The Day of Thanks

Thanksgiving is one of my favorite holidays. Is it because of the copious quantities of hella good food that come out of the kitchen? Maybe it’s because you get two days of work and it makes for one heck of a good Wednesday night out on the town. Is it because you get to see your family and friends from home, get to play a little tackle football in extremely cold weather and then go to a home town bar and have weird, almost scripted conversation. For me, I think it could be because I don’t have the stress of buying gifts for everyone I know. Don’t get me wrong, I love the holidays but always get stressed out with the present giving thing. Will they like it, What size should I get, Would they use it, Would I even use it, How much should I spend, Will they be able to return it? These are the types of questions that make the Christmas season stressful, and why I enjoy Thanksgiving so much. So with that said, Happy Thanksgiving to all my family, friends, co-workers, government officials, priests, the Cubs, bums, stray dogs, Oprah, Moe from Chicago, and to you.

Nice watch Jimmy-

As most of you know (if you don’t know, please refer back to 4^th grade), Thanksgiving is an American holiday thus is not celebrated here in Bulgaria. The week of Thanksgiving was pretty busy for me and my coworkers. One of the organizations I work for put together an International Youth Forum and took place this week. The Forum consisted of two other countries besides Bulgaria: Vigonza, Italy and Hajdusamson, Hungary. This was a very good forum that focused on youth action in civil societies. Its purpose was to allow the youth of the European Union an opportunity to build ideas from scratch and present them to other countries. Some of these ideas focused on a festival that encourages youth participation, environmental awareness amongst the youth, and sports programs to decrease crime and vandalism within the communities. This was good experience for me because it allowed me to hear good ideas straight from the mouths of the youth, not filtered by an adult. It was also entertaining to me to hear Italians, Hugarians and Bulgarians speak English to communicate their thoughts. There were two days of meetings and then culture trips to Veliko Turnovo and Pleven. I met some real cool people from both countries and hope to visit them in the future.

Some Pictures from the Forum.

The English speaking group-

The Bulgarians-

The whole group, I am on the bottom by the flags-

So, I was unable to celebrate Thanksgiving on Thursday and decided to join other volunteers near Starza Gora for the weekend. I left Belene a little before 11 on Friday. Just so you guys at home get a picture of what it is like to travel in Bulgaria, let me tell you the details of my trip. First off, by no means am I trying to say that Bulgaria is the worst country to travel in; I know there are countries that have worse transportation then Bulgaria. I am simply comparing Bulgarian travel to the States travel. I arrived in Starza Gora around 6 oclock. About a 7 hour, 300 km (186 miles) bus ride. All in all not a bad ride. The scariest part of the trip was going up and then back down the mountain. The road is two lanes and very curvey. The crafty Bulgarian drivers seemed as if they have watched Fast and the Furious way to many times. They were passing freight trucks around 180 degree bends. I almost had to change my underwear a couple of times because of this. I made it to Starza Gora safe and spent the rest of the night enjoying the big city life. For the sake of the people involved, I will not describe the events of the night.

Below is a picture of Bulgarian style bottle service on ice. (Top that SoBe)

The next morning, we headed to Anita's house for dinner. Anita is probalby my favorite person in the Peace Corps. She is a retired woman from Texas, who has lived in the Middle East for a time, and settled down in Florida. She has a daughter that was in the Peace Corps and she herself decided to try it out one day. She reminds me of my grandmother. The nicest person in the world. Any way, she was hosting about 18 other volunteers in her apartment. A lot of people and even more food. Some how Anita got her hands on 2 turkeys, so it was on like Donkey Kong. It was a fun time, and a good break from work. Below are some pictures.

Check that table spread. Paper plates and Plastic cups full of boxed wine.

Eat your heart out Martha. Mom, check out the carrots on the right, I had to use honey instead of maple syrup.

So with all of this, I would like to give my thanks: To my parents, brothers, family, friends, coworkers, ESPN, Fantasy Sports, peanut butter, SoBe, Moe's, Ditka, The Art of Pizza, Q-tips, Bake Rolls, Sports of Chicago, and you, the tax paying Americans that are financing all of this.

Again, I hope you all had a great hoilday. Take care and Stay Classy.

Chase

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Lets first start with the haircut.

Sorry for the gap in Blogs. My internet has been out of commission for the past week.

So I suppose I will start with my first haircut in Belene. I have had many hair styles throughout my lifetime some of those include the comb over, the karate kid spike, the flat top spike, the Vanilla Ice zig-zags (and lightning bolts), long hair, pony tails, dyed hair, shaved head, and the current "business" cut. I suppose that is what I will call it. With that being said, I believe I have spent my fair share of time in that strangely uncomfortable barber chair and feel good about my overall "sense" of what a haircut is.

Well, I decided to break in my new town with a честито (nice) haircut. I was accompanied by my counterpart, whom has a better grasp on the Bulgarian language then I do. The haircut started at 12:30, and continued...and continued... for about 1 hour. My hair is not that long, nor that fragile. No curls, no cowlicks?, no bald spots (yet), no gray spots to hide (Pete), and my hair is not greasy (do I have to say the name?). Why so long? Don't get me wrong, it was a fantastic haircut. The conversation was fantastic..... for my counterpart. I just smiled and said "ДА" for an hour. I think each hair on my head was cut, individually and repeatedly. I think I passed out at one point. All in all, the haircut was fantastic, 5 leva, and only took an hour. In the business world, you might say that the barber, though mastered in her craft, has not learned the meaning of efficiency and turn over. Good stuff.

Here are some pictures of my apartment.

My kitchen

My Living Room and My Balcony (with a great view of the “Block” style apartments

Things are going really well here. I am meeting as many people as I can and stumbling around with my Bulgarian language. I can honestly say that I will never feel ackwerd in any conversation in America again. I have had a perment blank stare on my face for the past 3 months.

My first Na Gosti!!

I did have my first successful Na Gosti this past weekend. You may need to refer back to previous post for a discribtion of what a Na Gosti is. Anyway, I planned to have the dinner at 5 oclock on Sunday. I woke up at 930 and preseeded to spend the next 4 hours visiting 5 different stores for materials. I was going to make 3 and a half dishes for the visit. Good ole American style Pasta salad, Bulgarian style cabbage salad and the ever inspiring vegetarian style lasagna (thanks to the Sappy Ban group). Everything came out well, and the apartment did not burn down.


The lasagna



The guests (starting from the right and going left. Counterpart from the Municpality, Boss from the NGO, Husband of my Boss from the NGO, Counterpart from the NGO, Counterparts ladyfriend)



Great evening full of food and drink.

Thats all for today, I have more that I will post in the coming days.

You stay classy Chicago, Read more!

Look..... Your on TV!!

Just a little something for everyone out there to watch. This was taken from our swearing-in ceremony in Sofia. Very nice ceremony, led by Mr. Eddie Shim. The two interviews are of Eddie and Rajun. They are 2 of the 3 best bulgarian speakers in our group and represented us well. I, being one of the top 3, was stricten last minute with a sore troat and was unable to give an interview. ( Just kidding, my Bulgarian lanauge skills rank somewhere in the range of slim to none, Lets just say if I went to a resturant to order a tomato salad in bulgarian, i would problably get a baked rosemary chicken with mashed potatos.) Enjoy the video clip.

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Two Words.....DEEP PURPLE

Yes, that's right. Deep Purple made its presence felt in Sofia on Thursday evening, in front of a sell out crowd. Mullets were rocked and the smell of leather was in abundance. Who would of thought that I would have to travel half way around the world to see one of the pioneers of heavy metal. The last band I saw play was The Police at Wrigley Field. Any who, I was invited by a group from the Община (Municipality) to attend. There were about 80 people that made the 4 hour trek to Sofia. I was without my counterpart that speaks relatively good English, but did however have a couple of people that spoke some English and wanted practice on the way. We finally arrived in Sofia, after multiple smoke breaks and slow moving traffic, and to much of my surprise there were a ton of people waiting for the rock legends. If was pretty amazing to see so many people. We grab a cocktail at a local drinking establishment and preceeded to the show. Once inside, my coworkers and I rushed to the floor area. I haven't felt this rush of excitement since the Offspring show in 98 at the Pavilion(man, I am old).

The lights dimmed and the music started. I braced myself for the madness that was sure to insue. I looked around at the people in the crowd and the age range was from 14 to 70. Pretty diverse group. Please take note, that I have never seen Deep Purple and was only vaguely familiar with their songs. Out came the band and everyone cheered. I was thinking, "Dang, this is pretty awesome, Bulgaria, Deep Purple and a cigarette burn on my pants." I started to pump my fist as the song played. I was hoping to hear "Smoke on the Water" first (Probably because it was the only song I knew the title for) but instead heard the blond haired lead singer say something that was in a language not familiar to me. I listened more closely to the lyrics and thought I heard some Bulgarian. Heck, it wasn't Deep Purple, it was a Local Bulgarian rock band. I felt like an idiot because 1) I am from America (though Deep Purple is from England) and felt i had a responsiblity to know what the band looked like and 2) I kept shouting "Deep Purple, Deep Purple" to a random Bulgarian band. No worries though because as I looked around I realized that no one really cared and maybe they thought the same as well.

The show went on and Deep Purple eventually came out and rocked the house. I was surprised on how many songs I recognized. There were several things that crossed my mind as the concert went on. I was thinking that Bulgarian rock shows aren't that much different then rock shows in the States. Here are a couple of things I noticed:

1) Bulgarian Bands' lead singers have long wavy rocknroll blond hair just like ours.
2) The random shout out to the crowd from the band, no matter the language, always insures a roar of a response.
3) Steve Morse is a pretty darn good guitar player.
4) The 250 pound person standing next to you doesn't smell of sweet roses whether you are in Sofia or Chicago.
5) People at concerts all over the world tend to stand as close as possibly to you, so much so that your clothes pick up sweat from the person in front, behind, and side to side.
6) The universal rock symbol, is truly universal
7) Any slow rock ballad requires a lighter and raised arms that go side to side.
8) The lead singers voices is much better then the crowds, that’s what he is paid to do.
9) The line for the bathroom is long, always.
10) The rule still applies that you don't wear the t-shirt of the band you are going to see, Period.

All in all, I had a great time. The 4 hour bus ride home was a bit challenging when the seat only comes to your mid back and you are comfortably wedged between a window and a man, but hey, what’s better then passing out at 4 in the morning and going to work at 8 the next day.

Happy Halloween,

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