Winter is coming!

 

It's starting to get chilly in Armenia, but happy to report, no snow yet!  First things first, Anne to answer your question, I have a ton of buckets in my apartment!  The one you see in the picture from my last post is my water filter.  I actually do not drink the water from the faucet in Armenia, all of the water I drink is either filtered, bottled, or boiled.  I also have a bunch of buckets in my bathroom to fill up my water filter, for bucket showers for when I don't have water, and for my toilet.  I only have running water for a few hours a day, so have to fill my buckets in the morning for use for the rest of the day.  Also, rumor has it my pipes tend to freeze during the winter, so water storage is pretty important:)

So some fun things that have been happening here...

There is a Cultural House in Gavar and one Sunday night I went with some of my Armenian friends to one of the most fun and interesting events I've been to since I've gotten here.  It was basically a night of traditional Armenian music and dance and what a cool experience.  The music was amazing and the energy incredible, people were even dancing traditional Armenian dance in pretty much every aisle in the whole place.  It was quite the event and there is talk that they are going to have similar events once every month or two which would be pretty great.

I've also gotten to travel a bit which of course has made me super happy.  I travelled to beautiful northern Armenia to celebrate Halloween with my fellow PCV's where I got to experience the leaves changing, quite similar to an east coast fall, and got in a wonderful hike throughout the town of Berd, where we all stayed.  It is amazing how quickly the scenery can change in this little country and we are so lucky to be able to travel and visit each other and see as much of Armenia as we can, which I plan to take full advantage of! 



With David in Berd

I  also traveled to Chambarak , a town greatly affected by past wars with Azerbaijan...devastation which is evident even though we were only there for a brief period, with Counterpart Int'l to observe a business training with the youth club in the small village of Martuni.  As Arpine, my Armenian friend who did the business presentation said, the people of Chambarak literally work so they can live, the level of poverty there is quite significant and apparently the winter is one of the most brutal in the countrry, making their challenges even greater. 

Last week, all of the A-20's (PCV's in my group) gathered in Tsakhkadzor for trainings.  As a CYD (community and youth development) volunteer, I was a part of the Program and Design Management training along with my counterpart Gegham.  All of the CYD volunteers and their counterparts attended this training in order to take a potential community project and develop it from start to finish.  Gegham and I chose to work on an agricultural production training project which we have discussed implementing in both Gavar and Noratus( Gavar's neighboring town).  It was an incredibly beneficial and significant training for both Gegham and me and I hope that we will be able to put our plan into action.  The last day of the training, all of the volunteers in country got together for an all volunteer conference.  It was pretty great to have all of us together, only time it will happen, to be able to get advice from the A-19's/A18's and to compare experiences, think all of us valued that time together. 

While I continue to work with VIA on a schedule and plan, I have gotten involved with other NGO's/orgs in my community and am most proud of my partnership with the Orphanage in Gavar.  Diana, one of my other Armenian friends who works with an organization called Armenian Caritas (an NGO I hope to begin working with soon) and I started going to the orphanage on Sunday afternoon/early evenings to work with the girls on a leadership curriculum.  Peace Corps has a program called Glow Camp which is a camp focused on girls leadership and empowerment.  Glow stands for Girls Leading Our World and is a program available in many Peace Corps countries including Armenia.  Because funding only allows for 40-50 girls throughout the country to attend, Diana and I decided we would do a mini Glow camp of sorts with the girls at the orphanage.  My time with Diana and the girls has been my best experience in Armenia to date.  So far, we have addressed communication and personal values and will continue with such subjects as leadership, character building, respect and manners, environmental awareness, exercise and health, self esteem, etc.  We meet with the girls in two groups, one group is 15-18 and the other 11-15. 

I am also involved with the two initiatives here in Armenia which are Gender Equality and HIV/AIDs awareness.  World AIDs day is December 1st so we are planning to do presenations in 4 different cities/towns in Armenia on Keith Haring, an artist who was an activist in New York City and who passed from AIDs related complications in 1990.  Along with two other volunteers, I will be presenting on his life, work, and HIV/AIDs awareness in Gyumri, one of the largest cities in Armenia. The other presentations will be in Yerevan, Vanadzor, and Kapan. 

So that is the latest from beautiful Armenia.  Winter is definitely making her way here quickly, so have to imagine my next post may have something to do with the cold of Armenia.  But so far so good.  In fact, Gavar was not the first to get snow!  Several other volunteers announced their first snowfalls last night, so Gavar is holding out for the moment, but is definitely cold enough for it!