Willkommen in Polska: The Honeymoon

Our first morning in Kostrzyn, I looked out our window and smiled. We have a beautiful tree full of autumnal colors. I told Alexander I was so excited because I would actually get to have a honeymoon phase, which didn't happen in Jakarta.

View from our window

We arrived on a Thursday and started the official paperwork for Alex on the Friday, so we got to drive through the beautiful forests of the region we're now living in. On the Saturday, we were able to get things to cook on our stove with and bake in our oven with. It was fantastic to be able to cook a proper meal with a four-burner stove top. On the Sunday, we went with our boss to his family church and met a lot of his family, and on the Monday, we started work.

On the walk to work

We walked 3.5 kilometers to work and about one kilometer of the walk was through a forest. The students here are about the same as students anywhere else. As with most foreign language learners, they tend to revert to their native language. The first week I was able to teach English, German and Spanish to students from the age of  6 to 50+, so it hasn't been boring. It's been especially exciting to be able to use the languages that I studied and got my degree in.

One of the first things I noticed about Kostrzyn was the deutsch. Due to its closeness to Germany, Kostrzyn has German on so many signs and several people here kann ein bisschen deutsch, which has made things a little smoother when it comes to transitioning here.

The first week in Kostrzyn was truly awesome. It was great to breath fresh air, and be surrounded by fall colors, and hear leaves crunching under my feet and raining onto the rooftops. However, in our second week we started to deal with a lot of bureaucracy, such as registering me, a non-EU citizen, to live in Poland. All the bureaucracy meant my honeymoon phase was quickly over...but it was great when it lasted.

A trip to the other side of the world: Take two (Part 2)

Washington, D.C. was beautiful and much warmer than we had expected. After a year of 32°C (90°F), we were expecting to freeze in 22°C (72°F), but DC actually got pretty warm during the days while we were there.

Visiting DC, was actually a bit of a culture shock. As much as we love the friends we made in Jakarta, Jakarta wasn't the easiest place to live. The macet, banjir dan polusi, in Jakarta made for a love/hate relationship: I loved the people, but hated the city. So when we were walking around DC, Alexander and I made some interesting comments, such as "Wow, it's great to breath", "Look! We can walk on the sidewalk" and "Wait, where are the motorbikes?". Other people also noticed our culture shock when we were amazed at the selection in the grocery store and accidentally said terima kasih.

with Brandon

in Baltimore

Our first weekend in DC, we were visited by one of my best friends, Brandon, which was lucky, since he got to see DC before the government shutdown. We were able to stay with my grandma Annie at my brothers' Dwayne and Christopher's
apartment in DC. They have an amazing apartment with a great view. We were also able to go to Baltimore in Maryland and Gettysburg Battlefield in Pennsylvania. Our second, and last, weekend we got to see my grandparents, who live on Martha's Vineyard. My grandma Ethel is 90-years old and still kicking with the help of my grandpa Ralph. I also got to meet my brother R.J. for the first time ever, which was amazing. It was incredibly emotional and something I've dreamed of my whole life.

with RJ

After spending so much time with so much family it was hard to say goodbye, but after 13 short days, we had to say goodbye again and leave for our next destination: Poland (via Reykjavik, Copenhagen, Berlin).

Since the flights weren't as long as our original flights from Jakarta, we didn't get as tired, and generally everything went rather smoothly. We were only in Reykjavik for about an hour, and I was worried we would miss the connection (but we didn't). The Copenhagen airport was incredibly expensive. We had about 7 hours for our layover, so we bought some lunch and spent almost 50USD for two sandwiches and two drinks. It was about 9 p.m. when we got into Berlin and, luckily, our boss agreed to pick us up and take us to our new home. We got to Kostrzyn just before midnight and decided to unpack. We checked four bags at the airport and the TSA went through three of them. Apparently it's suspicious to fly from DC to Berlin with four checked bags.

Once we unpacked almost everything, we were finally able to sleep....and start to enjoy the honeymoon phase of life in Poland.