Two weeks worth of updates

I have been really  bad about writing in this blog. Life has started to pick up here which is nice. I will try to recount briefly what has happened over the past  two weeks. Two weeks ago I went to Bulgaria for holiday. I spent a week visiting Burgas, Sofia, and Plovidiv. Bulgaria was amazing and I am really glad that I decided to go. I knew that I would have a week off of work so I thought about going to Greece, but the tickets were really expensive due to the holiday. A friend suggested Bulgaria so I looked into it. I emailed a friend of mine from high school who currently lives in Bulgaria and she invited me to stay with her. I was a little nervous about going there and spending a week with her because we hadn't seen each other in quite some time, but it was not a problem at all. I had such a good time with Nevena and I am hoping that we will travel together again soon.

Here are just a few highlights from my trip to Bulgaria.

Bulgaria is a small country but there is so much to do. My favorite city that we visited was Plovdiv. It is a bigger city with a small town feel. I was very fortunate having Nevena with me because she could translate for me and she knew everything about Bulgaria. It was like having my own personal tour guide. During our two days in Plovdiv we stayed with Nevena's grandmother who was everything you imagine an eastern European grandmother to be. She was so thoughtful and kept telling us to eat, eat, eat. At times it was a little awkward because her grandmother didn't speak English, but she did a great job of communicating with me through gestures. I love the fact that people can talk to each other even if they don't speak the same language. When we left Plovdiv her grandmother stuffed a bunch of food in our luggage and gave me a pair of knit socks. This was the best gift ever and I wear them all the time.

My favorite part of the trip was the bus ride from Sofia to Plovdiv. Sofia and Plovdiv are two major cities and when y. There are a lot of apartments and they are very busy. A lot of the apartments are from the days when Bulgaria was a communist country and they have a sort of dreary feel to them. They all look very similar in that they are painted dull colors and all look like they are going to fall apart soon.  Between Plovdiv and Bourgas is the countryside which is beautiful and filled with smaller villages. I loved seeing the contrast of the city to the villages.

Going to Bulgaria was such a random adventure and I am so glad that I made the decision to go. I also love the fact that I was able to reconnect with a friend from high school. It is random experiences like this that make me appreciate my life and how fortunate I am.

Life has started to pick up more after coming back from holiday. I have been busier at work which is really nice. I still have slow days occasionally though. The company has asked me to stay until May and I told them I would be delighted to. I am currently having some trouble with my visa so there is a chance that I will still be returning for good in December.

Ali came back from Canada the day I got back from Bulgaria. It is so nice to have her in the apartment again. I love living with Ceren, but it gets hard to speak broken English all of the time.

I have decided since there is a chance that I will be staying until May that I actually need to focus on learning Turkish. I searched craigslist and found a teacher that does not charge a ridiculous amount. I met with him last week and we will begin our lessons in two weeks. He is a grad student studying journalism and has had a lot of experience teaching Turkish in private lessons. I look forward to staring our lessons. Hopefully I will be able to start communicating with everyone in the office a little bit better.

I am trying to think of other interesting happenings to relay, but there really haven't been any. I am starting to feel comfortable here which is a relief. Life is feeling normal and I am able to do almost everything successfully. I did buy the wrong kind of dishwashing soap last week, but that has been my only mishap recently.