, and that trip is a bumpy 2 and half hour ride on a sweltering hot van they call a marshutka. I also visited my ex-host site. I say ex, because I was recently informed that there will be a ban on Americans to my particular site because of its proximity to Chechnya (like a few kilometers away). So now I have a new site. This site is not really a new site, since it is Borjomi (I wasn't stating actually places before because I thought we weren't supposed to, but it seems everyones doing it... so why not). Borjomi! A very awesome site, and I'm pretty excited and happy to stay here, since I've enjoyed it here. On the other hand, I was also excited to go ride the horses up on the steppes of Tusheti. Oh well, I think there are horses here as well. I'll still be doing the same thing, just for the Borjomi National Park, which is actually a more popular park, but a different kind of park. Tusheti was more for the adventurous and brave, Borjomi is a lovely park, but a different kind of park. So, still a park ranger, just in another park.

Me and my cluster successfully hosted an American Supra at my place a few weeks ago. I made some crepes for the supra, and since then, my host family has always asked for more. So I've been making lots of batches of crepes, and I'm becoming quite the expert at crepe-making. I'll like to thank my friend Teddy for the recipe (sans vanilla extract, which I can't find). Tomorrow me and my cluster are going to have another American Supra, where I'll attempt making fried rice. Yep, crepes and fried rice are American food I guess...

2 weeks left till the end of PST. Then swearing in and off to... well... down the street? Not really, but its really close. Now, I just gotta meet my new host family. Looking forward to that.

The TV I watched USA draw with England on. These are the TV's we have in Georgia. Even on these small TV's Italy still flops and look like wusses.

This guy was outrageous. We did shots of wine from that same thing on his finger. Death Supra... gotta love it.

Drinking from the horn... not just once.

Picture from my many Tbilisi trips.

Picture I stole from Sean's blog. My first crepes, they have turned out better since, but these were also delicious.

I'm a Ranger, a Park Ranger...

So today was site announcements. I'm just going to write a little about that since I'm not sure how much we can describe right now. Let's just say the west side of Georgia is the less hot, less cold side, next to the black sea and the beaches and turkey... and the east side is the hot, cold side with all the good wine. 27 volunteers got sites in the west (with a few on the beach probably) and I got one of the three in the east. I'll be working for a national park doing eco-tourism and business development (I think). The park is very beautiful and it looks sorta like new zealand, with plush landscapes, glaciers, tall mountains, and lots and lots of nature. Needless to say this is going to be a big departure from my life in LA. One good thing I heard about my future site is that it has a very nice toilet, which in Georgia is a very big deal if you haven't figured that out by now. I think I could tolerate the extreme weather just for that alone. You know you're in a developing country when you visit resturants or nice places so you can use their toilets and you count the hours/days till you can (especially since recently my house didn't have running water for 5 days and the electricity shut off for a day -- damn random storms!).

A week ago, we had our Job Shadowing trips. These trips were to let us experience what the previous year's volunteer (who are entering their 2nd year of service) do and how they live. I got lucky and got Johnny, a guy who works at a winery! I drank a lot of wine, and had a lot of fun. But it was sooo hot, I'm glad I shaved my head or it would've been unbearable. Oh, did I mention that this area is in the same area my new permament site is going to be? We also had a picnic where we barbecued tons of meat (barbecuing in Georgia is making a fire, putting meat on sticks, and cooking them over the fire... it was good!), played beerpong, and had a lot of general merriment.

We're doing site visits next week, which we get a first glance at our new sites and our new organizations we're going to work at. I'm very excited. I think I might be riding a horse even! If I get a park ranger uniform and a horse, I'm going to be very happy. Although I doubt it, since I'm mainly doing business development and developing eco-tourism in this place. For those who know me, I like to complain when I hike. I think I'll be complaining a lot soon. Fun times in Georgia! This is like the quintessential Peace Corps experience.

Stalin's favorite wine... it's pretty good actually.

Friends standing on a statue of Ilia who is a very big deal in Georgia. Also, I think we saw Russia from this statue on a hill... I'm like Sarah Palin!

Wine tasting was good... got kinda buzzed, didn't want to spit anything out.

"Special Reserve" wine, which we tasted, and it was delicious!

I should've asked for a case... or put a few in my bag...

Park I'm going to be developing Eco-tourism in... beautiful.