You can't win them all

I normally don’t like to blog while upset, but it’s been awhile since I’ve last updated and I need a few minutes to put my life in perspective aka vent. Things have been going fairly decent lately. Decent because we have been having some gorgeous weather, but other than that I feel like my life is falling apart.

Numero uno, I somehow can’t seem to shake a cold. I rarely get sick now, and when I get put out of commission for multiple days and miss events that I’ve been looking forward to for a while now, well, it sucks. On Sunday I went out in the countryside to kill some time, take in the scenery, and simply enjoy the outdoors. I was feeling okay enough, the weather was fantastic, and my hike somehow turned into an onion-planting fiesta with a couple locals. Pretty BA. I really enjoy getting out in the fields and getting my hands dirty, I just wish I could do it more often. The shitty part is that I woke up the next day- Memorial Easter where everyone goes to the cemetery to honor their deceased loved ones- feeling rotten and stayed at home all day. I don’t like missing national holidays, especially ones that are so different from our own.

The same day I missed out gettin’ down in the cemetery I found out the marathon I’ve been planning on running in October, the 2,500 anniversary race of the marathon IN ATHENS, is already booked up and I won’t be participating. UUUgggggghhhh. Frustrating. I was really looking forward to that. I know I could do another one around the same time, but all the ones I found are in Western Europe, and well, gross (kidding), no thank you. I’ll stick to Eastern Europe while I have the chance.

Lastly, I’ve been trying to move into another place for about four or five months now. I really wanted to move into a house, but my partners have deemed me incapable of making my own food, much less looking after a house. They told me they knew of a couple that would rent me an apartment. Great, that was easy enough. That was back in January. After waiting a month to simply see the place (it’s big and shitty, but I’ll only be there for a year so I really could care less what it looks like) they told me I could move in March 15^th. I gave notice to my host family, packed up my stuff, and was ready to move, except when time came, I found out I was going to be moving into the landlord’s apartment because there is someone living in the apartment. I wasn’t very keen on this idea, and would rather kick it with a family that I’ve gotten comfortable around for the last ten months instead of diving back into the “is it cool if I walk around in my drawers” stage with a new family. For the past month I’ve been hounding everyone when I can move in, and they finally gave me the date of April 15^th. The apartment would be clean, a family wouldn’t be living there, and all I had to do was get Peace Corps to come check it out before I call it home. The 15^th is tomorrow, and I’ve been trying to get in touch with the landlords all week (These damn holidays are really messing work/life up). My program manager is asking me when he should take the time out of his busy schedule to come to my village to see the place, and I can’t even get in contact with the people. I decided I needed to take a more direct approach and go to their home today to clear things up (not to mention the fact that I heard from my partner that they were going to go up on my rent before I even moved into the place). I got there in the late afternoon and no one was home. I decided maybe, just maybe, the lady was at the apartment cleaning it and getting it ready for me to move in. That was probably a mistake, because once I walked over there and I saw that the family is STILL LIVING THERE, I really flipped out. I don’t know if it’s because I’m foreign, the language barrier, the cultural difference, or what, but there is clearly a miscommunication going on and it is really wearing my patience down; And I consider myself to be a patient person after going through a year of Peace Corps. I decided to throw the towel in at that moment and busted out the big dogs- I called my program manager. In the heat of the moment I’m pretty sure I said verbatim “I’m really sick and tired of all this nonsense going on between everyone in my community and have no idea what to do anymore”. I guess I could have been a tad more composed while talking to my boss.

Life could definitely be worse, and tomorrow is a new day. The older groups are starting to leave and it was bittersweet to see some good friends leave. I am really proud to have known these people and have the utmost respect for them after seeing the great work they’ve done here and for sticking it out the whole two years. If you guys are reading this then I’d like to say thank you for being there for us; it was truly a pleasure getting to know you all, and good luck on your journeys. I need a piece of fruit and a nap now.