This week was phenomenal, Let's just go in chronological order, shall we?
Thursday Night:
Our bus for Latvia left at 22:00 (almost every clock here uses military time). We had to show our passport before we boarded. We traveled with LuxExpress. And it was luxurious! Free hot chocolate, free water, super comfy seats, outlets for charging devices, and FREE WIFI. Though there was a slight hiccup in my seating arrangement. Some lady (Lady 1) sat in my seat, so I sat in some other lady's (Lady 2) seat. Neither really spoke English. Oh, and it was the second to last row. So the bus driver had to come all the way to the back to sort it out. Lady 1 refused to move seats, so I got Lady 2's seat and Lady 2 got Lady's 1 seat. The kicker? Lady 1's original seat was literally 1 row behind my assigned seat. So she only moved up one row by taking my seat instead of her own. (Hopefully that story made sense).
Our Bus
Lady 2 sat across the isle from me in Lady 1's seat
The person in the blue jacket is Lady 1 (in my seat)
Anyways! It was like a 16 hour bus ride. But at least I got to sleep through a lot of it. The strangest part was we drove all the way north to Estonia and entered the EU there. So I never actually got passport stamps from Latvia or Lithuania. Haha
Friday:
We arrived in Riga (the capital of Latvia) just before noon, which was wonderful because we were able to walk straight to our hostel (Cinnamon Sally's) and check in.
Great first experience at a hostel!
Our hostel was on the third floor of a building near Old Town Riga. And the first floor? McDonald's. We took advantage of that while we could. Haha. After checking in, we decided to go explore the city! The group split pretty fast and I ended up exploring with Jenn and Elizabeth.
The Canal
Old Town Riga
The Blackheads (literally a medieval fraternity house)
The Three Brothers - Riga's oldest buildings
Baltic Tiki Head
Those are cat statues. They've become the symbol of Riga.
Freedom Monument (Latvian Statue of Liberty)
After some exploring we headed to a Mexican restaurant that was just a couple doors down from the Three Brothers. I was worried it would be small portions and not taste good. The portion was perfectly sized and positively delicious! Fajitas for the win!
From Right to Left: Elizabeth, Jennifer, and then me!
On the way back to our hostel for the night, we passed the coolest street performer. I NEVER give money to street performers. But I couldn't NOT give him money. I have never heard anything like this before. I was completely captivated. (Sorry the video is sideways)
Saturday:
I got up early the next morning to head over the Central Market to get breakfast. We got there at 7:15am only to discover most vendors don't arrive until 8:00am... nevertheless I found some AMAZING (AND I MEAN AMAZING) pastries and apples.
The market incorporated these old airplane hangers. (aka pastries, dairy, etc)
But there were also stalls outside. (aka apples, fruit, etc)
We then took yet another bus to Vilnius (the capital of Lithuania). Since it was just a day trip, we literally only had about 6 hours in the country. There was so much more that I wanted to see. But that just means I've got good reasons to come back, right? :)
Chicken, mozzarella cheese, and tomatoes on grilled homemade bread. Oh, and their "secret sauce" was like a really yummy garlic mayonnaise
Bell tower
You're supposed spin around once on this square and make a wish. Which I obviously did.
Gediminas Tower
Going inside the actual tower cost money. It was 7 Litas and I only had 4 Litas left... So I took this video from outside the tower.
Gediminas Tower was on a pretty tall hill. But then there's an even bigger hill called "Hill of Three Crosses" that overlooks Gediminas Tower. We hiked up there for the best view of Vilnius.
Three Crosses - hence, Hill of Three Crosses.
We got back to Latvia just before 10:00pm. I was exhausted so I went straight to bed. The hostel staff invited us to a concert but none of us had the energy for it. Haha
Sunday:
Pastries from the market, as well as crepes from this lovely little restaurant.
Well, they were more like pancakes. But not your every day type pancakes. They had regular pancakes, meat pancakes, banana pancakes, caramel pancakes, cheese pancakes, you name it! And the best part? Dirt cheap. We left there fat (distended stomachs) and happy. ;)
Our game plan for the day was Turaida Castle. Which required yet another bus ride. So we stalked up on snacks! I tried my first Lion Bar and my first Kinder candy.
They were both good, but I didn't think either one was spectacular. I'm more of a plain chocolate bar type of person. But they were yummy nevertheless.
Guyla's relative Catherine and her son George took us to go see the castle. They are both half Russian, half Latvian. Although they consider themselves to be Russian. They were both so kind and helpful. We took a bus from Riga to Sigulda, and then from Sigulda we walked to the castle. That walk ended up being 45 minutes or so. Haha. We took a bus back to Sigulda when we were done.
The largest cave in Latvia happened to be on the way!
I climbed that tower.
George was my exploring buddy. We went into literally every single room in the castle that was open.
800 years old, say whaaat!
I LOVE CASTLES.
After we got back to Sigulda (via bus), we then took a train back to Riga. We said goodbye to our new friends and then headed back to the hostel to check out.
For dinner we got McDonald's AND Subway. Don't judge. We had not eaten for almost 8 hours. The Subway here played American music so we were dancing while waiting in line. :) Oh and you know the $5 footlong? Here it's 5€ footlong. Haha
Monday:
The bus ride back was long. I didn't get much sleep because I wanted to wait until we crossed the border back into Russia. That didn't happen until 2am...
We arrived back in Moscow at 1:30pm. My class starts at 2:30pm. So I went straight to the school! On 5 hours of sleep and no lunch, I taught until 6:30pm. When I got home (around 8:30pm), I ate a huge dinner, and then focused on this blog post. It's past midnight now, so I guess I'll unpack in the morning. :)
Throughout my blog, I've made various comments here and there about being a teacher. But I've yet to dedicate a whole post to it -- until now!
This first part will be mostly explaining about my teaching schedule and such. For those who don't care and just want to see pictures of my cute kids, scroll down.
I teach 2 classes during the afternoon. I arrive at my school and eat lunch at 1:30pm. Although I usually come early to prep for my lessons. I don't know many of the teachers but Jenn and I are friends with the hall monitor named Nadiya. The school has a security guard that we see a lot. But usually we just say "zdrastvuytye" (hello) and "dasvidanya" (goodbye).
I teach my 1st graders first. They have a short break in between our two lessons when they go grab a snack from the cafeteria. Sometimes they bring me one back. :)
Vatrushka and juice :)
I took this picture today! I usually have around 7 kids, but only 3 made it into the picture. Haha. From left to right, Albert, Olya, and Fima. They were eating/drinking a "cocktail" from snack time. I'm not sure what exactly it was, but it definitely was more like sparkling cider.
From left to right: Albert, Olya, and Fima
My second class is my kindergartners. Jenn and I team teach. We have anywhere from 5 to 12 kids. We just wait and see who shows up. Haha. We teach them 2 lessons each, for a total 4 lessons in 2 hours. They have a snack time too -- but at dinner time so it's their dinner.
Today we had 11 kids, which we split into two groups. I got this picture from the second group. From left to right: Sonya, Dariya, Dyoma, Nika, Tanya, and Margarita.
From left to right: Sonya, Dariya, Dyoma, Nika, Tanya, and Margerita
And then here's just a couple individual pictures.
Adolzhon (counting his tickets)
Ksusha
Nika
Danya (serious face)
Danya (happy face)
Last week we were learning about snow gear and Jenn snapped a photo of David wearing my snow boots.
David with Nika (and me) in the background
They all had a lot of fun with that activity. They took turns trying on different pieces of my snowy weather clothes while we talked about what each item was used for. I hope none of them have lice, because my beenie got passed around a lot. And I saw one kid pick his boogers before he put on my gloves... Don't worry, I checked and he didn't leave any behind. But I think I'll wait another week or so to let ALL the germs die out.
Oh. If you glance back up to that photo of David, you will notice I'm wearing little blue booties over my feet. Russians are very particular about having shoes indoors. You either put on booties, or wear shoes specifically for indoor use only. At the main school, I change into my black vans as "indoor shoes" and at the Kindergarten (in a separate building) we are required to wear the booties. It's quite the hassle, but we're used to it!
And I think that's a pretty basic insight into my life as a teacher. :) I love being here in Moscow. My kids are great. My ILP family is amazing. I couldn't be happier with my decision to spend this semester volunteering abroad.
