Here's Your 'Andy' Update!

a big cultural difference that's been hard to adapt to
is the way bulgarians nonverbally say yes and no. back
home, "yes" is a nod, up and down, and "no" is a
shake, left to right. here, in bulgaria, a "yes" is
given with a wacky motion that i can only compare to a
bobble-headed doll! it's hillarious to watch, and
difficult to mimic without laughing. some are more
expressive than others. i ask them questions and i see
big smiles with their heads going crazy this way and
that for a response. the less expressive bobbles look
more like a shake, from left to right (what i'm used
to as "no"). and a "no" is given with a short nod up
and down, which is pretty much what "yes" was back
home. so, i always end up asking the same question
several times cause i can't tell if they're telling me
yes or no in bulgarian head language, or if they can
see that i'm american and are telling me yes or no in
american head language! got that? bobble your head if
you understand...

we had a meeting with the local police to learn how
the law enforcement works in krichim and other nearby
cities. we learned that the biggest crime is robbery.
robbery in the home... of the home basically. people
will steal metal from houses to sell to recyclers! i
thought it was kind of a funny thing to steal. and
there was a big issue of pick-pocketers too.
apparently they're very, very good. in fact, some of
the professionals cut off their own thumbs to reduce
obsticles for getting into your pocket!!! is that
insane or what! people are always saying look out for
the 4 fingered gypsies! there's a lot of racism here.
the main minorities in the country are turkish, and
roma (gypsie, but gypsie is evidently a deragatory
term). the turkish aren't liked by the native
bulagrians, but turkey doesn't like them either. and
nobody likes the roma. their reasons for dislike and
separation are very childish, but i'm sure they're
very deeply rooted. they say they don't like them
simply because they're them. stupid.

went on a 3 day site visit of the town i'll be
stationed in for the next 2 years. it's beautiful! the
name is kalofer. it's smack dab in the middle of the
entire country next to a bigger town called karlovo,
an hour north of plovdiv, bulgaria's 2nd largest city.
i'll be situated at the foothill of the highest peak
in the balkan mountains, mt. botev! there's a huge
national park here, central balkan national park, that
includes 9 large protected areas where people aren't
even allowed to go unless there's a trail running
through it, in which case you're not allowed to leave
trails. it's one of only five parks in all of europe
to qualify for the 'PAN Parks' certification. it was
explained to me that this means it's the purest of the
pure as evaluated by an independent organization. the
entire national park is more than 71,000 hectares (716
sq km), and is home to some impressive statistics on
biodiversity: more than 2,000 different species of
plants, including 1900 vascular plant species, 188
species of aglae, 229 species of moss, and 15 species
of ferns. 123 species of birds, 2,387 species and
subspecies of invertebrates, and 256 species of fungi!
in the park there are 13 local endemic species, 10
species of bulgarian endemic plants and 67 species of
balkan endemic plants!

the town of kalofer is 3,600 people, the vast majority
of which are either younger than 16, or older than 40.
there might be a few people i haven't met yet that are
within my age group, my 2 coworkers, elena and nadia,
are 27 and 22! elena has a 4 year old son that adores
me. the kid's name is yanni and he has more energy
than i've ever seen in a 4 year old! he's always
telling people i'm his friend and challenging me to
races! the town's population has declinded 50% in the
last 10 years. this trend is common throughout
bulgaria as college kids, or people with some
education, leave the country for western europe or
elsewhere in search of work. my apartment is cool and
only a short walk from my work. though everything in
town is a short walk from everything else. i have a
bedroom, living room, bathroom, and half a kitchen.
there's even an electric heater, and a boiler for hot
water! hot damn! and... a sit down toilet!!!! i can't
wait! i'll occupy the first floor of a 3 story
apartment. the 2nd floor is my landlord, baba tina
(baba = grandmother) who evidentally takes the
initiative from time to time to come in and clean the
place up a bit. this i learned from the pcv that i'm
replacing. on the 3rd floor, lives elena and her son,
yanni, so i'll have pleanty of noise around to keep me
awake! the small town lifestyle is going to take some
getting used to. before i arrived, the tourist office
learned that i was 26 and did taekwondo. 2 days later,
i went to a restaurant where the two ladies working
said they heard i was very healthy, i didn't drink any
alcohol, and i was a zen master! i don't know if the
gossip will be a source of humor or a source of
frustration...

in any case, my job will be working in the tourist
information center for an eco-tourist association
(NGO). when i found that out i was quite bummed. i
hate tourists. and my new boss, mitko, works 361 days
a year. great... good news is, i'm not just stuck
greeting ungrateful tourists everyday. most of my job
will consist of writing projects. this means that i
need to come up with ideas for project proposals so
that our association can get various grants from
different EU donors or elsewhere. once we get the
projects rolling, the idea is that more tourists will
come to kalofer to appreciate the towns rich culture
and natural beauty of the park, and leave a bunch of
money while they're here, in turn boosting the local
economy. the fun part is our partner organization is
the national park itself. so, i get to work on many
environmental education projects within the park,
instead of just staying in kalofer. that means, i get
to spend quite a few work days "researching" up in the
hills! anything for a nice hike! there's another pcv
in town, sara from minnesota. she's an english teacher
in the school here. i'll probably hang out with her
once in a while. the association i'll be working for
has a website: http://www.kalofer.com and website of
the national park which i'll be doing many projects
for is: http://www.visitcentralbalkan.net both are
available in english, so find the icon that says
switch to english or something like that.

the itenarary has me in krichim, learning the language
and minor other trainings until october 26. on the
27th, if i pass my language test, i get sworn in as an
official peace corps volunteer (now i'm just a
trainee). then, moments after swearing in, we all get
shipped off to our permanent sites, in my case -
kalofer. the closest good friend i have will be 2
hours away by bus. but that's considering the bus is
on time. when i tried to leave kalofer and come back
to krichim after my site visit was completed, the
12.10pm bus didn't come until 5.40pm! so my two hour
bus ride home turned into a full on 8 hour travel day!

hope all's well on your end. thanks for saying hi on
my last email. say hi again!

andy