Brian looking at some sweet Armenian birds during our bird-watching field trip to Lake Sevan.
And Beth, doing the same.
Vinny and Beth are quite talented harmonica players.
Noravank, which is very close to Yeghegnadzor.
A beautifully carved door at Noravank.
Noravank. The steps that lead up to the room at the top are about a foot wide with no railing to hold on to. I climbed up there, can't say it was easy, or that I wasn't sacred, but I can say it was a great view from there.
This is a little boy who lives in a village called Rind that is very close to Yeghegnadzor. I'm not sure if you can tell but his cheeks are STUFFED full of chocolate, and he is reaching for another. His mother did nothing to stop him, this is pretty typical here! What a life!
This is at Paige's house, a fellow volunteer in Vayots Dzor marz. She lives in Vayk, which is about 20 minutes away from Yeghegnadzor.
Patti and Ben, both A-15s that lived in Vayots Dzor. Patti showed me all over Yegh on my site visit, but she has since finished her service and is living in America.
Some storks that can be seen all over this part of Armenia.
Katie's dad drives the big yellow bus that makes a loop from Karenis to Charentsavan.
Janet and Kaitie.
Janet and I taking a break in the gorge after we met our new host families. We had many such debriefing sessions (usually including a bottle of wine or a bottle of Katayk beer) in the gorge.
Rani and her new puppy Maz. We were glad that her family didn't decide to name him Rex, as there are about 6 dogs named Rex in Karenis.
My host sister, Emma picking cherries. Later that day I helped her to pit about 50 lbs of cherries to be dried later, my favorite!
One of the two kitties I attempted to save from the gorge, they later ran away. I named this one Dahoor, which means sad. You should have heard him whine!
Some lillies in my garden.
My host mother and her lovely flowers. This was taken from the window in my bedroom.
My first meeting with my new host mother, Ruzan.
Ben, David, Janet and me posing for our lovely family photo.
This is the source of a natural spring that later heads to Arzakan then to the Hrazdan river. We spent all day following a creek to find this place. It was impossibly hot that day, only later the weather QUICKLY changed and we had to race down the mountian to take shelter in the curch where we waited for over an hour for the storm to pass.
This is before te mad rush to the church. We took a rest on some rocks a little farther down the mountian to watch a storm clould move over the valley. We quickly realiezed it was changing its path and heading right for us!
Right before we found the spring.
An Armenian cutting grass on a hillside just above Arzakan.
Janet and Don in Teghenik. Yeah, I can read that sign, woot woot!
Janet, Don and some cow traffic in the tunnel we walked through on our trek through the gorge to Arzakan. This was was definitely more scenic, safe and quicker than taking the road, but it was longer than we thought! We estimated it was maybe 6 miles.
Loading up all the trash we picked up for our community project.
Our dump truck.
Look how much we picked up! Sorry to say, there was A LOT we didn't get to because it was so far down the gorge.
Anoush, a Karenis village, who came every day to help us. We also painted a gazebo a little farther down the gorge.
Noyemi and Anoush, very hard working volunteers!
A sign the mayor got for us to ask people not to throw their trash in the gorge. Unfortunately it was stolen only a few hours later.
We used old cement bags to collect our trash. Notice they say "Portland Cement!"
One of our LCFs (language teacher) Anna on the left, and Noyemi.
Rani and some sweet trash.
Armen, the mayor of Karenis.
Vincent and Beth picking up trash.
Katie excavating some steps.
The before picture.
