Bookends

Because I had a few extra days before school started, after arriving in Sofia last weekend I decided to make the trip out to Pleven and Lovech to visit some friends. Although it's been several months, I have to say that it felt like I had never even left. However, time had passed and there was a lot of catching up to do with people who I have come to feel very close to in the last year. There's my friend Dessy, who I hope comes to Sofia often to visit (as I've promised to do as well), my mentor teacher, who was a lifesaver in helping me move and transferring all my luggage back to Sofia this week, a family I absolutely adore that I met through a friend in Lovech, and my new counterpart in Pleven, who will be taking over my role as ETA at the Foreign Language School.

I also visited my "old" school the day before classes started to see my former colleagues (teachers have to report back to school two weeks beforehand). A lot of them were happily surprised to see me and told me that I definitely should come back and visit whenever I can. It was a lot more Bulgarian than I'm used to speaking right now, not having used it all summer, but a few words came back to me and luckily I had someone to translate if I needed it. Going back to school made me miss the routine I had back in Pleven, and the comfort of knowing my coworkers and having a friend to talk to at school. I also ran into a couple of students walking around town, and I forgot how nice it is to see familiar faces, which is something that will happen less often here. I know I'll be starting all over again at the new school, which makes me a little nervous. At least I know that I can always go back and it will still feel, in a way, like home.

This song is on my "back to school mix." I definitely listened to it a lot on my walks to school last year.