Experience Albania: Travel, Pictures, History, Culture

http://www.boston.com/news/globe/ideas/articles/2006/11/26/younger_than_that_now/

If you’re familiar with the travel guide company ‘Lonely Planet,’ here’s their link for travel information about Albania.
http://www.lonelyplanet.com/worldguide/destinations/europe/albania
Lonely Planet is a reputable company and it’s nice to see Albania FIRST on their destination list for Europe … not just because it falls first due to alphabetical order, right?!

I’ve joined in on coaching/helping the debate team in Berat.  My counterpart has been coaching and organizing debate teams for over 10 years now, so I have a great opportunity to learn from her and this group of students.
 
We had our first tournament of the year/season last weekend.  Their topic was about US [...]

Happy Thanksgiving!  But by now … turkey day is over, but I hope you enjoyed the holiday.  Perhaps some are taking advantage of the biggest shopping day of the year this very moment?  One of my volunteer friends is talking to his girlfriend right now.  She’s standing in line in front of some bigname store, because it’s 2AM Minnesota time [...]

I’m teaching the other half of the fourth-year class (seniors) for the first time on Tuesday. I’ve been working mostly with my counterpart’s class (also four-year students), plus various classes of third (juniors) and second-year (sophomores) students. It’s been a gradual process of establishing myself, getting used to schedules, the students, and teaching [...]

Congratulations Dan and Heidi! (Ben’s oldest sister and her husband)
Baby Joey (as I’ve heard him called!) was born on Friday, November 10th. He is a very cute and healthy boy and instantly teamed up with Gracy (their first child) to form an adorable sister-brother duo.
Best wishes to the Nadderstads! Rest assured that people [...]

You could say I’m getting back into the swing of taking care of myself, after my host families took care of me to a T for the past 7 months. Washing dishes, washing my clothes …
Today I had my first washing machine lesson. It’s an Italian machine, but I had an excellent teacher [...]

I’ll make this short and sweet by letting the photos speak for themselves!
Here’s what came out of our Halloween celebration at a recent, four day Peace Corps conference:
 
 

R photo: Ersa, Katie, Bruna, and Bela —- L photo: Ersa, James, Bruna, and Bela
People identification reminders:Ersa and Bruna are my friends and colleagues; Bela is Ersa’s younger sister; and James is my Peace Corps sitemate.
 
These photos were taken in mid September, when you sometimes needed a light jacket in the evening.
I can’t remember what [...]

You wouldn’t guess that a country in the Mediterranean region, with a vast strench of Adriadic coastline would make a born and raised Minnesotan girl dress like this so early in November …
  But it’s suddenly gotten cold here in central Albania and I’ve deemed this outfit my winter uniform.  Thursday and Friday were chilly, too, [...]