After a couple more meetings with the School Director, she said that while there was some interest, those that really wanted to participate were from the villages and had to leave right after school. I then went to the other high school and she is interested and said Thursdays are good. After my vacation I will start a 6 week, changed format class. It will focus on how to create business and not just replicate them. I had a disturbing day today however. One of my former students, asked me yesterday if he could join my Outdoor Ambassadors. I said yes, drop by my office and I will give you some forms describing the program so you can inform your parents. He came in while I was not there picked up the papers, and also picked up Kozeta's wallet. After many phone calls with too many people involved, Kozeta found out his last name, where he lived, and 5 of us went to the poor 12 year old kids house. I don't think his parents know anything but he still was crying and had to deal with Kozeta and a few other angry co-workers. While I hope learned his lesson, I cannot let him join my OA group even if he wants to. My regular kids are the ones who tracked him down after about 30 minutes of calling, and I am sure they will not trust him, nor feel comfortable around him, nor let him play in any reindeer games.
To top it off, my director who has been very good/proud of the fact that so many of my kids feel comfortable in the office....have now banned all kids from the office.
All for now.
Tuesday, January 19, 2010
Wednesday, January 13, 2010
Wow, so it has been almost 2 months since my last post.
So last time I had mentioned my sore hips...This week I had an appointement with our Assistant medical officer...She took a bit more of a concern in my sore hips than the regular doctor and so we had a X-ray taken...$10.00...The medical assistant wants to meet personally in the office to discuss further the results..she mentioned something about a reduction of space in the joint area..More info next time.
Christmas, and New Years I spent out of Country. For Christmas I went to Prague with Rachel and Alex....They stayed at Rachels former host mom, when she lived here for a year and I stayed at a Youth Hostel. About half of the time I spent on my own and the other half with them until my phone credit went dead. Prague is incredible and worth the trip...we had good weather so the walking tours and roaming aimlessly was great. At night when I was not with Alex and Rachel, I did the Pub Crawls...5 hours of hanging out with a group of 15 (x-mas) and 40 another day, roaming the streets of prague and spending about 1 hour at each pub...Great way to meet people and get drunk. The bad part was that most of the participants are about 22-30 years old and can drink a lot more than I can ......then survive the next day. With Rachel and Alex we went to the castle and had a great dinner at a local resturant overlooking the city...I had Goolash and Dumplings...pretty darn good and fun. The other night, we went to see the Nutcracker. We sat in the highest seats on the top balcony and paid $2.50 for the tickets. The play was done much better than it was in Albania....which however was also about $2.50...Can you believe it...Less than a movie....And here in Albania I have seen the Nutcracker twice.
Everything was class..the last days my phone credit ran out and could not contact the girls. By then however I was ready to go to Brataslava, in Slovakia...My first and only night there I hung out with a bunch of fun Brits until about 2 in the morning only to have to leave early to make it to a toilet...and did not make it.....I met the guys on the streets, they too were looking for a bar to go to, I was done looking having tried for an hour for someplace that looked fun...an extreamly boring town. We decided to just go into the first one we found and hang out for a while...all in all...one of the best nights on the trip....The next day, went to the castle...Beautiful Castle but undergoing major repairs.
The following morning I took the Train 12 hours to Belgrade, Serbia... In Belgrade, I took a tour of the Military Museum, and had a private tour from Nicola, a young tatooed kid, whose passion was war trivia, but currently was unemployed. Went to Musuem of Nikola Tesla as well as an Automobile Museum ...At the auto museum, I had a good 1 hour conversation with a local on life in Serbia. During the tour of the Military Museum , I met some of my tatoo friends' friends, who I later spent New Years Eve with. They were 3 guys from Slovenia.....On the first of January, I was ready to go home....I went to Scopia in Macedonia, spent the night there, then took the first transportation to Tirana..First the taxi... There I met a couple of locals who were also going and Albania. They were great people who have made the trip often an helped me with the boarder processs. From the border we took a Furgon to Tirana....I went home a few days early, skipping the couple days I wanted to spend in Macedonia. Too Tired and stomach problems....
As for projects, My business class had a couple of good days since last entry, then it just crashed...I went to the school Director again and while she wanted the class, she could not find kids that were interested.
My outdoor Ambassador group is going good until I brought up a topic that caused a big arguement. We went bowling, and Ice Skating...and brought two additional friends. The boys hated it, the girls liked it, then they proceeded in argueing and saying things that were not good. That problem along with the fact that our Movie day got screwed up really put a damper on things...Our movie thing was a go until Besa/the owner of the place we were having it, and his brother, finally talked about it, then his brother backed out. That was after the kids told their friends, and passed out 400 flyers....Our video of the castle and translation of stuff is still moving slow.
So last week I had 2 meetings scheduled and then we get a call from the Peace Corps. They said that Lezhe, Buschat and Shkoder volunteers were going to evacuate do to the possibility flooding. In Shkoker there are 3 dams...Each of the dams were very near flood stage. Since little or no maintanence had been done on the flood gates in years, nor have been tested, the PC thought it better to get us out of the area. We spent 5 days Tirana...Myself and Chris at the County Directors office and the rest scattered around. The movies were fun, food was good, house was always warm and the last night we had dinner out at the Chicken Shack. After 5 days we came home to the Albanians thinking we were a bunch of Chickens for skipping town. I am sure they (the locals) did not know the possibility of the real danger, because all the information they had was from the news. The news is regulated by the political party in power who are the ones who determine the threat. If they tell everyone that there has been no maintence or test on the dams and there is a problem...they look bad...therefore..they inform little and hope for the best.
Today I have another meeting with the School Director.
So last time I had mentioned my sore hips...This week I had an appointement with our Assistant medical officer...She took a bit more of a concern in my sore hips than the regular doctor and so we had a X-ray taken...$10.00...The medical assistant wants to meet personally in the office to discuss further the results..she mentioned something about a reduction of space in the joint area..More info next time.
Christmas, and New Years I spent out of Country. For Christmas I went to Prague with Rachel and Alex....They stayed at Rachels former host mom, when she lived here for a year and I stayed at a Youth Hostel. About half of the time I spent on my own and the other half with them until my phone credit went dead. Prague is incredible and worth the trip...we had good weather so the walking tours and roaming aimlessly was great. At night when I was not with Alex and Rachel, I did the Pub Crawls...5 hours of hanging out with a group of 15 (x-mas) and 40 another day, roaming the streets of prague and spending about 1 hour at each pub...Great way to meet people and get drunk. The bad part was that most of the participants are about 22-30 years old and can drink a lot more than I can ......then survive the next day. With Rachel and Alex we went to the castle and had a great dinner at a local resturant overlooking the city...I had Goolash and Dumplings...pretty darn good and fun. The other night, we went to see the Nutcracker. We sat in the highest seats on the top balcony and paid $2.50 for the tickets. The play was done much better than it was in Albania....which however was also about $2.50...Can you believe it...Less than a movie....And here in Albania I have seen the Nutcracker twice.
Everything was class..the last days my phone credit ran out and could not contact the girls. By then however I was ready to go to Brataslava, in Slovakia...My first and only night there I hung out with a bunch of fun Brits until about 2 in the morning only to have to leave early to make it to a toilet...and did not make it.....I met the guys on the streets, they too were looking for a bar to go to, I was done looking having tried for an hour for someplace that looked fun...an extreamly boring town. We decided to just go into the first one we found and hang out for a while...all in all...one of the best nights on the trip....The next day, went to the castle...Beautiful Castle but undergoing major repairs.
The following morning I took the Train 12 hours to Belgrade, Serbia... In Belgrade, I took a tour of the Military Museum, and had a private tour from Nicola, a young tatooed kid, whose passion was war trivia, but currently was unemployed. Went to Musuem of Nikola Tesla as well as an Automobile Museum ...At the auto museum, I had a good 1 hour conversation with a local on life in Serbia. During the tour of the Military Museum , I met some of my tatoo friends' friends, who I later spent New Years Eve with. They were 3 guys from Slovenia.....On the first of January, I was ready to go home....I went to Scopia in Macedonia, spent the night there, then took the first transportation to Tirana..First the taxi... There I met a couple of locals who were also going and Albania. They were great people who have made the trip often an helped me with the boarder processs. From the border we took a Furgon to Tirana....I went home a few days early, skipping the couple days I wanted to spend in Macedonia. Too Tired and stomach problems....
As for projects, My business class had a couple of good days since last entry, then it just crashed...I went to the school Director again and while she wanted the class, she could not find kids that were interested.
My outdoor Ambassador group is going good until I brought up a topic that caused a big arguement. We went bowling, and Ice Skating...and brought two additional friends. The boys hated it, the girls liked it, then they proceeded in argueing and saying things that were not good. That problem along with the fact that our Movie day got screwed up really put a damper on things...Our movie thing was a go until Besa/the owner of the place we were having it, and his brother, finally talked about it, then his brother backed out. That was after the kids told their friends, and passed out 400 flyers....Our video of the castle and translation of stuff is still moving slow.
So last week I had 2 meetings scheduled and then we get a call from the Peace Corps. They said that Lezhe, Buschat and Shkoder volunteers were going to evacuate do to the possibility flooding. In Shkoker there are 3 dams...Each of the dams were very near flood stage. Since little or no maintanence had been done on the flood gates in years, nor have been tested, the PC thought it better to get us out of the area. We spent 5 days Tirana...Myself and Chris at the County Directors office and the rest scattered around. The movies were fun, food was good, house was always warm and the last night we had dinner out at the Chicken Shack. After 5 days we came home to the Albanians thinking we were a bunch of Chickens for skipping town. I am sure they (the locals) did not know the possibility of the real danger, because all the information they had was from the news. The news is regulated by the political party in power who are the ones who determine the threat. If they tell everyone that there has been no maintence or test on the dams and there is a problem...they look bad...therefore..they inform little and hope for the best.
Today I have another meeting with the School Director.
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