Growing pains perhaps

 

Today was the first time that I thought, “what am I doing here?” My first attempt at teaching an English lesson did not go well at all, my lack of Bulgarian was made painfully obvious, and I found myself craving a hamburger. Normally in situations like this I could always find solace in the fact that it is temporary and that I will be returning to my normal routine eventually, but today I felt that is not going to be the case this time. I am not going home soon and that suddenly seemed very real. Before I crashed and burned teaching that lesson I considered myself to have a great grasp on teaching and that it would transfer Continents with the same ease as the rest of my luggage. Don’t get me wrong I was never under the impression that it would be easy but somewhere deep down I thought that I would be good at it and that I could rely on my profession as the corner stone of my time in Bulgaria. I am sure I felt this because everything around me would be different but I knew that classroom dynamic of teacher/student would be the same or at least familiar and I could find a home in that but when it came time for it, that dynamic felt as foreign as the grocery stores here.

Today I also found out that one of the other volunteers in the group I came over with decided that he had enough and would be going home and I felt a bit envious of him. I thought, “soon he will be back to his life, to his family, to his friends, and to what felt comfortable.” That is when the stronger half of myself spoke up and said there is a reason you left that comfort, that normalcy, and it was so you could grow and be a stronger person. It is suppose to rain tomorrow, that always cheers me up