Christmas in Romania

You may have noticed that I have not updated in two months... A lot of things have been going on with work and we've been doing a lot of things, but mostly I am just lazy. So I am going to attempt to play catch up.

A couple of our coworkers had started planning a trip to Bucharest for Christmas weekend. Word about this little trip spread quicker than the flu spreads throughout our kindergarten and soon we had a group of 15 people going. Sam and I left with two other guys we work with on Thursday afternoon but most of the group showed up on Friday. I am really glad we chose to leave early, not just because we didn't have to be at work but because it also gave us a better feel for the city of Bucharest.

Underworld Bar/Wonderland Hostel

The hostel we stayed in was interesting to say the least. It was attached to the back a punk rock bar called Underworld and unless you knew it was there, you would have absolutely no way of finding it. There were no warnings, no signs on the building, nothing... So we spent a good while walking around Bucharest in the freezing snow trying to find this place. The Friday group was smarter than us and brought a map on how to find it... Whoops.

Interesting decor... To the left, a shower that didn't work that everyone ended up peeing in.

The hostel was pretty clean and nice, despite the weird surroundings. The worst part about it is that it only had two bathrooms for all 15 of us, so we were pretty rank by the end of the trip.

After we settled into the hostel, we set out to find food. There are not a whole lot of restaurants in the part of Bucharest we were staying in, which really bummed me out but we ended up finding a great little place called Zattara for dinner.

Our coworkers, Ben & William.

Sam and me

GRILLED PORK! Potatoes WITH HAM!

The next day Sam and I set out on our own to explore the city a bit. With me being from Southern California, then moving to Texas and Sam living in Dallas his whole life we were not prepared for how cold it actually was in Romania. Our day went mostly like this: 

1. Walk around until we're frozen.

2. Find a bar or cafe and have a drink until we warm up.

3. Walk around and do some shopping until we were frozen.

4. Drink some more. (Note my seriously awesome and seriously warm new hat.)

Rinse and repeat that cycle about seven more times. We saw some cute little churches, some nice architecture, a couple different Christmas markets... but mostly we drank a lot of coffee and alcohol and ate a lot of pork. 

Big Christmas Market

A little church we stopped in

A big drinking square that I am sure is really fun during the summer time.

Guys doing ice sculpture... The ice had tiny bottles of Jägermeister in it.

The next day we all woke up super early to spend some time away from Bucharest on a guided tour.

The man on the left is our awesome and super knowledgeable tour guide.

Before we set out for our tour, we asked to stop for some food and coffee. In a normal circumstance I would have been disappointed about eating McDonald's in another country... but this was McDonalds in a pork eating country so there was sausage and bacon involved. YUM. 

After breakfast we had about an hour and a half drive until our first stop, Peleș Castle.This was by far my favorite place we went in Romania. Sadly, though, we only got pictures of the outside because the castle had a "photography tax" added onto the price to get into the castle and we were all too cheap to pay it. The outside of the castle was beautiful, though... and we got to play in the snow!

Walking through the snow next to a really pretty, but shut down  hotel.

First glimpse of Peleș Castle.

Peleș Castle in its glory!

Me playng in the snow.

The next stop was a cute little monastery...

From the monastery we had another hour + drive to Castle Bran, also known as Dracula's Castle. The real kicker about Castle Bran is that it had nothing to do with Dracula or his inspiration, but it was the closest castle to where Bram Stoker put it in the book so the Romanians started marketing it as Dracula's Castle for tourism.

The little tourist shopping center outside of Bran Castle... so cute!

Snowy walk up to the castle (and a big fuzzy dog).

Bran Castle

Santa was on the top floor of the castle!

 After Castle Bran we took another short drive over to the medieval town of Brasov where we had a late lunch/early dinner... of course it was more pork :)

The town square

Huddling together for warmth!

Loooong drinking hall/restaurant where we ate.

PORK! and potatoes.

When we got back to the hostel that night we had our own mini Christmas party where we filled each others stockings (or boots, or hats, or whatever you had) with little stocking stuffers, listened to Christmas music and generally got in the Christmas spirit.

Running up and down the stairs, filling stockings with goodies :)

The last day in Romania was spent much like the first, except that it was Christmas and basically nothing was open.

Christmas breakfast of Doner Kebap sandwiches... The only food place open. Oh, Bucharest... 

Although we had fun on our mini-trip to Romania, I definitely wouldn't recommend anyone going out of their way to spend time there. It was nice for a really cheap weekend visit and a reason to get out of Istanbul for a little bit and eat some pork.... but besides that it wasn't anything super awesome.

Istanbul Marathon

Every year the city of Istanbul holds a marathon. This is very exciting because it's the only time of year that they allow foot traffic on the bridges, making it possible to walk from Asia into Europe. When told about the marathon my first question was, "Do you actually have to RUN the marathon?" as I am not much of a runner. Seriously, I hope I am never faced in a situation where the options are run or die... I will die. Getting a hasty, "No." entitled me to sign up for the "Fun Run" without any guilt.

Crowds before the marathon started.

Unfortunately for us, the weather was not on our side this day. It had been raining all week and Mother Nature did not decide to be kind to us, but being determined (i.e. stupid and stubborn) we decided to wake up early and walk the marathon anyways.

Lots of balloons!

Our little group of "runners."

We got there around 8 a.m., thinking that the marathon started at 9 a.m. but we were informed that the fun run actually started at 9:30... which meant a lot of standing around in the cold and whining (mostly from me). The fun run started around a kilometer back from the real marathon but since we were cold and lazy we decided to just wait up with the real marathon runners... and then start walking about 15 minutes early. We're cheaters.

Sam & Katie on the bridge

Foggy view of the Bosphorus.

While walking, Tercel's boyfriend Memet pointed out a Turkish television show that's supposedly famous around this part. I was like, "Neat!" and kept walking... until he decided to interview me.

Before I was ambushed.

The interview can be found here if you would like to watch it, but I refuse to since I am slightly embarrassed. It's one of my life goals to not make a jackass out of myself on national television. My only consolation is that it is not my own nation and I have no idea what he's saying (also: please don't tell me).

Katie pretending she's having fun, even though she's cold and wet.

Welcome to Europe!

Most of us didn't actually make it to the end of the marathon. We got to Beşiktaş/Ortaköy/I have no idea where we were and saw a Starbucks where we decided to sit, dry off and have a cup of warm coffee instead of finishing. 

About where we checked out of the race. Fun decorations!

Our friend Ben actually ended up running about half of the marathon and getting a metal and a t-shirt which makes me kind of wish we would have made it to the end... but that coffee was DAMN good.

Actually working...

You may have noticed a lack of posting within the past few weeks. Well, in short, The first weeks of school are hard. Really hard. I mean, it would be hard if we spoke the same language as the kids... but, damn.

Everybody is new to the system in our Kindergarten; The administration, the teachers, the students, the parents... So everyone is learning to pace themselves, what expectations to have out of each other, and generally trying to figure out what the heck is going on. There has been a lot of smiles, a lot more stress, and some tears (from the students and from the teachers) but I am mostly satisfied with my teaching experience here so far... Which is not the case with everyone (i.e. everyone else) in my department.

I am feeling pretty lucky because my partner-in-crime used to be the Head of the English Department (before they killed the department) so she has a good head on her shoulders and knows exactly what to do. I also am feeling lucky because I got the oldest set of kids and a good portion of them know enough English to understand me. The ones who don't understand me still haven't figured out that I don't understand them because I am pretty good at guessing what they're saying by their facial expressions. There's a lot of, "OOOOH, That's REALLY interesting!" and "Oh, that's so sad" coming from me now-a-days. It's not like Korea where I am losing my English speaking abilities ("Me no do, YOU do.") because they don't really understand me anyways, so I can pretty much say whatever I want.

 Most of my students are really sweet. We have a few that are rebellious, but they just need some time to get used to school and learn that they can't get everything that they want. We would be in a better situation going into the fourth week, but once I got my first 8-10 students-who-came-to-school-from-day-one trained, four new students have trickled in over the past week and a half and it's like starting over again, but worse, because these students didn't have the fun free-for-all that the first week of school was. It is frustrating getting the big cryers to stop and then having some more thrown at you. Hopefully someday we will have a day where nobody cries.

And that is all I am going into for work on this blog. I made a promise to myself to only think or do work things when I am at the school so I don't burn myself out, so the post will be fewer since we will be doing fun things less. We have a few holidays coming up and next week there may or may not be a trip to Bulgaria for bacon and beer! Let's hope we get next Friday off. We miss our sinful meats.

For the Foodie in You

Turkish coffee, the pride of Turkey. (5 lira)

One of the best things about living in Istanbul. These loaded waffles are a fairly

new food fad and FUCKING AWESOME. Topped with bananas, strawberry, kiwi, Nutella, pistachio, vanilla pudding?, shredded coconut, and more. (8 lira)

Cheap and delicious Donors in the district of Takism. (1 lira)

The House is a new upscale restaurant with a Caesar salad that rivals La Madeline's. (22 lira)

There isn't much Asian food is Istanbul, even on the Asian side. Katie got these noodles (and potatoes ಠ_ಠ ) in Kadikoy (on the Asian side) and said they "blew monster donkey cock". (17 lira)

The loaded potato. Not near as good as the waffle. Topped with ketchup, mayo, olives, peppers, pickles, hotdog slices, carrots, corn, and more. (10 lira)

A burger from The House restaurant. (26 lira)

The fajitas are surprisingly good. (18 lira)

The Tuesday Bazaar in Kadikoy is a must. Produce and housewares can be found at very low prices.

Our haul of tomatoes, mushrooms, and grapes: 6 lira.

Next week, I'll be sure to take some pictures of the school lunches. Hope this satisfies your appetites for now.