No Love for the Georgian Bromance

A running joke among my volunteer friends and I is that my host family thinks I am a man. I personally think it is hilarious, that we have come to this conclusion and for the most part they do have a point. My host father is quite keen on having me drink and for the first week everyday he would offer me different kind of alcohol, which I would also deflect with answers like that beer makes me vomit. I’m never a hundred percent successful at this. Last week I ended up having beers with my host dad and the region’s police chief. I hate to say it, but I was almost out drinking both of them, but then again they were were in a heated debate over some topic in Georgian so all I had to do was politely sip beer out of my “I <3 Georgia” mug, that my host parents bought for me in Tbilisi. (I cannot wait to take this bad boy with me back to America and use it for the Keurig machine at Gap.) The other night I also got in on the boys drinking action when we were having a supra to celebrate to delivery of about 5,000kg of fertilizer. I will admit it is fun for me to kick it with the village men, chugging wine, eating great food, toasting to everything, and trying to get me married off. Yes, that’s right I have a potential husband lined up. He seemed more interested in who ever was texting him, probably his secret girlfriend, then me. I am also pleased to report that I did not throw up after drinking all that wine, which again makes me a man. 

You see women here aren’t suppose to be drunk in public. A lot don’t seem to drink at all because of this, especially in the village. I have Georgian female friends who have been away to university and have lived a life away from their families and then after to come back and live with them. I had a friend tell me I like to drink a little and dance, but my brothers don’t like when I do that, so I don’t in front of them. If my older brother ever told me that I shouldn’t drink, I’m talking social amounts not black out amounts, I would tell him to go to hell. When I in my house my host mother is always hovering around to make sure that I don’t look too bad off or that the men aren’t too rowdy. If anything like this happens she pulls me out. If she thinking I am drinking too much she will try to cut me off, and normally my host dad shooters her down I am sure he says to her, “Just let her drink, she’s still in control. She is my American son I have never had. I mean half her head is shaved, so clearly she’s not a Georgian woman, there for she must be a man!” 

They have also tried to take me hunting for little birds with them. It’s quite a popular man activity here. They have this big riffle looking gun that shoots pellets. On the weekends they are always doing target practice, if they don’t have something to do like make Cha Cha. I honestly haven’t seen them kill a bird yet and I kind of want to take them up on the offer to go hunting and kill something so I can one up them. My host dad thought I didn’t want to shoot a gun and that is why I didn’t want go hunting. I really didn’t feel like being laughed at for doing something wrong again. I ended up pulling out my pictures of target practice from Ukraine. They were super impressed, it was either my sweet hat or the fact that I had l told them that I killed ten Russian spies with a sniper riffle, you decide. 

Ukrainian Rebel

They have also been really interested if I can drive or not. I explained to them that I have a license and my own car back home. There minds were f*ing blown. I drive and have my own car? They told me I could take the BMW for a spin, but it’s not an automatic, however the Mercedes SUV is. Again I think it was my host mother who ruined my fun and informed them that I could not drive cars when I am here. The men then had the bright idea that I can drive the tractor this spring. (Because yes boys, that is not a motorized vehicle, which again I am pretty sure that I cannot drive here. I will however pose for a photo op later on.) Many women here don’t drive, either because they don’t have a license, or because the men here just drive too crazy. They kind of have made up their own rules that they just seem to know, and I hate to say it, but I’ve heard that women driving causes a lot of accidents here because they fallow the proper road rules, not bro ones.

There are a lot of gender specific rolls here in Georgia and I am not completely against them. It is a very traditional society and awesome if the men want to be out in the fields growing the food that the women are going to cook in the kitchens. The issue I have is the double standards. We have a female friend of the family that comes over at least a few times a week, always brings some kind of food, and sits socializing with us, and oh smoking cigarettes. (Women here don’t smoke cigarettes in public incase you haven’t caught on yet.) She keeps a pack hidden in our kitchen and stays around for an hour or so and smokes a few. I do not know how her husband doesn’t know or better yet   why she should have to hide it. I understand that it is not the best habit to have, but I don’t think it spouses should be hiding things like that, I mean she goes off to a friends house so she can light up? I know she’s not the only one to be doing something like this. We were told during orientation to be aware that in the villages smoking women would hide it. I mean come on, people know you are doing these things, why not just do it in public if they all know? I’ve been tempted to walk down my village smoking a butt on my way home from school, with my bright red lipstick on and headphones in, just to see people’s reactions, but I am a teacher and I don’t need my students thinking this is good behavior. I just want to do it in spite so badly some days. The men can’t really judge, because most of them smoke and the village women already know that a select group smokes and they don’t beat them with sticks. Do it in public already! Stop hiding! 

The thing that I think pissed me off the most since being here was being at a supra with a friend and there were probably twenty or so people at it. The wife of the house hold that it was being held at was rushing around most of the time while we were eating, making sure that there was enough food, never really having time to sit down herself and enjoy the party. The table was split men on one half and women on the other. This seems quite common and I’m not horribly against it. The women can talk about women things like mommy and me yoga and guys can talk about the newest Apple product, oh shit sorry this is Georgia, those things don’t exist here. (Kind of off topic but I told my sixth grade boys how much I paid for my MacBook and they about shit their pants the other day.) 

The supra went on for hours and it was a school night and I wanted to get home and go to sleep. It was close to 10:30pm and the guys kept drinking more and more, toasting away. They were making a racket and having a jolly time. I looked over at my half of the room and it was full of a bunch of the most tired, pissed off looking women I had ever seen. One of the wives was even pregnant and the guys were completely ignoring the fact that we were beyond over it. None of us had drank, which was probably a good thing in my case, because if I had, and known enough Georgian to get my point across I would have shouted at them for being so fucken rude and irresponsible. They are suppose to take care of their wives, keep them happy and protected, yet they were sitting there drinking more and then driving home at least somewhat intoxicated. They more then had their allotted amount of fun. I mean this supra started around 5pm and I didn’t get driven home until well after 11:30pm and that was only because my friend was able to use the excuse that I was an American guest who had to teach the next morning. If I was a Georgian woman, forget it. I would probably still be there. Unacceptable in my eyes. I have grown up around very strong women, who have taught me to stand up for myself and I know that if my dad ever tried to pull crap like, especially if my mother was pregnant, he better enjoy the couch, because he was going to be sleeping there. It is so hard at times to sit in a country where women don’t always have a voice, granted mine is a rather loud, strong one. I would never stand for a spouse that acted like a big man-boy. 

After this particular supra, I was on the phone with one of my friends and I said, “I’m pretty sure this year I am going to get into more cars with drunk drivers then I had in my whole life.” I don’t really make it a habit, to be driven around by drunks in the States, but it has happened a few times, when people were a little buzzed. I can probably count the times on one hand, if I really sat down and thought about it, like I said it’s not a habit I am into. Here however, when someone gets pulled over the first thing they do is breathalize you, wether or not you seem drunk. This happened on one of my marshooka rides and man was the driver pissed. That says something about a country when they check alcohol content in the middle of the day. My friend asked why I didn’t refuse to get into the car of someone who had been drinking. I told her I didn’t want to cause a scene. He also didn’t appear to be drunk. I know that is not an excuse and people reading this right now are thinking that I am in fact stupid as shit and that I make poor choices. I except this, however to it is a really hard situation if the driver doesn’t look clearly intoxicated and his family members are getting in the car. You will seriously offend someone by questioning their ability to drive and you will shame them, which is taken very seriously here. It’s one of those damned if you do and damned if you don’t things. I feel every volunteer is going to or has at some point and not just once but multiple times had to deal with this. (I might add the last time I left my village was over almost two weeks ago so I am not getting driven around that much to start with.) Also if the police just assume the drivers they pull over are drunk, even if your drive is sober, the one next to you on the road may not be. 

Things like these make me wonder why I am here sometimes. I shake my head and think, “I just don’t know any more.” This weekend I am most likely going to try to spend at another volunteer’s place, which he has his own mini-apartment. I don’t know how to exactly explain to my host family that I will spending a night sleeping over at a guy’s house without them freaking out and thinking I’m a whore. (Women in Georgia don’t have sex unless they are married and if you are sleeping at a guy’s house you are sleeping in the same bed as him and there is penetration. There is also no such thing as a guy and a girl being friends here.) Nope, it’s more like a sleep over with two ex-pats who want to be able to speak fluent English to someone in person, while drinking a little, making fun of this crazy situation so they don’t loose their minds and then passing out in separate beds in different rooms. I am just waiting for the shit to hit the fan with this one. It makes me miss America and my parents who accept that I have friendships with guys and I’m not sleeping with them, but then again I think they suspect that the majority of them are gay. (We don’t have gay people in Georgia.)

I just want to slam my head against a hard object and go, what the hell are you people thinking? There are so many things I don’t understand here and it bothers me a lot. It’s just so backwards, like the fact that my host father encourages me to drink so much and then the next morning asks why I was drunk last night and why I am hung over this morning. I don’t know. I guess it’s because I am in fact not a Georgian man? 

Emily Teacher!!!!

This morning I woke up in a slightly bad mood, that most likely steamed from me getting woken up from a deep sleep by my alarm clock at 8am. I got out of bed, had breakfast and made sure to have my morning coffee hoping that at some point my mood would clear.

On my walk to school I listened to Brand New and an odd thick fog had settled in our village over night, I could only see a few feet meters in front of me at a time. It added to my mood and made everything seem a little creepy. I am sure the American English teacher, living in a village abroad getting attacked out of no where on her way to school would be a great film or maybe something with ghosts. I do enjoy a good ghost story.

Once I got to school I made my way to the teachers room and sat by the wood stove with the other teachers and warmed myself before going to class in grade four. One of my unofficial favorite students, seemed completely unfazed by my bad mood. Academically speaking she isn’t one of the best students, but she does give me a card about once a week telling me how much she loves me, in Georgian of course. She never wants to sit down and always has to be doing something that she shouldn’t be. She doesn’t have books, because she will destroy them I’ve been told, so she always borrows mine. I personally think she is super smart, but doesn’t apply herself. (I am positive my mother is reading this right now and thinking Hmmm, now who does that sound like Emily?) She has a desk right next to mine in class and is always jabbering along to me in Georgian which makes me laugh, because I would think by now she would know that I have next to no idea what she is saying. Today she had bread in her desk and would eat some when she thought I wasn’t looking and when I would catch her she would just give me an innocent smile mid-chew and make me smile, even though I was trying to look stern. (Students aren’t suppose to eat in class in Georgia.) By the end of the class my mood was much better.

We had grade three next and I went to go set my bag in there, and I took out my camera and headed outside to go take some photos. It was too cold and not that many students were around so I went back into my classroom. I went to go sit down at the teachers desk and wait for my co-teacher to come in after the break and I tried to photograph some of the students without them seeing me. I failed and they noticed right away, but they were over joyed to have my attention. This grade seriously is great. I just love everything about them. There is only one girl in the class, which I feel makes the boys try more because they know that they won’t be out shined by a bunch of girls, so they have a chance to impress the teacher. I just want to take all of them home with me and photograph an ad campaign for Gap Kids or something. They are a bunch of goofballs.

My last lesson of the day was in grade two. Again these kids just adore me. I even had coffee this past weekend at one of the their houses after their grandmother kidnapped me on one of my walks. There is one girl who just smiles at me for the whole lesson, every time. Today in class they were working in their workbooks, coloring so I took out my camera. I wish I could say that I was more sly, but again it was an epic fail. (I could never be a spy.) They too were over joyed to have me taking photos of them and even asked for a class photo which I indulged them in. After all it was just a small break from coloring. 

After that lesson I started to walk home and my certain unofficial favorite student from grade four started walking next to me. I kept my pace to match hers as we walked in silence, while she pulled a handful of sunflower seeds from her pocket and started eating them. The sun had come out during school and she would stop at the edge of a puddle and put her foot on the ice to break it. Having my trusty Bean boots on, I just stepped in the middle of a puddle and broke it with a huge cracking sound and then the splash of my foot hitting the water. She enjoyed this quite a bit, I am going to assume it is because no adult here just steps in puddles making huge messes. I always laughed at for having snow and mud cover my boots. They aren’t nice fashion boots, they are utilitarian so its fine. We made sure to crack every puddle between school and my house. When we reached my house she said goodbye and watched to make sure that I made it in ok, which is hilarious that ten year is making sure that everything is fine with me. I really should be the one walking her home.

I went up to my room and it being a Wednesday meant that I got to indulge in Glee. It is my 43 minuets, of musical bliss every week. I prefer to watch it in private, because most of the time I turn into a fourteen year old girl, this week was no exception. I think I almost cried at one point I was so full of emotion. I need a life.

After I went down to our kitchen and had lunch and did other random things. Making an attempt to connect and share culture with my family I let them in on my Glee addiction, by showing it to my fourteen-year old host brother. He knows next to no English, but my host mom said that he had to sit in watch it with me to learn English. I felt a little bad about having him be forced, but he did laugh at a few parts and I only made him watch half of it. I’m going to keep showing it to him every week, I’m sure if I can find it with Russian subtitles he would be completely into it. I know I am forcing things on him, but I am his older sister right now for all intents and purposes so I am going to treat him, like my little brother in the States. You are going to watch Glee and like it damn it and if you don’t I’m telling mom! 

-Also here are some photos from my first grade class that I didn't really have a blog for:

There's A Wocket In My Pocket

On the last day of January I was very excited when my texts from the bank came saying that I had been paid. I am sure my co-teachers were just as excited when they were informed that they had also been paid. The teachers I work with make about $100 a month, yes that is not a typo I meant to write $100 a month. There was one small issue, some of the teachers at my school had been over paid by about $50, from what I gather. I know that may not seem like a lot, but think of what you make a month (unless you are a bum, that doesn’t have a job) and imagine half of that is in your bank account randomly. 

The teachers got paid on February 1st, and by the 2nd someone had realized that the teachers had been over paid. This would not have been an issue if some of the teachers had not already with withdrawn the money, spent it, and now the bank wanted it back. Most people in this country live on very little money, so coming up with this extra $50 that was already spent on things that were necessary to live, naturally caused panic and a few pissed off teachers. I do not blame the teachers at all for being upset. Whoever was in charge of their pay should have known better then to make this mistake, granted I don’t know the whole story, but this is also Georgia so issues like this always seem come up in one form or another. It would be like the average American being asked to come up with between $500-$1,000 oh a day’s notice.

My English co-teacher was one of the teachers who had to go to the bank and deal with the money matters, along with her sister who teacher history at my school. She asked me if I wanted to go to Lagodekhi (the nearest town which is about 15 or 20 minuets by car) that afternoon after school with her, her husband, daughter, and sister. I am course always up for a trip into town, even if it did mean just going to the bank.

After my lessons for the day ended I went home to drop my school bag off and grab my camera. When I came back to school some of the students in fifth form where out playing in the snow. I think it was gym for them. I stood there for a bit taking photos. I then went up and collected my teachers and we made our way through the snowball fights to my co-teacher’s car. Her daughter was super excited to meet me, which naturally meant when I got in the car and said hello she was shy and would not look at me. Fare enough, I’m a big scary American. I understand. 

We drove into town and I was told that if might take a while at the bank so I could go off on my own if I wanted to. I spent my time walking into random markets and ended up buying some clementines and pastries. It had snowed earlier in the day, so walking on the street was very much a game of slipping and sliding over the slightly hilly town. I made my way back to the car and we pilled in and went off to get some food.

We went to three different restaurants and they were all busy and had about an hour wait and we wanted food then. In the mean time someone had called family that lived in the town and they said that they would be more then happy to have us. I was slightly hesitant, because all I could think was, Oh god I am in for another supra, I don’t know if I can handle this. I also have that fear of meeting new people. 

We were greeted by a lovely older woman, two young girls, and a male that was most likely in his thirties. They got to work cooking khinkali, meat filled dumpling like things. Other food was brought out as well and my co-teacher is a vegetarian so I was pleased to see a healthy representation of fruit and vegetables. 

When everything was being prepared some of us went upstairs to get the traditional drinking horns. They were quite impressive, especially when put on someone’s head so they look like a creature out of a Dr. Seuss book. The sun had also come out and made everything look like a winter wonder land.

Eventually we did get on to eating after being hungry all afternoon. I was pleasantly surprised to find out that my co-teachers had a rather liberal attitude toward female drinking (perhaps it was those few years they had spent living in Ukraine when they were young?) and I was offered vodka and wine. I stuck to the wine and I can’t not even begin to guess at how many glasses I drank, it was also almost two weeks ago now. We toasted to everything; God, family, dead loved ones, American and Georgia, children (I dedicated that toast to my students), and I think there was even a toast to me being the most amazing American ever or something along those lines. 

During all that drinking, there was just as much eating going on and I almost died. I sprinkled some pepper on some of my khinkali and you see when you are eating these you have to bite in and suck out the juice at the same time. I accidentally inhaled some of the pepper that was still dry and had a small coughing fit as everyone watched. I tried to assure them that I was fine, which worked well until about three seconds later when I took another bite and inhaled even more pepper and started coughing even more. I also had gotten some in my right eye, so it started watering uncontrollable. I was so embarrassed and was ushered into another room to die in peace, or get the pepper out of my eye and lungs. You pick.

When I came back no one laughed too hard and we continued to eat and drink some more. I banned myself from pepper. Drinking horns were brought out. These bad boys were wooden and could hold about two glasses. The men wanted to see the American try to attempt this and I knew that sooner or later in my year here I would have to give these a go and then seemed like as good as time or any. I knew my co-teacher’s family would not make fun of me too much for failing, that is if I did fail. The men went first and then I had my turn. I didn’t drink it all in one chug, but I got it down and felt like I had accomplished something in my life. (Got to love thinking you rule the world when you are drunk.) I then ate some more pepper free food to off set all the wine.

We soon wrapped up our small supra, which as much as I enjoyed it, at that point in time I knew I was going to enjoy getting home to my bed just as much. Before we got back into the car they made sure that they got one parting photo with me, which I honestly think is amazing. Looking at it, reminds me of Christmas card pictures with my brothers, if both my brothers were older then me and more Georgian. Looking at it almost even makes me miss my American brothers and Maine... almost.

Maybe Gaining Weight Isn't So Bad After All...

Today I was sitting at a Georgian restaurant, having lunch with a fellow volunteer and during our conversation I brought up how my host family put me on their industrial electric scale used for making Cha Cha (Georgian homemade hard alcohol, that I find the need to write with capital letters) and weighed me the other day. He was very confused as how I could even let this happen in the first place and I explained that it had been a very silly morning full of giggles. My host dad had started it off by saying that my host brother’s backpack was too heavy and decided to see just how much it weighed. He went outside and got the scale out. The backpack came in at a whopping 6.2kg and I laughed, thinking that my bag always was so much heavier in school. Then my host dad got on the scale to see how much he weighed, then my host mom. Naturally it was my turn next. I said no at first, but I was kind of curious to see how much I had gained in the time I have been over seas. Well I got my answer and my host family got a laugh. Seriously they laughed. I on the other hand ran up to my room to get a calculator to multiply my weight in kilos, by 2.2 so I could get it in pounds. I gasped a little when I realized that I had gained about 10lbs. I am not stupid. I knew Ukraine did nothing to help me out, nights spent drinking copious amounts of vodka and apple juice, mornings sleeping off a hangover and afternoons and evenings eating hearty Eastern European food with chocolate sprinkled in whenever I felt the need. The only exercise I had on a regular basis was from bar to bar, or grocery shopping. (Honestly I do not mind the extra weight at all. I had so much fun in Ukraine. Yes it was worth it.) 

Then Georgia has not helped the weight gain. There are three food groups here this time of year: bread, cheese, and meat. Oh I bet that sounds great doesn’t it? I am not kidding at all here. My daily weekday (weekends are always a toss up) food breaks down like this: breakfast is normally eggs that have been cooked with large amounts of sunflower oil, bread to soak up the oil, and cheese. Meat is also thrown in two or three times a week. Lunch is soup of some sort, that is eaten with bread always in one of your hands. If you do not eat with the bread in your hand you are questioned and given looks. Dinner is normally meat, potatoes, bread, and some other random thing like maybe picked cabbage. Coffee time happens once or twice a day and there is always cakes, biscuits, and chocolate. Fruit sometimes comes out after dinner. Add in a supra or two a week and I know exactly why wait gain is happening. On Monday I had 5 pieces of cake that day. It was people’s birthdays and you sometimes just cant say no. I also did not know at the time of eating the first pieces of cake at school that I would be going to a birthday supra that night or I would have tried to have eaten less.

Talk then turned to the fact that my male volunteer friend was perplexed as to why it seems like all the women gain weight and all of the men loose weight over here. (This does seem to be the norm. I know there are some exceptions. Lucky bitches.) He asked if we just eat all the time? When you are bored, do you just sit there thinking about how bored you are and how you should just eat to stay busy? I thought about it and concluded that, that cannot be the answer, besides some of the guys must fall into that trap too, besides I don’t think any of the girls I know really ate that much more then they do back in their homeland. Well, don’t hate me for saying this, but is it possible that girls are always on a diet or have some odd eating habit, then they get here and can’t keep it up or choose not to and let themselves go? Well, I thought, this does seem a little more probable. I mean I know a lot of people, guys and girls, who have let themselves go a bit since getting here, in one way or another. (Love not wearing make up everyday) Again this could not be the possible reason for the all around weight gain that split the genders.

Our conversation moved on to other things and naturally it came back to the topic of drinking. Georgians pride themselves on having the best wine, well as much as we would love to agree we can’t, because we don’t know. There are no wine snobs twirling glasses, smell the lush bouquets, swishing it around in their mouths and spitting it out. Oh no, here there is just chugging glass after glass on the weekends, that honestly for most of us, grossly enough, gives us the shits and makes us throw up. I don’t know who thought of it first, but we realized an important thing. Girls are not forced to drink here. We can get away with being too “delicate.” Guys cannot escape this fate (I just this moment thought of my father coming to see me in Georgia and going to a supra and being made to drink. This man never drinks in the States, except for stealing one of my PBRs ever few months. It would be hilarious for me to see. I’ve heard rumors about him being a Jack and Coke man back in the day.) Anyways guys here have to drink. In Georgia ‘no’ is a sarcastic yes. All of a sudden it clicked, the guys are made to drink, there for cleaning every single thing they have ever eaten out of them, they are literally shitting and vomiting the pounds away. Girls sometimes get to drink a little wine, but its not enough, often enough to make them turn Georgian bulimic. I would just like all of my fellow female volunteers to remember this the next time we want to kill a male volunteer for loosing weight or kiss him for that matter. He’s probably recently thrown up.

This Isn't Everything That You Are

*These pictures were taken on January 2nd, 2011 in Ukraine and the blog was written in late January in Georgia. The photos are meant more to evoke a feeling or mood rather then show information about my setting*

On January second I was suffering from a slight post holiday depression and woke up really, really angry. A feeling that I could not shake and might have been a slight carry over from the night before when I was over tired and all I want to do was enjoy my horrible hang over at home, but I was told to shower, because I kind of smelled. Brush my teeth, because my breath still reeked of alcohol from New Year’s Eve, and put on something other then a god damn, hoodie, jeans, and L.L. Bean slippers to show that I had some pride (Um hello, I was sporting Mainer pride clearly by my slippers) and go out to a going away party. I remember muttering that if I was in America I could have gone out like this. Yes I played the “if this was America” card with my roommate. He was right though. I was a horrible wreck that needed to be cleaned up to go to a going away party for a good friend, however that did not fix my mood.

The morning of the second I got up and showered before my roommate was up. By the time I was done he had woke and I stayed silent out of fear of an angry outburst. He could tell that I was upset, it was probably the way I was violently drying my hair with my head upside down so it would be done faster. I dressed in silence, cursing under my breath, when I realized that I had left my knit winter hat in Georgia, having only brought my fur Mad bomber hat. I was going to wear my hat so I didn’t have to do my hair, but now that was out of the question. My hair is currently divided into thirds. The two side parts are shaved completely and the midsection is left long. (I also have had it dyed this amazing bright orange- red color, that looks great with my complexion. The girls in the hair salon kept oooing, and awing over it after it was done, and I was like “Um you guys did it, but I guess I did pick out the awesome color.”) So with my hair being dried in such a way it kind of just fell everywhere and I ended up pulled it back into a high ponytail in frustration and was done with it. I threw on some clothes and packed my camera bag and started to put on my jacket.

My roommate finally asked what was wrong and in one rushed sentence in a slightly harsh tone I let out, “I just want to go out, get coffee to go, I would really like Starbucks right now, but that’s not going to happen, because I’m in Ukraine, take my to go coffee, get on a marshooka to who knows where, until I am in the middle of no where, take photos, and be completely alone, that is all I want right now.” He looked slightly startled and a little hurt. I said I was sorry and I knew that I had not been active enough in the passed few days and that can make me go a little crazy just sitting around. I promised that I would be better when I was done. 

He said it was ok and told me to have a good day, then the great coat debate begin. Something that pledged me the whole time I was in Ukraine. I brought 2 coats with me, a Gap moto jacket, that is mid weight and my heavy L.L. Bean Baxter State parker that I normally wear when it is around freezing. Everyone always wants me to wear the L.L. Bean one, because they think I am going to die from the cold and then I start throwing around my “I’m from Maine!” That day I explained that it wasn’t that cold out, I was going to wear my massive chunky cream wool scarf, it looks like a neck brace, and as soon as I got shooting I would warm up and start sweating if I worn the Bean’s coat. My roommate, smartly, knew not to fight with me. There was no point. We could either start a screaming match over a coat, that stubborn me would never give into or just let me freeze my ass off, if it really was that cold out and I couldn’t complain about it later.

I said goodbye and then booked it to the wannabe Starbucks. I went in and assessed the menu and confirmed that they indeed did not have “just coffee”. I asked for an Americano, in the largest paper cup that looked like a venti. The guy told me they don’t make it that big and pointed to a cup two sizes down that brought me to the size of about a tall. I muttered and said whatever and asked what kind of flavors they had to add to it, I went with the caramel trying to make it as much like as my Starbucks back home. I walked out of the coffee shop and took the first sip confirmed that it was indeed nothing like Starbucks. Epic fail. I jammed my headphones in and listened to Runaway by the Yeah Yeah Yeahs.

“I was feeling sad,

Can’t help looking back, 

Highways flew by, 

Run, runaway,

No sense of time.”

As I walked through the streets I caught a glimpse of myself in the reflection of a car window and I thought I looked some what like a model, or at least very European, with my hair pulled back, my face freshly scrubbed with only tinted chap stick, my high Euro scarf/ neck-brace (they are all the rage over here right now. I seriously wished I bought the one in the other color now too), my coffee in hand, and this odd look, that said “I mean fucken business. Get the hell out of my way, I am more important then you.” It startled me, but made me smile to myself at the same time since I was in such a bad mood. 

When I got to the marshooka stop, I stood there drinking my coffee and watching the chaos ensue, as they had just changed all the bus routs with the start of the new year, for a good twenty minuets. Number 38 pulled up and I got on, with a sneaking suspicion I knew where it has headed.

We wined our way through Lviv, seeing parts I had never seen before. I saw some rundown industrial type buildings that would have done nicely shooting, but I just needed out of the city. It had become claustrophobic and suffocating. I needed air. The buildings thinned and I knew we were headed out by a store Metro, that happens to be the way marshooka 84A use to go. (Look at my previous blog, Simply Happy Again, May 2011) I knew I would be ok once I got there. This marshooka happened to go straight at the roundabout, unlike 84A that turned right.  

I saw a cemetery in the distance and got off as we pulled to a stop at the side of the road in a village. I took off at a determined pace, pretending not to notice the dogs that barked at me as I walked pass the houses that they guarded. I crossed a large road and walked through wetlands soaking my boots and up a hill to the cemetery. I walked threw it and thought of how its was in a nice location by farm land, rolling hills, and woods, but it could still not hold a candle to the main cemetery in Lviv. I slipped and slide through the muddy lanes casually looking over the graves, but after a while they all blurred together. No one I knew was there and my own was also missing, so I moved down a hill away from there, to a valley and then back up another hill that was farm land. At this point in time I put my headphones in and started to listen to Snow Patrol’s new CD Fallen Empires. Again it was another great music choice for the day. I have loved Snow Patrol for over half a decade now, and had only heard one song from this album, Call Out In The Dark, before today. I do believe in fate and such and I feel that someone, call them God if you will, knew that I needed to hear this. (Seriously, this album is amazing. I don’t care how you get your hands on it, but just do it.) I needed a day to think over my past four weeks away and how I felt about situations and issues that I was having. One song that kind of put some stuff in perspective for me was “This Isn’t Everything You Are”. It is a song about loosing someone you love and letting people help you to move on and see that this one moment in your life is not all you are about, there is more to you then one relationship. I remember standing in the middle a field so muddy it was hard to pick up my boots as I walked, and just closing my eyes, breathing deeply, and thinking “I can do this.” Whatever “this” was, was more of a general feeling of being able to deal with everything in my life at that at that exact moment, as a small panic about the fact that I had moved half way around the world for a year had set in and the changing of relationships in my life for the good or the worst.

I reached into my pocket to get my phone to text my roommate that I was fine, and I was half way through writing a message and my phone rang. It was him checking up on me. (I swear he just knows sometimes.) He asked if everything was ok and where I was, then he asked about my mood. I said I was ok and I could be better or worse. He said that he wanted me in a better mood and didn’t like to see me like this. I went into a philosophical Emily rant about how could I know what true happiness is if I didn’t experience an occasional bout of sadness and anger? I like to store emotions, tie them up to memories and recall them at later times to change or stable my mood. It’s a coping skill that I find works quite well, especially when a smell is involved. Think about your favorite food that your mother or grandmother use to cook when you were a child, do you relax and feel a warm fuzzy feeling inside as your gut reaction? I am betting yes. It works like that for me some what. 

I then explained to him that I was truly fine, I just needed more time where I currently was, inhaling the dirt into my nasal passages, seeing what my camera lens wanted to show me, and listening to the advice my iPod was spewing. He again knew that there was no fighting with me and told me to take care and be safe after finding out ruffly where I was incase I never came back.

I walked in the fields, much slower then I normally would, taking in everything in the over cast day. Letting the wind hit my cheeks without flinching at the cold. I stopped and looked at the forest, thinking if I should go in or not and decided that I was much happier out in the open. I walked and came across some dead sunflowers and took some pictures for my mother. I always associate these flowers with her. 

I was coming closer to the houses that were being built and I felt calmer and called my roommate and asked him if he wanted to meet me at the grocery store out by my fields to pick up some food for the apartment. He agreed to and I knew that I had about an hour or so until I had to meet him. I went to inspect the house a little closer, but I was loosing motivation in photographing anything else that day. I just wanted to spend the time alone to think. I also used the outhouse. (See the Awwww Shit blog)

I walked along a field that seemed to stretch on and on, now having switched over to listening to Eddie Vedder and the sound track from Into The Wild, an old stand by for when I am feeling lost. The song “Guaranteed” was a perfect close to my day, because let’s face it, I am living in a small village in Georgia, where I am prone to spend my days teaching, reading, writing, taking photos, going for walks and spending a lot of time deep in thought.

On bended knee is no way to be free
Lifting up an empty cup, I ask silently
All my destinations will accept the one that's me
So I can breathe...

Circles they grow and they swallow people whole
Half their lives they say goodnight to wives they'll never know
A mind full of questions, and a teacher in my soul
And so it goes...

Don't come closer or I'll have to go
Holding me like gravity are places that pull
If ever there was someone to keep me at home
It would be you...

Everyone I come across, in cages they bought
They think of me and my wandering, but I'm never what they thought
I've got my indignation, but I'm pure in all my thoughts
I'm alive...

Wind in my hair, I feel part of everywhere
Underneath my being is a road that disappeared
Late at night I hear the trees, they're singing with the dead
Overhead...

Leave it to me as I find a way to be
Consider me a satellite, forever orbiting
I knew all the rules, but the rules did not know me
Guaranteed