The Day is Here

I leave for the airport in less than three hours! I've been talking about this trip forever and now the time has come. Needless to say, I'm excited and ready for some travel and adventure. I'm really not sure what to expect. No one has been back to Armenia since my grandfather was pushed out during the Armenian Genocide in 1915.

He spoke very highly of the 'old country', the beautiful language, music and most of all the huge fruits and vegetables! He swore that as a child he would sit on 80lb cabbages! He always encouraged me to learn the language, and would always try to sit me down with the Armenian alphabet and make me sound out the letters. He is probably laughing at me from above right now...saying I told you so. You should have learned this long ago! Oh well, I'll work it out Gramps!! I hope he is proud of me.

I have a 12 hour layover in London. Luckily, I will be meeting up with another volunteer who will also be living in Gyumri. He just happens to be on the same flight to Yerevan, with a very long layover in London. We are hoping to meet at the customs area at Heathrow and then wander around London deliriously together for a few hours. It will be nice to have a travel buddy!

Ryan and I should arrive in Yerevan at 6am Wednesday (Armenian time --9 hours ahead). I really don't know what to expect. How big and cosmopolitan is an Armenian city? What will they think of Armericans? American Armenians? Girls with short hair and nose rings?

I welcome the challenge of being flung into a foreign country. I'm really not that nervous about it. I have my pocket Eastern Armenian phrasebook, I don't mind the taste of vodka and I have enough kashi bars to keep me from starving to death. I read on another blog that some Armenians eat a soup called khash for breakfast. Stomach lining in a garlic broth, with flatbread and chased with a mulberry vodka shot. This is where i think a granola bar will come in handy!

I have already been receiving emails about the Birthright Itinerary for this week. We are all going to go to an Armenia vs. Poland soccer game after a lecture about the current politics in Armenia. On Saturday, we will be going to hiking to a monastery that is hidden in a cave. I hope we have a great group of volunteers, hopefully a few from outside of the US.

Well, I'll be giving a full report as soon as I can!