Less than 5 weeks left as a PCV!

This morning my counterpart, her father, and I met with my landlord to let her know I was moving out June 30th, make my last rent payment, and set up the day she would come to make sure everything is okay with the apartment.  It was then it finally hit me that this is almost the end!  It's quite surreal, but the more I pack, the more I give away, and the emptier my apartment looks, the more real it becomes.  I know when the time comes I will be ready, but doesn't make my current state any less weird.  Today is being spent cleaning, putting aside things I want to take home (the pile is already bigger than can fit in the small amount of luggage I want to cart around during my travels with Dorrie, Dad, and Liz so going to have to purge again at some point), and packing donation bags for my NGO's and fellow PCV's.  I feel pretty confident all of the things which I need to do will be taken care of by the 30th, at which point I'll move in with my site mate Tamika for a few days,then off to Yerevan to spend a few days saying goodbye to the PCV's leaving on July 7th and wait for Dorrie and Dad to arrive on the 10th.  I've also been working on all of the paperwork for Peace Corps to close out my service and getting my resume, cover letters, and recommendation letters ready for my job applications.  As many know about me, this is when I start to get a bit anxious and stress:)  But I've been pretty good about it so far, chipping away at everything little by little everyday, which is helping me stay a little calmer than my normal state of mind during big changes.

I had started to get a little overwhelmed a couple of weeks ago, but got to take a break for 10 days when Gary came to visit from Ghana.  It was an amazing trip that went by way too fast.  I got to check off a lot of the things from my must see in Armenia before I leave list and just really enjoyed having him here, experiencing a little bit of what life as a PCV in Armenia is like.  Liz had her cousin and her cousin's boyfriend visiting at the same time, so the five of us got to spend a lot of time together, which made the whole visit even more fun.  Gary got in at 6am on Friday morning so we both had a little bit of sleep catching up to do then we met up with a bunch of PCV's for a horovats (BBQ Armenia style) dinner at the gorge in Yerevan.  It was actually really fun to share all of the good food here in Armenia with Gary, he has access to much less variety than we do here, so every meal had something he hadn't had in over a year. 

Horovats at the Gorge

 The next day we went to Noy Cognac factory and got to taste 90 year old wine, which was amazing and impossible to describe, in addition to 10 and 20 year old cognac.  We were taught how to determine how good and aged cognac was, learned a lot about the factory, and were told that Noy is Noah in Armenian, notable since Noah's Arc is said to have ended up at the top of Mt. Ararat when the mountain was a part of Armenian land.  We then went to see Reincarnation, the Armenian reggae band, a musical treat for all of us.  We spent the next three days in Jermuk, a resort town in southern Armenia known for it's healing water, and got to take an off-roading tour to hot springs,a spillway, and a waterfall with an amazing family we met. 


 The father of the family then drove Gary and I to Shinuhayer, a village further south, and ended up with another off-roading adventure through the mountains.  While down there, we went to Tatev Monastery by way of the longest ropeway in Europe, and got to check out handzoresque, an old Armenian cave village built into the mountains.  


Then we got to meet up with a few PCV's to go bowling, first time since I moved to Armenia.  We then made our way to Gavar to have dinner with Stacy's host family, some of my favorite people I've met here and Gary got to experience what is was like to be a male in an Armenian village, lots of food, vodka, and toasts.  Stacy's family adored him and adopted him as one of their American sons. 



 The next morning, despite being exhausted, we went to Last Bell, the high school graduation of the seniors in Stacy's village, Karmir gyoogh. 

Last Bell

Then back to Yerevan for our last 24 hours full of shopping, delicious food, friends, and goodbyes.  It was such an amazing break for me and I am grateful for the friendship the two of us have developed over the last couple of years.

After he left, it was back to finishing things up here.  The day he left was our 2 anniversary of being in Armenia, so we celebrated by going to the movies for the first time since we arrived!  It was pretty awesome, they had a hard time making us leave the theater:) Then we were treated to the last open mic at our favorite pub here, Station.  One of the girls from Envoy Hostel sang Hallelujah to a candle lit bar, with everyone singing along during the chorus and we ended the night with karoake, one of my favorite nights here.


So now comes all of the finishing touches.  I am working on completing everything with my NGO's, planning goodbyes, and enjoying everything I love about Armenia for these last few weeks.  I have been able to reflect a lot on this experience, thinking back to when we first started to where I am now, and it's pretty incredible to think about all of the people I've met, the experiences I've had, the challenges I've faced, and how much I've grown.  I feel pretty lucky to have had this experience, it's one that will always be a part of me and I will never forget.

Now the real countdown begins, I have planned a horovats at the Lake to say goodbye to all of the friends I have made here in Gavar, many of the volunteers and I from my PST village are going to go back to Argel to say goodbye to our first host families here, we have an A20 volunteer goodbye dinner and party, some other events, and then it will all be over and Dorrie and Dad will be here!

Thank you to all of you for your love and support over the last couple of years, you've made this experience even more special!  Not sure there will be time for another post before I leave...so see you all in America!!