You know how divers have to go into decompression chambers if they come out of the water too quickly? Well, over the last couple of days, I've been awfully worried about bubbles getting into my system, so I've been taking it easy. Really easy. Greece was so nice, so warm, such a great place to spend the holidays with a couple of good friends, that coming back to Bulgaria seems to require a specific system for overcoming the stress of being here again.
For me, this system has been laying on a couch, watching a movie, reading a good book, and watching the dirty clothes pile slowly shrink as I do all the laundry from the trip. Unfortunately, it hasn't meant sitting in front of the computer and writing about the trip I've been talking about. I'll get working on that tonight and have the first installment tomorrow. All I have to do is slog my way home through the six or so inches of snow that fell in today's lovely pseudo-blizzard.
In addition, today was also very cold, and heat in the school was very poor. Consequently, there was some skippage in the upper classes today, including my 11th class. Some students even admitted to me before the class that they would be skipping. I told them that it would be unacceptable and that they would be punished. Some of them will be. If I have to shiver my way through a cold and poorly heated class, then they had better be there to sit through it, shivering along with me. I expect better attendance tomorrow.
As always, the 8th classes were all there, but were back to being their abundantly noisy selves. There will have to be a readjustment period there too, apparently.
All of the teachers I talked to in the teacher's room were sorry vacation had to end and didn't want to get back to teaching, but were all there, ready to put on their game faces and get the kids back to studying. It doesn't matter that the classrooms were near freezing, we were all there to work, even if we had to do it with gloves, scarves and coats on.
Tomorrow I'll go back, and things will improve bit by bit. I'll return to my apartment tonight, which will finally have hot water and heat after the hours it took to get it all back after I returned. Things are getting back to normal in Bulgaria. And the memories of Greece are heading to the backburner.
But man, is it cold out there.
Posted by Rob at January 5, 2004 06:43 PMYou have a great way of explaining the readjustment process after vacation....I noticed on wunderground.com that Silistra is now 3 degrees colder than Sitka and we have had quite a cold snap! Can't imagine working and/or studying in a freezing building, too! Brrrr! Maybe running around the room and chanting nice warm english phrases will help. :-) Thanks for the update.
Posted by: Ma at January 5, 2004 07:01 PM