It's The Little Things

What an adventure. I realize I should probably write more often so I can have shorter posts, but hey, this is all part of the learning process. If you don't have time to read all of this, I get it. Here's some of the highlights:
I officially became a Peace Corps Volunteer!
I got a new family. They're really cool.
I met my school director. She's pretty cool.
My counterpart who is super cool showed me the prettiest spots in Vanadzor.
I bought some stuff, successfully.
I felt my first ever earthquake! (A small one with no damage.)
I walked A LOT with some cool volunteers.
I found some inspiration.
I worked in the middle of some trees.
I taught some English.
And, of course, I received an amazing amount of support and encouragement from all of you.

So our swearing in ceremony was kind of a big deal this year. We are the 25th group of volunteers in Armenia, celebrating 25 years of service to Armenia, with the 1000th Peace Corps Armenia volunteer in our group. They made a big deal about it, and the ceremony was pretty cool. There was a competition for Armenians to write a song celebrating the Peace Corps' and Armenia's continued relationship. A group of our own A-25 volunteers did a beautiful performance. An amazing local band performed with a song they wrote just for us. A legacy video was created. There were dry ice fireworks, and a lot of important people.

U.S. Ambassador to Armenia, Richard Mills, giving me my Peace Corps Volunteer certificate.

The wonderful humans I got to spend PST with in Vanashen (our PST village). Included are the two wonderful LCF's (Language and Cultural Facilitators) who are the reason I can speak any Armenian at all and also a big part of the reason I've made it this far.

Here's the songs performed, and the link to the whole ceremony. I know all of the people in the music video, which is pretty cool, and I highly recommend watching the inspiring legacy video. I'll have more pictures up on my pictures page soon.

Peace Corps Armenia Legacy Video (Watch This One!) - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m3ZFyBNXCMQ

Song and Music Video (featuring current Peace Corps Armenia Volunteers) - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9K7ea8R9VBQ

Entire Ceremony - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4TKE0D_1NEg (I highly recommend watching at 1:30, 2:50, and 1:31:20 for the amazing musical performances!)

All in all, swearing in was a really nice day. I enjoyed it a lot, and topped it off with an American style cheeseburger from probably the only restaurant that sells them in Armenia. I have no shame in admitting cheeseburgers are near the top of my most missed food list.

After all of that excitement, I woke up very early the next day and packed up all of my things with my Peace Corps issue med kit, fire extinguisher, smoke alarm/CO detector, and water filter. We said goodbye to our PST village and families.

Then we got into vans for the treks to our new homes. We dropped a few others off along the way and it was a uniquely emotive experience. The other volunteers had become a type of security blanket for me over the past 10 weeks. They were familiar and like a touch of home as we were all adapting to this new culture together. I was the second to last one dropped off from my van, which meant I got to slowly say goodbye to a few people along the way. It was incredibly exciting to see their new homes, briefly meet their new families, and imagine all the wonderful things they were going to achieve in their new communities. It was also quite saddening as I was saying goodbye to people I had very quickly gotten very close with through this rare and trying mutual experience.

At the end of the road for me, it was only me and Lauren left. I cannot express how grateful and relieved I am that Lauren will only be a half hour away from me for the next two years. Also, our fantastic Peace Corps driver, Razmik, continued to show his thoughtfulness and kindness and voluntarily delayed his own day so Lauren could come in and have coffee at my house before she completed her own journey. My new host family was just as warm, welcoming, and comfortable as I remembered them during my site visit, and after a long week filled with lots of emotional turmoil, it was incredibly heartening to finally arrive at such an easy home. We've already had some great adventures and even more simple, cozy time just relaxing together (which is HIGHLY underrated, as you probably know if you've ever gone without that for a long period of time). Here's my new family (minus one).

From front to back: me, Heriknaz, Ashot, Inga, Mkhitar, (Syuzi not pictured)

Ashot and Inga are married, and Heriknaz is Ashot's mother. Inga, who speaks about as much English as I speak Armenian, says we are too close in age for her to be my host mom, so we all call Heriknaz my host mother. Mkhitar and Syuzi are Ashot's and Inga's kids. Mkhitar is 14 and very quiet. Syuzi is 17 and speaks amazing English (which is both super helpful and super bad for my Armenian learning) and is in Russia right now visiting her maternal grandparents. They are really chill people, which works perfectly for me. I cannot thank the Peace Corps Armenia staff enough for somehow finding the absolute perfect placement for me. I know a lot of volunteers aren't so lucky.

So my first week on site was a lot of getting to know both people and places. One of the very first introductory experiences for me was meeting the director of the school that is my primary assignment. This was just a tad bit intimidating for me as I knew three things: 1. My director could easily make or break my ability to accomplish things in my school; 2. Respect for authority is huge and vital in this society, and my director's opinion of me would directly impact literally everyone else's opinion of me; 3. My director does not speak any English. So after a few hours of waiting nervously for a meeting with my director, I walked into her intimidating office and sat in front of her big, intimidating desk, to meet her intimidating handshake. Fortunately, my counterpart was with me and had my back just in case things weren't going so well or my brain went on vacation and I magically forget every single word of Armenian I know. 

The really cool thing - none of the bad stuff happened! Side note - my director is one of the few female school directors I've heard of despite almost every single teacher in Armenia being a woman (not counting gym teachers obviously). Anyway, I successfully spoke Armenian with her for about fifteen minutes with my counterpart only translating about 3 words. This was a huge success!!! Not only that, but my director quickly assured me that if there was anything at all I needed, she would do everything she could to help. We soon discovered our visions for the English-learning students were aligned, and we both left the meeting with warm smiles, and, I think, some good old-fashioned hope for the possibilities.

Later in the first week, Mane, my amazing counterpart, gave me a tour of our city. We walked for about 3 hours exploring the city, talking, getting to know each other more, and discovering a sense of ease with each other. I also saw some really cool spots that will be featured in updates soon to come, I'm sure.

In case you couldn't tell thus far, I've been feeling a bit better since my last post. There's a couple other small things that have kept me going that I want to share briefly. First, I went shopping for some basics in our local amazing bazaar and successfully negotiated, in Armenian, with multiple different shopkeepers. I didn't pay the first asked price for a single item, there was a really nice gentlemen who empathized with my big feet struggle and helped me try on about ten different pairs of men's shoes just to find one that was my size and not overly masculine, and I made some connections with people who will remember my very American self and who will be helpful acquaintances over the next two years.

Next, I experienced an earthquake for the first time in my life! I am actually excited about this, and I want to preface that with the fact that it was a small earthquake with no damage or injuries. It was super cool, though! Our whole house rumbled for a solid 3 to 4 seconds. It was a good experience because I thought out a plan for where I would go if a bad one happened right after. Additionally, I was able to experience some of the helplessness of it. In 1988, a really bad earthquake completely destroyed a city about a half an hour from my placement. Needless to say, a lot of people in my city, including my family, were also affected. I can now understand a little bit more of what they must feel every time an earthquake occurs.

A couple days later, this pretty neat program organized by Peace Corps Volunteers came through Vanadzor. It's called Border-to-Border, and volunteers backpack from the northwest, the northeast, and the southern borders of Armenia and meet in the middle. They stop in a bunch of villages along the way and teach useful basic health information to local children. I walked part of the way (about 10km) with one group after they taught in Vanadzor. It was cool to experience part of it and learn from the PCV's who have been here longer than I have. I definitely want to do this program next year.

Still in the first week of my new placement, I happened upon some solid inspiration. I went to an English Club that another PCV asked if I'd be willing to help out with. The unique thing about this English Club is that it is primarily for Armenian women who work. A group of women wanted to learn English and had no prior knowledge. They reached out to a local volunteer about 8 months ago who told them they needed to find at least 5 members and be completely committed to showing up every class. These women self-organized, and have now grown to include about 20 women (with a few working men as well) and know enough English to make their way around in America. They have only met twice a week, with some breaks, for 8 months. These women work full-time jobs, clean, cook for, and take care of their families, and twice a week take an hour at 7pm to come learn English without any obligation other than their own motivation. Currently there is a young Armenian teaching the class who is fluent in English, but she has been accepted into an American college and leaves in the fall. The PCV who asked if I would take over was super insistent that I really commit and not let these amazing individuals down. He needn't have worried. I am enthused and inspired by this group. In my class are two doctors, the head investigator of my city's police force, three economics professionals (similar to CPA's), a child social worker, a school director, and many other impressive career professionals, who are all women. It is extraordinarily remarkable for a woman to hold any one of these jobs in Armenia, let alone still have a family, and self-commit to continuing their learning. If I did nothing else in my service but enable these amazing people to continue learning, I would feel accomplished. This is what will keep me going. This is everything.

Sometimes things can be overwhelming. I am in a new country, surrounded by a new culture, that I can't navigate super well in no small part because my language skills are limited. There's no way to just go back and be in America, so I found the next best thing. Meet my new work/escape space...

This is an amazing little hidden spot about a 15 minute walk away from my house. I have worked here for four hours without spotting a single other human being. Here, I can pretend I'm not an outsider, I don't have to struggle to understand things, and no one is going to stare at me. This is worth more than gold to me.

The rest of my time has been spent trying to get integrated into the community. That is, after all, our primary task for our first summer at site. I managed to miscommunicate with my counterpart during my site visit, so we are not having any clubs at our school this summer. That's okay though, because it has made me go out into the community and find clubs that already exist at local NGO's and IGO's. This is how that's gone. Step 1: Emily shoes up uninvited to observe random club. Step 2: Whoever is running the club makes a big deal about the American and has me introduce myself.

Step 3: Random American must have great ideas so let's put her on the spot and have her run any activity she wants right now! Step 4: I somehow come up with random activity at least somewhat vaguely related to what the students were doing.

Step 5: Students are super excited about different teaching style (aka let's pull this out of thin air teaching style) and the new shiny American person.

 Step 6: Whoever is running the club asks me to help out for future clubs.

This method has worked surprisingly well. The best part is I've formed some really great relationships with the other people in the community who are teaching English. Plus, it was a pretty awesome moment to see the pride on Inga's face when she got a phone call about how well I work with the students and how the club leaders can't wait to work more with me. She even asked me what the English word for հպարտ was so she could tell me she felt proud in English. It was a bonding moment.

Finally, I want to mention the amazing outpouring of support I received after my last not-so-sunny blog post. You all are outstanding, and I already know that I couldn't be doing this without you. In the words of our amazing Peace Corps Armenia Country Director, who is sadly leaving us soon, "The thing about the Peace Corps is the highs are really high and the lows are really low." There have been some of those lows in the past couple weeks still, but the highs have been a lot more noticeable too.

Thanks for always being there for me. You all are the best. I'm gonna try to change up my next post a bit, so stay tuned. Sorry for the length of this one!

Լավ մնացեք, իմ ընկերները։  Stay well, my friends.

Emily

Update: I added all of my photos from PST! Check out the pictures page!

It's All a Series of Ups and Downs

This week has been hard. Everyone warns you about the lows in your service. We get training on resiliency, coping mechanisms, and creating/using our personal support systems. The Peace Corps does their best to prepare you for the difficult times, but preparation can only do so much. (Warning: Don't read on if you're looking for a sunny, feel-good post.)

I want to start by saying I wasn't expecting to experience a low like this so soon in my service. Technically, I haven't even started my service until swearing-in tomorrow. I know there's no concrete timeline of highs and lows and no right way to do this, but I was trying to be optimistic. I want to clarify that I have not reached the point where I've thought about going home, and I am okay. I've had a tough case of 'the sads' for a bit, and some things out of my control have made this week hard. I've used those coping mechanisms though, and things will be back on the upswing soon.

Since I visited my permanent site, I have felt some distance from my PST host family. This could just be my own 'awkward transition feels' projecting on to them, or it could be that they are just super busy themselves with their own ups and downs of life. The cause could be any number of things, but the effect of it has been a little uncomfortable. I won't go more into it, but it has been a bit rocky. I've spent a lot more time visiting other volunteer families or being on my own in my room for the past week. It wouldn't be a big deal by itself, but it didn't exactly help anything else either.

Probably the biggest factor in my lower level of optimism was the fact that I was missing something big at home. For my scouting family out there, you probably know that this being Memorial Day Weekend means more than just a day off work for our family. Since I was 4 years old, me, Mom, and Dad, (and when we were kids, my brother, too) have gone up to our favorite scout camp, Owasippe, every Memorial Day Work Weekend (MDWW) and cooked all weekend for the volunteers who come up to work on camp improvement projects. At it's peak, this has meant cooking a meal for 350 people. It's hectic, exhausting, stressful, and also absolutely wonderful. I never thought I would miss not being there so much as the weekend is characterized by working non-stop from 6am (sometimes earlier) until usually around 12am. The food is amazing (we cook almost everything from scratch), so I was missing that. I was also missing the people I see every year and work well past the point of exhaustion with and for. My best friend has been coming for years with me to help out, and thankfully he is a saint and still went with my parents. However, last weekend I was thinking about them often, calling them quite a bit, and even took a few times to just worry and cry. I was worried about my parents and friends, and I also didn't want to be missing out. It was rough.

Here's a few photos for those of you who don't know to see some of the glory I was missing out on. Obviously, they aren't my pics. Photo credit to Karen Shamasko.

The last one is of my family and my best friend, Gonzo. I was missing them bunches. (Left to right: Gonzo, Dad, Mom, Broski)

In case my weekend wasn't perturbing enough, I also had my final language exam on Saturday. This meant lots of stress leading up to Saturday, and afterwards, I felt as if I didn't do as well as I was capable. I was upset with myself and having a hard time. I got my results yesterday, and after taking some time to contemplate, I feel okay about it. Still, I've felt like no matter how hard I work at this language, I have not been able to excel at it. In fact, I've been feeling like I haven't really had a space to do much of anything that I'm good at since I got here. When your main field of study is communication, and you can't effectively communicate, you are excruciatingly aware of all the other things you can no longer effectively do.

I've also been thinking a lot about my relationships with people at home. It feels as if I've left a lot of things unfinished. I've stepped out of my friends lives for two years. There's a couple friendships that needed work when it was time to leave, and now I'm not sure what will happen with those. A lot of my friendships are used to distance, but are built back up when we see each other, and we usually see each other at least a few times a year. I don't know where those will go. There's friendships that I was just starting to really build when it was time to go, and who knows if we'll be able to pick those back up in a couple of years. I know it's cheesy, but it's also a very real feeling sometimes. I'm sure most of my relationships with people will be okay when I get back, but that doesn't change the feelings of worry and sadness that I will have over the next couple of years.

The topping on the cake of my rough week was my favorite 3-year-old friend getting injured. I was playing with him at the time. My host family was incredibly insistent that it was no big deal and not my fault, but I felt at fault all the same. The little guy is okay now, and I'm sure it will be a funny story later, but it is emotionally taxing to desperately want to communicate sincere apologies and concern and not have the words for it. I ended up crying in front of my host family, which I did not in any way want to do, and all of my emotions from the last week seemed to want to come out. I ran away to my room, and thankfully Lauren was there and helped me through my emotional mess. It's just been rough.

Tomorrow is our swearing in ceremony, and I will officially become a Peace Corps Volunteer. Saturday, I move to my new host family in my new town and get to start doing things for the community I will call home for the next two years. There's a lot of things to look forward to, and I know that. Sometimes, we just need to be sad. In fact, one of my favorite parts of Armenian culture is the acceptance that everyone just has bad days sometimes. You don't need to cheer them up or fix it. They don't need to smile or be happy or pretend to be okay. If you're having a bad day, you can just have a bad day. So I'm accepting that this week was a Down, and I'm looking forward for the Ups to come.

Ուղարկում եմ բօլօրը լավ ցանկությունները և մտքերը ձեզ համար;
Oorgharkoom em boloruh lav tsankootyoonneruh yev mitkeruh dzez hamar.
I am sending all of the good wishes and thoughts to you all.

Emily