Merry Christmas!

So, tomorrow morning I am leaving to meet up with my family in Salzburg, Austria.  I am so excited to see them and to celebrate Christmas with them in Austria.  I think it will be absolutely beautiful and quintessential Christmas! :-)

Just wanted to wish you all a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. Safe travels for all of you who are visiting family and exploring new places!! 

Love you! Happy Holidays!

Christmas Break is finally here!

Oh what a week.  Serendipitously (and lucky for me) my students were doing group work, so the work load this week was not too heavy.  I would have thought that Thanksgiving vacation would have offered some respite, but it only made me more anxious for Christmas to come.  Ahhhh... the feeling of knowing you are on vacation.  It is so wonderful :-)

This past weekend was filled of Christmas engagements, a few basketball games, and lots of work as well as play.  Friday night was the faculty Christmas party at the "Floyd Black House".  Floyd Black was the founder of the school, and so the Presidents' house is named in his honor.  The Cangiano's hosted a wonderful party, complete with the passing of our final Secret Santa gifts, a little bit of appetizers, and well stocked bar (as the Bulgarians do a party well).  I was certainly surprised by who my S.S. was, and received this adorable single serve tea pot with cup.  It was a very cute gift.  Saturday night, our friends hosted a small gathering at their house for some more Christmas cheer, good company, good stories, food and drinks.  I made some mulled wine (yummmm!) and it seemed that most people enjoyed it!  (at least I hope they did.  I thought it was pretty good)

During the afternoon on Saturday (between the two evenings of Christmas parties) we had a 3 v 3 basketball tournament

 where Erin and myself played as the "exhibition game" against the winning female group.  Needless to say

 that NEITHER of us have EVER played on an organized bball team, and have very limited experience on the court.   Maybe except for the occasional game of H-O-R-S-E with a sibling or in

 gym class.... So, I thought we played really well.  Only lost 10-0 but we played very hard- great defense, just no offense.  It is kind of a necessary skill.  Oh well. It was a wonderful and fun way to spend a Saturday afternoon.  The men's exhibition team, however had more skill and definitely more talent, and more players than the team Erin and I made up.  I think that the men's team was definitively winning up until the last 5 minutes, where one of the students scored 3 3-pointers.  It was certainly a close finish, and definitely a good fight. 

The busy nature of the weekend just continued right into the week, which was a whirlwind of classes, last minute errands, making sure things are all set for when I come back from break, and just the act of teaching.  I also had m

y fill of the teenage drama--I really had not had the privilege yet of dealing with any overly emotional and/or anxiety-filled/stress-filled

students about the week before vacation.  This week I think 

I had my fill of the drama for the entire year.  I am sure that everything was just compounded with the fact that it is the week before Christmas break and so everyone is just ready to be gone.  It was interesting trying to get my students to do the things that I wanted them to in a timely manner, and everything seemed to work out.  I think we all will benefit from some time off. 

 I certainly am looking forward to it! 

Yesterday evening and this afternoon were the performances of the ACS Winter Concert.  There were several different acts:a few school bands, a rap, the debut of a couple songs from the spring musical (the school is doing a production of Hair), as well as a few songs and solos from the ACS Choir.  I thought all the students did  a really great job with each of the performances.  The last part of the concert was the balkan dances.  Erin, Jess, Andy and I were a few of the international teachers who took part in the winter celebrations.  We performed in the Balkan 

dance with about 40 other teachers, students and even a few parents.  The beautiful, colorful costumes, were made of this heavy wool material, and of course were multi-layered.  It was hot up on stage, but was so much fun, learning the steps to the dances, and being with other teachers, adults and of course students.  Some of my students were also dancing, and they said we were good.  I messed up a few of the steps, but not anything major.  

Apparently they have a show in the spring too, which I would like to do. 

Here are a couple video clips of the dances.  One if of us at practice, and the other is of the students on stage right before the dances I was in.  Enjoy!

Video of the students in full costume on stage:

After the performances were over, everyone was invited outside in a whole group dance.  

It was pretty neat see almost 100 people all doing the same steps in time with one another, as well as some people trying to just in to learn them (like me).  It was a pretty nice day; the rain was attempting to hold off from falling.  I have another short video of the group dancing outside too.  (Hopefully you are able to see all of these)

That wraps up, in a nutshell, the whirlwind of a week that I have had.  I cannot wait to leave on Monday to go meet up with my parents in Austria.  It is going to be a wonderful way to celebrate Christmas, and I cannot wait to see them and my sister.  After Christmas, we will come back here to Sofia and explore the city and hopefully some places outside the city.  :) 

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to everyone!  and for some translation into Bulgarian:

Весела Коледа и Честита Нова Година

Koprivshtitsa... An overdue entry

The weekend of Halloween (yes I realize that this is over a month ago), we went on a trip outside of Sofia, a few hours to a mountain town of Koprivshtitsa.  It is a beautiful heritage village, with museum houses and good traditional Bulgarian restaurants.  I had the best "doughnuts" of my life there before we headed back onto the bus to return to the big city.  They are a little less like doughnuts and more like small rounds of fried dough (which I guess is what a doughnuts is but these have more of the "fried dough/funnel cake" consistency). They are served hot, with powdered sugar, and I am sure are terribly bad for you, but taste oh so yummy... 

We took a bus the morning after Halloween from Sofia, and arrived mid afternoon in this lovely town.  We- my roommates (Meg and Erin), their boyfriends (Cooper and Andy) as well as Meg's friends from England went; two other Mike and Kate also went as well.  We all perused the shops, antiques, Bulgarian crafts, touristy shops too, as well as a little "open market" in the main square, where some baba's were selling homemade jams, bottled honey, woodcrafts, etc.  It was a great afternoon to wander around and enjoy some of the slower pace of the small town.  

Our "hotel" was an adorable inn/house.  We had rented out a couple of apartments in this building which had been refurbished from an old house into a rentable residence.  It was absolutely precious.  The inside of the apartments were painted and furnished with Bulgarian furniture, tapestries, and decor.  The ceilings were also extremely low!  I felt almost like Alice in Wonderland, when she is in that little house and eats the different pieces of mushroom to grow or get smaller...

It was just such a neat place to stay for this weekend trip.  The house itself was adorable and had a wonderful view of the village below and the mountains across the way...

The night we arrived, after sitting down to a large dinner/late lunch Andy convinced everyone 

to hike up this hill to this horse statue that is supposed to symbolize the man who fired the first shot in an uprising that happened in or around Koprivshtitsa.  By the time we reached the top of the flight of large granite steps, the sun had set behind the mountain on the other side of the town.  From our perch, under the orange and lavender sunset, we had a wonderful view of all the chimneys pumping out smoke from the houses, up into the darkening sky.  Such a neat sight- hundreds of rooftops, chugging smoke out the top...

Erin, Andy and I woke up early on Sunday to go for a walk around the still sleepy town.

  Gorgeous pictures were taken, mostly of the sun rising over the beautifully painted buildings.  There were bright greens, blues, a purple church, all with the low hanging, brown shackled roof.  Such a trip back in time...