Greetings from Bulgaria, Day 3 submitted by Anne W. Dale Blair.
The day started in assundry ways, depending on the needs of the participants. Breakfast was served down in the dining room from 8 - 10:30 am. Some of the group made it to the wonderful spread called breakfast...eggs, grape leaves wrapped around cheese, ham, little sausages, bread, vegetables, fruit, cheeses, orange juice, coffee, phyla dough wrapped eggs and cheese, and more. YUM. Next, because we had to meet in the lobby at 11 to go for lunch, we decided to go walking, go back to the room or searching for opera tickets. Some just got up for that happening and some went shopping and some went for falafel.
After breakfast, Le, Carol, Andrea and Stephanie went walking down a main shopping district and felt very fortunate to meet the acquaintance of another friendly Bulgarian. With her lovely Bulgarian dress and pillbox hat, she kept smiling and trying to speak the best English that she could. She was very interested in the fact that they were Americans. It gave her a chance to tell them about her friends that lived in San Francisco. She was also very excited and eager to share that she was 87 years old! She was so kind to allow them to get a picture taken with her and her huge smile was priceless as she saw it reviewed on the camera. She smiled even more when they told her how beautiful she was!
At any rate all had to be back at the motel by 12 to check out and load the bus with the cute little trailer to hold all our big suitcases. We all (can you believe it?) were on the bus and on the road by 12:08!!!!! \On the way we stopped and picked up Nadia who is our fabulous host while we are visiting the American University of Bulgaria. Karen and Kristen stayed behind to retrieve a late suitcase arriving on the same London flight a day later.
Fourteen of us, with Nadia, were headed to Blagoevgrad, sitting snugly on the cute bus. The landscape was initially hilly/small mountains- like Tennessee/Kentucky mountains and the road was like the Pennsylvania turnpike in some places, better and worse in other places. After driving through a pass, the land was less mountainous/big hills into more rolling hills.
We stopped at a pulloff gas station for a break which was like the gas oasises on turnpikes. The houses all along the way were all tiled in red and orange neat rows with the usual variety of newness and dilapidation. \I noticed that houses are usually in with groups of houses and not many out all by themselves, we saw rows of cypress trees that reminded us of Italy. The country side was beautiful, green, and because of the roads and houses you knew you were in a different country. I also saw a farmer helping push his horse drawn wagon up a short hill.
We arrived in Blagoevgrad at 2:20pm and unloaded all our bags from the bus and trailer and schlepped them into the lobby of the Residence hall called Scaptopara 1. We handed in our passports to the residence director - Ilko - who took them to copy and handed us our room cards. We had picked our roommate back in Michigan so there was no fighting about that! We went up and settled in, rested, etc. and met down in the lobby at 3:50 for our walking tour.
Blagoevgrad has a population of about 75,000 people, Nadia walked us through part of the city, past a shrine to someone, past a market area which is open on Wednesdays, to the American University of Bulgaria. The building was once the communist headquarters and is a massive marble building with an impressive entrance hall with flags representing the countries of students hanging in rows. There we were assigned our secret email passwords to be able to communicate with everyone. YEA! Then we toured the facility, saw our classroom for the next few weeks. and the dining room. We parted with her and walked down a main street to a restaurant named Napoli Ristorante.
Dinner was wonderful, sitting under an umbrella awning, with our new friends, eating great Bulgarian food. Interesting tidbit is that "broached beer" means draft beer....which was very good. I had the Bulgarian famous salad - shopska salad of cucumbers, tomatoes, peppers, with shredded feta cheese and topped with a black olive. Then shared roasted pork with sauce of garlic, parsley, butter and lemon.
We then had the walking tour of part of the city, including the old part, with a church and hotel. People live in some of the buildings and others are open to the public.
We are getting a sense of the city and the people. This is such an outstanding opportunity for us to learn and share our experiences with our colleagues and students. I am noticing all the strengths that everyone has as we get to know them better and those will add even more to the overall experience!
The day started in assundry ways, depending on the needs of the participants. Breakfast was served down in the dining room from 8 - 10:30 am. Some of the group made it to the wonderful spread called breakfast...eggs, grape leaves wrapped around cheese, ham, little sausages, bread, vegetables, fruit, cheeses, orange juice, coffee, phyla dough wrapped eggs and cheese, and more. YUM. Next, because we had to meet in the lobby at 11 to go for lunch, we decided to go walking, go back to the room or searching for opera tickets. Some just got up for that happening and some went shopping and some went for falafel.
After breakfast, Le, Carol, Andrea and Stephanie went walking down a main shopping district and felt very fortunate to meet the acquaintance of another friendly Bulgarian. With her lovely Bulgarian dress and pillbox hat, she kept smiling and trying to speak the best English that she could. She was very interested in the fact that they were Americans. It gave her a chance to tell them about her friends that lived in San Francisco. She was also very excited and eager to share that she was 87 years old! She was so kind to allow them to get a picture taken with her and her huge smile was priceless as she saw it reviewed on the camera. She smiled even more when they told her how beautiful she was!
At any rate all had to be back at the motel by 12 to check out and load the bus with the cute little trailer to hold all our big suitcases. We all (can you believe it?) were on the bus and on the road by 12:08!!!!! \On the way we stopped and picked up Nadia who is our fabulous host while we are visiting the American University of Bulgaria. Karen and Kristen stayed behind to retrieve a late suitcase arriving on the same London flight a day later.
Fourteen of us, with Nadia, were headed to Blagoevgrad, sitting snugly on the cute bus. The landscape was initially hilly/small mountains- like Tennessee/Kentucky mountains and the road was like the Pennsylvania turnpike in some places, better and worse in other places. After driving through a pass, the land was less mountainous/big hills into more rolling hills.
We stopped at a pulloff gas station for a break which was like the gas oasises on turnpikes. The houses all along the way were all tiled in red and orange neat rows with the usual variety of newness and dilapidation. \I noticed that houses are usually in with groups of houses and not many out all by themselves, we saw rows of cypress trees that reminded us of Italy. The country side was beautiful, green, and because of the roads and houses you knew you were in a different country. I also saw a farmer helping push his horse drawn wagon up a short hill.
We arrived in Blagoevgrad at 2:20pm and unloaded all our bags from the bus and trailer and schlepped them into the lobby of the Residence hall called Scaptopara 1. We handed in our passports to the residence director - Ilko - who took them to copy and handed us our room cards. We had picked our roommate back in Michigan so there was no fighting about that! We went up and settled in, rested, etc. and met down in the lobby at 3:50 for our walking tour.
Blagoevgrad has a population of about 75,000 people, Nadia walked us through part of the city, past a shrine to someone, past a market area which is open on Wednesdays, to the American University of Bulgaria. The building was once the communist headquarters and is a massive marble building with an impressive entrance hall with flags representing the countries of students hanging in rows. There we were assigned our secret email passwords to be able to communicate with everyone. YEA! Then we toured the facility, saw our classroom for the next few weeks. and the dining room. We parted with her and walked down a main street to a restaurant named Napoli Ristorante.
Dinner was wonderful, sitting under an umbrella awning, with our new friends, eating great Bulgarian food. Interesting tidbit is that "broached beer" means draft beer....which was very good. I had the Bulgarian famous salad - shopska salad of cucumbers, tomatoes, peppers, with shredded feta cheese and topped with a black olive. Then shared roasted pork with sauce of garlic, parsley, butter and lemon.
We then had the walking tour of part of the city, including the old part, with a church and hotel. People live in some of the buildings and others are open to the public.
We are getting a sense of the city and the people. This is such an outstanding opportunity for us to learn and share our experiences with our colleagues and students. I am noticing all the strengths that everyone has as we get to know them better and those will add even more to the overall experience!
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