There’s No Trick To Staying Sensible…
Taking a break from Paris for a moment to bring you this
blog post message! Nah in all seriousness I have had three common questions that MANY people have asked
me since I moved here.
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| Frustration |
1. How
old are you? (Usually followed up by either, “are you married?” OR “That’s very
young….”)
2. Why
would you move here? (To which I have finally hit infuriated: BECAUSE I RESPECT
YOUR COUNTRY AND WANT TO BE HERE!)
3. How
do you handle things that go wrong, or all the stress?
Tonight’s blog post will be like a public service
announcement, consider it a “how to” guide to handling stress and issues.
Because not only have some of my American counterparts in BG asked me, but a
lot of my students have as well. They ask me how I remain positive or
optimistic, and they ask me how I just keep going when there are some really
bad days. I know this is in part to them thinking it’s odd I’m here but still-
great question. Here’s my secret…come closer. No seriously, come closer how do
you sit so far back? It’s sarcasm. Tons of it. I just have this personality
that is- “Oh? So my entire life just went out the window? Ok, so lunch?”
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| Just going with it |
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| Embrace the shadows |
Now understand friends, I grew up that way. There was always
something wrong, that if I got upset every time a Doctor gave me bad news, or
something broke-I’d live my life angry. And yes I know I have a lot to be angry
about, but what is the point of that? It’s ok to get angry, but get over it.
That’s just how I am, let’s give an example (I’m a teacher, examples are like
my thing)
Today:
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| They kept staring... |
Today after weeks of planning, translating Romanian bus
schedules, finding hostels, arranging pick ups and drop offs, getting ahead in
class planning, and being all packed; I was supposed to board a 7:30 am bus to
Ruse, to change there to a train to Bucharest, where I would stay overnight
then take the early morning bus to Chisinau and stay in Moldova until mid day
Monday where I would go back to Bucharest, stay overnight, then back to Ruse,
stay overnight, then back to Burgas. Intricate plan right? Slight issue, it
hinged on buses and trains actually RUNNING.
After getting up at 5 am and not sleeping, going in the
freezing cold, getting to the bus station and being ready, I waited. And
waited. And then these 3 people waiting for the same bus started to get closer
to me, staring and looking like they wanted to talk to me. Finally one asked me
in Bulgarian if I was going to Ruse, so I responded “yes on the 730 bus” to
which he responded that the bus was broken.
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| Just keep it together! |
Now downside to this conversation-bus is broken
Upside- I understood and spoke a good bit of Bulgarian!
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| Or Walk away... |
Moving on…I’m informed that they are trying to fix it. But
by the time they tell us it won’t be fixed we have all missed one of the only
two other ways to fix this. So the other option is taking the bus to Varna.
Which you know great except they don’t know when we will get in and I will most
likely miss my Ruse connection and thus ALL MY OTHER CONNECTIONS.
It’s at this point that I turn to the other people and say:
This is a sign. Forget it. And head back to my flat. Now you would think: Ok
Anna, you spent money, and weeks of planning time for nothing. You now have a
semester break that you’ve been planning on for months that will not be filled
at all. And it’s literally wasting time. You are heartbroken, and
frustrated,
and you just want to cry. Channel your inner Disney and break down. What do I
do? I call my mom to tell her I’m not going then decide to let my hostels know I’m
not coming…which leads to the next part of frustration I faced. My computer.
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| When upset fall down! |
To get online I turn on my computer, which just did system
updates. Only to find out my system erased my old user account, passwords, and
hid ALL OF MY FILES. My music, my pictures, and all the research I have done
for 6 years. Which as “Bear” from apple told me as he was remote controlling my
computer was “a lot of writing.” Now I wanted to fix this but the online forums
were iffy and I thought “let’s just call apple.” Thus I find the Bulgarian help
line and dial them from skype. Perfect right? Yeah, turns out that a digit must
be off on the website because I got a Sex hotline. My mom couldn’t stop
laughing when I told her. Probably one of the least sexual people on the planet
ended up calling a sex hotline at 9 am trying to get her Disney songs back.
Yep.
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| No... |
So then I call the American line, which isn’t open yet. Thus
I quit. I think “well, I can’t fix this right now, I’m exhausted. Let’s nap and
face this when you CAN do something to fix it.” (Hint 1: that’s a good strategy
in living abroad, if you know you can’t do something right away, don’t panic.
Recognize it is beyond your reach and if you focus on it you will go insane.) I
went back to sleep and woke up ready to handle this.
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| Angry Computer |
I called the American hotline and talked to George,
excellent guy. He told me I was a dear and when he realized I had waited 7
hours to call him he told me “sweetie we will get this fixed.” Apparently
getting this fixed meant transferring me to Bear who gave me his personal
number in case we got cut off- at this point I was terrified for my computer if
they were taking it that seriously. My poor Spock! (Yes, I named my computer
Spock, judge me if you dare.) However after 40 minutes of him remote controlling
my computer from America, and my working with him we got everything back and he
was enjoying all the Doctor Who pictures I have on my computer, and my
questionable music choices.
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| BRING BACK MY MUSIC! |
OK so what did we get from this? It was a BAD day. But here
is how I handled it:
Step 1: Allowed myself to be angry at the loss. I had
planned so well, I was really excited, and I wanted to go so badly, and now
even if I went I’d get maybe 8 hours in Moldova.
Step 2: I just let it out, ate chocolate, napped, watched
Doctor Who, listened to my “questionable” music. (Kate, Clay Aiken is a good
singer, back off my love of him)
Step 3: Moved on and made snarky remarks.
Step 4: Got positive again.
For me this meant I figured ok, be upset for an hour at the
most. Then plan what fun things you can do in Burgas this weekend. What movies
do you want to watch at night? Have you answered all your students messages? Do
they need anything, if so make sure you get on it immediately.
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| We can do it! |
This is an extreme example. But let’s look at easier ones.
Like last week when I fell down these stone steps because I didn’t see the
black ice and seriously bruised my spine. I could get angry, I could start to
swear at the inanimate object steps. I could fume. My response: Bulgarian steps
1, Anna 0. Well played steps, well played.
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| Why do they even have that lever? |
When my washing machine stops working my response- Cosplay
Cinderella and hand wash everything while listening to Disney soundtracks.
When my elevator won’t let me get out on my floor but
instead keeps going- “Wrong lever Kronk!!”
When the students who clearly hate me are cruel and the ones
who want to learn are then distracted: “Eh, at least I’m not an Orc, that would
be really bad.”
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| I get that feeling sometimes... |
When everyone says “Aren’t you afraid to live alone? What if
you are murdered or raped?” My response- “Well, then they’d have to do my
dishes, so they’d lose…priorities.”
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| Stay open minded |
When someone asks me the hardest part of living alone
(thinking it’s the fear of murder)- “Opening the pickle jar. I mean when you
can’t get it open, there’s no one to go to. You are just denied your pickles.
They sit there mocking you…”
When my students ask what I eat since I can’t read half the
labels: “Well, cereal mostly, and whatever I can understand. I like it you
know, it’s simple. I kept losing at “guess this cheese” and I have no mice to
feed to justify my trying again.”
When I accidentally wear red to teach the Scarlett Letter
and tell my students that red was the color assigned to “whores” and they point
out my error: “Yeah, I’m not even gonna try to claim I did that on
purpose…let’s chalk this up to 6 am shall we?”
When my student jokes about bombing his desk: “Ugh, just
wait until the next hour, I don’t want to have to do that paperwork.”
You get the point. If I got angry at every little thing
happened when would I have time for
joy? And further, if I got mad at even the
big things then how would I appreciate the little things? For those of you
considering living abroad especially take my advice- develop a dry sense of
humor. Explore sarcasm. You’ll adapt much faster, and when things happen they
won’t get to you. You’ll just walk it off and move on. I am glad that I learned
to adapt because I’m finding it is not only helping me get along great here,
but it also helps my students feel more positive. Always find the positive.
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| Sarcasm rules! |
Tonight’s song is “You’re On The Right Track” from pippin.
Because there will be days that you worry you aren’t doing things right, that
you don’t think that what you’ve left behind is enough and what’s ahead looks
daunting but you just have to stay on the right track.
Anna
