Laura Butterbrodt

Getting into Bulgaria was very pretty. There were big, snow covered mountains and rolling hills as we flew in. The cities look very Soviet and old. A girl who arrived at the airport with me, Ana from Brussels, said Bulgaria is the poorest country in Europe. That isn't surprising when looking at a lot of the buildings. The population of Blagoevgrad is 70,000, and most people live in apartments so the city isn't really too big at all.

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Tuesday, January 16

9 p.m.

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Ana, plus Aarya and Rajjwal (They're from Nepal, but go to school in Washington, D.C.) and I went out to get SIM cards for our phones, sheets and towels and some food. It is pretty hard to find people in stores who speak Englsih. Time to make some Bulgarian friends! It feels so good to be sleeping in a bed and not an airplane seat. My culture shock is pretty bad, and I don't have much of an appetite to try any foods yet.

  

Thursday, January 18

9:30 a.m.

 

Yesterday (Wednesday) was a lot better. It started with a breakfast for all exchange students. Then I got my ID from the main building and was able to hook up my email account and WiFi (finally!!). All the American ISEP students (the program I am with) got to have lunch with the Dean of Students Lydia Krise, who is American and helped ease our minds a little bit about being here. I think there were seven of us at the meeting, from D.C., Maine, Maryland, Indiana and Ohio.

 

I was still really shaken up from the culture shock, and tired because I called my mom around midnight the night before to tell her to book my flight home because I couldn’t stay here anymore. Even now, not even two days later, I am already feeling a little better. Still not 100 percent, but at least I can eat and sleep finally and I don’t feel like I’m going to pass out from anxiety all the time.

 

After our lunch and a tour of the America For Bulgaria Student Center (essentially the student union) we had a session with the counselor. I really liked that because we got to meet all the exchange students and we went around in a circle and shared things about ourselves, like what we expect in our semester and what we have to offer to other students. We also played a game where we shared something we were feeling and anyone who felt the same way had to get up and find a new chair to sit in. It sounded really cheesy, but I liked being able to see what I had in common with the others and was happy to see I wasn’t the only one who was freaking out.

 

Next was a crash course on Bulgarian language and culture with the woman who is teaching my semester-long class on the same subject. I loved this session! She was a really great teacher and she was really entertaining. I was able to learn some basic phrases, even though I have already forgotten most of them. Guess I better start studying! Her lesson helped to ease my mind a bit about the language barrier and she helped me to understand more about the culture here, and we got to watch a video about all the things Bulgaria is proud of. Although the sights in the film were mostly of nature and mountains and didn’t show anything similar to the cities I have seen (which were what freaked me out the most) it was helpful to know there are beautiful place right outside my door. Literally, I am surrounded by mountains on three sides of my campus!

 

The night ended with a pizza and karaoke night with all the new students. There is a guy from Tennessee who is here as a four year student. He’s an interesting guy but he’s in love with Bulgaria, so I guess he's in the right place! It was fun to get to talk with all of the new students. I sat with Nisha from Maine, two girls from Latvia, both named Sindija, and a guy from Blagoevgrad named Sevo. The students from Germany are also really nice!

 

One of the RAs from the front desk who is probably tired of me asking him for help sang a lot at the karaoke night and was really good! I did not have the courage to go sing. I was getting really tired, so while a lot of other students were planning to go out to the bars, I decided to just come back to my room and get to bed. I still ended up staying up until almost 1 a.m. because I called Dad and Sidney. Dad of course made me cry a lot, but it was good to get to finally talk to him.

 

This morning I got up to confirm my classes. I got into all the ones I signed up for! (You can find out what they are at the FAQ page).

 

Another thing from my trip that I forgot to write earler:

Many people on my way to/in Germany spoke to me in German because I looked German/because of my last name. That made me feel pretty cool, although they were always surprised when I answered in English! Pari from Germany even told me when she first saw me she thought I was from Germany. Cool!

 

Saturday, January 20

9:30 p.m.

 

The past two days have been so fun! All of the exchange students have gotten so close with each other and we all get along really well. Wednesday I had a really relaxed day. There were a couple of training sessions for orientation, like how to use the library and the student health clinic. I took three naps between all my sessions!!

 

I started talking with Alli, who is from Maryland. We both were feeling a lot of culture shock and just struggling overall, so I pestered her into getting dinner with me. We walked around the city a little bit and talked forever about things in the United States and our struggles with adjusting and lots of other things. It was so nice! We also went shopping at H&M because my suitcase still had not arrived and I was completely out of things to wear.

 

The next day, there was a diversity training session all morning. A lot of students missed it because they had had a little bit too much fun the night before! :) It was a pretty fun session. We did a lot of ice breaker activities with the first-year students and talked about privilege and diversity a little bit. I got to talk to some of the girls more. My favorite part of the session was at the end, when we all put pieces of paper on our backs and wrote nice things about each other anonymously. Nothing like a little confidence boost to make you feel more welcome! One word someone described me with was “persistent,” which I took as a compliment since I have been trying my very best to keep talking to people. I also got “nice accent”!

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All of the exchange students get along so well. We all are in the same mindset and have a group message so we can always find something to do with other people. I really like everybody here! So far there aren't many cliques; we can hang out with any of the people in a group. It'll be weird when the rest of the students come back to campus because we're used to only seeing each other on campus.

 

After diversity training I found out MY SUITCASE HAD FINALLY ARRIVED!!!!!!! After making a large scene about how excited I was, I went to lunch at the dining hall, where most of the other exchange students were eating too. So far I think the food on campus will be pretty mediocre, but edible!

 

Then there was a tour of the city on our schedule. We got to go to Varosha, the old city, which is located right in Blagoevgrad, about a 15 minute or so walk from campus. We saw the church there and a building that is the oldest in the city (I think from the 1700s or 1800s). The building is now used as a teaching facility for the arts, including dance, silk painting and linguistics. We got to go into a house that is shared by a mother and son who are artists that sell their works to the United States and Western Europe, where they get better prices for their art.