Pictures from October (And some updates)

Since I was MIA during October, lets play a little catch up...

Village Market

In a previous post I explained the ins and outs of the Gramsh market but what I failed to mention is that a 45 min walk outside of town, there is also a village market.  This market is very very very different from the Gramsh one.  Here you can buy animals (chickens, sheep, goats, cows, donkeys, you name it they got it) farming tools and food basics like ginormous bags of flour and corn.  Needless to say, they were shocked to see a foreigner walking around but it was definitely worth the experience.

Get your hunting gear here.

Need some pots and pans?

Yes those are chickens hanging on the side of the trailer and of course the trailer
itself was later filled with sheep. 

Albania vs. Iceland Soccer Game

At the beginning of October, I and around 20 other volunteers went to Tirana to see the Albanian national soccer team play Iceland in a World Cup qualifying match.  Watching sports and going to games is one of the things I miss the most here and it was amazing to have the opportunity to do that again.  But what we didn't count on was the fact that a huge storm would roll into Tirana right as the game started.  A little rain wasn't going to stop us but when the lightning started we decided that standing around in a stadium with umbrellas in a lightning storm probably wasn't the best life choice.  We relocated to a bar to watch the rest of the game but by then we were absolutely soaking.  Despite the fact that Albania lost, it was still one of the highlights of my time here.

Just a little wet...

 Language Refresher

During our time here, there are a few ISTs (In-Service Trainings) that are mandatory.  The first one is Language Refresher.  So after a little under 6 months at site, all of the volunteers from my group were reunited in Elbasan to learn some Shqip.  It was great seeing everyone again and it truly felt like returning home.  Elbasan was were we were during out training and we even stayed at the same hotel we were in for our first 2 nights in Albania.  It is shocking how much we've all changed since then!

While the conference was fun it was also absolutely exhausting.  We were divided into groups based off of the amount of Shqip that would be spoken during our classes.  I somehow got placed in the 90% group (apparently the language staff has more faith in my language abilities than I do).  Classes started at 9 AM and went on until around 4 PM.  The language staff really tried hard to make our classes as fun as possible and we got to learn a new Albanian song and a poem as well as do some circle dancing.    The video above is of the Albanian song "Nen nje portokalli" that we learned.

Too much Shqip can drive a girl cray-cray!

But there is always enough time to Ha buke (Eat bread)!

 Halloween

Every Monday I teach English to a group of 9-vjecare students.  They are amazing and working with them is definitely the highlight of my week.  A few of them are the girls who I worked with this summer as well.  But in honor of Halloween, we learned about some of the American traditions like Trick-or-Treating and Haunted Houses.  PS- If you want to feel like you're crazy try explaining to people that Americans will pay to go into a house that has been made scary just for the fun of it.  Thanks to my amazing parents, we even had some Halloween themed art supplies!

Watching 'Thriller'

The group with their finished products.  Thanks again Mom and Dad!!

(Photo credits to Joyce and Michael)