Hello all,
Since we last spoke:
Friday night, Maarja and Kaspar came over and had dinner here at my house… in keeping with my crappy day that had already occurred, on the bus ride home, I ended up ripping the bag Irina had given me to carry my school stuff in. The strap ripped off from the bag, and it was very frustrating, and hard to get off the bus/walk home. Thankfully, I got home with all my stuff more or less, since a nice lady on the bus helped me get the stuff that dropped. Karolina told me that was the Soviet woman mindset, because in Soviet times, the ladies who did the grocery shopping, like herself, would have multiple kids and multiple bags that they had to carry for the groceries and had to balance all of these things.
Anyway, I made chicken piccata (a personal favorite and a crowd pleaser :)) and it was delicious. We got to chat for a while, and worked on finding schools for Maarja to go to in America! She’s hoping to get back to the States again for a year for school somewhere. If you have any suggestions, let us know! She’s looking for Technical Theatre and Design type majors.
Saturday, I woke up earlier than I wanted to, and got up and did some work, and ended up going back to sleep for a little while. I woke up again and decided that even though I didn’t know where I was going, I was going to go somewhere. I left the house, and there are two bus stops near our house, and as I was walking, I decided to first go on the 36 to Nõmme, the larger town that I live in, to their centrum and to look around, since I haven’t been there except to go to the post office the other day. I walked around, checked out some other secondhand shops, and browsed around a rain boot store, and ended up buying ankle high rain boots in leopard print! Big shocker, I know. Anyway, it was really good to get boots…it rains a LOT here, so they were necessary.
I hopped onto the 23 bus and decided I was going to go into Old Tallinn (Vana Tallinn) and go look at this cute little shop that had had these PacMan earrings I really liked and find somewhere to eat. As I got closer to town, I realized I was actually quite hungry, so I went back to the pancake restaurant that Maarja and I had gone to before, and had cheese and garlic pancakes that were to die for. Absolutely fantastic. I went to the earring shop, and looked all over, but didn’t find them, so I asked the lady about them, and she said she didn’t have any, but she could email the artist and have her make me some new ones! So I’m stopping back in a week for handmade Estonian PACMAN EARRINGS! I’m rather excited.
I ended my fabulous, self-indulgent Saturday by going to see The Switch, the new movie with Jennifer Aniston. It was hilarious, but even more hilarious because a lot of the jokes are colloquial jokes so even with the translations underneath it, they weren’t necessarily translated also. So I’d laugh at a lot of parts that were in fact not funny to other people, and it was amusing to be the only one laughing at certain parts. I ended up hopping a ride home on the bus again, and it was just a really good day. I got to do exactly what I wanted at my own pace, and it was very nice. It was like going to TJ Maxx with Eric instead of BoyfriendTim ;)
Sunday I again woke up early, and read my book (I’m now in The Girl Who Played With Fire and almost done with it… I did find the third book at the Viru Keskus book shop, and ended up buying it, and after we’re all done reading it, I’m going to donate it to the library at the school so they have a complete set :) ) Irina and I were going to go to the KUMU Museum (for those of you who went to Estonia with me the last time, think: awful, weird crayon and cardboard art exhibit) to see an exhibit on photographs from Estonians during Soviet times. But, as there was a 10K happening in Tallinn, Irina’s nephew and his family came over, because his wife was running in the race. So instead, I did work for school, napped, and hung out with the kids. It was nice to again just chill.
Later, Irina and I went to Selver and got some things for the week, and also got cake mix and some flowers because Karolina’s birthday was Monday, and I wanted to get her pretty orange flowers, since that’s her favorite color. We ended up finding beautiful, bright gerbera daisies that were a very vibrant orange, and they were completely perfect. I made a cake, with pudding in it to combat dryness, and a chocolate sauce over top. I was quite pleased.
Today, Monday, was a good day. I had lots of good lessons, including a GREAT time with the previously problematic 3rd graders. They all seemed to understand, and ALL my non-speakers were answering and participating. It was great. I’m feeling kind of bla though, not quite under the weather, but almost, so I took a nap today and I’m going to bed soon too… Hoping to keep on top of that, since lots of the kids are getting germy, and I’m trying to continue to not be getting germy.
Thanks for reading! Sorry I’ve been slow with the responses… I’ll try to improve my consistency!
That’s all for now though.
Maintain,
Virginia
so how was the cake??
ReplyDeleteI think you are doing a great job of blogging!! :) Love you!
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