Coming home!

But not for a while still.....

Cuttino and I have booked our tickets home. After I finish here (sometime before September 21) we will be traveling with our friend Tighe all over the world. We will be back in Detroit on Monday, November 24th at 8pm. So mark your calendars!

Our rough idea for the trip (if you know people who want to host three friendly ex-Peace corps volunteers in these countries, let me know!)

Jordan--Israel (with my parents)--Egypt--maybe Lebanon--Syria--Turkey--Georgia (for Mo's wedding!)--Iran--Kyrgzystan--Uzbekistan--Tajikistan--back to Kyrgyzstan--China.

Miss you all!

The New Playground!!!

before

And the best news of all, I have all of the money I need for the playground. I can finally stop begging for money!

We have bought and installed the playground equipment. The first day the kids played on it was so much fun, they were so excited and happy.

after

We will be buying a cover for the playground, so the kids can play in the shade (right now it’s too hot to stay out there for very long at a time) and some flowers and trees to make a garden on the other half of the playground. We also need to put sand under all of the equipment and paint murals on the walls. But we are getting there.

Thank you so much to everyone who donated money!!!!

Oma's visit to Jordan

A couple of weeks ago, my grandmother came to visit me in Jordan. Everyone in Jordan was very very impressed that she came, and when I told people she was my grandma (everyone thought she was my mother) they were amazed.

She came to work with me every day and played with my kids. My six year old was especially bad for the whole week and tried to spit on my grandma whenever possible. Good things for her, she is adorable and Oma fell in love with her anyway.

We also went to Petra and rode camels, floated in the Dead Sea, covered ourselves in mud, and were force fed delicious meals by eight thousand families in the village.

We took a field trip with the older girls up to the Karak castle. It was fun to get to see the castle with my students (who had never seen it before).

Spring Breakers come to Jordan

In March I hosted a spring break trip from LCM (Lutheran Campus Ministry at UNC) I had six UNC students, and Cuttino come and work at my center for a week. They did activities for my kids during the morning and we painted murals at the boy’s school in the afternoons. The picture is all of us in front of the Jordanian flag that we painted. We also went on trips to Petra (the picture is the group standing on top of the urn of the monastery), little Petra, and Aqaba (picture of everyone in Aqaba) with the students. It was really nice to have Cuttino in Rajef, and to share with him what I do every day.

We ended the week going to the biblical sites in Jordan (the Baptism site, Mukkawir, where John the Baptist was beheaded, and Mt. Nebo where Moses died).

Dad and Loree's visit

My dad and stepmom Loree came to visit for a few days in February. For fun, we took the kids from my center to Petra for the day. The day started off with intense fog, so thick that driving was difficult. Luckily the weather cleared up for our day of hiking. When we finally got up to the monastery (a very long hike for my kids and co-teachers) the sky opened up and we got a rain/hail/thunder/lightening storm. We waited until it cleared a little bit and hiked back through the waterfalls covering all of the paths. Even though we were all soaked by the bottom, the kids loved it.

Disability Awareness Camp

I helped run a four day camp on Disability Awareness for teenagers in Jordan. I had worked with three other volunteers for several months to plan the curriculum, and we used some material from the workshops run in Michigan.

I brought three deaf students to participate in the camp with the other teenagers from all over Jordan. I was a little nervous because they were the only deaf students participating, but it went very well. Mohammed (the only boy I brought) was quickly absorbed into the group of boys, and didn’t emerge again until the end of the camp.

The kids spent three days doing awareness activities (for visual, hearing/speech, physical and learning disabilities)

On the fourth day of the camp, we brought down kids from my center and a friend’s center for the teenagers to do activities with. The kids from my center had a wonderful time and I was very proud of the teenager's activities and interactions with the students.

Visit to Georgia

I spent two weeks in opposite land, visiting my fiance Cuttino in Georgia. It seemed like most things about his country were opposite to mine. However, some things were the same; the lack of heat in buildings, crazy bus stops, and excessive hospitality.

One evening out with a host family included ten vodka toasts, to topics such as our upcoming marriage, love, friendship, Georgia, parents, Gori (where he lives) Stalin, and the kicker was the last one that somehow included God, Gori, the church, Stalin and despotism, all rolled into one big toast. Stalin is important in Gori because it is his birth place. Hence the Stalin statue. I was even asked to make a toast and I talked about the amazing hospitality of Georgia. It went over well.

I think I managed to eat khachapuri (sp?) every day, which is an amazing cheese bread. In Batumi they put a huge chunk of butter and an egg in it. Heart attack on a plate, delicious!

Also while in Georgia, I went to work with Cuttino, which was a lot of fun. He works for an amazing NGO which helps IDPs (like refugees, but still inside their own country) and street children. I did three workshops for his teachers about special education and individualizing education for all students.

I’m looking forward to going back to Georgia after COS for Cuttino’s friend’s wedding in September. I’m sure there will be a lot more toasting!

Christmas

I spent Christmas shopping for baby clothes and towels in Aqaba with my co-teachers. (their children, not mine!) This included about 9 hours of walking through eight billion stores all selling the same cheap garbage. I kept reminding myself that someday I will look back on this day and laugh. My teachers bought me a beautiful matching blue sweat-suit, which I then wore every night for three weeks.