"Lost" features Polar Bears?!?!

A quick note to readers: I'm trying to upload a photo gallery of our Christmas vacation, and "imbed" it into the blog as a slideshow, but I'm not sure if my internet cafe connection will allow me to do it. If not, you'll have to wait until I can get to the Peace Corps office in Tbilisi in a couple weeks. (I've got a few pictures up, but it keeps crashing, so bear with us.)
Apologies for not posting earlier, (Martha and I have been back for about a week now) but due to weather/sleeping bags/travel restrictions/school starting/secondary projects, we have'nt been able to get outta town.

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Terjola, 15th of January, 2008

Firstly, I’d like to wish you and yours a hearty Georgian “Gilotsavt Axal Tzels!” (happy new year), since Monday (1.14) was the Georgian Orthodox New Year, which is not when the Georgian Santa (“Father Snow”) comes down the chimney (or petchi flue), because that would be the other new year that is celebrated in Georgia, or the 31st of December. Yes, that New Year is also celebrated replete with a “new year’s tree,” which looks eerily like a Christmas tree, so go figure. Confused? So are we.

Second, and more importantly, I’d like to join my family in wishing our very own Joachim Alexandre Roman Katchinoff a fantastic 16th birthday. With a name like that, you know DMV is going to enjoy seeing his mug in line. I’m not sure of what legal hurdles one clears when hitting the big “one-six” these days, but I think driving is still one of them. Congratulations Jo, and I hope you had a good time on Monday, eating all that varied food, in your warm house, with broadband internet, television, and my dog.

Great thanks are also in order for my mother and everyone in Europe for our recent Christmas vacation. My mom, who is currently on a NGO site visit of her own in “hot-hot-hot-Honduras!” is gathering her own charming stories of developing world transportation. (How strange it is to read emails from ones’ mother describing almost identical stomach parasites as your own! Giardia: it brings a family together.) I’m only kidding, obviously I would never publicize that my own mother has Giardia. She probably only contracted an amoeba of some sort.



Anyhow, thanks to Grazyna, and my family in Europe, Martha and I were able to spend a very lovely 21 days in Belgium and France. We went with another Peace Corps Volunteer, Josh, who didn’t mind sleeping under staircases, or sharing a room with a married couple, as long as we kept feeding his face with kilo after kilo of foie gras. Thanks Josh, for a great 3 weeks. It was nice to get a change of scenery, and, though we missed out on all of the Georgian holiday festivities, we really appreciated everything Belgium and France had to offer. We also had a chance to spend a few days with G6 PCVs Ryan and Paige (of http://www.whereisnickum.blogspot.com/ fame) in Paris. They had somehow finagled an apartment near the Bastille for two weeks, and we rang in the new year with them at the place de la Concorde (along with half-a-million people/French riot police). We also got to spend a few hours at the beach, taking in the lovely North Sea air, and the brisk Belgian coastal weather at Oostende. Remarkably, our prude Georgian eyes also took in our fair share of Belgian skin, as we happened upon the same Polar Bear club that we saw 3 years ago, and watched 1500 of them sprint into the churning frigid waters of the Chunnel. (I really should just replace “Polar Bear Club” with “Fat Naked Men,” since young Baywatch-esque women seem to have a better sense than to take a winter dip in the sea.)

A couple days ago, stuffed to the gills with great food, beer, wine, and hot new Sarko-Bruni relationship gossip, we returned to the land of the Kartvelli, ready to start an exciting and action-packed new year. Our current cold snap may have forced us to hide in the petchi-room and in our sleeping bags, but we’ve got tons of work waiting for us if we can only brave the cold. School starts up in a couple days, and deadlines for our Secondary projects are going to keep us (well, Martha mostly) busy for the next couple weeks.

Tune in next time to find out everything you ever wanted to know about new PC Georgia winter work innovations in our next post: “Julien and Martha Work-From-Home: lessons in sleeping bag texting.”