A Return

25/6/2014

My trip to Armenia has been a welcome break, despite the excessive amount of dental appointments.

Before my journey West, I had two days in Kathmandu.  I partook of good food, did some PC work at the PC office and spent a ridiculous amount of money on a new battery for my laptop (it turns out that it was not swelling because of the humidity, but because it was faulty-something that, were I in America, would have been replaced for free, but in Nepal cost me nearly an entire month’s salary to replace-Ughhhh). 

After forking over a fortune for a new battery I left the mall, only to hear the most pathetic, soft mewling sound.  I looked down into the gutter and saw a tiny, wet, dirty black kitten.  After questioning a couple of men, nearby, I ascertained that the kitten had a sibling, which I also scooped up, and their mother was nowhere to be found.  I realized, immediately, that I could not leave them there, so I jumped in a cab to return to the PC office. 

As if I could be more disappointed with PC and the people that work for it, the sight of two orphaned kittens elicited only disdain from the PC staff.  One staff member said that he could think of “literally a million other things that you could have done with them, besides bringing them to the Peace Corps office.” Jesus Christ-what a caring person!  I have never, in my life, been around people who cared so little about helpless creatures.  Nepalis, in general, do not like cats, so none of the Nepali staff would take them, either.  I was on the verge of crying for hours, so heartbroken and disappointed.  I very much believe that you can tell what kind of a person someone is by the way they treat animals-I guess my suspicions about those people are correct.  After some research, I found an animal rescue place in KTM.  Unfortunately, they could not come pick the kittens up, nor could they house them for more than a week.  With 90 minutes until I had to leave for the airport, I hopped in a cab to drop the kittens of, because, what was the alternative? Putting them back on the street?  After a comedy of errors with a box of kittens in my lap, I made it to the KAT rescue center (please look them up and donate-they do invaluable work for the many, many abandoned animals in KTM).  The man there was very kind, and I donated some money to keep the kittens alive and housed until I returned from Armenia.  Despite my many, many pleas, no one has adopted them in the two weeks that I have been in Armenia.  I guess that means that I’m taking two kittens back to my site, with me…

I was excited to be on a plane-the cleanest place I’d been in 9 months! The trip was fine, with the exception of:

-A 10-hour lay over in the New Delhi airport.  Not helped by the fact that they only have free Wi-Fi for 45 minutes.

-Sitting behind a row of seats with THREE INFANTS who collectively cried 75% of the flight from Delhi to Moscow.

I arrived in Yerevan after 24 hours of travel.  I even had a driver with a sign waiting for me!  Armenia is beautiful-it kinda looks like that stretch of road between Helena and Great Falls-arid, rolling hills, red cliffs and sagebrush.  I was driven to the PC office and met the very nice and organized staff-such a change from PC Nepal.  The PCMO gave me a folder with maps, vocabulary, information on museums and a schedule for my trip-so helpful!  I was then driven to the hostel.  In general, I hate hostels, but for 10 of the 13 nights there, I was in a room by myself, so it wasn’t too bad. 

The first few days, I didn’t do much-I was sore from the wisdom tooth extraction and intimidated by a country where I not only didn’t understand the language, but couldn’t even read the signs! 

Things that I did do:

-A night walking tour of the city.

-Drinks at a bar with a nice German guy that I met.  We had a reserved table to hear an amazing Armenian woman sing great Blues.

- An all-day tour of famous Armenian churches, followed by a wine tasting (the wine was terrible, but it was still a fun day).

-Visits to the Ancient Manuscript Museum, History Museum, Art Museum and various wanderings around the city.

-A large, delicious, expensive Mexican meal, complete with guacamole.

-Donuts, Cinnamon rolls and German sausage (served with corn, olives and mayonnaise-yuck!)

-A few hours spent with PC Armenia volunteers-wandering, eating, drinking, and watching the fountains in the main square.

-Pizza with ketchup instead of sauce.

-Dinner with a girl from The Netherlands and a horrible Armenian guy that she met on Couch Surfing. 

The dentist was terrible-although I didn’t have a single panic attack, so I’m very proud of myself. 

Things went fairly smoothly, except for the inevitable mess-up by PC Nepal, which PC Armenia fixed immediately and didn’t blame me for-a miracle!

Being here has been a wonderful break from Nepal-it’s a beautiful, very European city (although I feel very under-dressed compared to the women of Armenia).  There are hot showers, toilets with toilet paper, good food, beautiful things to see, fast Internet.  It is going to be very hard to go back, especially to monsoon season.  I am, however, dying to see Danny.

My plan for the first week that I’m back is to do project plans for all the projects I will be starting in the next year-I’m hoping that will make me feel more motivated, although it’s exhausting just thinking about going back.

In bowel news:  I had a real (read: not just held up to the light from a window) stool sample done while I was here.  The lab found nothing wrong, which is actually more troubling because it means that my IBS has started acting up, again.  Since I can’t really control my diet at site, I’m dreading going back to the days of diarrhea 8 times daily.

I’ll spend today doing last minute computer things, shopping for bring-backs, going to the sculpture garden and having a glass of famous Armenian cognac.

When I return to KTM on Friday morning, I will try to see a couple of NGOs.  I may have to stay in town until Monday to have more meetings and discuss applications for my GAD committee-exciting, although I’d rather just go back to site right away.

I feel so lucky to have gotten this break, and to have gotten to Skype with some of you-such a treat to see your lovely faces!  I hope to have my first visitor at the end of September, so that’s something to look forward to!

I love and miss all of you,

Xoxox

Zoop