Goodbye Bazaleti

Once again I am writing to you from my bed, seems like mornings are best for updating things online. However, I can't make any promises moving forward since who knows where I will be headed tonight. We will find out our training host family placements this afternoon and then head out to meet them in Gori. This past week has honestly felt like I was at summer camp, sequestered away in the mountains with a bunch of random people- whose company I have come to enjoy. Now it's time for things to get just a little more "real".

To celebrate Alex's birthday and our last night at the training center, we had some of the Georgian staff help us make a small bonfire and we roasted food and sang songs until it was late:

G15s around an improvised bonfire with our new Georgian friends

Also if you need more media, here is a video of our airport arrival that a current volunteer put together, they were a great 3am welcome committee. 

 Finally, since "what are you going to be doing over there?" seems to be the biggest question I have received, I thought I would share a few thoughts about the Peace Corps work/mission. First, it's mission statement and goals:

The Peace Corps' Mission

To promote world peace and friendship by fulfilling three goals:

1. To help the people of interested countries in meeting their need for trained men and women
2. To help promote a better understanding of Americans on the part of the peoples served
3. To help promote a better understanding of other peoples on the part of Americans

Peace Corps Georgia's view on development is summed up in the following quote:

Go to the people. Live with them. Learn from them. Love them.
Start with what they know. Build with what they have.
But with the best [Volunteers], when the work is done, the task accomplished, the people will say
“We have done this ourselves”.

Lao Tzu


Most of what I'll be doing over the next 6 months will be working to integrate myself into the local Georgian communities I am assigned to. There won't be a lot of "action" per say. However, there will be a lot of learning going on. Peace Corps works at the grassroots level targeting the most vulnerable populations, but to be effective we need to learn to fit in with the people which really entails learning their language and culture. My current assignment is English education, yet, that only gives a small idea of what I will be doing. Once I have been assigned to my permanent site, I will begin to try and identify the strengths and needs in my community and work with local leaders to come up with work we can do together to improve the lives of community members. Trust me, it will be exciting.

So in the meantime, keep following along. Feel free to ask questions. I'll share anything you want to know about Georgian people, food, language, and culture. As far as I can tell this is going to be a fantastic place to work and live for the next 27 months.

ნახვამდის-Naxvamdis (Just in case anyone is doubting my ability to learn some Georgian)