August 20, 2011

Goodness! I didn’t realize it had been so long since I blogged. Now that I know where the button is to post photos, I’ll show you some of the places I've been in Bulgaria.

There are many fields of sunflowers. I never seem to be on the right side of them when I have my camera. It's almost like they're shy and turn away when they see someone trying to take their picture. I took this from the bus window on our way back from Hissar.

My apartment looks out over the tops of these grapevines. As you can see they are thick with grapes. I thought surely we would be stomping grapes for wine, but they are just for  eating. 

This is part of the yard where I live.

This video shows more of the yard and the steps to my apartment.

On July 21 we took the church's summer day camp kids to the zoo in Stara Zagora. They had a surprising number of exotic animals. Then the children all turned wild when Father took them to a house of mirrors. Before we left we stopped at a mall complete with a McDonald's! It was a very fun day.

The day camp lasted through the end of July. After church on the 31st the nuns put on a program for the kids to show off what they learned. They had asked me to teach them something in English that they could perform. Not knowing what the nuns would be doing, I found a silly song to help them learn some food vocabulary. Well, I wanted to crawl into a hole when I saw the first presentation. One of the nuns had been teaching them Italian and had them sing a song in Italian. It was beautiful. Next several girls performed a folk dance to live music. It was very impressive. Then about 8 students put on a play about Don Bosco. I didn't even know who Don Bosco was. Then it was our turn. We performed our silly little banana song. I didn't die of embarrassment and everyone laughed at the funny ending, but for next year...does anyone have the music to "Let There be Peace on Earth"?

I started teaching summer school on August 1. Again, I didn't really know what to expect but figured we could start by introducing ourselves and reviewing the alphabet. Well, most not only knew the alphabet, but two could carry on a conversation in English. It has been a challenge to meet the needs of such a diverse bunch, but it has been fun.

I want to write about my trip to the Black Sea but will have to save that for another time.

Peace and love, Joan