Mokle List.

The Sucky:

• Rainy weather makes our water yellow.  Good thing we have those handy-dandy PC issued filters!
• Rainy weather also makes for less-than-ideal trips to the toilet in the middle of the night in a path that falls right underneath the edge of the roof and ends in a mud patch.
• Rainy weather also makes me want to feel sorry for myself, (more than usual).
• 2 Georgians now have said my Georgian isn't good enough.  Also, apothecary lady when I went to get Mono cards for Internet told me I need to start an English club so her son can go, and proceeded to yell at him for not studying before I could escape.
• Trying to reassure my counterpart she's not a bad mom because she works hard and doesn't have a lot of time for her son.  She is the bomb.  And I don't mean the ones brought to mind by a certain TV station who cried "war with Russia."

The Good:

• My host mom, telling me my Georgian is understandable and that I don't need to work on it because I won't need it after I leave.  Which will be a good and bad time for me, and not really a good time at all for the fam because I'm not annoying.
• Hair cuts that make me feel cute.  All for the low low price of conversation and a gift of tights given to me for women's day by my secondary counterpart (the one who worked with "Lizzy" from Montana [read:not too keen on the newcomer who is notlyssa]), size large (for people 60-80 kilos, or something ridiculous like that).
• A new ring, that I don't need.  Georgian people don't understand the concept of "I want it, but I don't need it."  Thus, when the ring lady comes a knockin', Cara and I yield to temptation to buy ourselves the first things we've bought ourselves in a long time.
• Successful journey to Tsinandali, complete with marshutka "layover" in the middle of nowhere.  Woot!
• Nettles are delicious vittles.  Cluny the Scourge adds his seal of approval.
• Also, a neighbor gave me a pear when I was walking home the other day.  Because he could.  It was delicious.
• Today, I used the fam's old Singer and a pair of the host bro's old jeans and reconstructed the awesome denim skirt that I burned a hole in the butt in out of distractedness (and putting it on a heater to dry.  Oops.).  SEW GOOD!

The Usual in Georgia:

• Breaking resolutions to train for the 2016 Notrunning Team.  My left leg HURTS LIKE AN EMPTY BOX OF CHOCOLATES.
• Study time with host fam consists of a lot of impatience on the part of the kids with the cousin, who learns at a slower pace than they do.  But the host bro reprimanded the sis for laughing, keeping things back on track.  *proud of subtle signs of maturity*

And, it's probably about time I explained my blog's name.  The guys in the family are known as "Kwavebi" = "ravens" or "crows" (not sure), because they're dark skinned with raven hair.  My official last name, as host unc informs me, is Schmid-Mosulishvili.  Thus, I'm a Kwavi, too.  One with significantly different plumage than the rest of the family.  (Tetri = white.)  Tetri Kwavi.

Tan da tan. Poco a poco. Little by little.

It's funny that there's a phrase in three languages which represent many, vastly different cultures that describes the same way work gets done.

Then again, maybe not.

So, I'm working with my counterpart to design a tech training in the village.  We need a building, computers, a teacher, and students.  We need 25% community contribution, whether it be money or in kind.


Notwithstanding the fact that the proposal for the SPA grant we're counting on to fund the project is due in like a week, there is much work that remains to be done with the planning stage.  Realistically, my counterpart and I should probably go through project design and management training, and we should have more people on board for this on the planning level.  But my CP is kickass, and although she's got German language exams in July that she's freaking out about, as well as private students every day, housework and a 4-year-old and a husband to take care of and maintain a relationship with, not to mention that thing called school that we actually plan lessons for every day--all this aside, she REALLY wants to work on this project.  I think, though, since she's got about as much experience as I do working on things like this, it'll be pretty difficult.  The director knows what he's doing--he's even got what I think is the SPA handbook from former volunteers.  He drew up a budget and talked to people for the space.  He found a computer literate guy and found a different teacher when the guy who owns the computer building (who's in the regional gov't) told him that the first guy was in the opposition party and no one from the community would take lessons from that guy.

(Isn't work in a developing country with highly dynamic political stances fun?)

Yet, still, I'm worried about the sustainability of the project.  Will this last after 3 months?  How will we pay the bills? the bills be paid.. BY the community?  When I'm gone?

Will the computer lab even last that long?



Changing the subject completely, why is everyone so concerned with my eating habits and marriage status?  SERIOUSLY.
My grandma called me a "bad girl" yesterday because I don't eat meat.  I really wasn't expecting it from this family.  But she still wants me to eat meat and is SOOO concerned that I don't.  I just want to get a book on healthy eating and sit her down and make her read every bit of it.  Maybe then we won't have scrambled eggs that float in an ocean of oil in the frying pan and sit in a wading pool of oil in the serving dish.  Miirtviet.  Gemrielia.

But two other women now, on separate occasions, in separate locations, have told me that I have chubby cheeks now and it looks good on me.  Thanks.  Yeah, stress eating and lack of desire to leave the petchi room will do that to ya.  And comments like this make me feel even better about myself.

And two men have recently, on separate occasions, told me I need to get married.  (One being my host uncle/brother-in-law [I'm going through a host generational identity crisis], the other being his cousin and my counterpart's husband.)  Seriously.  Seriously.  There is just not enough seriousness in this computer to express how serious I am about loathing conversation on this subject.

I've been spending quite a bit of time thinking/worrying about my future and present lately.  I know that I want:
-a warm bathroom with a heated toilet seat, fuzzy toilet seat cover/around the toilet carpet, and maybe a Hawaii/volcanoes of the world theme.
-a space where I can do exercise that's not rocky and uncomfortable and freezing and lacks people that stare at you EVERY DAY like you're an extraterrestrial traveler.
-peanut butter, raisins, and celery.  Lots of it.
-to live with people that I don't feel guilty about not spending all my waking moments with.
-to read more and waste less time online (whoops).
-morning showers.  Warm ones.  Daily.  Or at LEAST every other.

Also, I've noticed a few things that really suck every last drop of hope out of your body.
-Turkish toilets in the winter.
-Going to school, seeing the petchi lit in the bathroom, being excited ALL DAY about finally taking a shower after 5 days of not bathing, but by the time you actually get into the bathroom at night, the water is freezing.
-flicking a glob of frozen toothpaste in your eye.


Some good things?
-The mountains I live by are still really beautiful.  Not that I appreciate them enough, but...
-The people I live with are still good people.  Not that there's not ups and downs, but...
-The people I work with are still good people.  Even though there's BIG DRAMA going down about the English library being locked all day, every day.  I hold it's a power struggle; the older volunteer wants to hold onto the responsibility and the power of The Key.  Her excuse for not having it open is that we'll "lose" books.  And they're doing a lot of good to everyone being locked in the cabinet for all eternity, aren't they?  But I digress.  This is Good Thing time.
-I got some new music to listen to and expand my horizons!  Woot!

Yeah, that's all I got.  Off to do more tsutsunebda. (that's whining, for all you English speakers.)

P.S. I got this e-mail that says, "We will be contact you to set up an interview for the FLEX position."

Just because it was on the news..

So, I know there are more important things that have been on the news, like John Makkaini being here for like a day, but this was on yesterday.  Apparently Medvedev's secretary of something got pretty mad at the Ukraine station that aired this.

So I decided to look it up and found it quite amusing.  As did my host mom.  Hope you do, too.

Then, I saw this linked and couldn't resist.  It made me smile and lift an eyebrow.