Georgia, open letter to OPA 4th grade

It never worked. Borrowing someone's laptop for a few seconds. And happy birthday John! It's your birthday, right?

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(last week sometime)
This internet is awful. We're five weeks into pre-service training, and it's a lot of work. We have four hours of language classes a day, six days a week, and then a bunch of other type classes, health and safety classes, how to be a teacher, how to not get into trouble, how to not get aides. Lot's of breaking off into groups and role play stuff and groupwork, small group communication workshop stuff that probably is helpful but brutal nonetheless. Anyway, not much time for anything. This lasts another 10 weeks. And I don't have internet anyway, but I ordered this cool like cellphone internet modem, so hopefully i can get it working and reestablish some sort of working internet presence.

Last week, was able to send a letter to my fourth graders back in the states right before they went on summer break. I'll post that here now, if it be the internet's will. Our bus leaves in twenty minutes, and if I can post this one damn thing before i leave, I will consider hauling my laptop here worth the trouble.

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Letter for Opa

Hello everyone!

I've been here in Georgia two weeks so far and it feels like much longer! I remember when I had only two weeks until I left, and I was like, holy moley, it's pretty much here right now! But now remembering to when I first came into Georgia off the plane seems like a very long time ago. I think this strange trick of time is because so many new things have happened and so many things have changed. I think it's kind of like walking for a mile or so on a straight road and then a mile on a road that has many hills a valleys and things to climb over. Even though both miles are a mile, the second of course seems much longer, just like two weeks ago seems so far off to me now.

I should tell you about some of these changes and new things, but first let me say thank you everyone for giving me such a kind good bye, and to Mrs. Miquelon's class, thank you for the pictures and notes you wrote me! I show them to the people here and they like seeing what fourth graders in Utah are like. Isn't it weird to think that someone all the way across the world has been seeing pictures of you? Anyway, most people in Georgia have darker skin and black hair just like many students at Opa. Perhaps they think that all fourth graders in America are like that, but when I learn the language better, I will tell them that America has so many different kinds of people that schools everywhere are of all different kinds too.

Before I forget, I want to tell you about a young Georgian guy, probably about my sister's age, I saw the other day. He was in his sports car and listening to Justin Beiber! I guess young Mr. Beiber is popular with older boys here, but then again maybe it was just the radio and he didn't know better. I was hoping he would be wearing one of those sparkly Beiber shirts too, but he wasn't.

I live with a very nice Georgian family too. They have two boys, one named Zaza, who is twelve, and one who is nine i think, and named Giorgi, which corresponds to the name George in English, like King George i guess. Their grandma and grandpa also live with them, which is very common in Georgia, and in fact people often live their whole lives in the same house with the same people here. It's not weird at all to be thirty years old and living with your parents still. And when you get married, you bring your new husband or wife home. They have to leave their house and their family of course, but that's okay because it usually won't be far away at all. In fact most people in the villages are related to each other, and there's lots of birthday parties to go to all the time.

Everyone has animals here, at least chickens, and they run all over the place. Most people have cattle too and pigs and often dogs. Dogs aren't really pets the way they are in the states though. Some are. A lot of the dogs are stray dogs, and a lot of them just stay outside all the time and aren't petted or played with or walked. Sometimes people aren't very nice them either, and will scare them off by raising their hand as if the strike when they want them to go away. I asked a sixth grader why are they mean to dogs, and he said that in America he knows we don't have dogs wandering around living in the street and scaring people. And I had to agree, we don't. We have dog catchers to pick up stray dogs. And then we take them to the pound and if no one claims we... well we all know what happens then. I guess if I was a stray dog, I would probably choose Georgia over America come to think of it.

I am learning Georgian and it is quite hard. I finally have the whole alphabet down and can write words out without checking my English key. I'm still having trouble though with some letters, for instance they have three different letters for the "ck." One that looks like a lower case "b" with a little arm, one that looks like a lowercase "y" but is a little more curvy, and one that looks like a very very tall and skinny backward "c" but with a line behind it like an English "d" has. And the crazy thing is that to everyone here they all sound completely different. They say, "no Ryan no, like this," and they make a strange "ck" sound, and I do a perfectly good imitation, I swear, and they shake their head and laugh and say, "Ryan, no, no." The different "ck" sounds are made with different places in the throat, parts I have only ever used before when a piece of food gets stuck there. Some of the words have four, even five, consonants in a row, and none of them are silent. I'm supposed to pronounce them somehow. So yeah, a lot of my time here is spent talking like an alien.

The schools are in very old buildings with poor lighting and pit toilet bathrooms outside. The first day i thought they had forgotten to turn on the lights. But nope, that's how it always is. But at the same time, the schools are really cool too, the buildings i mean, not the bathrooms; they're awful. The buildings though are really big with very high ceilings and huge windows. There are a few cows nearby in the back, and a few chickens and noisy rooster in the front and big trees and a statue of a famous author that that i think is from our village, which is called Keestaoori by the way. The children and classes are very similar i think, with desks and a teacher in the front and the kids all seem nice and smart although they are late to class more often than in the states I noticed. The only go to school from nine to two, but they don't have a lunch, and many of them have tutors afterward, mostly in English.

The closest big city is about 20 minutes away or so. It has a grocery stores and electronic stores and lots of people and cars. In our village though there are only a small shops that have the same sort of stuff as a 7-11, food and snacks and beer and soda and random stuff, like a shelf of shoes in one for instance. The little store buildings are old too, and some of them look more like some one's shed than a store. I guess it's the same in America in some places, like small towns in Wyoming for instance, if you ever go there. The  here are all really big, with very high ceilings, and, it's weird, windows INSIDE the house looking into other rooms, with curtains and everything. They have curtains in front of the doors and most of the time they'll just pull the curtain closed instead of closing the door. This is where I will live for the next few months until i complete training, and then it will be off to my permanent site, where I will live for the next two years if all goes well. I have no idea where that will be yet.

The meals are always big and very delicious, lots of food to choose from usually, and always wine. In fact wine is everywhere here. People think Georgia might be the first place ever to have wine in the world. Everyone grows their own grapes and makes their own wine, and it makes the villages look beautiful with grape vines everywhere, often even growing on frames above the driveways and in the front yards. Everyone makes their own wine every year, and then have some every night at dinner. Even the children are allowed a small glass of wine if they want, since they say red wine is good for you. I think they usually don't like it though.

The mountains here are also beautiful and the biggest mountains you've ever seen. They are a ways away, probably about fifteen miles or so, and i haven't got to see them except at a distance. They also make for very strange weather, and it can be rainy, sunny, rainy, then sunny, all in one day. Last night there was a lightening and thunderstorm too, but without any rain at all! It went on for hours and would light up the whole sky with cloud silhouettes.

 

There's more to say of course, but this is getting quite long. And I'm pretty tired. Tomorrow hopefully I can email this, and you can all read it! I hope you have a great summer vacation, and you all remember to read some good books. I'll be reading some here. Please email me if you want, and I will try to respond when i can. I don't have Internet yet, so it's pretty hard right now to respond, but hopefully that will change. Oh and I almost forgot, a few days after I arrived here there was a small earthquake. My first ever. I was upstairs in my room and the first thing I thought was that someone had driven a tractor into the side of the house. It only lasted for a few seconds, and nothing really happened. Things shook on the table a little as if someone was stomping around. Some people didn't even feel it at all, if they were outside. But still, an earthquake. I was in an earthquake! No one can ever take that away from me.

Okay. All my best. Be safe, and have a great vacation. I miss you guys.

You're friend,
Ryan