My Placement!

gamarjoba! 

Two posts in one day for you lovely people across the world!  Today is finally the day in which we will be leaving to go live with our host families in any of the 11 regions that make up the country of Georgia (excluding the autonomus region of Abkhazia in the upper northwest).  So, where am I going right?!

I will be spending the next four months in the village of Apeni, near the town of Lagodekhi in the Kakehti region.  See this nice Google map for a geographical reference.

All I know about my host family situation currently is that my host father, my host mother and my host brother (who is 12 years old) live in a house.  This house is supposed to have an indoor bathroom and toilet (yay!!!) and internet available in the home.   These are just very broad specifications about the family right now, so I’ll obviously have a lot more to report on in a few days after I’ve officially moved in with them.  For example, instead of a Western indoor toilet, they could definitely have a Turkish toilet instead.  Living with a host family and having to speak Georgian (or use charades for a while) is one of the best aspects of this Teach and Learn with Georgia program and makes it such a unique cultural experience and language immersion quite unlike any other program out there. 

Along with everyone else in the program, I immediately scoured the Internet hoping to find any information I could about my village, and let’s just say that I didn’t find much.  It’s pretty close to the Azerbaijan border and the biggest town near me is Lagodekhi, about 35 minutes away (but if all Georgians drive the same way, it will take 15 minutes).  Another teacher in my group is going to be placed in the village closest to me and I think there is a Peace Corps. Volunteer who just arrived to my village last month, so they will be nice people to interact with when I am missing native English speakers.

Although the thought of meeting this new family in a few hours is the most daunting part of my day this is truly the beginning of this experience (just a few thoughts running through my head right now: how will the greet me?  Shake of the hand? Hug? Cheek kiss? What if they don’t like me?  Where will my supra be? Will my host brother be nice?  Moreover, will he speak some English? etc. etc.).  Orientation was just a crash course of knowledge for the real deal that starts today: living with the host families.  I’m nervous, I’m excited, but most of all I feel prepared to meet these people and integrate myself into their life for the next four months.

Miss you all,

Kelsey