Busy busy weekend :)

Busy. I finally feel like my life in Georgia picked up a little bit. Really my social life picked up a bit :) I loved it! I guess I can start with Friday.

Friday:
Of course I went to school. Taught some English. I ended the school day with the 3rd grade, that was not so fun. They were crazy. There are these two kids that sit right by the teachers desk and they were pretty much fighting the entire time. Then there were other kids that were not paying attention and distracting others from the reading we were going over. Generally this class is pretty loud and we can complete tasks despite that. But on Friday they were just plain rowdy. We had to go so far and call the Mandatory. The Mandatory of the school is responsible for the discipline. They monitor the halls, make sure there is no major fights in between classes, discipline disruptive kids (when I say "discipline" I mean talk to them, call the parents, i think make notes in school files, etc.).... After the Mandatory was called into class, then everyone behaved very well because they did not want to get in trouble. That was the first time a Mandatory came into one of the classes I was in. Like I said, for the most part the kids are pretty great. But Friday. oofda.
Then after school I got a wonderful phone call from Yahya (a volunteer from my TLG group) and he told me that a bunch of people were in Batumi for the weekend! My first thought was: Yay! People who speak English! haha. So I proceed to meet up with them at the hostel to take part in the nights festivities. When I got there a few of us went to 24/24 (a restaurant by the water) for dinner. While we were at dinner, the power went out once for 30 minutes or so. Came back on for 30 seconds. Then it was out for the rest of our meal. Thanks to the magical lights on our phones, we could still see our food as we ate. :)  Then after dinner we went back to make a plan for the night.
I honestly don't even know the name of the first place we went to. I was told that we were going to a disco. Now when I think of disco, I picture a club atmosphere, loud music, lots of dancing, the ripe smell of sweat in the air... I hope I'm painting a great picture for everyone. Even though that is what I was picturing, that is not what it turned to be. It was still in a basement, but it was more of a relaxed, full of sofas, and the only music was coming from the DJ wearing an awesome blue and green knit sweater. Anyway, we got some drinks and got to chatting. Then Kyle (a fellow Wisconsinite from Kenosha - small world!) turns to me and says, "I just heard someone say Wisconsin from over there." Then he pushed me in that direction. We go over to a group of people who are in the Peace Corps and placed in Georgia. And guess what! One of the Peace Corps girls was from Whitefish Bay, Wisconsin. So weird, but so funny! The entire night was full of meeting new friends, swapping stories of experiences that we've had in Georgia, and making new memories.

Saturday: I spent the day with my host family. We went to the village of my host father. They say "my village" but they mean "hometown". His parents live there and he is actually building a host on the same property. The house that they are building is about 10 feet from his parents house. Super close! From what I could understand, they have been working on building the fireplace. Oh yeah. This house that they're building in 3-stories! It's going to be awesome when it's finished. Except it's going to take 2 years I think and I won't get to see the finished product. While he was building the fireplace the rest of us spent the day in the sitting/family room, thanks to the really crappy weather. Thank goodness for my Kindle. I can only watch Spanish Soap Operas with Georgian dubbed over it for so long. Then at about 10pm we left the village, my host dad dropped me so I could visit with the TLG people for a couple of hours before returning to the apartment.

Sunday: I bid a farewell to the TLGers leaving Batumi and then went to meet some new friends at The Press Cafe. New friends: Tina, Kas, and Breff. They started in Georgia with TLG back in September. Tina and Kas are also placed in Batumi (yay!). When I reached the cafe, everyone was already eating. Therefore I tried to flag down the waitress for what felt like forever! After ordering my fries and Sprite, someone came over to tell us that the cafe was closing in 30 minutes. Awesome. By the time my fries actually came, I had to scarf them down just before gettting kicked out.
After that, I was not ready to head back to my host family's place. The day was still young! Therefore Tina and I went to a different cafe inside this clocktower in the Old City. (Picture to come)  It was called "La Brio" ... or something like that. It was a little more expensive, but that's okay. I got a vanilla milkshake and a chocolate muffin. Not as sugary as the US but still decent. After 2 hours of chatting about TLG, what were did before, and what we're going to do next... I got a call from one of my co-teachers, Nino. She was telling about how she did a special training seminar and the man that lead the seminar had given them a topic to do for a lesson that they would need to present for him on Tuesday. I told her I would help her with anything she needed. Therefore I spent the night at her apartment with her and her family; 2 daughters (one is in my 6th grade class) and her mother-in-law. Her husband is a sailor and I last I heard he was working on a ship that was going to Romania. I hope to meet him soon :) When I arrived, we went over our topic, Heroes, and came up with a lesson plan. Then we had dinner, where they made me my own Khacapuri Atcharolo... I feel like I spelled that wrong. Oops! Anyway, they made me a different kind of Khacapuri than what they were eating because I once had said that I liked the other one better. My heart melted a little bit. Georgians are so hospitable. So nice! :) The rest of the night we were preparing materials for the lesson. My favorite part of the night was when I went on youtube and looked up the video for "Bailamos" by Enrique Iglesias and we all started singing! It was excellent. We listened to a little Enrique, some Juanes, Lady Gaga, and of course Miley Cyrus for the daughters. We worked really hard on the plan and I think that it's going to go smoothly. I'll let you all know how that goes after tomorrow!

Until next time. Adventure is out there!