LG's Excellent PC Adventure

Last week offered a break in the routine of four or five hours a day of language lessons. On Wednesday we were taken to a bigger city, Pazardjik, for a day of technical training and an opportunity to reunite with the whole group of 59 trainees for a day. Then we were split into smaller groups of 4-6 trainees and given travel instructions to get us to various current Volunteers serving in cities and towns all over the country. I travelled south into the Rhodopi Mountains with four other people and we met with the local volunteer and spent two and a half days shadowing him as he did his job. He works for the Municipality of Chepelare and is based in the town of Chepelare. It's one of the prettiest towns in the country and is located in the heart of the Rhodopi Montains just north of the Greek border. The main industry in the town is tourism and Nick is busy constructing a website to catalog every single hotel, guest house, restaurant and tourist site in the municipality. We were given a two day tour of the mountains and saw quite a bit from a minivan and then some more remote areas from a Land Cruiser. It was also necessary to hike into some gorges to see some caves and natural marble bridges. I've taken photos but still have no way to upload them. I'll keep them until I can get them online. From the bottom of the gorge, it was an hour hike straight up to get back to the Land Cruiser. The PC really needs to think about buying a helicopter for just such occasions. In the evenings we went to a local Mehana or tavern to unwind. The four recent college grads I was with unwind by putting a serious dent in the local beer supply and singing "You've Lost That Loving Feeling". Unfortunately, I happen to know the words to that tune and now there's just one more place I can never go back to.

Hiking is a pretty serious tourist activity in the area, at least until the snow starts and the ski resorts open. The trails run for miles through some pretty spectacular scenery and offer very little in the way of amenities. Still, there are a lot of hard core hikers huffing & puffing their way up and down the mountain sides. I suspect that they are all marginally deranged and should be avoided. This opinion was confirmed by the sight of a large bearlike man hiking down the road wearing his hiking boots, his large heavy backpack and his red and white striped speedo. Oh, he had a floppy white tennis hat on too.

We stayed in a beautiful small hotel owned by a man who comes from an Omani family but was born and raised in Zanzibar and then moved to London. He's a great guy and quite a character. Everyone in Chepelare knows Nasser and he cannot drive a block down the street without someone stopping him to discuss one project or another. He's a perfect example of the PC philosophy of integrating into the community and he's been a lot of help to Nick by putting him in touch with people who can help with his projects. We've come away with the hopes of locating Nassers in our own sites, where ever they may be. He's set up a bar in his hotel that is used by many of the local young people. They come in to shoot pool and drink coffee or beer. They like to grab Nasser and shout "Taliban!!" at him. He just pulls back and tells them that he saved them from the Communists and that they are, "goddamned ungrateful bastards". The man's a natural born diplomat.

A couple of things seem to be clearer now. One is that it seems to be preferable to be in a small town site than in one of the big cities because the jobs and living conditions seem to be better in the small towns. Two is that the actual jobs seem to be very unstructured. It's something of a status symbol for municipalities and NGO's to have their very own tame PCV, a bit like the Mayor's Mercedes. So some people end up in places that don't really have a need for them. In those cases the successful Volunteers create their own projects and flourish and the unsuccessful Volunteers wander around, get frustrated and go home. Our group should know in a couple of weeks what jobs and sites they have in mind for us. Based on what I learned this past week, I suppose I'd prefer being a a smaller city or town in the mountains. That, however, can change in a heartbeat.

In the next week or so we go to Sofia - big cities, yeah that's the ticket. It's the only way to spend your tour.?!