I don't feel like titles.

Today it got up to 92 degrees here. Crazy warm! This has been the most unusual spring/summer. It feels normal! I didn't even get a snow storm in April, and May has been totally gorgeous. I had to break out my hot weather clothing that's been wasting away in the bottom of my drawer for two years. It's not nearly as fun though without anyone here to enjoy it with me. Damn it boyfriend! Why do you have to be in Colorado when we actually have summer weather?

Well, the good/interesting news of Camilo being out there is that he has a potential job offer from the Solar Energy International place in Paonia, CO. Which is amazing! They told him to apply because they love him so much. At first when he told me I was totally disappointed about not moving to Dayton. I mean, yes, I kind of hate Ohio but I'd really pumped myself up about all the positive aspects of moving there like proximity to family (relative to here anyway), less snow, more job opportunities, potential for grad school, nearby dance companies and studios...all kinds of stuff. So when I heard that we may have to move to a town that's smaller and more isolated sounding than Houghton, well...I wasn't exactly overcome with joy. I'm getting used to the idea though. It would be really great for Camilo, and I will figure out something to do. It would probably only be for a year anyway, and it looks like a very beautiful, adventurous kind of place. I'll feel like I'm in the Wild West!

Life with my Bolivian is unpredictable to say the least, and I kind of love that, even though it often drives me insane :)

Blue Peeps?!?!

The weather has been so gorgeous here. Puts me in a good mood and makes all the job searching seem really unimportant for the time being. Yesterday as I was out on the patio, enjoying the sunshine, something shiny caught my (as shiny objects often do). It was a blue peep, sugar glistening in the sun (yes, those disgusting little marshmallow chicks you get for Easter). My first thought was "Wow, I didn't know they made blue peeps." My second thought was "Why in hell is there a blue peep on my patio?" Upon further inspection of the surrounding area, I found an additional 8 peeps lounging around on my patio, in the yard, and next to the back door. Where did they come from? I have no idea. I'm inclined to think that our neighbors found it easier to throw their uneaten peeps into our backyard rather than the trash. I have a suspicion that they called the cops on one of our previous parties so why not throw their trash in our yard too?

In other news, one of my best friends, Kaye, is leaving to study abroad in Jordan for the summer. I know she reads this so Kaye, darling, I love you and I wish you the absolute most amazing time while you're there. I miss you so much already!

Meanwhile Camilo has also abandoned me for two weeks for a photovoltaics workshop in Colorado and I'm stuck here in Houghton alone, bored out of my mind, with no one to play with. Thankfully I still have work to keep me somewhat occupied, and the Canterbury House (which I'll actually be getting paid for now!). Today I met with three of my students: Neila from Italy, Sahar from Iran, and Lina from Colombia. They're all really sweet girls and speak English pretty well already so it's more fun than work to help them out with conversation skills. Tomorrow I'll be meeting with a new student, Dimh(?), from Ukraine and I'm a bit worried about that. His English is probably intermediate which is fine but I think he actually has some mental issues. I'm not sure what's wrong with him exactly but he picked me as his coach because I'm a "pretty girl." Yes, a little creepy. I've never dealt with anyone like this before so we'll see how it goes.

The Joys of Job Searching

Alright, I've decided to start blogging again. I'm not doing anything particularly exciting at this point in my life but, I don't know, it's something to do. And what better place to voice my complaints about the world than to random people on the internet?

Anyway, at this point in my life I'm a college graduate with a BA in Communication and Culture Studies. What does that get me? Apparently a minimum wage job at the front desk of the Ramada. Not quite what I had envisioned for my future. However, living in Michigan (and Houghton, MI at that) I suppose I'm lucky to even have a job. Hopefully mine and my boyfriend's move to Dayton, Ohio this summer will bring me some new opportunities. What I would really love is to find a job at a university or somewhere, working with international and/or study abroad students. I found some jobs about a month ago that would have been great but a couple of weeks later when I went to apply for them, they were already gone. Needless to say I was sorely disappointed.

Since then I've been sifting through the endless search results of what comes up when I type in "international programs." It's kind of ridiculous how many companies unnecessarily add the word international to their name. Out of those results, it's extremely rare that I actually find what I'm looking for. Yesterday I finally found the type of job I want, only to discover that it was at an evangelical community college (who knew those even existed?), and all of their staff had to be "born again Christians." Furthermore, in addition to the regular application and resume, you also had to submit a letter of reference from a pastor, and a copy of the doctrine of the church you currently attend. I briefly thought about applying anyway and trying to explain that I really was a good person, despite my absence of faith, but then I realized that I don't really want to work in a place where I would most likely be forced to attend church, and where my colleagues would alternate between trying to "save" me and telling me that I'm going straight to hell. No thanks.

Today I happened across a position called Administrative Assistant/Receptionist. I could totally do that! In fact, I think I'm overly qualified to do such work. As I read through the requirements I found "Must have strong work ethic, sense of urgency and a high energy level." This I read as I sat at work, head resting sideways on top of my desk, looking like I was either mostly dead or really hung over (but I was mostly just really tired and starving). Kind of made me smile anyway.

Last Day!!

July 21 2009

We’ve finally arrived to our last full day in Estonia. Looking back on it, time has passed relatively quickly. The first week here was a little slow and tiring but once we got used to everything, time went by a little faster. Estonia has been nice but at the same time, I am definitely ready and excited to go home. I think this is the first trip of my entire life that I’ve gotten a little homesick on…and I’ve only been gone for 3 weeks! But mostly, I think it’s probably me going through Camilo withdrawals. I have tried my very best to enjoy the time I’ve had here though. I’ve been relatively social and up for trying lots of new things, I’ve had conversations with locals, learned tons through the lectures, picked up a little of the language, and I’m pretty satisfied with the trip overall. I actually feel like I know more about Estonia than I do about Michigan at this point. I’m sure I’ll miss it when I finally get settled back into life at home. I always miss Europe in general when I’m at home.

But here are some things I’ll miss in particular about Estonia: pirukas, pelmeenid, canoeing in Sooma, the giant spongy bog with it’s Coke-colored ponds, Baltic Sea beaches, freestyle Estonian rap, real Russian food, the smell of Juniper wood, Russian street singers, barley cake, that crazy water slide at the Terevis Spa, thatched roof cottages, people with noses like me, cloud berries, the giant dance festival, the giant song festival, daylight until midnight

Here are also some things that I will not miss: daylight at 3am, ginormous seagulls on the roof top across the street waking me up with their cawing in the middle of the night, Finnish tourists, meat market clubs, soviet style architecture, boiled potatoes, dill in everything, showers that make the entire bathroom floor soaking wet, the city of Tallinn, 4 hour lectures

So yeah, I guess I’ll be happy to be heading back home but there are things that are uniquely Estonian that I will definitely miss. Every country has it’s own special flavor even if it is as small as this one.

Today we had a simple excursion to the open air museum. It was basically a set up of what a rural town would have been like in the 1400-1800’s. It would have been really nice except for the schizophrenic weather. First it was pouring rain, then it would be sunny and warm for 5 minutes, then it would thunder, then it would be cold and downpour for another 5 minutes, and repeat the whole cycle over and over again. Now, it’s just overcast and depressing looking outside but at least it’s stable. I’m so glad we had such nice weather while we were in our beach town.  The weather in Pärnu couldn’t have been better. Really I liked every place we went a lot except for Tallin. My favorites were Pärnu and Tartu; good manageable sizes, a little safer feeling, less expensive, and better food and weather.

Tomorrow we’re catching the taxi to the airport at 6am and I’ll arrive in Detroit around 6:30pm (EST). So I’ll be traveling for around 14 hours….ewww. Wish me luck and hope that I arrive home alive! See you all State side. 

Untitled.

July 20 2009

Monday we had our very last lecture of the program. Thankfully, it was one of the best. The professor was a funny little man who was an economist. He talked about whether or not Estonia is doing well or not economically. When it comes down to it, how a country is doing can really only be measured in comparison with how well other countries are doing, especially your neighbors. So Estonia is doing quite well in many things and they are pretty much better in everything compared with their southern neighbors of Latvia and Lithuania. It is pretty impressive how quickly Estonia took off after the collapse of the Soviet Union. However, it seems that now, through this global recession, they’re sort of coming down from their high of having grown so much in so little time and they are now finally realizing some of the mistakes they have made, and how to manage themselves a little better in the future in order to be prepared for another recession.

For dinner, we finally got to go to a Russian restaurant which I’ve been wanting to do this whole time, although apparently a lot of the food we’ve had on this trip is Russian, like the Seljanka soup and pelmeenid (little meat filled dumplings…mmm). Anyway, I ordered a sort of pot roast with bread cooked over the top and it was probably the most deliciously fattening thing I’ve ever eaten. I’ve never had gravy so thick, so greasy, and so salty. I could feel all of my arteries instantaneously clogging but it was one of the better things I’ve eaten here.

But yeah, that’s pretty much my day. Things are really winding down here as we come to the end of our trip. I don’t feel like doing much of anything at this point except sleeping and eating. I know, I’m worthless J

Back to Tallinn

July 19 2009

Today we moved from Pärnu back to Tallinn. Goodbye sunshiney beaches!!! :(  I can’t believe we’ve only got 3 nights left in this country. The hotel we’re staying at now is not nearly as nice as I was hoping. Their website was totally misleading. Unfortunately we don’t even have internet so when I post this, it will be thanks to the wi-fi at a nearby McD’s. The rooms have no kitchenettes so for lunch we ate all of the food that would have needed to be refrigerated (leftover stuff from Pärnu). After that, we went into town to find internet and something to do. Since it’s Sunday, most things were closed except for a bookstore. I managed to find some books to keep me busy and help me not think about how much I miss the internet. Thankfully I’m rather fond of reading so I bought One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel García Márquez (that one’s in honor of you darling), and I also managed to find a copy of The Little Prince in Spanish!!! (El Principito…that one is also in honor of mi amor). So those books plus my French book, should keep me busy until it’s time to leave.

At this point in the trip I think everyone is VERY ready to go home and be as far away from each other as possible. It isn’t that we don’t like each other, it’s just that spending every single day together for hours on end during 3 weeks, well, it’s enough to drive any sweet person to snide side comments. Dinner together tonight was probably a bad idea as we were all very grouchy but we managed to keep things civilized.

On the walk home it poured rain on us. You would think this would add to my grumpiness but it was really exactly what I needed. Everyone needs to walk through the pouring rain without an umbrella once in a while. I think it’s good for your soul. All I can hope at this point is that we make it through these next few days without saying things we might come to regret. I just keep reminding myself that I only have to deal with these people for 3 weeks and then, if I really feel like it, I never have to spend time with them again. So I’ve done my best to let things go, and encourage others to do the same. There’s no point in making things even worse by laying into someone about the way they chew or other stupid things like that. Unfortunately, not everyone possesses such philosophies of patience.

Tallinn somehow has a way of putting everyone into a bad mood…seriously. Maybe it’s a poorly planned city or the air pressure is different here. Who knows? All I can do is try my best to stay positive, and enjoy the rest of my stay here.

Beach Day 2

July 18 2009

Second free day. Yay!! Guess what we did? Yup, went to the beach again, and improved my tan some more. I didn’t stay quite as long as the day before but it was still fantastic; the sun just as bright, the water just as warm.

Later in the day we had a group dinner at a medievalish looking restaurant since it was our last day with Matt. I had a fantastic meal of pork roast with a port wine sauce, some vegetables, and a potato/spinach puree which was super delicious and I’ll have to make at home. The food I’ve had seems to be getting better but mostly, I think I’m getting really good at picking items on the menu that sound like flavor combinations I’ll enjoy (no more random pickles or pickled herring in things!).

After dinner I didn’t feel much like going out again so I just spent a nice evening in, conversing with the roomie. I’m just not really the type of person who enjoys going out two nights in a row.

I guess I’m kind of boring sometimes but, meh, I don’t really care. I enjoy my style.