Spain, Portugal and Two Visits from Germany

We had a week off school in February so Randy and I decided to visit Spain and Portugal. In the past we have spent one or two nights in a few different cities in an effort to see as much of each country as possible. This time we decided to pick one city in each country and stay put for a bit longer. We spent four nights in Barcelona, Spain and three nights in Porto, Portugal. It worked out well and was not nearly as exhausting to stay in one city for a longer period of time. We chose to visit Barcelona because it is on the coast and we had heard so much about the architect Gaudi and wanted to see his work. Also, several teacher friends had recommended Barcelona plus when our daughter, Elizabeth, spent a semester abroad in Luxembourg, she said her favorite European city to visit was Barcelona. As you will see by our pictures, we were not disappointed with our choice.

We have discovered many new airlines over the last few years. This trip we discovered Vueling which is the largest airline in Spain and is part of British Airways. It is also a low cost airline which is why we chose to fly them. When we were walking through the Barcelona airport we noticed all the signs were in three languages. The languages are Catalonian, English and Spanish. Until we traveled to Barcelona, we did not understand the depth of feeling in this part of Spain about wanting to separate from Spain and become their own country of Catalonia. Much of this disagreement happened as recently as 2017. We certainly never fully understood this disagreement but the feelings were made clear when the airport places English above Spanish in their airport signage.

When we arrive in a new city we often take a tour (sometimes a food tour) to help us get familiar with where we are visiting.

We found that using the Barcelona subway to move around the city was easy to figure out plus it was efficient and inexpensive.

Photos from an early morning run.

Here are a few of the buildings where Antonio Gaudi was the designer and architect. As you can tell, the design of his work was modern. HIs passions in life were architecture, nature and religion.

I can see Gaudi’s interest in nature in this design.

Park Guell is a 40 acre private green space which features the designs of Gaudi.

We took a half day trip out of Barcelona to visit Montserrat which includes a Benedictine monastery in a gorgeous setting. There are currently 80 monks living within the monastery. The photo on the far right are two angels carving the “teeth” of the surrounding mountain which is one of the legends of how the mountain was formed.

The apostles above the entrance to the church. Can you recognize Judas on the far left? He is the only apostle looking away and down.

The church houses the Black Madonna. Questions arose about why the Madonna is black and the answer given was that years ago she turned black from the use of candles in the church and since that time the color has been maintained. We climbed up behind the altar to get a better view of the Madonna. There is an opening in the protective glass surrounding her that allows you to touch her and say a prayer.

If you zoom up and look carefully at the photo on the top right, you will see a cross. After touring the church, we took a hike up to the cross, beautiful!

One evening we attended a Flamenco Show which is native to southern Spain and includes dance, singing and guitar playing. This was the setting for the show, beautiful!

Flamenco dancing is known for being very passionate which I think you can see in this video and the following video.

Here we are arriving at the La Sagrada Familia. This is a large Catholic Church that started to be built in 1882 and is scheduled to be complete in 2026 although that date has been extended many times. Gaudi was the designer and architect for the church and devoted the last 40 years of his life to working on the construction of the church. He designed it to have a total of 18 spires symbolizing the twelve apostles, four evangelists, the Virgin Mary and the tallest spire to represent Jesus Christ.

Gaudi hired different artists with vastly different styles to complete different sides of the church.

You can easily see the different artistic styles between the nativity and resurrection sides of the church.

Look at the gorgeous inside of the church. Earlier in the blog I said that Gaudi had three passions in life: architecture, nature and religion. I can see how clearly these three passions come together in these pictures. By the way, Gaudi attended Mass daily. He died at the age of 72 when he was hit by a tram on the way to church.

We took an elevator up and then climbed down one of the towers of the Sagrada Familia. The spiral picture is the steps going down, down, down. The wheat and grapes at the top of the spires symbolize the Eucharist, the body and blood of Christ.

After spending four nights in Barcelona, we flew to Porto, Portugal. I originally thought we would take the train because the train system in Spain is excellent but then I learned that it was an 18 hour train ride. We debated as to whether to visit Lisbon or Porto for three nights. We settled on Porto because we had just spent time in the large city of Barcelona and we wanted to spend time in a smaller city. Porto is more walkable and is full of Old World charm. We loved our time there and hope to go back some day.

One of the first things we were told when arriving in Porto was that if we did not know how to speak Portuguese, we should only communicate in English. The Portuguese people do not appreciate it when people speak Spanish to them and expect them to respond.

We found our Airbnb apartment along this pedestrian street very close to this charming pharmacy.

These street performers are students at a local engineering university who enjoy making traditional music together.

Porto is all about blue and white tile. In the 17th century the Portuguese imported massive amounts of tile from the Netherlands because they liked the look of it so much. Much of the tile work tells the history of Portugal with pictures. In the case of the church tiles, Biblical stories are told.

Exploring Porto…

The Livaria Lello is known as one of the most beautiful bookstores in the world and after visiting, it is easy to understand why. After the death of her mother in 1991, J.K. Rowling moved to Porto where she taught English, got married and had her daughter. Porto is also where she wrote the first three chapters of the book Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone. I am not a big Harry Potter fan but Randy is and he said this bookstore was like the Hogwarts Library.

Unfortunately, there are a lot of reflections in these pictures so it is hard to see but outside of the Livaria Lello there is a vending machine that sells coffee and books!

Codfish is one of the more traditional dishes in Portugal. It is seen on almost every menu. Portugal is the world’s largest consumer of codfish. What we found most interesting is that Portugal does not produce any codfish. All of it is imported from the UK and from northern Canada. Portugal imports codfish in such large quantities that they also supply Spain with codfish.

We typically do not eat at American franchises when we are abroad but we were told we needed to check out this McDonald’s. Randy enjoys McDonald’s at home so that was another reason to go. Look at the fancy entrance and chandeliers inside the restaurant. The menu even includes four different types of soup. As in many McDonald’s in Europe all ordering is done electronically. I wonder if electronic ordering at McDonald’s happens in the States.

We took a day long tour outside of Porto to visit the Douro Valley which is known for it’s beautiful landscapes, wines and history. The Douro Valley is listed as a World Heritage Site.

The winery is owned and run by a father and his two sons (one who is pictured here). This is where the grapes are actually stomped once a year at a festival.

When we toured the winery we were told that Portugal is the world’s largest producer of cork. 50% of the world’s cork comes from Portugal and is primarily used for wine bottle stoppers.

Our next stop was Sabrosa with a current population of about 6,000 people. This was the birthplace of Ferdinand Magellan, the Portuguese explorer who was the first to circle the globe in the early 1500’s confirming that the world was round, not flat.

The local school bus dropping the children off at the end of the day.

Our final stop on the tour was the small town of Pinhao. We boarded a small, wooden, traditional boat and cruised down the Douro River for an hour as we admired the beautiful landscape.

A couple other interesting bits of info we found out about Portugal during our visit is that during World War II, Portugal was neutral and actually supplied canned sardines to both sides of the conflict. Lastly, another random fact about Portugal is that the three most prevalent religions in Portugal are Catholicism, Church of England and Judasim. We were not surprised that Catholicism is the most popular. There seems to be several close connections between Portugal and the UK but I do not yet understand the history of why that is true. The Portuguese people hid hundreds of Jews during WWII so that is why the Jewish population is so high in the country. We loved our three night stay in Porto and would readily return if the opportunity presents itself. As usual, we felt like we did not have enough time to explore all that we wanted to see.

In mid-March Peter and Julia came to visit in Albania. You may remember from previous blog posts that Peter stayed with our family in Fairport for a year when he was 17 years old. We have stayed well connected since that time. While Peter and Julia were here we went for coffee (at one of the many coffee shops in Tirana), took a walking tour and they visited my class at ACT.

We took an overnight trip to Berat, visited a winery and spent the night in the castle. Julia is an artist and took many of these beautiful pictures. Also, Peter and Julia are looking forward to the arrival of their baby daughter in early June.

The following day we drove to Vlore and enjoyed time at the Adriatic Sea. Beautiful! I loved having Peter and Julia visit!

The second visit from Germany came a few days later when Lulu and Marie came to Tirana. Lulu was an au pair for Elizabeth and Ben’s family five years ago when they were living in Virginia. Lulu and her friend are in their 20’s and are within a year of finishing their teacher certification. They are wonderful young women and it was good to spend time with them. They were in Tirana for a few days and then took buses to visit several cities in southern Albania. The cherry blossoms were in bloom when they visited. As you can see, they also visited my classroom. I think it is so good for my students to meet people from other countries, introduce themselves and ask questions.

Recently I finished teaching a unit called Where We Are in Place and Time to my grade two students. The unit centers on the children learning their family history. The children marked the origins of their families on a map, interviewed an older family member, made a personal timeline, created a family tree, wrote an autobiography and brought family and personal artifacts to school. They then invited their parents to come to school to help them present what they had learned to children from other classes. It was a fun unit to teach and the children really loved learning about their own history.

I just finished taking individual pictures of my students for an upcoming project. I thought the pictures turned out well so I wanted to share them with you. These children are wonderful kids who I enjoy teaching every day. Of course, there are some challenges but overall my teaching at Albanian College continues to be a positive experience.

Later this week my cousin Chris and his wife, Cathy, will be arriving in Albania. It will be good to share this beautiful country with them. Next week is our spring break when we will be heading to Turkiye for a week. Chris and Cathy have visited Istanbul before so it will be good to be introduced to a new part of the world through them.

As you read this blog I hope all is well with each of you. Thanks for taking the time to follow along on this adventure.

April, 2023

Covid, London and Home for the Holidays

A couple weeks after my last blog post, in late November, I tested positive for Covid for the first time. I felt horrible for two days and then just tired for a week or so, grateful for my relatively mild symptoms. When we came to Albania in August, we brought several Covid tests with us plus a supply of cold medication. We ran out of both. It is not possible to buy at-home Covid tests here but there are many clinics where, for $15, you can have a test done. The person at the clinic wore no mask even though her job was to administer Covid tests. So interesting and different than many other nations.

Since we ran out of our cold medication supply from home, I went to one of the many small pharmacies near our apartment to find something similar. We have roughly 5 small pharmacies within a 10 minute walk from our apartment. Almost all the pharmacies are staffed by pharmacists who speak excellent English. They suggested I try Tylolhot which cost $2 a packet and could be taken every 6 hours. It is a powder that is dissolved in hot water and consumed like a hot tea. I found the taste to be likable and it felt good to drink something warm when I didn’t feel well. Maybe we have something similar in the States and I am just not aware of it. I liked using it better than DayQuil and will probably bring some back to the States to have on hand.

A final thought about Covid. Last fall I asked about getting a Covid booster. I was told it would be better to wait until I went back to the States to get the vaccination. The physician I was talking to said that most Covid vaccines that were administered in Albania were donated from other countries and there weren’t many available at the time.

That was probably way too many details about being sick but I did find it interesting to get a glimpse of health care in Albania.

As you might remember, Randy went back to the States in late October to deer hunt. Our son, David, was very sweet and said he wanted to meet me somewhere in Europe so we could visit the Christmas markets. He said he felt bad that I was by myself in Albania. I feel perfectly comfortable on my own here since I have a supportive school community to socialize with. Regardless, I appreciated our son’s concern and thoughtfulness. We decided we wanted to go someplace that had a direct flight for both of us. After some thought, we decided London was the best choice.

Upon arriving in London, after a 3 hour flight, one of the first things I saw as I walked through the airport were several of these signs. I admire the UK for being so welcoming to Ukrainian refugees.

Another interesting sign was a reminder about Brexit and that the UK is no longer part of the EU.

Look what else I saw walking through the airport!! Ben & Jerry’s is a big weakness for me. I had never seen it come from a machine before. Yum!!!

We walked over to visit Harrod’s on our first morning. Most things were well out of our price range but it was delightful to spend time walking around this beautiful department store. I included a picture of the Baccarat crystal because it reminded me of my beloved mother-in-law. She had a few pieces of this crystal in her home. The Wedgewood china gave me a warm feeling because my maternal grandmother had the same china.

Loved seeing the Christmas Lights of London.

We watched the Changing of the Guard Ceremony which starts at St. James Palace and ends at Buckingham Palace.

Heading towards Buckingham Palace.

The Queen’s (King’s) Guard arriving at Buckingham Palace. The Guard’s uniforms are gray during the winter and the more traditional red during the warmer months of the year.

Seeing Buckingham Palace does not disappoint. This was the first time I had ever taken a tour, it was well worth it. The flag on top of the palace let us know that the King was not at home at the time we were there.

Isaac Newton is buried at Westminister Abbey as are many others including the following:

The Coronation Chair which has been used at the coronation ceremony for every British monarch since the 1300’s. It will be used for the coronation of King Charles III this coming May.

I found these items to be a charming addition to the Westminister Abbey gift shop. On the left is a Bible with folded pages to make a Christmas tree and nativity. On the right is the same idea but a Book of Common Prayer was used instead.

Just some interesting sights as we traveled around London (often in a traditional Black Taxi).

Hearing a Salvation Army Band on the street added to the charm of being in London at Christmas time.

Dishoom restaurants (there are eight of them) are very popular in London. They take limited reservations which meant we ate dinner at 4:30 in the afternoon so that we would not have to wait in line as long. This was our favorite place to eat featuring flavorful and authentic Indian food.

The Churchill War Room is a relatively new (2003) museum in London. We felt it was well worth the time it took to walk through the actual underground emergency shelter where so many decisions were made during WWII. Also, learning more about the life of Churchill was interesting.

The last time we were living in Albania we did not go back to the States for the holidays. We traveled instead. Now that all of our children and grandchildren live in the northeast part of the U.S. we decided to go home for three weeks. The time went super fast and I felt like I squeezed in a lot in those three weeks.

I don’t usually take pictures out the window of airplanes but the sunrise as I took off from Tirana seemed especially stunning.

The grandchildren and their Grandaddy thought it would be fun to cut down a Christmas tree from our Scio property. Notice how huge the tree seems to be.

Dragging the tree to the truck to load it up and take it home.

My mother used to make candy villages with her mother at Christmas time, then I did the same with my mom. My children made candy villages with me when they were young and now my grandchildren have made a candy village to celebrate Christmas. Making candy villages at Christmas time is a five generation family tradition! I loved seeing all the creativity from picking out the various candies to how the children wanted to design the village.

We weren’t sure David and Kevin would be able to make the three hour drive from Schenectady to our home because of the blizzard. They ended up having no problems.

Since the Chervenak Family has lived in South Africa for the last four years, Juliet has no memory of going to see Santa Claus. It looks like she enjoyed the experience!

Pictures in front of the Christmas tree: our three children, David and Kevin, Elizabeth and her family.

Christmas Eve dinner followed by Christmas Eve Church

This picture was taken around midnight on Christmas Eve. I love the calmness of this time of the season. All the preparations are complete and there is now time to sit, relax and take it all in. Although I am not Catholic, a tradition I always enjoy is watching the Christmas services from the Vatican which is what you can see on the TV. The experience is so calming and helps center me on why we are celebrating. Notice how small the Christmas tree looks compared to how huge it looked before the family cut it down.

It was a treat to have one-on-one time with each of my grandchildren. Bennett and I went for pancakes. Ella and I went to the library where they had various dogs that the children could read aloud to. Juliet and I ended up at Starbucks for a snowman cookie. I forgot to take a picture of Jacob at Shake Shack in Virginia. Although we are temporarily living far away from our grandchildren we are grateful that they were able to stay with us for a couple of weeks.

After Christmas I rode back to Schenectady with David and Kevin so I could spend a bit more time with them. David took me to see Ellis Hospital where he started his career as a heart surgeon last August. Schenectady is a city with a population of about 70,000 located right outside of Albany (NY’s state capital). After many years of training he is happy to finally have his own practice. Kevin has continued as a Physician’s Assistant at Sloan Kettering in Manhattan. It is a two hour train ride between Manhattan and Schenectady so they are able to see each other often.

I spent the last five days of my time in the States with Elizabeth and her family in Fairfax, Virginia. Ella and I did some baking and I attended one of her basketball practices. We all enjoyed some hot chocolate after school…

…and a family dance party…

…and watching Bennett zip around on a scooter that used to belong to his Uncle David.

One of my favorite activities while I was in Virginia was taking a five minute walk with the grandchildren to and from school each day.

I flew back from Washington D.C. in early January in time for school to start again on the 9th. As I was waiting for my luggage in Tirana, I noticed this sign which I thought was so interesting.Who knew there was medical tourism in Albania?? I do know that there is a plastic surgeon from Italy who has set up a practice (primarily doing nose jobs) near us. It is very common to see young people walking around our neighborhood with big white bandages covering their noses. As I understand it, the plastic surgeon makes a lot more money practicing in Albania. He offers some type of package that includes the surgery, airfare from Italy and a hotel stay. I never get tired of learning about the happenings that occur while living internationally.

Well, that’s it for now. School is going well. Right now I am teaching my grade two students a unit on family history. They have been busy making timelines of their lives, making a family tree, interviewing family members from an older generation and writing an autobiography. It has been a fun unit to teach!

Next week is our February Break so Randy and I are headed to Barcelona and Porto, Portugal. I am looking forward to some time away from school.

As always, thanks for reading my blog.

A First Birthday, the Albanian Alps and a Trip to Southern Italy

The first year I taught at Albanian College I had an assistant named Edlira. She was a wonderful translator and assistant in the classroom but also she quickly became a friend. She was helpful as I tried to sort out some of the culture and traditions of her country. Edlira, her husband (Aldo), Randy and I have shared many meals and outings together. For the first time this year Edlira has been promoted to being a full teacher with a class of her own. Since Albanian College is an English immersion school she teaches in English and has her own teaching assistant. Last year Edlira and Aldo welcomed a precious little boy into their family.

We were honored to be invited to Aled’s first birthday celebration in early October. As has become the tradition in America, first birthdays have become bigger and bigger celebrations. However, Aled’s birthday took the first birthday celebration to a whole new level. Edlira has three brothers who are all married with children and live in Florence, Italy. They all traveled to Albania to celebrate as did Edlira’s parents who also live in Florence. Aldo’s married sister and three teenage sons all traveled from Greece to be part of Aled’s first birthday. Aldo’s parents and other relatives traveled from different parts of Albania too. Aled is a well loved little boy!

The proud Mommy with her son. We were completely underdressed for the occasion. I had worn what I would typically wear to a child’s birthday party in the U.S. while all of Aled’s family wore clothing that I would have worn to attend a wedding. Also, it is tradition to wear blue to a boy’s first birthday and pink, purple or white to a girl’s first birthday.

Here are all of Aled’s grandparents. They are all in their early to mid-60’s but none of them are still working. In Albania, it is a law that women cannot work past the age of 60 and men cannot work past the age of 64.

Note the balloon arch and special lighting for the birthday.

There was even a DJ at the birthday party who played popular and traditional Albanian music for dancing. One of my goals is to learn to Albanian dance more confidently. As you can see, I could not take my eyes off my feet in order to follow along. 🙂 I love how all the family members dance together and everyone from young to old knows how to do the same dances that have been passed down over many generations.

Part of the tradition at a first birthday is to cut off a small piece of hair which is supposed to ensure thick hair in the future.

The family then enjoyed a huge meal as a culmination to the birthday clebration.

We loved being part of Aled’s birthday party and meeting so many extended family members. It was an honor to be included!

The following weekend a group of teachers went to the Albanian Alps to a small village called Theth. If you have been reading this blog for awhile, you know that Theth is my favorite place to visit in Albania. The mountains are stunning and breathing all the fresh, outdoor air is a wonderful change of pace.

We left Tirana at 6:00 in the morning as the sun was rising. Mountains, here we come!

We are about halfway to Theth and the views are becoming more and more fantastic.

After arriving in Theth, our first hike was to the Blue Eye with unbelievable blue water.

The next day we hiked to Grunas Waterfall. We passed a small working farm with a stone house and barn. There was even a coffee shop halfway up the hill to the falls. Two friends are modeling traditional Albanian headwear.

One of the charming parts of Theth is this small Catholic Church nestled in the mountains. Since the last time we visited Theth, outdoor night lighting has been added to the church. Also, this is the first time the church was open so we could see the inside. This church is financially maintained by Albanians who used to live in Theth but now live in the United States. They consistently send money back to take care of the church.

What a fun group of people to travel with! These teachers are from Spain, Egypt, Canada and the States.

On the bus ride out of the mountains look what I saw out the window!

The following week was our nine day October Break. Randy and I rented a car in Albania and headed to southern Italy.

We drove our rental car from Tirana to the Albanian port city of Durres where we boarded an overnight ferry to Bari, Italy.

If you read the reviews for traveling on the ferry they are not very positive. Contrary to those reviews, we found the trip to be relaxing and an easy way to get to Italy with a car. It was much less expensive to rent a car in Albania and take it on the ferry instead of flying to Italy and then renting a car. The car we rented was a Suzuki Swift which I thought would be too small but it worked out perfectly.

We are arriving in Bari after a 9 hour trip across the Adriatic Sea. The trip went very quickly since we slept for most of it.

One of the many parts of Italy that I love is all the small and large churches that we randomly come across as we visit various cities.

After getting off the ferry we drove three hours to Naples where we stayed for two nights. The only reason we stayed in Naples was because of its close proximity to Mount Vesuvius and Pompeii. I have loved everywhere we have gone in Italy but Naples is the exception. Someone used the term “gritty” to describe Naples and I think that would be accurate. The city has not yet figured out how to deal with their trash. It was common to see overflowing trash cans, empty beer bottles and unkept streets. Naples is not a city that I would want to return to. That being said, there were aspects of the city we enjoyed.

Naples was founded by the Greeks in 300 BC. We saw Greek ruins at different places throughout the city.

Naples is the birthplace of pizza and it was delicious! We have never eaten so much pizza in our lives.

We took a food tour while in Naples and fried pizza was one of the featured food items.

Since Naples ia on the sea, we saw fish markets everywhere we went. It was so interesting to see the huge diversity in the seafood they were selling.

I came across this beautiful sight on an early morning run. That is Mount Vesuvius in the background.

A typical Italian breakfast for us… The hot drink in the foreground is cocoa, not to be confused with hot chocolate. As in Albania, if you order hot chocolate you will get a hot, thick chocolate pudding. If you want hot chocolate like in the USA, you need to order cocoa.

This is the street where our hotel was located. It was a lovely hotel in a central location but I found the the neighborhood to be somewhat dreary.

Street musicians always add so much to the experience of wandering around a city.

A small beautiful city park that shows the trash problem that seems to be everywhere in Naples.

I am always a bit startled when we randomly come across soldiers and military vehicles. We have seen this throughout Europe in our travels over the years.

In 79AD Mount Vesuvius erupted. The rocks and ash from the explosion rained down on Pompeii for almost a full day. Pompeii was a city of 20,000 people. Most people fled the city but there were 2,000 that stayed behind and perished. The 79AD explosion was the most severe. The volcano most recently erupted in 1944 and is expected to erupt again.

It was well worth it to make the mile long hike to see the crater at the top of Mount Vesuvius. They even had an ambulance parked at the top and bottom of the hiking trail to help people who may have trouble.

Our next stop was Pompeii which was fabulous! If you get the opportunity to visit then you need to go for it. I never realized how big Pompeii is. The city was buried until sometime in the 1700’s when a farmer was trying to dig a well and was unable to because he just kept coming across lots of ash instead of water. Since that time the location has been an active archeological site.

You can see Mount Vesuvius in the background.

This is graffiti carved on the walls hundreds of year ago.

This is a mold of a person who perished in Pompeii. It was made by pouring plaster into the cavities left by the ash that covered the people.

I hesitated to add these two pictures but we found this so amazing that I decided to go ahead and include them. Our guide explained that Pompeii was a port city with many sailors coming and going. They spoke several different languages. Many of them wanted to visit a brothel when they came to Pompeii but did not speak the language to ask for directions. The picture on the left is the town brothel. Throughout the city there were signs to direct the sailors to the brothel. The picture on the right is a wordless sign of the male genitalia that was carved in the stone wall to direct the sailors to the brothel.

We drove all over southern Italy with no problems. Most of the roads were four lane divided highways with tolls similar to the E-Z Pass lanes we have in New York. We drove through lots and lots of tunnels since southern Italy is so mountainous.

We drove from Naples to Salerno which took about an hour. The hotel we chose had an artist’s theme to it where every room featured a different artist. Charming!

There are many gorgeous places to stay on the Amalfi Coast. We took a lot of time weighing the options and decided on Salerno because it was significantly less expensive plus it provided easy access (by ferry) to the other scenic cities i.e. Amalfi, Ravello, Positano, Sorrento and Capri.

We had heard lots about the narrow, curvy road along the coast so we choose to use the ferry most of the time but we did want to experience a short segment of the scenic road so we took a bus from Salerno to the city of Amalfi. We came upon this bus and our bus had to back up plus both busses had to collapse their side mirrors so they could pass each other. I took some motion sick medication before we left but even with that I felt sick by the end of the hour long trip. From then on we took the ferry between cities.

The beautiful city of Amalfi…

Ravello was my favorite place on the Amalfi Coast. It is a smaller, less touristy town that is charming and incredibly beautiful.

Visiting the Villa Cimbrone Gardens in Ravello was cathartic and breathtaking.

Next we visited Positano which is the most popular town on the Amalfi Coast. It is known for it’s upscale shopping. Here is one of the charming walkways throughout the town. Positano was VERY crowded so I felt happy to get this photo with no tourists in it.

Positano is also known for it’s beaches with crystal clear water.

As we walked along the narrow streets we could peek into the entrances of some of the very upscale hotels which start at $1000 a night.

There were lots of people, cars and even a gas station on some of the narrow roads.

Interesting art looking over the sea in Positano.

Arriving in Salerno by ferry after a day of touring this beautiful part of Italy.

This was our favorite meal on our trip. It was a small family owned restaurant where the grandmother (who only spoke Italian) took our order by us pointing at the menu.

It was a five hour drive (including a ferry crossing) to our next location in Taormina, Sicily.

Another one of the many tunnels we drove through in Sicily.

This was the hotel where we stayed. We loved it and could have stayed there a week if we had the time. As you can see the same family has owned it since 1833.

These are some pictures from our hotel including the deck off our room and the charming place where we ate breakfast each morning.

Dipping my toes into the Mediterranean Sea

Walking around the charming town of Taormina

I loved coming across this school bus picking up children to get them to school. From what I can tell all European school buses are smaller and have a driver and a bus assistant. I know there are many schools in the USA that wish they had bus assistants on all their buses.

We took a sunset hike to Mount Etna. The volcano has been erupting for the last 2,700 years, most recently in 2015, 2017, 2019, 2020 and 2021. In all that time it has killed a total of 77 people. We asked our alpine guide how he could be sure it was not going to eminently erupt. He said there are usually several small earthquakes proceeding an eruption. Walking around on the volcano seemed like we were on the moon or in a Star Wars movie.

We were able to climb part way down into the crater to actually feel the heat that continuously radiates from the volcano. Amazing!

The sunset view on Mount Etna did not disappoint, 85% of what you see coming out of the top of Mount Etna is water vapor. The rest is sulphur, radon and other things that I do not remember.

That is my update for now. Randy is currently back in the States enjoying some deer hunting. I am in the midst of writing extensive reports about each of my students since the end of term one is approaching. I am flying home on December 16th to celebrate the holidays with the whole family. I cannot wait!!! As always, thank you for taking the time to read my blog. I hope you skimmed through lots of it since it is soooooo long this time. Not sure if I will make another post before the holidays so I am wishing you all the best over the upcoming holiday season.

November, 2022

Wow, it is already October!

We have almost completed our 6th week of school. I am always glad when October rolls around because by then most of the students are into the school rhythm and we are past learning all the routines that come with a new school year.

As always, I have enjoyed getting to know my new group of students. They have some excellent academic skills. It has been a while since I have taught second grade so it has been interesting to observe how strong they are in reading, writing and math. Most of these children attended Albanian College last year which means they are all fairly fluent in English. In the past I have always had at least 3 or 4 children who had no English in my class. Several of my current students are trilingual. Some of them speak Arabic or Russian. I have students who were born in Russia, Egypt, Kenya and of course, Albania. One of my Albanian students has lived in Ukraine for most of her life but because of the war, her family moved back to Albania from Kiev last spring. I have never had such an international class. I love the diversity! One more thing, my assistant’s name is Stefi. She is a 22 year old young woman who is just getting started with her career. I am enjoying getting to know her.

If we take a regular picture then we have to allow time for a silly picture too!

Here is an updated picture of the school. The addition on the right was completed in September, 2021.

You may remember from a previous post that the school building was originally built by the communists as a place where they could train their officers. The architecture of the building says communist style. Many of the older buildings in Tirana have this same box like, somewhat dreary look to them. Anyways, the new part of the school is for the Early Years (ages 3-5) Program and the Primary (grades1-5) Years Program. It is a nice addition to the school. Because of all the windows it can get really warm even though there is air conditioning. My classroom is on the third floor. In much of Europe, what Americans would call the third floor, Europeans call the second floor because they call the first floor “zero” or ground floor. Confusing at times but I am getting the hang of it.

Here are two of the other three grade two teachers. Nilda is from Albania and Rawand is originally from Lebanon but is now a Canadian. We make a good team and I am glad to get to work with them.

The children sang happy birthday to me in both English and Albanian. After they finished, one child raised his hand and asked if he could sing happy birthday to me in Russian. Loved it all!!!

We celebrated International Dot Day a couple weeks ago by listening to the the book The Dot by Peter Reynolds. The book has a good message about “making your mark” which led to lots of good discussion.

The day was full of lots of dot activities.

This is what a week of teaching Grade Two at Albanian College includes:

Between 8:00 and 8:30 the children arrive at school and go directly to the canteen where they eat breakfast that is provided by the school.
The children have these special classes each week. Each special area class is 45 minutes long.
- 4x/week Albanian Class; the children who are not native speakers attend a separate class so they can become more proficient in Albanian.
- 2x/week Music
- 2x/week Art
- 2x/week P.E.
The children are given 25 minutes for lunch which is provided by the school.
There are three 20-25 minute recesses every day. That is one of my favorite parts of Albanian College. It is SO good for the kids to get outside often during the day.
The children go to their bus or to parent pick-up at 3:10.
Three days a week the children can attend an after school club if they are interested. The clubs dismiss at 4:00.
Each teacher has some type of duty everyday. I supervise for 25 minutes during lunch. That means I have a shortened lunch period each day but I am fine with it because then I have more planning time during the rest of the day.
There are weekly hour long staff meeting after school in addition to twice weekly grade level meetings during the school day.
Each teacher is required to teach a club after school until 4:00 one day a week. I teach the Sudoku Club. 🙂

Now you have been updated about school so far.

The second week of September Derek and his dad, Karl, came to visit us in Tirana. A family member of theirs was married in North Macedonia so they decided to come visit us before heading back to the States. Our families have been friends for more than 30 years. We loved hosting them for a few days!

Karl could not stay more than a couple of days but Derek was able to stay through the weekend. We took him to Berat which is about a two hour drive from Tirana. Berat is known as the “City of 1,000 Windows” for obvious reasons.

**Can you see Derek running up to the top of one of the castle walls?**

We stayed overnight at Berat Castle which has been continuously lived in since 400 BC. We love the tranquility and beauty of staying at Kris Guesthouse inside the castle walls.

This is my favorite picture from our trip to Berat, Derek standing on one of the castle walls at sunset.

In 2021 Tirana hosted an International Mural Festival with over 30 artists visiting the city. I just adore coming across various murals as we walk around the city.

This is my favorite mural that I have seen so far. It is titled “A Mother’s Love”.

Well, that is my update for now. Thank you so much for taking the time to read my blog. I really do enjoy sharing our experiences with you. My first school break is approaching so Randy and I are renting a car to take on a ferry from Albania to Bari, Italy. From there we will drive to the Amalfi Coast and then head south to spend a couple days in Sicily. Can’t wait! Randy heads back to the States at the end of the month to spend time deer hunting. I always dread his departure but then when he is gone I always end up handling it just fine. 🙂

Settling Back into Tirana

We have been back in Tirana for about two weeks now and all is well so far. Our flights from Rochester to Tirana were on time and we even arrived with all of our luggage. Yay! Someone had suggested we put an Air Tag in each of our pieces of checked luggage which we ended up doing. Fortunately, we never needed to rely on the Air Tags but it was comforting to know they were there.

Our son, Josh dropped us off at the Rochester airport early in the morning on August 12th.
Here we go!

A month ago, I had no idea what an Air Tag was but I am learning. The Air Tag is linked to your phone using the Find My App. That way at any time you can see the location of your luggage. Pretty cool!

Our son, David frequently tracks our flights as he did here. It was a 10 hour flight to Istanbul from JFK followed by a two hour flight to Tirana.

The Istanbul Airport had areas called Napzones. They were lovely, quiet zones with outlets where you could relax and recharge at no cost.

We have arrived in Tirana and are headed into the airport. The airport was VERY crowded, more crowded than we had ever seen it. There are 30% more passengers in and out of the airport compared to two years ago. We have heard that the taxes on tickets has been significantly reduced causing the influx.

We flew from Istanbul to Tirana on an airline called Air Albania. Air Albania has leased some airplanes from Ukraine which is one of the planes we flew on.

The school pays for us to stay at a hotel for three nights so we can start to acclimate before moving into our apartment. Look at the yummy lunch we had after checking in.

We were thrilled to reconnect with our friends Edlira and Aldo on one of our first nights back in Tirana. As you can see, they now have a 10 month old son, Aled. He is adorable!!!

I have resumed my Saturday morning runs at Artificial Lake. It cost the equivalent of 40 cents to take a city bus almost anywhere in Tirana. It is a 20 minute bus ride to the lake and then about a four mile run around the lake. You may have read about the dogs in Albania on previous posts. I was amazed to see the dog in the foreground again. He laid in pretty much the same spot back when we were here in 2020.

This is our apartment building which is one of 10 identical buildings in the same complex. Our apartment is on the 6th floor. We loved our apartment last time and we are growing to like our current apartment. It is more dated and did not come as well equipped as our former apartment. The landlord has been working to get us a few more basic items (i.e. toaster, silverware, pots and pans, etc.)

If you look carefully, where the red arrow is pointing, you will see a cord that goes from our apartment balcony to the apartment tower across the plaza from ours. That is our internet connection. We could use a more traditional internet source but our landlord told us he had a friend across the way who had recently started his own internet company. The cord links us to his friend’s internet company and cost the equivalent of $8/month. All of our internet communication goes through a VPN so we feel safe using it. When we told our son, Josh (who is a network engineer) about this setup he thought we were crazy to get the internet this way. After giving him more details he feels okay about it. As we have all said to ourselves, “only in Albania.”

An early morning view from our apartment balcony.

The multiple fruit and vegetable stands continue to be plentiful all along our street.

We continue to buy much of our everyday groceries (milk, eggs, yogurt, etc.) here. It is a very small grocery store by American standards but it is amazing to see how well stocked it is.

Three years ago we could get a dinner of pizza and salad for the two of us for $7, now it costs $10. We are definitely noticing an uptick in prices of about 30% on many things. In talking to people who have lived here a long time this increase in prices has all come about in the last six months. This is somewhat hard on us but VERY hard on the average Albanian who makes a limited amount of money to start with. Depressing…

On a more positive note, Tirana is bursting with construction projects. Everywhere you look, there is a new high rise being built. We have not yet figured out what that means. The buildings are primarily offices and apartments. Are that many people moving to Tirana? Is it growing that fast? Will all these new buildings fill up quickly? The mosque in the picture was being renovated for the two years we were here previously and is now open. I am looking forward to going inside soon.

We just had our pictures taken for our visas.

I took this picture as I headed to school for the first day of teacher induction. The American flag has been added to the sign because last year the school started a new section to the school called the “local pathway” at the primary level and the “American Program” at the secondary school level. From what I understand this was done to boost enrollment and to create a more diverse student population.

Today I finished setting up my classroom, yay! I am excited to meet my students tomorrow. As I said earlier the primary students are now housed in a new part of the school. I LOVE all the natural light in my classroom!

One of our concerns with moving back to Tirana was Covid. The first day of teacher training the director of the school tested positive for Covid. The next day three teachers also tested positive. The whole staff then went to wearing masks throughout the day. Most of the meetings were put on Zoom. At this time, no one else has tested positive and we are hoping for a smooth, healthy start to the school year. Randy and I brought several Covid test kits with us but have not needed to use any of them yet, thank goodness! We have found out that it is fairly simple to get a Covid test in Tirana at no cost at several clinics around the city.

Before we came to Albania a couple weeks ago we were told that many places in Europe were having trouble getting flour because of the war in Ukraine. Because of the flour shortage we heard that there were very limited baked goods available. None of that has been true in Tirana. The baked goods are as plentiful as always. As I said earlier in this post the inflation rate here is very high. I do not know if that is a result of the war or Covid or because inflation is happening worldwide. I am looking forward to having a Ukrainian refugee child in my grade two class this year.

Thanks for reading this blog post. I always think I will be making a short post and then I keep adding more and more. Kudos to you if you are still reading! It will probably be a few weeks before I make another post. The craziness of school starting always takes a lot of time as my school friends know.

Teaching in Albania- Round Two

As many of you know in March, 2020 my teaching in Albania was cut short by Covid. I then returned to teach first grade special education at Dudley School in Fairport, New York. Although I only needed to teach in Fairport for two months in order to retire, I ended up teaching for two more years. It was hard to think about leaving a teaching position that was challenging but gave me great satisfaction. When I turned 40 and then 50 and then 60 years old it never caused me any angst. But then I turned 65 which meant I was required to sign up for Medicare. That got my attention and forced me to start seriously thinking about retirement. When reflecting about whether or not to retire from Fairport, someone suggested that I start making a list of what I wanted to do after retiring. On that list was to teach again in an international setting. The first person I asked about it was my husband, Randy. Because he is a super supportive husband, when I asked him if he would consider moving abroad with me again, he said, “Sure, let’s do it.” Since I had previously taught in Albania I have friends that now live and teach in many parts of the world. Some of them encouraged me to come teach at their current schools. After much thought, Randy and I decided to go back to Albania. The cost of living in Albania is very reasonable. The location and climate are good. Plus, we still have friends in Albania. Finally, the ease of moving back into a setting that we were familiar with was enticing. For all those reasons we decided Albania was again a good choice.

When I reached out to Albanian College last fall about the possibility of teaching grade one there again, they said they did not have a grade one opening but they did have a grade two opening. So starting on August 29th, I will be teaching grade two in Tirana (the capitol of Albania) at Albanian College. Even though I have taught at the school before I will be participating in the new teacher training which starts on August 17th. We fly out of Rochester on the morning of August 12th. We fly through JFK to Istanbul and then onto Tirana arriving there on the 13th. We have rented an apartment that is close to the apartment we had previously and is a five minute walk to the school.

We have a few reservations about moving abroad. How will Covid be? Will the war in Ukraine impact our stay in Albania? Obviously, we have given this much thought and talked to friends that are living there and feel confident in our decision to go. If it is not working out or we feel unsafe at any time, we will simply come home.

Thanks for joining me on this second adventure to Albania. It is wonderful to be able to stay in touch with our family and friends through this blog. I will be back in touch after we start to get settled in Tirana.

Four Months of Lockdown in South Africa

As you can tell, I have decided to write one more blog post so that I could tell you about my experience of being locked down in South Africa. When I arrived in South Africa on March 13th there were very few cases of COVID in the country. The country was functioning normally.

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Even though the country had not yet imposed any restrictions we decided that we were not comfortable being around others. We sought out places we could visit outside like the Union Buildings which is the seat of South African government and houses the office of the president of South Africa. You can see from the statue that Nelson Mandela is a beloved hero in this country (and the world).

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The Union Buildings are surrounded by beautiful gardens that include these gorgeous Birds of Paradise flowers.

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Several months before COVID one of the au pairs who had lived with the Chervenaks a few years ago, made plans to visit them in South Africa. Sophia and her boyfriend, Andrew, arrived from Germany a week before I did. They had anticipated spending another week in South Africa by visiting Cape Town. Unfortunately, they had to cancel their trip and then fly back to Germany instead. In this picture we are enjoying a bowl of ice cream as we listen to the president addressing the nation about COVID. President Ramaphosa is announcing that starting on March 26th the entire country will go into lock down. The lock down will prohibit people from leaving their homes unless they need to buy food, gasoline or need to get to a hospital. The lock down meant that we were not allowed to leave our property even to go for a walk, run or bike ride. 😦 Another restriction that was imposed starting March 26th was that the sale of tobacco products and alcohol was banned. Both of these restrictions are still in place as I write this blog post in August. The sale of tobacco and alcohol generates millions of rand (the South African currency) as tax revenue. Now, because of these restrictions, the government is not receiving this tax revenue causing even more hardship. Also, the black market is selling both alcohol and tobacco which has complicated everything.

Before the lock down started on the 26th of March the family went on as many walks…

…and bike rides…

…and puddle stomping expeditions as possible.

Now virtual learning has begun. Jacob is in third grade and Ella is in first. They attend an international school in Pretoria that went to all virtual learning on March 16th. The children spent about a half a day on daily assignments sent by their teachers. Their lessons often included large, small or individual Zoom meetings.

Both Jacob and Ella needed help from a parent with virtual lessons. Although both these pictures show Ben helping the kids, it was really Elizabeth who spent the most time with the kids on this. Ben was usually doing his work virtually in another part of the house and I was teaching my Albanian students virtually in still another part of the house. Elizabeth does have a part time job writing a twice monthly newsletter for the Embassy but thank goodness it does not require a lot of hours. Keeping up with Jacob and Ella’s schooling plus keeping tabs on the younger two children floating around the house was definitely a full time job. I am not sure how families with two parents working full time could handle it all. Plus I think being a single parent during this pandemic would be especially stressful.

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Here Ben is heading off to work in the back of the house so he can attend a virtual meeting. 🙂

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The family is headed outside to take a PE class with Ben. Don’t we look tough and ready to go?!?!

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Meanwhile, back in the States, Josh is food shopping at Wegman’s and finds the bread aisle almost empty. This shortage only happened at the beginning of the pandemic.

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Randy has spent much time during the pandemic making a waterwheel. He adores his workshop and can easily spend hours at a time making all kinds of things. He decided to make a waterwheel to go in a stream at our property (the Loop) which is about two hours south of Rochester. The property is quite rustic with no electricity or running water. Randy has decided to make this waterwheel to generate electricity for when he spends time at the Loop.

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Josh spent much of his time during the pandemic digging up part of the backyard and planting a vegetable garden.

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At the same time, David’s job was changing rapidly at NYU Languone Medical Center in Manhattan.

David sent these pictures to help us understand the difference between a healthy lung x-ray on the right and and a COVID infected lung x-ray on the left.

David spent some time walking around NYC and sent a few pics of the empty streets. He saw the USS Comfort docked in the harbor. The video is from Times Square, so sad. 😦

Back to Pretoria and the Chervs enjoying their pool. Since South Africa is in the southern hemisphere their seasons are opposite of ours. When I arrived in March it was a week away from the first day of fall. The fall and winter are quite mild in South Africa which means the Chervs use the pool year round.

Digging a hole in the yard looking for worms, playing shoe shop with Nana, playing house in the dog crate and simply being cute were all ways to pass the time when we were locked down during the pandemic.

Elizabeth and Ben are great cooks! Every meal I ate with them was delicious and almost always full of healthy ingredients. I never prepared a meal while visiting them but I was in charge of cleaning up each night. It was a routine that we fell into and it worked well.

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I was so glad that I was able to be with Juliet to celebrate her third birthday on March 27th. Ben has a tradition of buying roses for his daughters on their birthdays. Juliet turned three so her daddy bought her three roses, very sweet!

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I absolutely adore this picture! Francesca is an important and loved part of the Chervenak family. She is originally from Zimbabwe but has lived in South Africa for 20 years. She lives with the Chervs in her own apartment which is part of the house. Her responsibilities mostly center around housework but she also helps out with childcare at times. When the pandemic hit, Francesca had the choice of moving out to live with one of her adult children or staying put in quarantine with the Chervs. She chose to stay with the Chervs which I was glad for because it allowed me the time to get to know this lovely person.

Reading aloud to Juliet each night was a highlight of my time in lock down. Her sense of humor, enthusiasm and candidness made her such fun to be around.

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Look at the text sent out in Albania in early April by the prime minister, Edi Rama. I thought South Africa had a tight lock down but it was mild compared to what was happening in Albania. No one was allowed to leave their home from 1:00PM Friday until 5:00AM Monday for several weeks. Also, you could not leave your home unless you had a pass that you applied for and then was issued to you via text. The very hard lock down kept the COVID numbers low for several weeks but then the economy was suffering so much that Albania opened back up. According to some of my friends that live there, very few people wear masks or social distance now. The number of COVID cases is going up significantly.

Spa Day!!! One of the many events that Elizabeth came up with to help keep the children entertained during quarantine was to have a Spa Day. Elizabeth gave manicures and pedicures, Ben gave massages and I gave facials. All of this with the backdrop of relaxing spa music. The kids loved it and so did we.