The Adventure Begins....

Well folks, this is definitely going to be quite the adventure. Meg arrived in the weeee hours of Wednesday morning (3:00am) which meant I had to get a cab out there and back because while I had figured out how to drive there during the day, there was no way I going to make the trip without any visual queues in the middle of a sleep induced stupor. Thankfully, it all worked out and she's here.

Internet access has yet to be figured out for the residences, so right now, I'm posting from an Internet cafe. GEL 2 / hour = $1.25 per hour. Not too shabby. Catch is, Google appears to be smart enough to try to use Russian. Which doesn't really work out so well for me. It took me a few minutes to figure out how to post here.

Meg's still working on her first week here, while I'm pushing into my second week. So far, we've figured out how to:

• Buy groceries (a bit comical I'm sure since there's a lot of pointing and use of calculators to explain how much things cost)




• Buy gas. Also an adventure as we seem to have moved to NJ where we can't pump our own gas. (The similiarities between Tbilisi & NJ are kinda creepy, but I'll save that for a future post.)




• Get air put in the tires of the truck




• Figure out how to park the pickup in the super tight garage




• Order dinner at restaurants




• I've found the local beach, but Meg hasn't gone yet. (Was hoping to do that today, but the weather is kinda cool and overcast today, so maybe next weekend.)




• Get a cab to take us where we want to go




• Get a cab to take us to places we don't want to go. (Go figure, this is easier than the one above.)




• Get cell phones working in town that don't cost us a fortune in roaming charges. (Email us if you want the #.)




• Found a horse track that is being used by folks to run around. 1.8 km around of C&O trail type of running. Not bad to start with and pretty close to home.

It's quite humbling how challenging things can be when you can't speak the language, can't read the signs and generally are living in your own world. Meg feels pretty vulnerable right now, but I think that'll wear off as she gets used to living here. She's shown quite the adventuresome spirit so far, and seems to be increasing her confidence as it goes on.

Work was SUPER busy for me for the first week with a turn over and a number of visitors showing up that I had to help take care of. That's finished now, so I can finally work on settling into a routine. The new Embassy is GEORGOUS and certainly makes it easy for me. We'll see what Meg's office is like, but she already has two half-days scheduled this week and is looking forward to being gainfully employed in the city. (Colombo Charlie I'm sure knows all about this problem.)

We'll go to our first hash on Sunday and hopefully meet some folks from outside the Embassy community there. We've started making friends with random folks that I've found at the cafeteria and through the CLO, and I'm sure it'll be very soon before our social schedule is packed again.

Ok, I've rambled enough for today. Again, as soon as I have legit internet, I'll try to post more frequently and some photos. Hope all is well for you guys out there.